fresh arms in her shallop to Brian and his fighting-men; but as the sun,
bursting through the clouds, flashed full upon the shining war-ax which
she held aloft, the superstitious Danes saw in the floating figure the
"White Lady of the Rapids," the banshee, _A-oib-hinn_, the fairy guardian
of the Clan of Cas. Believing, therefore, that they could not prevail
against her powerful aid, they turned and fled in dismay from the flowing
river and the haunted rock.
But fast upon young Brian's victory came the tearful news of the battle of
Broccan's Brake and the defeat of the Irish kings. Of all the brave lad's
family only his eldest brother Mahon escaped from that fatal field; and
now he reigned in place of Kennedy, his father, as King of Thomond. But
the victorious Danes overran all Southern Ireland, and the brothers Mahon
and Brian found that they could not successfully face in open field the
hosts of their invaders. So these two "stout, able, valiant pillars,"
these two "fierce, lacerating, magnificent heroes," as the brothers are
called in the curious and wordy old Irish record, left their mud-walled
fortress-palace by the Shannon, and with "all their people and all their
chattels" went deep into the forests of Cratloe and the rocky fastnesses
of the County Clare; and there they lived the life of robber chieftains,
harassing and plundering the Danes of Limerick and their recreant Irish
allies, and guarding against frequent surprise and attack. But so
hazardous and unsettled a life was terribly exhausting, and "at length
each party of them became tired of the other," and finally King Mahon made
peace with the Danes of Limerick.
But "Brian the brave" would make no truce with a hated foe. "Tell my
brother," he said, when messengers brought him word of Mahon's treaty,
"that Brian, the son of Kennedy, knows no peace with foreign invaders.
Though all others yield and are silent, yet will I never!"
And with this defiance the boy chieftain and "the young champions of the
tribe of Cas" went deeper into the woods and fastnesses of the County
Clare, and for months kept up a fierce guerilla warfare. The Danish
tyrants knew neither peace nor rest from his swift and sudden attacks.
Much booty of "satins and silken cloths, both scarlet and green, pleasing
jewels and saddles beautiful and foreign" did they lose to this active
young chieftain, and much tribute of cows and hogs and other possessions
did he force from them. So dauntless an outlaw did he become that his name
struck terror from Galway Bay to the banks of Shannon, and from Lough Derg
to the Burren of Clare. "When he inflicted not evil on the foreigners in
the day," the quaint old record asserts, "he was sure to do it in the next
night, and when he did it not in the night he was sure to do it in the
following day."
To many an adventurous boy the free outlaw life of this daring lad of nine
centuries ago may seem alluring. But "life in the greenwood" had little
romance for such old-time outlaws as Brian Boru and Robin Hood and their
imitators. To them it was stern reality, and meant constant struggle and
vigilance. They were outcasts and Ishmaels--"their hands against every man
and every man's hand against them,"--and though the pleasant summer
weather brought many sunshiny days and starlit nights, the cold, damp, and
dismal days took all the poetry out of this roving life, and sodden
forests and relentless foes brought dreary and disheartening hours. Trust
me, boys, this so-called "free and jolly life of the bold outlaw," which
so many story-papers picture, whether it be with Brian Boru in distant
Ireland, nine hundred years ago, or in Sherwood Forest with Robin Hood, or
with some "Buckeye Jim" on our own Montana hill-sides to-day, is not "what
it is cracked up to be." Its attractiveness is found solely in those
untruthful tales that give you only the little that seems to be sweet, but
say nothing of the much that is so very, very harsh and bitter. Month by
month the boy chieftain strove against fearful odds, day by day he saw his
brave band grow less and less, dying under the unpitying swords of the
Danes and the hardships of this wandering life, until of all the
high-spirited and valiant comrades that had followed him into the hills of
Clare only fifteen remained.
One chill April day, as Brian sat alone before the gloomy cave that had
given him a winter shelter in the depths of the forests of Clare, his
quick ear, well trained in wood-craft, caught the sound of a light step in
the thicket. Snatching his ever-ready spear, he stood on guard and
demanded:
"Who is there?"
No answer followed his summons. But as he waited and listened, he heard
the notes of a song, low and gentle, as if for his ear alone:
"Chieftain of the stainless shield,
Prince who brooks no tribute fee;
Ne'er shall he to pagan yield
Who prevailed at Carrick-lee.
Rouse thee, arm thee, hark and heed,
Erin's strength in Erin's need."
