Page:The Chronicle of Henry of Huntingdon.djvu/70

 the anger of the Lord was moved, and He visted the corrupt race with a terrible plague, which in a short time carried off such great multitudes that those who survived scarcely sufficed to bury the dead. But not even the sight of death, nor the fear of death, were sufficient to recall the survivors from the more fatal death of the soul into which their sins had plunged them. The righteous judgment of God was therefore openly shown in his determination to destroy the sinful nation; and He stirred up against them the Scots and Picts, who were ready to avenge their former losses by still fiercer attacks. They rushed on the Britons, like wolves against lambs, driving them again into the fastnesses of the woods in which it was their custom to take refuge. There they took counsel what was to be done, and in what quarter protection was to be sought against these repeated irruptions of the northern tribes. It was agreed, therefore, by common consent, with the concurrence of their king Vortigern, that the nation of the Saxons should be invited to come to their aid from over the sea; a counsel disposed by divine Providence to the end that punishment should follow the wicked, as the issue of events sufficiently proved.