 Section 1 of Early Kings of Norway. The Icelanders, in their long winter, had a great habit of writing, and were, and still are, excellent in penmanship, says Dahlman. It is to this fact that any little history there is of the Norse kings and their old tragedies, crimes and heroisms is almost all due. The Icelanders, it seems, not only made beautiful letters on their paper or parchment, but were laudably observant and desirous of accuracy, and have left us such a collection of narratives. Sagas, literally, says, as for quantity and quality, is unexampled among rude nations. Snorrow Sturluson's history of the Norse kings is built out of these old sagas, and has in it a great deal of poetic fire, not a little faithful sagacity applied in sifting and adjusting these old sagas, and, in a word, deserves, were it once well edited, furnished with accurate maps, chronological summaries, etc., to be reckoned among the great history books of the world. It is from these sources, greatly aided by accurate, learned and unwirried Dahlman, the German professor, that the following rough notes of the early Norway kings are hastily thrown together. In histories of England, rapins accepted. Next to nothing has been shown of the many and strong threads of connection between English affairs and Norse. CHAPTER I. HART HARFAGRA Till about the year of grace, 860, there were no kings in Norway. Nothing but numerous yarls, essentially kinglets, each presiding over a kind of republican or parliamentary little territory. Generally striving each to be on some terms of human neighbourhood with those about him. But in spite of fylketings, folk things, little parish parliaments, and small combinations of these, which had gradually formed themselves, often reduced to the unhappy state of quarrel with them. Harald Harfagra was the first to put an end to this state of things, and became memorable and profitable to his country by uniting it under one head and making a kingdom of it, which it has continued to be ever since. His father, Holf Don the Black, had already begun this rough but salutary process, inspired by the cupidities and instincts, by the faculties and opportunities, which the good genius of this world, beneficent often enough under savage forms, and diligent at all times to diminish anarchy as the world's worst savagery, usually appoints in such cases. Conquest, hard fighting, followed by wise guidance of the conquered, but it was Harald the Fairhaired, his son, who conspicuously carried it on and completed it. Harald's birth year, death year, and chronology in general, are known only by inference and computation, but by the latest reckoning he died about the year 933 of our era, a man of 83. The business of Conquest lasted Harald about twelve years, AD 860 to 872, in which he subdued also the vikings of the out islands, Orkneys, Shetlands, Hebrides, and Mann. Sixty more years were given him to consolidate and regulate what he had conquered, which he did with great judgment, industry, and success. His reign altogether is counted to have been of over seventy years. The beginning of his great adventure was of a romantic character, youthful love for the beautiful Gidda, a then glorious and famous young lady of those regions, whom the young Harald aspired to marry. Gidda answered his embassy and prayer in a distant lofty manner. Her it would not be seem to wed any yarl or poor creature of that kind. Let him do as Gorm of Denmark, Eric of Sweden, Egbert of England, and others had done. Do into peace and regulation the confused contentious bits of yarls round him, and become a king. Then perhaps she might think of his proposal, till then not. Harald was struck with this proud answer, which rendered Gidda tenfold more desirable to him. He vowed to let his hair grow, never to cut or even to comb it till this feat were done, and the peerless Gidda his own. He proceeded accordingly to conquer, in fierce battle, a yarl or two every year, and at the end of twelve years, had his unkempt and almost unimaginable head of hair clipped off. Yarl Rognvald, reginald of Moor, the most valued and valuable of all his subject yarls, being promoted to this sublime barber function. After which King Harald, with head thoroughly cleaned, and hair grown or growing again to the luxuriant beauty that had no equal in his day, brought home his Gidda and made her the brightest queen in all the north. He had after her, in succession, or perhaps even simultaneously in some cases, at least six other wives, and by Gidda herself one daughter and four sons. Rognvald was not to be considered a strict living man, and he had a great deal of trouble, as we shall see, with the tumultuous ambition of his sons. But he managed his government, aided by Yarl Rognvald and others, in a large, quietly potent and successful manner, and it lasted in this royal form till his death, after sixty years of it. These were the times of Norse colonization—proud Norsemen flying into other lands, to freer scenes, to Iceland, to the Faroe Islands, which were hitherto quite vacant, tenanted only by some mournful hermit, Irish Christian Fakir or so, still more copiously to the Orkney and Shetland Isles, the Hebrides, and other countries where Norse squatters and settlers already were. Settlement of Iceland, we say, settlement of the Faroe Islands, and by far the notablest of all, settlement of Normandy by Rolf the Ganger, A.D. 876. Rolf, son of Rognvald, was lord of three little islets far north, near the fjord of Folden, called the Three Vigton Islands. But his chief means of living was that of sea robbery, which, or at least Rolf's conduct in which, Harald did not approve of. In the court of Harald, sea robbery was strictly forbidden as between Harald's own countries, but as against foreign countries it continued to be the one profession for a gentleman. Thus I read, Harald's own chief son, King Eric that afterwards was, had been at sea in such employments ever since his twelfth year. Rolf's crime, however, was that in coming home from one of these expeditions, his crew having fallen short of victual, Rolf landed with them on the shore of Norway, and in his strait drove in some cattle there, a crime by law, and proceeded to kill and eat, which, in a little while, he heard that King Harald was on foot to inquire into and punish. Thereupon Rolf the Ganger speedily got into his ships again, got to the coast of France with his sea robbers, got investment by the poor king of France in the fruitful shaggy desert, which is since called Normandy, land of the Northmen, and there, gradually felling the forests, banking the rivers, tilling the fields, became, during the next two centuries, Vilhelmus Conquistor, the man famous to England and momentous at this day, not to England alone, but to all speakers of the English tongue now spread from side to side of the world in a wonderful degree. Tonkred of Hottville and his Italian Normans, though important too in Italy, are not worth naming in comparison. This is a ferocious earth, and the grain of mustard seed will grow to miraculous extent in some cases. Harald's chief helper, councillor and lieutenant, was the above-mentioned Yarl Rognevalt of Moor, who had the honour to cut Harald's dreadful head of hair. This Rognevalt was father of Turf Einar, who first invented peat in the Orkneys, finding the wood all gone there, and is remembered to this day. Einar, being come to these islands by King Harald's permission to see what he could do in them, islands inhabited by what miscellany of Picts, Scots, Norse squatters we do not know, found the indispensable fuel all wasted. Turf Einar too may be regarded as a benefactor to his kind. He was, it appears, a bastard, and got no coddling from his father, who disliked him, partly perhaps because, he was ugly and blind of an eye, got no flattering even on his conquest of the Orkneys and invention of peat. Here is the parting speech his father made to him, on fitting him out with a longship, ship of war, dragonship, ancient seventy-four, and sending him forth to make a living for himself in the world. It were best if thou never cameest back, for I have small hope that thy people will have honour by thee, thy mother's kin throughout is slavish. Harald Harfagra had a good many sons and daughters. The daughters he married mostly to Yarls of Doomerit who were loyal to him. With the sons, as remarked above, he had a great deal of trouble. They were ambitious, stirring fellows, and grudged at their finding so little promotion from a father so kind to his Yarls. See robbery by no means an adequate career for the sons of a great king. Two of them—Halfdan Halek, long leg, and Gudrod Leome, gleam—jealous of the favours won by the great Yarl Rognvald—surrounded him in his house one night, and burnt him and sixty men to death, there. That was the end of Rognvald, the invaluable Yarl, always true to Harfagra, and distinguished in world history by producing Rolf the Ganger, author of the Norman conquest of England, and Turf Einar, who invented Pete in the Orkneys. Whether Rolf had left Norway at this time there is no chronology to tell me. As to Rolf's surname, Ganger, there are various hypotheses. The likeliest, perhaps, that Rolf was so weighty a man, no horse—small Norwegian horses, big ponies, rather—would carry him, and that he usually walked, having a mighty stride with all, and great velocity on foot. One of these murderers of Yarl Rognvald quietly set himself in Rognvald's place, the other making for Orkney, to serve Turf Einar in like fashion. Turf Einar, taken by surprise, fled to the mainland, but returned days or perhaps weeks after, ready for battle, fought with Halfdan, put his party to flight, and at next morning's light searched the island and slew all the men he found. As to Halfdan long like himself, in fierce memory of his own murdered father, Turf Einar cut an eagle on his back. That is to say, hewed the ribs from each side of the spine, and turned them out like the wings of a spread eagle. A mode of Norse vengeance fashionable at that time in extremely aggravated cases. Harald Harfagra, in the meantime, had descended upon the Rognvald scene, not in mild mood towards the new Yarl there. Indignantly dismissed said Yarl, and appointed a brother of Rognvald. Another notes Dalman, though Rognvald had left other sons. Which done, Harfagra sailed with all speed to the Orkneys, there to avenge that cutting of an eagle on the human back on Turf Einar's part. Turf Einar did not resist. Submissively met the angry Harfagra. Said he left it all, what had been done, what provocation there had been, to Harfagra's own equity and greatness of mind. Magnanimous Harfagra inflicted a fine of sixty marks in gold, which was paid in ready money by Turf Einar, and so the matter ended. CHAPTER II Eric Blood-Axe and Brothers In such violent courses, Harfagra's sons—I know not how many of them—had come to an untimely end. Only Eric, the accomplished Sea-Rover, and three others remained to him. Seeing these four sons, rather impatient for property and authority of their own, King Haralt, in his old days, tried to part his kingdom in some eligible and equitable way, and retire from the constant