"'T is the banshee," was the youth's first thought. "The guardian of our
clan urgeth me to speedier action." And then he called aloud: "Who sings
of triumph to Brian the heavy-hearted?"
"Be no longer Brian the heavy-hearted; be, as thou ever art, Brian the
brave!" came the reply, and through the parting thicket appeared, not the
dreaded vision of _A-oib-hinn_, the banshee, but the fair young face of
his foster-sister, Eimer of the golden hair.
"Better days await thee, Brian, my brother," she said; "Mahon the King
bids thee meet him at Holy Isle. None dared bring his message for fear of
the death-dealing Danes who have circled thee with their earth-lines. But
what dare not I do for so gallant a foster-brother?"
With the courtesy that marked the men of even those savage times, the boy
chieftain knelt and kissed the hem of the daring little maiden's purple
robe.
"And what wishes my brother, the king, O Eimer of the golden hair?" he
said. "Knows he not that Brian has sworn never to bend his neck to the
foreigner?"
"That does he know right well," replied the girl. "But his only words to
me were: 'Bid Brian my brother take heart and keep this tryst with me, and
the sons of Kennedy may still stand, unfettered, kings of Erin.'"
[Illustration: "THE BOY CHIEFTAIN KNELT AND KISSED THE HEM OF THE DARLING
LITTLE MAIDEN'S PURPLE ROBE."]
So Brian kept the tryst; and where, near the southern shores of Lough
Derg, the Holy Isle still lies all strewn with the ruins of the seven
churches that gave it this name, the outlawed young chieftain met the
king. Braving the dangers of Danish capture and death, he had come
unattended to meet his brother.
"Where, O Brian, are thy followers?" King Mahon inquired.
"Save the fifteen faithful men that remain to me in the caves of
Uim-Bloit," said the lad, "the bones of my followers rest on many a field
from the mountains of Connaught to the gates of Limerick; for their
chieftain, O my brother, maketh no truce with the foe."
"Thou art but a boy, O Brian, and like a boy thou dost talk," said the
king, reprovingly. "Thy pride doth make thee imprudent. For what hast thou
gained, since, spite of all, thy followers lie dead!"
"Gained!" exclaimed the young chieftain, impetuously, as he faced Mahon
the King; "I have gained the right to be called true son of the Clan of
Cas--of ancestors who would brook no insult, who would pay no tribute fee
to invaders, who would give no hostage; and as to my trusty liegemen who
have fallen--is it not the inheritance of the Clan of Cas to die for their
honor and their homes?" demanded Brian. "So surely it is no honor in
valorous men, my brother, to abandon without battle or conflict their
father's inheritance to Danes and traitorous kings!"
The unyielding courage of the lad roused the elder brother to action, and,
secretly, but swiftly, he gathered the chiefs of the clan for council in
the _dun_ of King Mahon by the ford of Killaloe. "Freedom for Erin and
death to the Danes!" cried they--"as the voice of one man," says the
record. Again the warning beacons flamed from cairn and hill-top. In the
shadow of the "Rock of Cashel," the royal sun-burst, the banner of the
ancient kings, was flung to the breeze, and clansmen and vassals and
allies rallied beneath its folds to strike one mighty blow for the
redemption of Ireland.
In the county of Tipperary, in the midst of what is called "the golden
valley," this remarkable "Rock of Cashel" looms up three hundred feet
above the surrounding plain, its top, even now, crowned with the ruins of
what were in Brian's day palace and chapel, turret and battlement and
ancient tower. Beneath the rough archway of the triple ramparts at the
foot of the rock, and up the sharp ascent, there rode one day the herald
of Ivar, the Danish King of Limerick. Through the gate-way of the palace
he passed, and striding into the audience-hall, spoke thus to Mahon the
King:
"Hear, now, O King! Ivar, the son of Sitric, King of Limerick and sole
Over-lord of Munster, doth summon thee, his vassal, to give up to him this
fortress of Cashel, to disperse thy followers, to send to him at Limerick,
bounden with chains, the body of Brian the outlaw, and to render unto him
tribute and hostage."
King Mahon glanced proudly out to where upon the ramparts fluttered the
flag of Ireland.
"Say to Ivar, the son of Sitric," he said, "that Mahon, King of Thomond,
spurns his summons, and will pay no tribute for his own inheritance."
"And say thou too," cried his impetuous younger brother, "that Brian, the
son of Kennedy, and all the men of the Clan of Cas prefer destruction and
death rather than submit to the tyranny of pirates and the over-lordship
of foreigners and Danes!"
