attention and care often produce. Alfred was considerate, quiet, and
reflective; he improved the privileges which he enjoyed, and did not
abuse the kindness and the favors which every one by whom he was known
lavished upon him.

Alfred was very fond of the Anglo-Saxon poetry which abounded in those
days. The poems were legends, ballads, and tales, which described the
exploits of heroes, and the adventures of pilgrims and wanderers of
all kinds. These poems were to Alfred what Homer's poems were to
Alexander. He loved to listen to them, to hear them recited, and to
commit them to memory. In committing them to memory, he was obliged to
depend upon hearing the poems repeated by others, for he himself could
not read.

And yet he was now twelve years old. It may surprise the reader,
perhaps, to be thus told, after all that has been said of the
attention paid to Alfred's education, and of the progress which he had
made, that he could not even read. But reading, far from being then
considered, as it is now, an essential attainment for all, and one
which we are sure of finding possessed by all who have received any
instruction whatever, was regarded in those days a sort of technical
art, learned only by those who were to make some professional use of
the acquisition. Monks and clerks could always read, but generals,
gentlemen, and kings very seldom. And as they could not read, neither
could they write. They made a rude cross at the end of the writings
which they wished to authenticate instead of signing their names--a
mode which remains to the present day, though it has descended to the
very lowest and humblest classes of society.

In fact, even the upper classes of society could not generally learn