press of business, now becoming burdensome to him. To each of them he gave a kind of kingdom. Eric, his eldest, to be head king, and the others to be feudatory under him, and pay a certain yearly contribution, an arrangement which did not answer well at all. Head King Eric insisted on his tribute. Quarles arose as to the payment, considerable fighting and disturbance, bringing fierce destruction from King Eric upon many valiant but too stubborn Norse spirits, and among the rest upon all his three brothers, which got him, from the Norse populations, the surname of Blot-Axa, Eric Bloodaxe, his title in history. One of his brothers he had killed in battle before his old father's life ended. This brother was Bjorn, a peaceable, improving, trading economic under-king, whom the others mockingly called Bjorn the Chapman. The great-grandson of this Bjorn became extremely distinguished by and by as St. Olaf. Head King Eric seems to have had a violent wife, too. She was thought to have poisoned one of her other brothers-in-law. Eric Bloodaxe had by no means a gentle life of it in this world, trained to see robbery on the coasts of England, Scotland, Ireland, and France, since his twelfth year. Old King Fairhair, at the age of seventy, had another son, to whom was given the name of Hawcon. His mother was a slave in Fairhair's house. Slave by ill luck of war, though nobly enough born. A strange adventure connects this Hawcon with England and King Ethelstan, who was then entering upon his great career there. Short while after this Hawcon came into the world, there entered Fairhair's palace one evening as Fairhair sat feasting, an English ambassador or messenger, bearing in his hand as gift from King Ethelstan a magnificent sword, with gold hilt and other fine trimmings, to the great Harald, King of Norway. Harald took the sword, drew it, or was half-drawing it admiringly from the scabbard, when the English excellency broke into a scornful laugh. Ha-ha! Though art now the feudatory of my English king, thou hast accepted the sword from him, and art now his man. Acceptance of a sword in that manner being the symbol of investiture in those days. Harald looked a trifle flurried, it is probable, but held in his wrath, and did no damage to the tricksy Englishman. He kept the matter in his mind, however, and next summer little Hawcon, having got his weaning done, one of the prettiest, healthiest little creatures, Harald sent him off under the charge of Hawke, Hawke, so called, one of his principal warriors with order, take him to England, and instructions what to do with him there. And accordingly one evening Hawke, with thirty men escorting, strode into Ethelstan's high dwelling, where situated, how built, whether with logs like Harald's, I cannot specifically say, into Ethelstan's high presence, and silently set the wild little cherub upon Ethelstan's knee. What is this? Asked Ethelstan, looking at the little cherub. This is King Harald's son, whom a serving maid bore to him, and whom he now gives thee as foster child. Indignant Ethelstan drew his sword, as if to do the gift a mischief. But Hawke said, Thou hast taken him on thy knee, common symbol of adoption. Thou canst kill him if thou wilt, but thou dost not thereby kill all the sons of Harald. Ethelstan straight away took milder thoughts. Brought up, and carefully educated Hakon, from whom, and this singular adventure, came before very long, the first tidings of Christianity into Norway. Harald Harfagra, laterally withdrawn from all kinds of business, died at the age of eighty-three, about eighty-nine thirty-three, as is computed. The contemporary in death, with the first Danish king, gorm the old, who had done a corresponding feat in reducing Denmark under one head. Remarkable old men, these two first kings, and possessed of gifts for bringing chaos a little nearer to the form of cosmos, possessed, in fact, of loyalties to cosmos, that is to say, of authentic virtues in the savage state, such as have been needed in all societies at their incipients in this world. A kind of virtues, hugely indiscreted at present, but not unlikely to be needed again, to the astonishment of careless persons, before all is done. End of Section 1 Early Kings of Norway Preface and Chapters 1 and 2 Chapter 3 Hack on the Good Eric Bloodaxe, whose practical reign is counted to have begun about eighty-nine thirty, had by this time, or within a year or so of this time, pretty much extinguished all his brother kings, and crushed down recalcitrant spirits, in his violent way, but had naturally become entirely unpopular in Norway, and filled it with silent discontent and even rage against him. Hack on Fairhair's last son, the little foster child of Athelstan in England, who had been baptized and carefully educated, was come to his fourteenth or fifteenth year at his father's death, a very shining youth, as Athelstan saw with just pleasure. So soon as the few preliminary preparations had been settled, Hack on, furnished with a ship or two by Athelstan, suddenly appeared in Norway, got acknowledged by the peasant thing in Trondheim, the news of which flew over Norway like a fire through dried grass, says an old chronicler, so that Eric, with his queen, gun-hilled, and seven small children, had to run. No other shift for Eric. They went to the Orkneys, first of all, then to England, and he got Northumberland as earldom, I vaguely hear from Athelstan. But Eric soon died, and his queen with her children went back to the Orkneys in search of refuge or help, to little purpose there or elsewhere. From Orkney she went to Denmark, where Harold Bluetooth took her poor eldest boy as foster child, but I fear did not very faithfully keep that promise. The Danes had been robbing extensively during the late Chumultz in Norway. This, the Christian Hack on, now established there, paid in kind, and the two countries were at war, so that Gun-hilled's little boy was a welcome card in the hand of Bluetooth. Hack on proved a brilliant and successful king, regulated many things, public law, among others, ghoul-thing, law, frost-thing, law. These are little codes of his accepted, by their respective things, and had a salutary effect in their time. With prompt dexterity he drove back the Bluetooth foster-son invasions every time they came, and on the whole gained for himself the name of Hack on the Good. His Danish invasions were a frequent source of trouble to him, but his greatest and continual trouble was that of extirpating heathen idolatry from Norway, and introducing the Christian evangel in his stead. His transcendent anxiety to achieve this salutary enterprise was all along his grand difficulty in stumbling block, the heathen opposition to it being also rooted and great. Bishops and priests from England Hack on had, preaching and baptizing what they could, but making only slow progress, much too slow for Hack on zeal. On the other hand, every yule-tide, when the chief heathen were assembled in his own palace on their grand sacrificial festival, there was great pressure put upon Hack on, as to sprinkling with horse-blood, drinking yule-beer, eating horse-flesh, and the other distressing rites, the whole of which Hack on abhorred, and with all his steadfastness drove to reject utterly. Sigurd, Yarl of Lad, Trondheim, a liberal heathen, not openly a Christian, was ever a wise counsellor and conciliator in such affairs, and proved great help to Hack on. Once, for example, there having risen at a yule-feast, loud, almost stormful demand that Hack on, like a true man and brother, should drink yule-beer with them in their sacred high tide, Sigurd persuaded him to comply, for peace's sake at least inform. John took the cup in his left hand, excellent hot beer, and with his right cut the sign of the cross above it, then drank a draught. Yes, but what is this with the king's right hand? cried the company. Don't you see, answered shifty Sigurd, he makes the sign of Thor's hammer before drinking, which quenched the matter for the time. Horse-flesh, horse-broth, and the horse-ingredient generally Hack on all but inexorably declined. By Sigurd's pressing exhortation and entreaty he did once take a kettle of horse-broth by the handle, with a good deal of linen quilt or towel interposed, and did open his lips for what of steam could insinuate itself. At another time he consented to a particle of horse-liver, intending, privately, I guess, to keep it outside the gullet, and smuggle it away without swallowing, but farther than this not even Sigurd could persuade him to go. At the things held in regard to this matter Hack on's success was always incomplete. Now and then it was a plain failure, and Hack on had to draw back till a better time. Here is one specimen of the response he got on such an occasion, curious specimen with all of antique parliamentary eloquence from an anti-Christian thing. At a thing of all the filks of Trondheim, thing held at frost in that region, King Hack on, with all the eloquence he had, signified that it was imperatively necessary that all bonders and sub-bonders should become Christians, and believe in one God, Christ the Son of Mary, renouncing entirely blood sacrifices and heathen idols, should keep every seventh day holy, abstain from labour that day, and even from food, devoting the day to fasting and sacred meditation. Whereupon, by way of universal answer, arose a confused universal murmur of entire descent. Take away from us our old belief, and also our time for labour, day, and angry astonishment. How can even the land be got tilled in that way? We cannot work if we don't get food, said the hand-labourrs and slaves. It lies in King Hack on's blood, remarked others. His father and all his kindred were apt to be stingy about food, though liberal enough with money. At length, one Osbjorn, or Bear of the Osson, or God's, what we now call Osborn, one Osbjorn, of metal hues and gullethal, stepped forward, and said in a distinct manner, We bonders, peasant proprietors, thought King Hack on, when thou heldest thy first thing-day here in Trondheim, and we took thee for our king, and received our hereditary lands from thee again, that we had got heaven itself. But now we know not how it is, whether we have one freedom, or whether thou intendest anew to make us slaves, with this wonderful proposal that we should renounce our faith, which our fathers before us have held, and all our ancestors as well, first in the age of burial by burning, and now in that of earth burial, and yet these departed ones were much our superiors, and their faith, too, has brought prosperity to us. Thee at the same time we have loved so much that we raise thee to manage all the laws of the land, and speak as their voice to us all. And even now it is our will and the vote of all bonders to keep that paction, which thou gave us here on the thing at Frost, and to maintain thee as King, so long as any of us bonders who are here upon the thing has life left, provided thou, King, wilt go fairly to work, and demand of us only such things as are not impossible. But if thou wilt fix upon this thing with so great obstinacy, and employ force and power, in that case we bonders have taken the resolution, all