"Hear then, Mahon, King of Thomond; hear thou and all thy clan, the words
of Ivar, the son of Sitric," came the stern warning of the Danish herald.
"Thus says the king: I will gather against thee a greater muster and
hosting, and I will so ravage and destroy the Clan of Cas that there shall
not be left of ye one man to guide a horse's head across a ford, an abbot
or a venerable person within the four corners of Munster who shall not be
utterly destroyed or brought under subjection to me, Ivar the king!"
"Tell thy master," said Mahon the King, unmoved by this terrible threat,
"that the Clan of Cas defy his boastful words, and will show in battle
which are lords of Erin."
"And tell thy master," said his brother, "that Brian the outlaw will come
to Limerick not bound with chains, but to bind them."
The Danish power was strong and terrible, but the action of the two
valiant brothers was swift and their example was inspiriting. Clansmen and
vassals flocked to their standard, and a great and warlike host gathered
in old Cashel. Brian led them to battle, and near a willow forest, close
to the present town of Tipperary, the opposing forces met in a battle that
lasted "from sunrise to mid-day." And the sun-burst banner of the ancient
kings streamed victorious over a conquered field, and the hosts of the
Danes were routed. From Tipperary to Limerick, Brian pursued the flying
enemy; and capturing Limerick, took therefrom great stores of booty and
many prisoners; and the queer old Irish record thus briefly tells the
terrible story of young Brian's vengeance--a story that fittingly shows us
the cruel customs of those savage days of old, days now fortunately gone
for ever: "The fort and the good town he reduced to a cloud of smoke and
to red fire afterward. The whole of the captives were collected on the
hills of Saingel, and every one that was fit for war was killed, and every
one that was fit for a slave was enslaved."
And from the day of Limerick's downfall the star of Ireland brightened, as
in battle after battle, Brian Boru,[E] the wise and valiant young
chieftain, was hailed as victor and deliverer from sea to sea.
But now he is a lad no longer, and the story of the boy chieftain gives
place to the record of the valiant soldier and the able king. For upon the
death of his brother Mahon, in the year 976, Brian became King of
Thomond, of Munster, and Cashel. Then uniting the rival clans and tribes
under his sovereign rule, he was crowned at Tara, in the year 1000,
"Ard-righ," or "High King of Erinn." The reign of this great king of
Ireland was peaceful and prosperous. He built churches, fostered learning,
made bridges and causeways, and constructed a road around the coast of the
whole kingdom. In his palace at Kincora, near the old _dun_ of his father,
King Kennedy, by the ford of Killaloe, he "dispensed a royal hospitality,
administered a rigid and impartial justice, and so continued in prosperity
for the rest of his reign, having been at his death thirty-eight years
King of Munster and fifteen years Sovereign of all Ireland."
So the boy chieftain came to be King of Ireland, and the story of his
death is as full of interest and glory as the record of his boyish deeds.
For Brian grew to be an old, old man, and the Danes and some of the
restless Irishmen whom he had brought under his sway revolted against his
rule. So the "grand old king of ninety years" led his armies out from the
tree-shaded ramparts of royal Kincora, and meeting the enemy on the plains
of Dublin, fought on Friday, April 23, 1014, near the little fishing
station of Clontarf, the "last and most terrible struggle of Northman and
Gael, of Pagan and Christian, on Irish soil." It was a bloody day for
Ireland; but though the aged king and four of his six sons, with eleven
thousand of his followers were slain on that fatal field, the Danes were
utterly routed, and the battle of Clontarf freed Ireland forever from
their invasions and tyrannies.
"Remember the glories of Brian the brave,
Though the days of the hero are o'er;
Though lost to Mononia and cold in the grave,
He returns to Kincora no more!
That star of the field, which so often has poured
Its beam on the battle, is set;
But enough of its glory remains on each sword
To light us to victory yet!"
So sings Thomas Moore in one of his inspiring "Irish Melodies"; and when
hereafter you hear or read of Brian Boru, remember him not only as
Ireland's greatest king, but also as the dauntless lad who held the ford
at Killaloe, and preferred the privations of an outlaw's life to a
disgraceful peace; and who, dying an old, old man, still kept his love of
country undiminished, and sealed with his blood the liberty of his native
land, declaring, as the poet Moore puts it in his glowing verse:
"No, Freedom! whose smiles we shall never resign,
Go tell our invaders, the Danes,
That 't is sweeter to bleed for an age at thy shrines
Than to sleep but a moment in chains!"
