began, a deed never equalled in horror in the annals of Swedish history.
Early in the dark morning all the gates of the city were shut to prevent
anybody from taking flight, and making the affair known in the country
beyond. Every new comer was let in, but no one was allowed to go out. The
streets were guarded, and field-pieces were placed upon the great market
place, levelled towards the people. The way from the castle to the market
was lined with Danish soldiers; trumpeters rode about the streets and
proclaimed that all persons were to retire to their houses; and close their
doors on pain of death. But the common people were horror-struck at these
preparations they dared to disobey the king's orders, and crowded together
to see what would happen next.
Towards noon the castle gates were opened, and bishops and nobles,
councillors and burgomasters, were led between executioners and common
soldiers to the appointed place on the market, just in front of the Council
House. The bishops were clad in their sacred robes, the councillors had not
had time to take off the dress they wore in council. Oh what a sad
procession it was, as they came slowly along, with erect heads and a proud
and calm demeanour worthy of their race! Sobs and murmurs were heard
amongst the crowd; the roughest of the soldiers and headsmen were touched
with pity and respect as these innocent men, most of them grey-headed,
walked to their death. As soon as they reached the market place, a speech
was made to the mob in which it was declared that the king was deeply
grieved to be obliged to have recourse to such severe measures, but that he
felt himself bound to punish the Swedes for the offence they had given to
the Pope by becoming Protestants. And thus he made the terrible crime he
was about to commit even worse, by his falsehood!
One of the bishops, an aged man, then declared his innocence, and asked
that a clergyman might be allowed to attend himself and his companions in
their last moments; but his request was refused, and a noise was made to
prevent his words from being heard by the people. Then the headsmen began
their dread work; the fourth victim was Erick Johannson the father of
Gustavus. In a little time the market place was filled with dead bodies
and the streets streamed with blood. Some of the mob, roused to a state of
frenzy by the dreadful spectacle, made an attempt to rescue those of the
doomed ones who were yet living, but they were cut down by the soldiers who
had received orders to quell any outbreak on the part of the common people
with the punishment of death. Escape was not to be thought of, because the
gates of the city were always kept closed; the frightened people crept into
cellars and corners. And when the king heard that they had hidden
themselves, he caused a decree of pardon to be read, so that many of them
came out believing it to be true, and only fell into the trap he had thus
artfully laid for them.
Ninety-four Swedes fell the first day. For two days and two nights the
corpses lay on the market place, and the cattle and the fowls strayed
amongst them. To add to the horror the king caused the dead bodies of Sture
the younger and his son Sten to be disinterred and thrown amongst the
murdered to be buried with them.
Sture's widow, Christina, did not escape the king's wrath; she was summoned
to his presence and condemned to die, but some persons present asked the
tyrant to spare her life, and she was only sentenced to be imprisoned for
the rest of her days.
In other parts of Sweden deeds equally cruel were enacted. Numbers of the
peasants were deprived each of a leg and a hand, and, thus maimed, they
were supposed to be able to till the land although they could not possibly
fight. For these acts of cruelty and oppression Christiern the Second
justly gained the title of the Wicked, and his own people soon began to
hate him as much as the Swedes hated him for all the evil he had done.
In the meantime Gustavus was sought for in vain. He was still in his
hiding-place at Rafnaes, sending out his peasants now and then to collect
news. And one sad day a grey-haired man came to the neighbouring castle of
Gripsholm which belonged to Joachim Brahe. It was Brahe's steward; he had
followed his master to Stockholm, and had witnessed his unhappy fate. The
old man could not speak for crying, and could only make known by signs the
terrible events that had happened. Soon after, a peasant came by, and told
the same story. And Gustavus sat in the lonely house, sorrowing for his
father and his friends, and many of his kindred besides; yet although he
was forsaken by all, and surrounded as it were by enemies, he would not
give up hope, but only longed the more to succour his unhappy country. So
one day he packed up all the money and valuable things he possessed, and
taking them with him, left Rafnaes on horseback with the idea of persuading
the brave people of Dalecarlia to stand by him in the struggle for freedom.
This province, which was the scene of his adventures for some time, is
bordered on its western side by Norway: the mountain ridge which divides
the sources of its two rivers Dalef from Lake Famund in that country rises
to between three and four thousand feet above the level of the sea.
Dalecarlia abounds in rivers and lakes; the winters there are long and
severe; corn will not grow, and the tender bark of the pine trees is mixed
with the scanty supply of rye or barley of which the people make their
bread. Wolves and bears frequent the forests, and fish is plentiful in all
the lakes, except in those near Fahlun, now the capital of the province,
where the vapours for ever rising out of the great copper mine there, drive
away to a distance birds, beasts, and fishes, and destroy, all verdure in
the country around. Fahlun lies in a wide valley between two lakes; the
mine is a vast abyss, and is worked open to the sky, and besides copper
produces gold, silver, vitriol, ochre, and brimstone. The natives of
Darlecarlia are hardy from the nature of their climate; they have always
been very brave, trusting in their own strength, and having very little
intercourse with the other people of Sweden. At the time Gustavus was
amongst them they were so simple in their manners that the noblemen could
scarcely be distinguished from the peasants. There was not a town then in
the whole province, the people clustered together in villages, which were
divided into parishes. Some of these lay along the rivers and lakes, others
were hidden among the mountains, and were only to be approached by the
steepest and most difficult of paths.