of us, to fall away from thee, and to take for ourselves another head, who will so behave that we may enjoy in freedom the belief which is agreeable to us. Now shout thou, King, choose one of these two courses before the thing disperse. Whereupon, as the chronicle, all of bonders raised a mighty shout, yes, we will have it so, as has been said, so that Yarl Sigurd had to intervene, and King Hakkon to choose for the moment the milder branch of the alternative. Yet other things Hakkon was more or less successful. All his days, by such methods as there were, he kept pressing forward with this great enterprise, and on the whole did thoroughly shake us under the old edifice of heathendom, and fairly introduce some foundation for the new and better rule of law and life among his people. Sigurd, Yarl of Lad, his wise counselor in all these matters, is also a man worthy of notice. King Hakkon's arrangements against the continual invasions of Eric's sons with Danish Bluetooth backing them were manifold, and for a long time successful. He appointed, after consultation and consent in the various things, so many warships, fully manned and ready, to be furnished instantly on the King's demand by each province or fjord. Watchfires, on fit places, from hill to hill, all along the coast, were to be carefully set up, carefully maintained in readiness, and kindled on any alarm of war. By such methods Bluetooth and Company's invasions were for a long while triumphantly, and even rapidly, one and all of them beaten back, till at length they seemed as if intending to cease altogether, and leave Hakkon alone of them. But such was not their issue after all. The sons of Eric had only abated under constant discouragement, had not finally left off from what seemed their one great feasibility in life. Gunn Hild, their mother, was still with them, a most contriving, fierce-minded, irreconcilable woman, diligent and urgent on them, in season and out of season, and as for King Bluetooth, he was at all times ready to help, with his goodwill at least. That of the alarm fires on Hakkon's part was found troublesome by his people. Sometimes it was even hurtful and provoking, lighting your alarm fires and rousing the whole coast and population when it was nothing but some paltry viking with a couple of ships. In short, the alarm signal system fell into disuse, and Good King Hakkon himself, in the first place, paid the penalty. It is counted by the latest commentators to have been about AD 961, sixteenth or seventeenth year of Hakkon's pious, valiant and worthy reign. Being at a feast one day, with many guests on the island of stored, sudden announcement came to him that ships from the south were approaching in quantity, and evidently ships of war. This was the biggest of all the Bluetooth foster-son invasions, and it was fatal to Hakkon the good that night. Ivan, the scaldest pillar, annihilator of all other scalds, in his famed Hakkon's song, gives account, and still more pertinently, the always-practical snoro. Danes in great multitude, six to one, as people afterwards computed, springing swiftly to land and ranking themselves, Hakkon nevertheless at once deciding not to take his ships and run, but to fight there, one to six, fighting accordingly in his most splendid manner, and at last gloriously prevailing. Routing and scattering back to their ships and flight homeward those six to one Danes. During the struggle of the fight, says snoro, he was very conspicuous among other men, and while the sun shone, his bright gilded helmet glanced, and thereby many weapons were directed at him. One of his henchmen, Ivan Finsen, i.e. scaldest pillar, the poet, took a hat and put it over the king's helmet. Now among the hostile first leaders were two uncles of the Eriksons, brothers of Gunnhild, great champions both, Skreya, the elder of them, on the disappearance of the glittering helmet, shouted boastfully, Does the king of the Norsemen hide himself then, or has he fled? Where now is the golden helmet? And so saying, Skreya, and his brother Alph with him, pushed on like fools or madmen. The king said, Come on in that way, and ye shall find the king of the Norsemen. And in a short space of time braggart Skreya did come up, swinging his sword, and made a cut at the king, but Thorolff the strong, and Icelander, who fought at the king's side, dashed his shield so hard against Skreya that he tottered with the shock. On the same instant the king takes his sword Kernbiter, able to cut Kerns or Milestones with both hands, and hues Skreya through Helm and Head, cleaving him down to the shoulders. Thorolff also slew Alph. That was what they got by such overhasty search for the king of the Norsemen. Snoro considers the fall of these two champion uncles as the crisis of the fight, the Danish force being much disheartened by such a sight, and King Hakka now pressing on so hard that men gave way before him. The battle on the Ericsson part became a whirl of recoil, and in a few minutes more a torrent of mere flight and haste to get on board their ships, and put to sea again, in which operation many of them were drowned, says Snoro, survivors making instant sail for Denmark in that sad condition. This seems to have been King Hakka's finest battle, and the most conspicuous of his victories do not allittle to his own grand qualities shown on the occasion. But alas it was his last also. He was still zealously directing the chase of that mad Danish flight, or whirl of recoil toward their ships, when an arrow, shot most likely at a venture, hit him under the left armpit, and this proved his death. He was helped into his ship, and made sail for Ericsstad, where his chief residence in those parts was, but had to stop at a smaller place of his, which had been his mother's, and where he himself was born, a place called Hella, the Flat Rock, still known as Hakkaan's Hella, faint from loss of blood, and crushed down as he had never before felt. Having no son and only one daughter, he appointed these invasions of Erick to be sent for, and if he died to become king, but to spare his friends and kindred. If a longer life be granted me, he said, I will go out of this land to Christian men, and do penance for what I have committed against God. But if I die in the country of the heathen, let me have such burial as you yourselves think fittest. These are his last recorded words, and in heathen fashion he was buried, and besung by Ivan and the Scalds, though himself a zealously Christian king. Hakkaan the good, so one still finds him worthy of being called. The sorrow on Hakkaan's death, Snorro tells us, was so great and universal, that he was lamented both by friends and enemies, and they said that never again would Norway see such a king. CHAPTER IV World Gray Fell and Brothers Erick's sons, four or five of them, with a herald at the top, now once got Norway in hand, all of it but Trondheim, as king and under-kings, and made a severe time of it for those who had been or seemed to be their enemies. Excellent Jarl Sigurd, always so useful to Hakkaan and his country, was killed by them, and they came to repent that before very long. The slain Sigurd left a son, Hakkaan, as Jarl, who became famous in the northern world by and by. This Hakkaan and him only would the Trondheimers accept a sovereign. Death to him, then, said the sons of Erick, but only in secret, till they had got their hands free and were ready, which was not yet for some years. Nay, Hakkaan, when actually attacked, made good resistance, and threatened to cause trouble. Nor did he by any means get his death from these sons of Erick at this time, or till long afterwards at all, from one of their kin as it chanced. On the contrary, he fled to Denmark now, and by and by managed to come back to their cost. Among their other chief victims were two cousins of their own, Trigve and Gudrod, who had been honest under-kings to the late head-king, Hakkaan the Good, but were now become suspect, and had to fight for their lives and lose them in tragic manner. Trigve had a son, whom we shall hear of. Gudrod, son of worthy Bjorn the Chapman, was grandfather of St. Olaf, whom all men have heard of, who has a church in south work even, and another in Old Jewry to this hour. In all these violences, Gunn Hild, widow of the late King Erick, was understood to have a principal hand. She had come back to Norway with her sons, and naturally passed for the secret advisor and maternal president in whatever a violence went on. Always reckoned to fell, vehement, relentless personage where her own interests were concerned. Unfortunately as things settled, her influence on affairs grew less. At least one hoped so, and in the sagas here's less and less of her, and before long nothing. Harold, the head-king in this eric fraternity, does not seem to have been a bad man. The contrary, indeed, but his position was untoldly, full of difficulty and contradictions. Whatever Harold could accomplish for behoove of Christianity, or real benefit to Norway, in these cross-circumstances, he seems to have done in a modest and honest manner. He got the name of Grayfell from his people on a very trivial account, but seemingly with perfect good humour on their part. Some Iceland trader had brought a cargo of furs to Trondheim, Lod, for sale. Sale being slacker than the Icelander wished, he presented a chosen specimen, cloak, doublet, or whatever it was, to Harold, who wore it with acceptance in public, and rapidly brought disposal of the Icelander's sdok, and the surname of Grayfell to himself. His under-kings and he were certainly not popular, though I almost think Grayfell himself, in absence of his mother and the under-kings, might have been so. But here they all were, and had wrought great trouble in Norway. Too many of them, said everybody, too many of these courts and court-people, eating up any substance that there is. For the seasons withal, two or three of them in succession were bad for grass, much more for grain, no herring came either. Very cleanness of teeth was likely to come in Ivan Skaldespiller's opinion. This scarcity became at last their share of the great famine of eighty-nine seventy-five, which desolated western Europe. See the poem in the Saxon Chronicle. And all this, by Ivan Skaldespiller, and the heathen Norse in general, was ascribed to anger of the heathen gods. Discontent in Norway, and especially in Ivan Skaldespiller, seemed him in very great. Whereupon Exile Hakkan, Yarl-sigard's son, besters himself in Denmark, backed by old King Bluetooth, and begins invading and encroaching in a miscellaneous way, especially intriguing and contriving plots all round him. An unfathomably cunning kind of fellow, as well as an audacious and strong-handed, intriguing in Trondheim, where he gets the under-King, Greyfell's brother, fallen upon and murdered, intriguing with Gold Harald, a distinguished cousin or nephew of King Bluetooth, who had done fine viking work, and gained such wealth that he got the epithet of Gold, and who now was infinitely desirous of a Sharon Bluetooth's kingdom as the proper finish to these sea rovings. He even ventured one day to make publicly a distinct proposal, that way to King