Edric had impelled his brother Brightric to prefer an accusation of treason against Wolfnoth, governor of Sussex, the father of the famous Earl Godwin; and that nobleman, well acquainted with the malevolence as well as power of his enemy, found no means of safety Dut in deserting with twenty ships to the Danes.
[* There were two hundred and forty-three thousand six hundred hides in England.

Consequently, the ships equipped must be seven hundred and eighty-five.

The cavalry was thirty thousand four hundred and fifty men.] Brightric pursued him with a fleet of eighty sail; but his ships being shattered in a tempest, and stranded on the coast, he was suddenly attacked by Wolfnoth, and all his vessels burnt and destroyed.

The imbecility of the king was little capable of repairing this misfortune.
The treachery of Edric frustrated every plan for future defence; and the English navy, disconcerted, discouraged, and divided, was at last scattered into its several harbors.
It is almost impossible, or would be tedious, to relate particularly all the miseries to which the English were henceforth exposed.

We hear of nothing but the sacking and burning of towns; the devastation of the open country; the appearance of the enemy in every quarter of the kingdom; their cruel diligence in discovering any corner which had not been ransacked by their former violence.