Gustavus took with him as he supposed the most faithful of all his
servants, but the cowardly man thought the fortunes of his master much too
insecure to be followed, and contrived to get away from him with the
valuable things it had been his duty to carry. Gustavus soon found out his
treachery, and pursued him until his horse could go no farther; then, being
in great danger himself, he was obliged to leave the horse and the few
things he had with him on the road and run for very life. Thus, without
friends or money, clad in a coarse peasant's frock, he wandered about the
dark pine forests and the mountains, only occasionally finding a roof to
shelter his head from the inclement winter nights, or food to satisfy his
sharp hunger. Still he never despaired, but trusted that God would let him
live until he should have given back to his country the happiness it had
lost for so long.
On the last day of November he arrived at Fahlun, and there he cut his hair
short, and put on a round hat, such as the Dalecarlians wore, and a rough
woollen vest, and set out with an axe on his shoulder in search of work. In
a little time he found employment in the mines of Fahlun, by which he
earned barely enough for his support; and finding that the noxious vapours
and the closeness of the mines impaired his health, he left them, and
wandered farther until he came to the house of a rich man named Andres
Fehrson. Here he was hired as a farm-labourer, and set to work in the
barns. The other farm-servants soon began to watch the new comer with
interest. In their intercourse with him they soon found that he was not
quite like one of themselves; he had been observed, too, to wear a rich
silken handkerchief, beneath his woollen vest, and they suspected that he
was some nobleman in disguise. Reports of this reached the ears of Fehrson,
and he desired that the stranger should come to him. The very moment he saw
him he recognised him as a fellow student in the school at Upsal, but
although he was very glad to see his old comrade again, he dared not keep
so dangerous a person in his house, and he urged him to go higher up the
mountains and not to stay too long a time in one place. Gustavus was
therefore obliged to set out on his wearisome travels once more: the winter
had set in with all its rigour, the lakes and rivers were frozen, and as he
was crossing some ice between Wika and Torsanga, a part of it gave way, and
he fell up to his shoulders in the water, and was very nearly drowned.
However, he managed to clamber out, and he found his way to a cottage,
where some kind peasants gave him food and shelter, and afterwards brought
him to the country house of Arendt Fehrson, a relation of Andres, who had
served under Gustavus in the war with the Danes.
This man appeared to receive him with respect and courtesy, but soon after
his arrival he rode swiftly to one of his friends to tell him of the prize
concealed in his house, and to ask him to join him in making the affair
known to the king;--for it will be remembered that a heavy price had been
set upon the head of Gustavus--and the man who would have been base enough
to betray him would have reaped great gain to himself. This friend was too
honourable to listen to such a proposal, and Fehrson, enraged at his
refusal, went to another of his friends, an officer in the Danish service,
who had fewer scruples. Fehrson passed the evening at his house in feasting
and drinking, and it was planned between them that he should return home
the next morning, accompanied by twenty men, and seize the fugitive by
force.
But Barbro Stigsdotter, the wife of Fehrson, had guessed the treachery of
her husband, for she had seen him ride past his own house as he came from
Magno Wilson, and take the road which led to the officer's dwelling.
Touched with pity, she warned Gustavus of his danger, and kindly provided
him with a horse and sledge, so that he might fly at once.
Gustavus was very thankful to avail himself of the means of escape, and was
soon flitting over the snow in his sledge beneath the starry sky in search
of another place of refuge. The next morning, when Arendt Fehrson arrived
with his twenty men, he was told that his guest had been missing since the
evening before, and that no one knew whither he was gone.
Gustavus at last reached the house of a true friend, a Swedish pastor, who
helped him with good advice during the eight days he remained with him, and
strengthened him in his resolve to arouse the Dalecarlians. But he dared
not stay longer in this part of the country, because Arendt Fehrson had
already spread the report of his being alive; and the pastor drove him to
the village of Isale, where he was received into the cottage of an honest
peasant named Swen Nilson, who did him good and faithful service.
One day when Gustavus was standing in the cottage, clad in his peasant's
garb, which was beginning to be the worse for wear, a body of Danish
soldiers employed to track the fugitive, rushed in, breathless and anxious,
and asked if a young nobleman, a well known traitor to the king, were not
concealed about the place. Nilson answered, No; and his wife, to remove
suspicion, gave Gustavus a sharp blow with a long wooden spoon, and scolded
him loudly for standing idle instead of going to work in the barn with the
others. Gustavus took the hint, and hastened out of the cottage, thus
escaping from his pursuers, who did not for one moment suppose that the
general of the Swedish army, and the descendant of kings, was concealed
beneath so humble a disguise.
[Illustration: Front. _Gustavus Vasa in the Swedish peasant's hut.--p.