Harold Bluetooth himself, who flew into thunder and lightning at the mere mention of it, so that none dares to speak to him for several days afterwards. Of both these, Harold's Hakkan was confidential friend, and needed all his skill to walk without immediate annihilation between such a pair of dragons, and work out Norway for himself with all. In the end he found he must take solidly to Bluetooth's side of the question, and that they too must provide a recipe for Gold, Harold, and Norway both at once. It is as much as your life is worth to speak again of sharing this Danish kingdom, said Hakkan, very privately to Gold, Harold, but could not you, my golden friend, be content with Norway for a kingdom, if one helped you to it? That could I well, answered Harold. And keep me these nine warships you have just been rigging for a new Viking cruise. Have these in readiness when I lift my finger. That was the recipe contrived for Gold, Harold. Recipe for King Graefel goes into the same vial, and is also ready. Hitherto the Hakkan Bluetooth disturbances in Norway had amounted to but little. King Graefel, a very active and valiant man, has constantly, without much difficulty, repelled these sporadic bits of troubles. But Graefel, all the same, would willingly have peace with dangerous old Bluetooth, ever anxious to get his clutches over Norway on any terms, if peace with him could be had. Bluetooth, too, professes every willingness, invagals Graefel, he and Hakkan do, to have a friendly meeting on the Danish borders, and not only settle all these quarrels, but generously settle Graefel in certain fives which he claimed in Denmark itself, and so swear everlasting friendship. While joyfully complies, punctually appears at the appointed day in Lymphard Sound the appointed place, whereupon Hakkan gives signal to Gold, Harold, to Lymphjord with these nine ships of yours swift. Gold, Harold flies to Lymphjord with his ships, challenges King Harold Graefel to land and fight, which the undaunted Graefel, though so far outnumbered, does, and fighting his very best, perishes there, he and almost all his people. Which done, Jarl Hakkan, who is in readiness, attacks Gold, Harold, the victorious but the wearied, easily beats Gold, Harold, takes him prisoner, and instantly hangs and ends him, to the huge joy of King Bluetooth and Hakkan, who now make instant voyage to Norway, drive all the brother under-kings into rapid flight to the Orkneys, to any readyist shelter, and so, under the patronage of Bluetooth, Hakkan, with the title of Jarl, becomes ruler of Norway. This foul treachery done, on the brave and honest Harold Graefel, is by some dated about A.D. 969, by Munch, 965, by others computing out of Snorough only, 975. For there is always an uncertainty in these Icelandic dates, say rather, rare and rude attempts at dating, without even an A.D. or other fixed year one to go upon in Iceland, though seldom, I think, so large a discrepancy is here. End of Section 2, Early Kings of Norway, Chapters 3 and 4. Section 3 of Early Kings of Norway. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Christine. Early Kings of Norway by Thomas Carlisle. Early Kings of Norway, Chapter 5 and 6. Chapter 5. Harkon Jarl. Harkon Jarl, such a style he took, had engaged to pay some kind of tribute to King Bluetooth, if he could, but he never did pay any, pleading always the necessity of his own affairs, with which excuse joined to Harkon's readiness in things less important. King Bluetooth managed to contend himself, Harkon being always his good neighbor, at least, and the two mutually dependent. In Norway, Harkon, without the title of King, did in a strong hunted, steadfast and at length successful way, the office of one, governed Norway some count for about twenty years, and both at home and abroad, had much consideration through most of that time, especially amongst the heathen autodox, for Harkon Jarl himself was a zealous heathen, fixed in his mind against these numerical Christian innovations and unsolutory changes of creed, and would have gladly trampled out all traces of what the last two kings, for Grafell also was an English Christian after his sword, had done in this respect. But he wisely discerned that it was not possible, and that, for peace's sake, he must not even attempt it, but must strike preferably into perfect toleration, and that of everyone getting to heaven or even to the other goal in his own way. He himself, it is well known, repaired many heathen temples, a great church builder in his way, manufactured many splendid idols, with much gilding and such artistic ornament as there was, in particular one huge image of Thor, not forgetting the hammer and appendages, and such a color, supposed of solid gold, which it was not quite, as we shall hear in time, round the neck of him as was never seen in all the Norse. How did he his own jewel festivals, with what magnificent solemnity, the horse-eatings, blood-sprinklings, and other sacred rites, need not be told? Seeing of a ritualist, one may perceive, perhaps had Scandinavian pusasms in him, and other desperate heathen notions. He was universally believed to have gone into magic, for one thing, and to have dangerous potencies derived from the devil himself. The dark heathen mind of him struggling vehemently in that strange element, not altogether so unlike our own in some points. For the rest, he was evidently, in practical matters, a man of sharp clear insight, of steadfast resolution, diligence, promptitude, and managed his secular matters uncommonly well. Had sixteen jewels under him, though himself only haken jewel by title, and got obedience from them stricter than any king since Harfager had done. Add to which that the country had years excellent for grass and crop, and that the herrings came in extuberance, tokens to the thinking mind that haken jewel was a favorite of heaven. His fight with the far-famed Jomsvikings was his grandest exploit in public rumour. Jomsburg, a locality not known known, except that it was near the mouth of the river Odder, denoted in those ages the impregnable castle of a certain hotly corporate, or sterobory association limited, which for some generations held the Baltic in terror and plundered far beyond the belt. In the ocean itself, in Flanders, and the opulent trading heavens there, above all in opulent anarchic England, which for forty years from about this time was the Pirates Gossen, and yielded regularly every summer slaves, Danagout, and Miss Selener's plunder, like no other country Jomsburg or the wicking world had ever known. Palnatok, Bue, and the other quasi-heroic heads of this establishment are still remembered in the northern parts. Palnatok is the title of a tragedy by Olin Schlager, which had its run of immortality in Copenhagen some sixty or seventy years ago. I judge the institution to have been in its flowery state, probably now in Harkonjarl's time. Harkonjarl and these pirates robbing Harkon's subjects and merchants that frequented him were naturally in quarrel, and frequent fighting had fallen out, not generally to the profit of the Jomsburgers, who at least determined on revenge and the rooting out of this obstructive Harkonjarl. They assembled in force at the Cape of Stout in the Ferdofilk, and the fight was dreadful in the extreme, noise of it filling all the north for long afterwards. Harkonj, fighting like a lion, could scarcely hold his own. Death or victory, the world on both sides went suddenly, the heavens grew black, and there broke out a terrific storm of thunder and hail appalling to the human mind. Universe swelled holy in black night. Only the momentary forked blazes, the thunder pealing as of Ragnarok, and the battering hailed torrents, hailstones about the size of an egg, tore with his hammer evidently acting, but in a behalf of whom. The Jomsburgers in the hideous darkness, broken only by flashing thunderbolts, had a dismal apprehension that it was probably not on their behalf, for having a sense of justice in him, and before the storm ended, thirty-five of their seventy ships sheared away, leaving gallant Bu, with the other thirty-five, to follow as they liked, who reproachfully hailed these fugitives, and continued the no-hopeless battle. Bu's nose and lips were smashed or cut away. Bu managed half articulately to exclaim, Ha! the maids of Funen will never kiss me more. Overboard all ye boys' men, and taking his two sea-chests, with all the gold he had gained in such life-struggle, from of old, sprang overboard accordingly, and finished the affair. How come Charles renown rose, naturally to the transcendent pitch after this exploit? His people, as opposed chiefly the Christian part of them, whispered one to another with a shudder, that in the blackest of the centerstorm he had taken his youngest little boy, and made away with him, sacrificed him to tour, or some devil, and gained his victory by art-magic, or something worse. Charles Eric hackens eldest son, without suspicion of art-magic, but already a distinguished viking, became thrice distinguished by his style of sea-fighting in this battle, and awakened great expectations in the viking public, of him we shall hear again. The Joesburgers one might fancy, after the sad clap went visibly down in the world, but the fact is not altogether so. Old King Bluetooth was now dead, died of a wound caught in battle with his unnatural, so-called natural son and successor, Otto Swain of the Forked Beard, afterwards king and conqueror of England for a little while. And seldom, perhaps never, had viking isn't been in such flower as now. This man's name is Sven in Swedish, Sven in German, and means boy or lad, the English Swain. It was at odd, Father Bluetooth's funeral ale, drunken bureau feast, that Swain, corrosing with his Jomsburg chiefs and other choice spirits, generally of the robber class, all risen into height of highest robber enthusiasm, pledged a vow to one another, Swain that he would conquer England, which in a sense he, after a long struggling did, and the Jomsburgers that they would ruin and root out Huck and Jarl, which, as we have just seen, they could by no means do. And other guests, other foolish saints, which proved equally infeasible. Zero were volunteers, so especially abounding in that time, one perceives how easily the Jomsburgers could recruit themselves, build or affect new robber fleets, man them with the pick of crews, and steer for opulent fruitful England, where, under Etelbert the Unready, was such a field for profitable enterprise as the viking public never had before or since. An idle question sometimes rises on me, idle enough, for it never can be answered in the affirmative or the negative. Whether it was not these same refitted Jomsburgers, who appeared some while after this, at Redhead Point, on the shore of Angus, and sustained a new severe beating, in what the scotch still faintly remember, as their battle of Lonkertie, beyond doubt a powerful north pirate armament dropped anchor at the Redhead, to the alarm of peaceable mortals, about that time. It was sought and hoped to be on its way for England, but it visibly hung on for several days, deliberating, as was sought, whether they