354.] [*** Hoveden, p.

422.] [**** W.Malms, lib.ii.cap.6.Anglia Sacra, vol.i.p.

212.] But those annals, so uncertain and imperfect in themselves, lose all credit when national prepossessions and animosities have place; and, on that account, the Scotch historians, who, without having any more knowledge of the matter, strenuously deny the fact, seem more worthy of belief.
Constantine, whether he owed the retaining of his crown to the moderation of Athelstan, who was unwilling to employ all his advantages against him, or to the policy of that prince who esteemed the humiliation of an enemy a greater acquisition than the subjection of a discontented and mutinous people thought the behavior of the English monarch more an object of resentment than of gratitude.

He entered into a confederacy with Anlaf, who had collected a great body of Danish pirates, whom he found hovering in the Irish seas, and with some Welsh princes, who were terrified at the growing power of Athelstan; and all these allies made by concert an irruption with a great army into England.

Athelstan, collecting his forces, met the enemy hear Brunsbury, in Northumberland, and defeated them in a general engagement.