Kincora, the royal home of Brian the King, is now so lost in ruins that
travellers cannot tell the throne-room from the cow-house; Cashel's high
rock is deserted and dismantled; and on the hill of Tara the palace of the
ancient Irish kings is but a grass-grown mound. But, though palaces
crumble and nations decay, the remembrance of truth and valor and glowing
patriotism lives on forever, and to the boys and girls of this more
favored time the stories of noble lives and glorious deeds come as a
priceless legacy, bidding them be stout-hearted in the face of danger and
strong-souled in spite of temptation. So to every lover of daring deeds
and loyal lives time cannot dim the shining record of the great King of
Ireland, Brian Boru--Brian of Munster: the Boy Chieftain.
[Illustration]
FOOTNOTES:
[E] _Boru_, or _Borumha_, the tribute; therefore "Brian of the Tribute."
[Illustration]
III.
OLAF OF NORWAY: THE BOY VIKING.
(_Afterward King Olaf II., of Norway--"St. Olaf."_)
[A.D. 1010.]
Old Rane, the helmsman, whose fierce mustaches and shaggy shoulder-mantle
made him look like some grim old northern wolf, held high in air the great
bison-horn filled with foaming mead.
"Skoal to the Viking! Hael; was-hael!"[F] rose his exultant shout. From a
hundred sturdy throats the cry re-echoed till the vaulted hall of the
Swedemen's conquered castle rang again.
"Skoal to the Viking! Hael; was-hael!" and in the centre of that throng of
mail-clad men and tossing spears, standing firm and fearless upon the
interlocked and uplifted shields of three stalwart fighting-men, a
stout-limbed lad of scarce thirteen, with flowing light-brown hair and
flushed and eager face, brandished his sword vigorously in acknowledgment
of the jubilant shout that rang once again through the dark and
smoke-stained hall, "Was-hael to the sea-wolf's son! Skoal to Olaf the
King!"
Then above of the din and clash of shouting and of steel rose the voice of
Sigvat the saga-man, or song-man of the young viking, singing loud and
sturdily:
"Olaf the King is on his cruise,
His blue steel staining,
Rich booty gaining,
And all men trembling at the news.
Up, war-wolf's brood! our young fir's name
O'ertops the forest trees in fame,
Our stout young Olaf knows no fear.
Though fell the fray,
He's blithe and gay,
And warriors fall beneath his spear.
Who can't defend the wealth they have
Must die or share with the rover brave!"
A fierce and warlike song, boys and girls, to raise in honor of so young a
lad. But those were fierce and warlike days when men were stirred by the
recital of bold and daring deeds--those old, old days, eight hundred years
ago, when Olaf, the boy viking, the pirate chief of a hundred mail-clad
men, stood upon the uplifted shields of his exultant fighting-men in the
grim and smoke-stained hall of the gray castle of captured Sigtun, oldest
of Swedish cities.
Take your atlas, and, turning to the map of Sweden, place your finger on
the city of Stockholm. Do you notice that it lies at the easterly end of a
large lake? That is the Maelar, beautiful with winding channels,
pine-covered islands, and rocky shores. It is peaceful and quiet now, and
palace and villa and quaint northern farm-house stand unmolested on its
picturesque borders. But channels, and islands, and rocky shores have
echoed and re-echoed with the war-shouts of many a fierce sea-rover since
those far-off days when Olaf, the boy viking, and his Norwegian ships of
war plowed through the narrow sea-strait, and ravaged the fair shores of
the Maelar with fire and sword.
Stockholm, the "Venice of the North," as it is called, was not then in
existence; and little now remains of old Sigtun save ruined walls. But
travellers may still see the three tall towers of the ancient town, and
the great stone-heap, alongside which young Olaf drew his ships of war,
and over which his pirate crew swarmed into Sigtun town, and planted the
victorious banner of the golden serpent upon the conquered walls.
For this fair young Olaf came of hardy Norse stock. His father, Harald
Graenske, or "Greymantle," one of the tributary kings of Norway, had
fallen a victim to the tortures of the haughty Swedish queen; and now his
son, a boy of scarce thirteen, but a warrior already by training and from
desire, came to avenge his father's death. His mother, the Queen Aasta,
equipped a large dragon-ship or war-vessel for her adventurous son, and
with the lad, as helmsman and guardian, was sent old Rane, whom men called
"the far-travelled," because he had sailed westward as far as England and
southward to Norvasund (by which name men then knew the Straits of
Gibraltar). Boys toughened quickly in those stirring days, and this lad,
who, because he was commander of a dragon-ship, was called Olaf the
King--though he had no land to rule,--was of viking blood, and quickly
learned the trade of war. Already, among the rocks and sands of Sodermann,
upon the Swedish coast, he had won his first battle over a superior force
of Danish war-vessels.