would do this poor coast the honor to land on it before going farther. Did land, and vigorously plunder and burn south westward as far as Perth, laid siege to Perth, but brought out King Kenneth on them, and produced that battle of Lonkertie, which still dwells in vague memory among the Scots. Perhaps it might be the Jomsburgers, perhaps also not, for there were many pirate associations, lasting not from century to century like the Jomsburgers, but only for very limited periods, or from year to year indeed. It was mainly by such that this blended thief harvest of England was reaped in this disastrous time. No Scottish chronicle gives the least of exact date to their famed victory of Lonkertie, only that it was achieved by Kenneth III, which will mean some time between AD 975 and 994, and by the orders they put it in, probably soon after 975, or the beginning of this Kenneth's reign. Buchanan's narrative, carefully distilled from all the ancient Scottish sources, is of admirable quality for style, and otherwise quiet brief, with perfect clearness, perfect credibility even, except that semi-miraculous appendage of the ploughman, hay and suns, always hanging to the tail of it, the grain of possible truth in which can now never be extracted by man's art. In brief, what we know is fragments of ancient human bones and armor have occasionally bluffed up in this locality. Proof positive of ancient fighting here, and the fight fell out not long after Harkon's beating of the Jomsburgers at the Cape of Stout. And in such dim glimmer of wavering twilight, the question whether these of Lonkertie, were refitted Jomsburgers or not, must be left hanging. Lonkertie is now the biggest bleachfield in Queen Victoria's dominions. No village or hamlet there, only the huge bleaching house and a beautiful field, some six or seven miles north-west of Perth, bordered by the beautiful Tay River on the one side, and by its beautiful tributary almond on the other. A Lonkertie fitted either for bleaching linen, or for a bit of fair duel between nations in those simple times. Whether our refitted Jomsburgers had the least thing to do with it is only matter of fancy, but if it were, they who here again got a good beating. Fancy would be glad to find herself faked. The old, prioritical kings of Denmark had been at the founding of Jomsburg, and to swain of the Forketbjord it was still vitally important, but not so to the great Knott, or any kings that followed, all of whom had better business than mere thieving, and it was Magnus the good of Norway, a man of still higher anti-anarchic qualities, that annihilated it about a century later. Hock and Jarl, his chief labors in the world being over, is said to have become very disolute into his elderly days, especially in the matter of women. The wretched old fool led away by idleness and fullness of bread, which to all of us are well said to be the parents of mischief. Having absolute power he got into the habit of openly plundering men's pretty daughters and wives from them, and, after a few weeks, sending them back, greatly to the rage of the fierce north heart, had there been any means of resisting or avenging. It did, after a little while, prove the ruin and destruction of Hock and the rich, as he was then called. It opened the door, namely, for entry of Olof Trigveson upon the scene, a very much grander man, in regard to whom the wiles and traps of Hocken proved to be a recipe, not on Trigveson, but on the wily Hocken himself, as shall now be seen straight away. Hocken in late times had heard of a famous steering person, victorious in various lands and seas, lattery united in Cirobury, with Swain, Prince Royal of Denmark, after once King Swain of the Doublebeard, or Forkbeard, both of whom had already done transcendent feats in the Viking way during his co-partnery. The fame of Swain and the steering personage, whose name was all, and recently, their stupendous feats in Plunder of England, Siege of London, and other wonders and splendours of Viking glory and success, had gone all over the North, awakening the attention of Hocken and everybody there. The name of all was enigmatic, mysterious, and even dangerous looking to Hocken Jarl, who at length sent out a confidential spy to investigate this all, a feat which the confidential spy did completely accomplish by no means to Hocken's prophet. The mysterious all proved to be no others than Olaf, son of Trigve, destined to blow Hocken Jarl suddenly into destruction, and become famous among the heroes of the North World. Of Olaf Trigve's son, one always hopes there might, one day, some real outline of a biography be written, fished from the Abysses where, as usual, it welters deep in full neighborhood for the present. Farther on we intend a few words more upon the matter, but in this place all that concerns us, in it limits itself to the two following facts, first, that Hocken's confidential spy found all in Dublin, picked acquaintance with him, got him to confess that he was actually Olaf, son of Trigve, the Trigve whom blood acts the fierce widow and her sons had murdered, got him gradually to own that perhaps an expedition into Norway might have its chances, and finally that, under such a wise and loyal guidance as his, the confidential spies, whose friendship for Trigve's son was so indubitable, he, Trigve's son, would actually try it upon Hocken Jarl, the disloyal old scoundrel. Fact second is, that about the time they too set sail from Dublin on their Norway expedition, Hocken Jarl removed to Trondheim, then called Laid, intending to pass some months there. Now just about the time when Trigve's son, spy and party, had landed in Norway and were advancing upon Laid, with what support from the public could be got, disloyal old Hocken Jarl had heard of one Gudrun, a bondor's wife, unparalleled in beauty, who was called in those parts Sunbeam of the Grove, so inexpressably lovely, and thened off a couple of thralls to bring her to him. Never answered Gudrun, never her indignant husband, in a tone dangerous and displeasing to these court thralls, who had to leave rapidly, but threatened to return in better strength before long, whereupon instantly the indignant bondor and his Sunbeam of the Grove sent out their war arrow, rousing all the country into angry promptitude, and more than one perhaps into greedy hope of revenge for their own injuries. The rest of Hocken's history now rushes on with extreme rapidity. Sunbeam of the Grove, when next demanded of her bondor, has the whole neighborhood assembled in arms around her. Rumor of Trigve's son is fast making it the whole country. Hocken's insolent messengers are cut in pieces. Hocken finds he cannot fly under cover too soon. With a single slave he flies the same night, but witherward. Can't think of no safe place, except some old mistress of his, who lives retired in that neighborhood, and has some pity or regard for the wicked old Hocken. Old mistress does receive him, pities him, will do all she can to protect and hide him. But how? By what uttermost stretch of female artifice hide him here? Everyone will search here first of all. Old mistress, by the slave's help, extemporizes a cellar under the floor of her pig house. Sticks Hocken and slave into that, as the one saves seclusion she can contrive. Hocken and slave, be granted by the pigs above them, tortured by the devils within and about them, past two days in circumstances more and more horrible. For they heard, through their light slit and breathing slit, the triumph of Trigveson proclaiming itself by Trigveson's own lips, who had mounted a big boulder nearby, and was victoriously speaking to the people, winding up with a promise of honors and rewards to whoever should bring him big to old Hocken's head. Wretched Hocken, justly suspecting his slave, tried to at least keep himself awake. Slave did keep himself awake, till Hocken dosed or slept, then swiftly cut off Hocken's head, and plunged out with it to the presence of Trigveson. Trigveson, detesting the traitor, useful as the treachery was, cut off the slave's head too, had it hung up along with Hocken's on the pinnacle of the laid gallows, where the populace pelted both heads with stones and many curses, especially the more important of the two. Hocken the bad ever henceforth, instead of Hocken the rich. This was the end of Hocken Jarl, the last support of hisenary in Norway. Among other characteristics he had, a strong-handed, hard-headed, very relentless, greedy and wicked being. He is reckoned to have ruled in Norway, or mainly ruled, either in the struggling or triumphant state, for about 30 years, 965 till 995. He and his seem to have formed, by chance rather than design, the chief opposition with the hard-fucked posterity throughout its whole course experienced in Norway, such the cost to them of killing good Jarl Sigurd in Greifel's time. For curses like chickens do sometimes visibly come home to feed, as they always, either visibly or else invisibly, are punctually sure to do. Hocken Jarl is considerably connected with the farrier saga, often mentioned there, and comes out perfectly in character, and are together worldly wise men of the roughest type, not without a turn for practicality of kindness to those who would really be of use to him. His tendencies to magic also are not forgotten. Hocken left two sons, Eric and Spain, often also mentioned in this saga. On their father's test they fled to Sweden, to Denmark, and very busy steering up troubles in those countries against all of Trigvason. Tilt length, by a favorable combination, under their auspices chiefly, they got his brief and noble reign put an end to. Nay, furthermore, Jarl Eric left sons, especially an elder son, named also Eric, who proved a sore affliction and a continual stone of stumbling to a new generation of half-huggers, and so continued the course of Sigurd's murder upon them. Towards the end of this Hocken train it was that the discovery of America took place, 985. Actual discovery it appears, by Eric Zered and Icelander, concerning which there has been abundant investigation and discussion in our time. Ginungagab, roaring abyss, is thought to be miles of bearing straight in Baffins Bay. Big hello land, the coast of Cape Valsingham, to near Newfoundland. Little hello land, Newfoundland itself. Markland was lower Canada, New Brunswick, and North Cotcia. Southward lands to cheesepeak, bay was called Vineland, wild grapes still grow in Rhode Island and more luxuriously farther south. Whitemans land, called also Great Ireland, is supposed to mean the two Carolinas down to the southern Cape of Florida. In Dalman's opinion the Irish themselves might even pretend to have probably been the first discoverers of America. They had evidently got to Iceland itself before the North Exiles found it out. It appears to be certain that, from the end of the 10th century to the early part of the 14th, there was a dim knowledge of those distant shores extend in the North mind, and even some struggling series of visits thither by rowing Norsemen. Though, as only danger difficulty and no profit resulted, the visit ceased, and the whole matter sank into oblivion. And, but for the Icelandic talent of writing in the long winter nights, would never have been heard of by posterity at all. End of Section 3 of Early Kings of Norway. CHAPTER VII RAYN OF OLOFTRIGVISON Olaf Trigvison, A.D. 995-1000, also makes a great figure in the Föhr saga, and recounts there his early troubles which were strange and many. He is still reckoned a grand hero of the North, though his vates now is only Snorro Sturluson of Iceland. Trigvison had indeed many adventures in the world. His poor mother, Astrid, was obliged to fly on murder of her husband by Gunn Hild, to fly for her life three months before he, her little Olaf, was born. She lay concealed in Reedy Islands, fled through trackless forests, reached her fathers with the little baby in her arms, and lay deep hidden there, tended only by her father himself. Gunn Hild's pursuit being so incessant and keen as with sleuth-hounds. Poor Astrid had to fly again, deviously to Sweden, to Estland, Estonia, to Russia. In Estland she was sold as a slave, quite parted from her boy, who also was sold and again sold, but did at last fall in with a kinsman high in the Russian service, did from him find redemption and help, and so rose in a distinguished manner to manhood, victorious self-help and recovery of his kingdom at last. He even met his mother again, he as king of Norway, she as one wonderfully lifted out of darkness into new life and happiness still in store. Grown to manhood, Trigvison, now become acquainted with his birth, and with his, alas, hopeless claims, left Russia for the one profession opened him, that of sea-robbery, and did feats without number in that questionable line in many seas and scenes, in England latterly and most conspicuously of all. In one of his courses thither, after long labours in the Hebrides, Mann, Wales, and down the western shores to the very land's end and farther, he paused at the silly islands for a little while. He was told of a wonderful Christian hermit living strangely in these sea solitudes, had the curiosity to seek him out, examine, question, and discourse with him, and after some reflection accepted Christian baptism from the venerable man. In Snorro the story is involved in miracle, rumour, and fable, but the fact itself seems certain, and is very interesting. The great, wild, noble soul of Fierce Olaf opening to this wonderful gospel of tidings from beyond the world, tidings which infinitely transcended all else he had ever heard or dreamt of. It seems certain he was baptized here, date not fixable, shortly before poor heartbroken Dunstan's death, or shortly after. Most English churches, monasteries especially lying burnt under continual visitation of the Danes. Olaf, such baptism notwithstanding, did not quit his Viking profession. Indeed, what other was there for him in the world as yet? We mentioned his occasional co-partneries with Sphin of the Double Beard now become King of Denmark, but the greatest of these, and the alone interesting at this time, is their joint invasion of England, and Trigvison's exploits and fortunes there some years after that adventure of baptism in the Silly Isles. Sphin and he were above a year in England together. This time they steered up the Thames with three hundred ships and many fighters. Siege, or at least furious assault of London, was their first or main enterprise, but it did not succeed. The Saxon Chronicles gives date to it, A.D. 994, and names expressly as Sphin's co-partner, Ulius King of Norway, which he was as yet far from being, but in regard to the year of grace the Saxon Chronicle is held to be indisputable, and indeed has the field to itself in this matter. Famed Olaf Trigvison, seen visibly at the Siege of London, year 994, it throws a kind of momentary light to us over all that disastrous whirlpool of miseries and confusions, all dark and painful to the fancy otherwise. This big voyage and furious Siege of London is Sphin Double Beard's first real attempt to fulfill that vow of his at Father Bluetooth's funeral ale and conquer England, which it is a pity he could not yet do. Had London now fallen to him it is pretty evident all England must have followed, and poor England, with Sphin as King over it, been delivered from immeasurable woes, which had to last some two and twenty years farther before this result could be arrived at. But finding London impregnable for the moment, no ship being able to get a thwart the bridge, and many Danes perishing in the attempt to do it by swimming, Sphin and Olaf turned to other enterprises, all England in a manner lying open to them, turn which way they liked. They burnt and plundered over Kent, over Hampshire, Sussex. They stormed far and wide, world lying all before them where to choose. Wretched Ethelred, as the one invention he could fall upon, offered them Dengelt, sixteen thousand pounds of silver this year, but it rose in other years as high as forty-eight thousand pounds. The desperate Ethelred, a clear method of quenching fire by pouring oil on it. Sphin and Olaf accepted, withdrew to Southampton, Olaf at least did, till the money was got ready. Strange to think of it, fierce Sphin of the double beard and conquest of England by himself, this had at last become the one salutary result which remained for that distracted, downtrodden, now utterly chaotic and anarchic country. A conquering Sphin, followed by an ably and earnestly administrative, as well as conquering Canute, whom Dalman compares to Charlemagne, were thus by the mysterious destinies appointed the effective saviours of England. Trigveson, on this occasion, was a good while at Southampton, and roamed extensively about, easily victorious over everything, if resistance were attempted, but finding little or none, and acting now in a peaceable or even friendly capacity. In the Southampton country he came in contact with the then Bishop of Winchester, afterwards Archbishop of Canterbury, excellent Elfagus, still dimly decipherable to us as a man of great natural discernment, piety, and inborn veracity, a hero soul, probably a real brotherhood with Olaf's own. He even made court visits to King Ethelred, one visit to him at Andover of a very serious nature. By Elfagus, as we can discover, he was introduced into the real depths of the Christian faith. Elfagus, with due solemnity of apparatus, in presence of the King at Andover, baptized Olaf anew, and to him Olaf engaged that he would never plunder in England any more, which promise, too, he kept. In fact, not long after, Spain's conquest of England being in an evidently forward state, Trigveson, having made with all a great English or Irish marriage, a dowager princess who had voluntarily fallen in love with him, see Snorro for this fine romantic fact, mainly resided in our island for two or three years, or else in Dublin, in the precincts of the Danish court there in the Sister Isle. Accordingly it was in Dublin, as above noted, that Hakon's spy found him, and from the Liffey that his squadron sailed, through the Hebrides, through the Orkneys, plundering and baptizing in their strange way, towards such success as we have seen. Trigveson made a stout, and in effect, victorious and glorious struggle for himself as king. Daily and hourly vigilant to do so, often enough by soft and even merry methods, for he was a witty, jocund man, and had a fine, ringing laugh in him, and clear, pregnant words ever ready, or if soft methods would not serve, then by hard and even hardest he put down a great deal of miscellaneous anarchy in Norway. It was especially busy against heathenism, devil worship, and its rites. This indeed may be called the focus and heart of all his royal endeavour in Norway, and of all the troubles he now had with his people there. For this was a serious, vital, all-comprehending matter, devil worship, a thing not to be tolerated one moment longer than you could by any method help. Olaf's success was intermittent, a varying complexion, but his effort, swift or slow, was strong and continual, and on the whole he did succeed. Take a sample or two of that wonderful conversion process. At one of the first things he found the bonders all assembled in arms, resolute to the death seemingly, against his proposal and him. Trigveson said little, waited impassive. What your reasons are, good men? One zealous bonder started up in passionate parliamentary eloquence, but after a sentence or two broke down. One, and then another, and still another, remained all three staring in open-mouth silence there. The peasant proprietors accepted the phenomenon as ludicrous, perhaps partly as miraculous with all, and consented to baptism this time. On another occasion of a thing, which had assembled near some heathen temple to meet him, temple where Hakan Yarl had done much repairing and set up many idle figures and sumptuous ornaments, regardless of expense, especially a very big and splendid door, with massive gold collar round the neck of him, not the like of it in Norway, King Olaf Trigveson was clamorously invited by the bonders to step in there, enlighten his eyes, and partake of the sacred rites. Instead of which he rushed into the temple with his armed men, smashed down with his own battle-axe, the God door, prostrate on the ground at one stroke, to set an example, and in a few minutes had the whole Hakan Pantheon wrecked, packing up meanwhile all the gold and preciousities accumulated there, not forgetting Thor's illustrious gold collar, of which we shall hear again, and victoriously took the plunder home with him for his own royal uses and behoof of the State. In other cases, though a friend to strong measures, he had to hold in and await the favourable moment. Thus, once, in beginning a parliamentary address, so soon as he came to touch upon Christianity, the bonders rose in murmurs, in vociferous and jingling of arms, which quite drowned the royal voice. Declared they had taken arms against King Hakan the Good to compel him to desist from his Christian proposals, and they did not think King Olaf a higher man than him, Hakan the Good. The King then said he purposed coming to them next yule to their great sacrificial feast, to see for himself what their customs were, which pacified the bonders for this time. The appointed place of meeting was again a Hakan Yarl Temple, not yet done to ruin, chief shrine in those Trondheim parts, I believe. There should Trigvison appear at Yule. Well, but before Yule came, Trigvison made a great banquet in his palace at Trondheim, and invited far and wide all manner of important persons out of the district as guest there. Banquet hardly done, Trigvison gave some slight signal, upon which armed men strode in, seized eleven of these principal persons, and the King said, since he himself was to become a heathen again, and do sacrifice, it was his purpose to do it in the highest form, namely, that of human sacrifice, and this time not of slaves and malifactors, but of the best men in the country, in which stringent circumstances the eleven seized persons and company at large gave unanimous consent to baptism. Straightway received the same, and abjured their idols, but were not permitted to go home till they had left in sons, brothers, and other precious relatives