Other ships of war joined him; the name of Olaf the Brave was given him by
right of daring deeds, and "Skoal to the Viking!" rang from the sturdy
throats of his followers as the little sea-king of thirteen was lifted in
triumph upon the battle-dented shields.
But a swift runner bursts into the gray hall of Sigtun. "To your ships, O
King; to your ships!" he cries. "Olaf, the Swedish king, men say, is
planting a forest of spears along the sea-strait, and, except ye push out
now, ye may not get out at all!"
The nimble young chief sprang from the upraised shields.
"To your ships, vikings, all!" he shouted. "Show your teeth, war-wolves!
Up with the serpent banner, and death to Olaf the Swede!"
Straight across the lake to the sea-strait, near where Stockholm now
stands, the vikings sailed, young Olaf's dragon-ship taking the lead. But
all too late; for, across the narrow strait, the Swedish king had
stretched great chains, and had filled up the channel with stocks and
stones. Olaf and his Norsemen were fairly trapped; the Swedish spears
waved in wild and joyful triumph, and King Olaf, the Swede, said with grim
satisfaction to his lords: "See, jarls and lendermen, the Fat Boy is caged
at last!" For he never spoke of his stout young Norwegian namesake and
rival save as "Olaf Tjocke,"--Olaf the Thick, or Fat.
The boy viking stood by his dragon-headed prow, and shook his clenched
fist at the obstructed sea-strait and the Swedish spears.
"Shall we, then, land, Rane, and fight our way through?" he asked.
"Fight our way through?" said old Rane, who had been in many another tight
place in his years of sea-roving, but none so close as this. "Why, King,
they be a hundred to one!"
"And if they be, what then?" said impetuous Olaf. "Better fall as a viking
breaking Swedish spears, than die a straw-death[G] as Olaf of Sweden's
bonder-man. May we not cut through these chains?"
"As soon think of cutting the solid earth, King," said the helmsman.
"So; and why not, then?" young Olaf exclaimed, struck with a brilliant
idea. "Ho, Sigvat," he said, turning to his saga-man, "what was that
lowland under the cliff where thou didst say the pagan Upsal king was
hanged in his own golden chains by his Finnish queen?"
"'T is called the fen of Agnefit, O King," replied the saga-man, pointing
toward where it lay.
"Why, then, my Rane," asked the boy, "may we not cut our way out through
that lowland fen to the open sea and liberty?"
"'T is Odin's own device," cried the delighted helmsman, catching at his
young chief's great plan. "Ho, war-wolves all, bite ye your way through
the Swedish fens! Up with the serpent banner, and farewell to Olaf the
Swede!"
It seemed a narrow chance, but it was the only one. Fortune favored the
boy viking. Heavy rains had flooded the lands that slope down to the
Maelar Lake; in the dead of night the Swedish captives and stout Norse
oarsmen were set to work, and before daybreak an open cut had been made in
the lowlands beneath Agnefit, or the "Rock of King Agne," where, by the
town of Sodertelje, the vikings' canal is still shown to travellers; the
waters of the lake came rushing through the cut, and an open sea-strait
waited young Olaf's fleet.
"Unship the rudder; hoist the sail aloft!" commanded Rane the helmsman
"Sound war-horns all! Skoal to the Viking; skoal to the wise young Olaf!"
A strong breeze blew astern; the Norse rowers steered the rudderless ships
with their long oars, and with a mighty rush, through the new canal and
over all the shallows, out into the great Norrstrom, or North Stream, as
the Baltic Sea was called, the fleet passed in safety while the loud
war-horns blew the notes of triumph.
So the boy viking escaped from the trap of his Swedish foes, and, standing
by the "grim gaping dragon's head" that crested the prow of his war-ship,
he bade the helmsman steer for Gotland Isle, while Sigvat the saga-man
sang with the ring of triumph:
"Down the fiord sweep wind and rain;
Our sails and tackle sway and strain;
Wet to the skin
We're sound within.
Our sea-steed through the foam goes prancing,
While shields and spears and helms are glancing.
From fiord to sea,
Our ships ride free,
And down the wind with swelling sail
We scud before the gathering gale."
What a breezy, rollicking old saga it is. Can't you almost catch the spray
and sea-swell in its dashing measures, boys?