sufficient hostages in the King's hands. By unwirried industry of this and better kinds, Trigvison had trampled down idolatry, so far as form went, how far in substance may be greatly doubted. But it is to be remembered with all that always on the back of these compulsory adventures there followed English bishops, priests, and teachers, whereby to the open-minded conviction to all degrees of it was attained, while silence and passivity became the duty or necessity of the unconvinced party. In about two years Norway was all gone over with a rough hero of conversion. Heathenism at least constrained to be silent and outwardly conformable. Trigvison next turned his attention to Iceland, sent one Thangbren, priest from Saxony, of wonderful qualities, military as well as theological, to try and convert Iceland. Thangbren made a few converts, for Olaf had already many estimable Iceland friends whom he liked much, and was much liked by, and conversion was the ready road to his favour. Thangbren, I find, lodged with the Hall of Sida, formal acquaintance of Berneál, whose saga has its admirers among us even now. Thangbren converted Hall and one or two other leading men, but in general he was reckoned quarrelsome and blusterous rather than eloquent and piously convincing. Two scalds of repute made biting lampoons upon Thangbren, whom Thangbren, by two opportunities that afforded, cut down and did death because of their scaldic quality. Another he killed with his own hand, I know not for what reason. In brief, after about a year, Thangbren returned to Norway and King Olaf, declaring the Icelanders to be a perverse, satirical and unconvertible people. Having himself, the record says, been the death of three men there. King Olaf was in high rage at this result, but was persuaded by the Icelanders about him to try farther, and by a wilder instrument. He accordingly chose one Thormund, a pious, patient and kindly man, who within the next year or so did actually accomplish the matter, namely, get Christianity by open vote, declared at Thangvala by the general thing of Iceland there, the roar of a big thunderclap at the right moment rather helping the conclusion if I recollect, whereupon Olaf's joy was no doubt great. One general result of these successful operations was the discontent to all manner of degrees on the part of many Norse individuals, against this glorious and victorious but peremptory and terrible king of theirs. Trigvison, I fancy, did not much regard all that, a man of joyful, cheery temper, habitually contemptuous of danger. Another trivial misfortune that befell in these conversion operations, and became important to him, he did not even know of, and would have much despised if he had. It was this. Sigrid, queen dowager of Sweden, thought to be among the most shining women of the world, was also known for one of the most imperious, revengeful and relentless, and had got for herself the name of Sigrid the Proud. In her high widowhood she had naturally many wooers, but treated them in a manner unexampled. Two of her suitors, simultaneous two, were King Harold Grinsake, a cousin of King Trigvison's, and a kind of king in some district by sufferance of the late Hackens. This luckless Grinska, and then Russian sovereign as well, named not worth mentioning, were zealous suitors of queen dowager Sigrid, and were perversely slow to accept the negative, in which her heart was inexorable for both, though the expression of it could not be quite so emphatic. By ill luck for them they came once, from the far west, Grinska, from the far east, the Russian, and arrived both together at Sigrid's court, to prosecute their importunate and to her odious and tiresome suit, much how very much to her impatience and disdain. She lodged them both in some old mansion, which she had contiguous, and got compendiously furnished for them, and there I know not whether on the first or on the second, or on what following night, this unparalleled queen Sigrid had the house surrounded, set on fire, and the two suitors and their people burnt to ashes. No more of bother from these two, at least. This appears to be a fact, and it could not be unknown to Trigvison. In spite of which, however, there went from Trigvison, who was now a widower, some incipient marriage proposals to this proud widow, by whom they were favorably received, as from the brightest man in all the world they might seem worth being. Now, in one of these anti-heathen onslaughts of King Olaf's on the idle temples of Hakan, I think it was that case where Olaf's own battle-axe struck down the monstrous, refulgent Thor, and conquered an immense gold ring from the neck of him, or from the door of his temple. A huge gold ring at any rate had come into Olaf's hands, and this he bethought him might be a pretty present to Queen Sigrid, the now-favorable, though the proud. Sigrid received the ring with joy, fancied what a collar it would make for her own fair neck, but noticed that her two goldsmiths, weighing it on their fingers, exchanged a glance. "'What is that?' exclaimed Queen Sigrid. Nothing answered they or endeavored to answer, dreading mischief. But Sigrid compelled them to break open the ring, and there was found, all along the inside of it, an occult ring of copper, not a heart of gold at all. "'Ha!' said the proud Queen, flinging it away, he that can deceive in this manner can deceive in many others, and was in hot wrath with Olaf, though by degrees again she took milder thoughts. Milder thoughts, we say, and consented to a meeting next autumn at some half-way station, where their great business might be brought to a happy settlement and betrothment. Both Olaf Trigvison and the High Dowager appear to have been tolerably of willing mind at this meeting, but Olaf interposed, what was always one condition with him. Thou must consent to baptism, and give up thy idle gods. "'They are the gods of all my forefathers,' answered the lady. "'Choose thou what gods thou pleasest, but leave me mine.' Whereupon an altercation, and Trigvison, as was his want, towered up into shining wroth, and exclaimed at last, Why should I care about thee then, old-faced heathen creature, and impatiently wagging his glove, hit her, or slightly switched her on the face with it, and contemptuously turning away walked out of the adventure. "'This is a feat that may cost thee dear one day,' said Sigrid, and in the end it came to do so, little as the magnificent Olaf deigned to think of it at that moment.' One of the last scuffles I remember of Olaf's having with his refractory heathens was at a thing in Hordaland, or Rogaland, far in the north, where the chief opposition hero was one Jarnskag, Ironbeard, Scottish—Ironshag, as it were. Here again was a grand heathen temple, hack on Yarl's building, with a splendid thaw in it, and much idle furniture. The king stated what was his constant wish here as elsewhere, but no sooner entered upon the subject of Christianity than universal murmur rising into a clangor and violent dissent interrupted him, and Ironbeard took up the discourse in reply. Ironbeard did not break down. On the contrary, he with great brevity, emphasis, and clearness signified that the proposal to reject their old gods was in the highest degree unacceptable to this thing, that it was contrary to bargain with all, that if it were insisted on, they would have to fight with the king about it, and in fact were now ready to do so. In reply to this, Olaf, without word uttered, but merely with some signal to the trusty armed men he had with him, rushed off to the temple close at hand, burst into it, shutting the door behind him, smashed Thoran company to destruction, then reappearing victorious found much confusion outside, and in particular what was the most important item, the rugged Ironbeard done to death by Olaf's men in the interim, which entirely disheartened the thing from fighting at that moment, having now no leader who dared to head them in so dangerous an enterprise, so that everyone departed to digest his rage in silence as he could. Matters having cooled for a week or two, there was another thing held in which King Olaf testified regret for the quarrel that had fallen out, readiness to pay what most was due by law for that unlucky homicide of Ironbeard by his people, and with all to take the fair daughter of Ironbeard to wife, if all would comply and be friends with him in other matters, which was the course resolved on as most convenient. To baptism we marry Yarnskog's daughter, you. This bargain held on both sides. The wedding, too, was celebrated, but that took a rather strange turn. On the morning of the bride night, Olaf, who had not been sleeping, though his fair partner thought he had, opened his eyes and saw with astonishment the fair partner aiming a long knife ready to strike home upon him, which at once ended their wedding life, poor Demoiselle Ironbeard immediately bundling off with her attendants home again, King Olaf into the apartment of his servants, mentioning there what had happened and forbidding any of them to follow her. Olaf Trigmasen, though his kingdom was the smallest of the Norse three, had risen to a renown all over the Norse world, which either he of Denmark nor he of Sweden could pretend to rival. A magnificent, far shining man, more expert in all bodily exercises as the Norse call them than any man had ever been before him or after was, could keep five daggers in the air, always catching the proper fifth by its handle and sending it aloft again, could shoot supremely, throw a javelin with either hand, and in fact in battle usually throw two together. These with swimming, climbing, leaping, were the admirable fine arts of the North, in all which Trigmasen appears to have been the Raphael and the Michelangelo at once, essentially definable too if we look well into him as a wild bit of real heroism in such rude guise and environment, a high, true and great human soul. A jovial burst of laughter in him, with all a bright, airy, wise way of speech, dressed beautifully in with care, a man admired and loved exceedingly by those he liked, dreaded as death by those he did not like. Hardly any king, says Snorro, was ever so well obeyed, by one class out of zeal and love, by the rest out of dread. His glorious course, however, was not to last long. King's fan of the double beard had not yet completed his conquest of England, by no means yet some thirteen horrid years of that still before him, when over in Denmark he found that complaints against him and intricacies had risen, on the part principally of one Burislav, king of the Wends, far off the Baltic, and in a less degree with the king of Sweden and other minor individuals. Sven earnestly applied himself to settle these, and have his hands free. Burislav, an aged heathen gentleman, proved reasonable and conciliatory, so too the king of Sweden and Dowager Queen Sigrid, his managing mother. Bargin in both these cases got sealed and crowned by marriage. Sven, who had become a widower lately, now wedded Sigrid, and might think, possibly enough, he had got a proud bargain, though a heathen one. Burislav also insisted on marriage with Princess Theory, the double-beard sister. Theory, inexpressibly disinclined to wed an aged heathen of that stamp, pleaded hard with her brother, but the double-bearded was inexorable. Theory's wailings and entreaties went for nothing. With some guardian foster-brother and a serving-maid or two she had to go on this hated journey. Old Burislav, at side of her, blazed out into marriage-feast of supreme magnificence, and was charmed to see her, but Theory would not join the marriage-party, refuse to eat with it or sit with it at all, day after day for six days flatly refuse, and after nightfall of the sixth, glided out with her foster-brother into the woods, into by-paths and inconceivable wanderings, and in effect got home to Denmark. Brother Sven was not for the moment there, probably enough gone to England again. But Theory knew too well he would not allow her to stay here or anywhere that he could help, except with the old heathen she had just fled from. Theory, looking round the world, saw no likely road for her, but to Olaf Trigvison in Norway, to beg protection from the most heroic man she knew of in the world. Olaf, except by renown, was not known to her, but by renown he well was. Olaf, at side of her, promised protection and asylum against all mortals. Nay, in discoursing with Theory, Olaf perceived more and more clearly what a fine, handsome being, soul and body Theory was, and in a short space of time winded up by proposing marriage to Theory, who humbly, and we may fancy with what a secret joy consented to say yes, and become Queen of Norway. In the due months they had a little son, Harold, who it is creditably recorded, was the joy of both his parents, but who, to their inexpressible sorrow in about a year died, and vanished from them. This and one other fact now to be mentioned is all the wedded history we have of Theory. The other fact is that Theory had, by inheritance or covenant, not depending on her marriage with old Burislav, considerable properties in Wendland, which she often reflected might be not a little behooful to her here in Norway, where her civil list was probably but straightened. She spoke of this to her husband, but her husband would take no hold, merely made her gifts and said, Poo-poo, can't we live without old Burislav and his Wendland properties? So that the lady sank into ever deeper anxiety and eagerness about this Wendland project, took to weeping, sat weeping whole days, and went all off, asked her, What ails thee, then, would answer, or did answer once, what a different man my father Harold Gormson was, vulgarly called Bluetooth, compared with some that are now kings. For no king's fenn in the world would Harold Gormson have given up his own or his wife's just rights. Whereupon Trigvison started up, exclaiming in some heat, Of thy brother's fenn I was never afraid, if fenn and I meeting contest it will not be fenn I believe that conquers, and went off in a towering fume. Consented, however, at last, had to consent to get his fine fleet equipped and armed, and decided to sail with it to Wendland to have speech and settlement with King Burislav. Trigvison had already ships and navies that were the wonder of the North. Especially in building warships, the crane, the serpent, last of all the long serpent, he had for size outward beauty and inward perfection of equipment, transcended all example. This new sea expedition became an object of attention to all the neighbors. Especially Queen Sigrid the proud and fenn double-beard, her now king, were attentive to it. This insolent Trigvison, Queen Sigrid would often say, had long been saying to her fenn, to marry thy sister without leave, had, or asked of thee, and now flaunting his war navies, as if he, king only of Paltry Norway, were the big hero of the North. Why do you suffer it, you kings really great? By such persuasions and reiterations, King Sven of Norway, King Olof of Sweden, and Yarl Eric, now a great man there, grown which by prosperous sea robbery and other good management, were brought to take the matter up, combined strenuously for destruction of King Olof Trigvison on this grand Wendland project of his. Fleets and forces were with best diligence got ready, and with all a certain Yarl Sigwald of Jomsberg, chieftain of the Jomsvikings, a powerful, plausible and cunning man, was appointed to find means of joining himself to Trigvison's grand voyage, of getting into Trigvison's confidence and keeping Sven Doublebeard, Eric, and the Swedish king aware of all his movements. King Olof Trigvison, unacquainted with all this, sailed away in summer with his splendid fleet, went through the belts with a prosperous wind, under bright skies, to the admiration of both shores. Such a fleet, with its shining serpents, long and short, and in perfection of equipment and appearance, the Baltic never saw before. Yarl Sigwald joined with new ships, by the way, had he, too, a visit to King Burislav to pay, how could he ever do it in better company, and studiously and skillfully ingratiated himself with King Olof. Old Burislav, when they arrived, proved altogether courteous, handsome, and amenable, agreed at once to Olof's claims for his new queen, did the rites of hospitality with a generous plentitude to Olof, who cheerily renewed acquaintance with that country, known to him in early days, the cradle of his fortunes in the Viking line, and found old friends there still surviving, joyful to meet him again. Yarl Sigwald encouraged these delays, King Sven and company not being yet quite ready. Get ready, Sigwald directed them, and they diligently did. Olof's men, their business now done, were impatient to be home, and grudging every day of loitering there, but still Sigwald pleased, such his power of flattery and cajoling trigbison, they could not get away. At length, Sigwald's secret messengers reporting already on the part of Sven and company, Olof took farewell of Burislav and Venland, and all gladly sailed away. Sven, Eric, and the Swedish king, with their combined fleets, lay in wait behind some cape in a safe little bay of some island, then called Svold, but not in our time to be found, the Baltic tumils in the fourteenth century having swallowed it, as some think, and leaving us uncertain whether it was in the neighborhood of Rügen Island or in the sound of Elsinor. Their lace vein, Eric and company, waiting until trigbison in his fleet came up, Sigwald's spy messengers daily reporting what progress he and it had made. At length, one bright summer morning, the fleet made appearance, sailing in loose order, Sigwald as one acquaintance with the shoal places, steering ahead and showing them the way. Snorrow rises into one of his pictorial fits, seized with enthusiasm at the thought of such a fleet, and reports to us largely in what order trigbison's winged coarsers of the deep, in long series, for perhaps an hour or more came on, and what the three potentates, from their knoll advantage, said of each as it hove in sight. Sven thrice over guessed this and the other noble vessel to be the long serpent. Eric always correcting him. No, that is not the long serpent yet, and aside always, nor shall you be lord of it, king, when it does come. The long serpent itself did make appearance. Eric, Sven, and the Swedish king hurried on board, and pushed out of their hiding place into the open sea. Treacherous Sigwald, at the beginning of all this, had suddenly doubled the cape of theirs, and struck into the bay out of sight, leaving the foremost trigbison ships astonished and uncertain what to do, if it were not simply to strike sail and wait till Olaf himself with the long serpent arrived. Olaf's chiefed captains, seeing the enemy's huge fleet come out, and how the matter lay, strongly advised king Olaf to elude this stroke of treachery, and with all sail hold on his course, fight being now on so unequal terms. Snorro says the king, high on the quarter-deck where he stood, replied, Strike the sails, never shall men of mine think of flight. I never fled from battle. Let God dispose of my life, but flight I will never take. And the battle with all fury went loose, and lasted hour after hour till almost sunset, if I well recollect. Olaf stood on the serpent's quarter-deck, says Snorro, high over the others. He had a gilt shield and a helmet inlaid with gold. Over his armor he had a short red coat, and was easily distinguished from other men. Snorro's account of the battle is altogether animated, graphic, and so minute that antiquaries gather from it, if so disposed, which we but little are, what the methods of North sea-fighting were. Their shooting of arrows, casting of javelins, pitching of big bones, ultimately boarding and mutually clashing and smashing, which it would not avail us to speak of here. Olaf stood conspicuous all day, throwing javelins of deadly aim with both hands at once, encouraging, fighting, and commanding like a highest sea-king. The Danish fleet, the Swedish fleet, were both of them quickly dealt with, and successively withdrew out of shot range. And then Yarl Eric came up, and fiercely grappled with the long serpent, or rather with her surrounding comrades, and gradually, as they were beaten empty of men, with the long serpent herself. The fight grew ever fiercer, more furious. Eric was supplied with new men from the Swedes and Danes. Olaf had no such resource, except from the crews of his own beaten ships, and at length this also failed him, all his ships accepting the long serpent being beaten and emptied. Olaf fought on unyielding. Eric twice boarded him, was twice repulsed. Olaf kept his quarter-deck, unconquerable, though now left more and more hopeless, fatally short of help. A tall young man, called Einer Timberskilver, very celebrated and important afterwards in Norway, and already the best archer known, was kept busy with his bow. Twice he nearly shot Yarl Eric in his ship. Shoot me that man, said Yarl Eric to a bowman near him, and just as Timberskilver was drawing his bow the third time, an arrow hit it in the middle and broke it in two. What is this that has broken? asked King Olaf. Norway, from thy hand, King, answered Timberskilver. Trigvison's men, he observed with surprise, were striking violently on Eric's, but to no purpose. Nobody fell. How is this? asked Trigvison. Our swords are notched and blunted, King, they do not cut. Olaf stepped down to his arm-chest, delivered out new swords, and it was observed, as he did it, blood ran trickling from his wrist, but none knew where the wound was. Eric boarded a third time. Olaf, left with hardly more than one man, sprang overboard. One seized that red coat of his still glancing in the evening sun, and sank in the deep waters to his long rest. Rumor ran among his people that he still was not dead, grounding on some movement by the ships of that traitorous Sigvald. They fancied Olaf had dived beneath the keels of his enemies, and had got away with Sigvald, as Sigvald himself evidently did. Much was hoped, supposed, spoken, says one old morning Sigvald, but the truth was, Olaf Trigvison was never seen in Norseland more. Strangely he remained still a shining figure to us, the wildly beautifulest man in body and soul that one has ever heard of in the north.