100_]
After this Swen Nilson had the courage to drive his guest in a cart loaded
with straw to Rattwik. It was a dangerous journey: the Danish soldiers
guarded all the passes and bridges, and some of them plunged their weapons
into the straw, and wounded Gustavus severely in the leg as he lay covered
up at the bottom of the cart. He bore the pain in silence, but
unfortunately the blood dripped from the wound through the cart, and would
have betrayed the fact that he lay hidden there, had not Nilson thought of
cutting open the heel of his horse, so that the blood appeared to be
trickling from that. Happily the hurt was not dangerous, and the moment
after it was bound up on his arrival at Rattwik, Gustavus went to the
church, where a great crowd of people had assembled, and without making
himself known, he told them of the horrible cruelty of the King of Denmark,
and how Sweden would never be free unless they roused themselves, as their
brave ancestors would have done, to shake off the shameful bondage.
The peasants listened in horror, they were moved by his words, and said
they would take up arms as soon as they could find out how their neighbours
were disposed in the matter. Gustavus thought he had gained something, and
went on joyfully to Mora, the largest and most populous parish in the
valley. The news of his coming got spread abroad, and the Danish governor,
who dwelt in the strong castle of Westeras, began to tremble; he knew that
the inhabitants of the valleys, if once aroused, could make themselves
very terrible. So he doubled the heavy price already set upon the head of
Gustavus, and told the people around that none of the deeds reported to be
done at Stockholm had really been carried out, and that Christiern was a
most kind and merciful sovereign!
It was Christmas-time when Gustavus arrived in Mora: the peasants had come
down from their distant mountain homes to make merry with their friends in
the valley, and one day he went up to the top of a hill, and spoke to a
vast concourse of people, who had followed him out of curiosity. Here again
some of the peasants were touched by his words; their eyes filled with
tears, and they signified by their shouts and cheers that they were willing
to aid him. But others were of a different mind; they did not want to go to
war; the nobles had hitherto been chiefly the objects of the king's
cruelty, and they thought that they should be left in peace themselves.
They were very near fetching their weapons, and chasing the speaker by
force from the spot. A turn of good fortune, however, came to Gustavus
whilst he was still at Mora.
A party of a hundred Danes, having heard that he was there in the hope of
rousing the peasants, rushed suddenly upon the place, making the air
resound with their wild cries, and threatening to put every one they met to
the sword if he were not given up. The peaceful people of Mora were unused
to be thus disturbed, and they hastened to ring the church-bells, which
were only rung when some great danger was at hand. The wind carried the
sound of the bells to the neighbouring villages, and in a little while
some thousand armed peasants were seen pouring into Mora. They stormed the
great walled-in court around the pastor's house, where the Danes (alarmed
in their turn) had taken refuge, broke down its gates with heavy wooden
stakes, and only spared the lives of the soldiers on condition that they
should not attempt to lay hands on Gustavus. This was the first time that
arms had been taken up in his cause: it was a feeling of honour that
prompted the Dalecarlian peasants to defend him, because they said that
they should have been ashamed if any one demanding their help had been
taken by force from amongst them.
Gustavus, thankful to his preservers, now quitted Mora, and took his way
towards the western valleys, so that he might conceal himself in the wilder
parts of the country, if the fury of his pursuers increased. Many Swedish
nobles had already fled thither, and they came out of their hiding-places,
and met together in the valley. And there came to Mora an old man named
Lars Olosson, who had always been faithful to his country, and another
brave man came from the forest, and entreated the people to take up arms.
The peasants now saw that they were in earnest, and they hastened to seek
for Gustavus, fearing that he might already have passed the boundary and
entered Norway. But Swedish messengers can go on their errands very
quickly, because all through their nine months of dreary winter the
peasants wear long sliding-shoes, which enable them to flit over the snow
with almost the speed of an arrow. These shoes are very strange looking
things; they are long, narrow pieces of fir-wood, the one worn on the
right foot being three feet in length, and that on the left foot seven. The
messengers found Gustavus in a parish called Lima, and he was joyful indeed
when he came back to Mora, and saw that two hundred peasants were ready to
follow him at once. Their numbers soon increased, and he divided them into
little companies, which had their headquarters, so that they could all
fight in unity: they were hardy, long-lived men, and could be quite content
to live upon coarse meal stirred in water, or a little bread made of the
bark of the trees if they could get no better food. And Gustavus still went
up the steep mountain paths from cottage to cottage, and from one country
house to another to try and persuade the people to help him, and before the
ice had melted on the rivers and lakes the number of his followers had
increased to several thousand. He chose sixteen of the youngest and bravest
for his bodyguard, and maintained strict discipline amongst his men,
although he was greatly beloved by them for his kindness of heart.
The first attempt they made was on the strong castle of the Governor of the
Koppar Mountain, which they captured, together with the stores of
provisions it contained. Amongst these was a large chest full of money,
which Gustavus divided amongst his followers, and another day they captured
some pieces of silk, which they made into banners, but they had neither
powder nor balls as yet.
Now that Gustavus had so large an army he wanted to begin the war by a bold
stroke, and he drew off towards Westeras, the governor of the strong
fortress there, being at the time absent in Stockholm. Here he gained a
great victory over the Danes, which prepared the way to future success, but
the manner in which a great part of his army rejoiced over the triumph they
had won, was not at all to his taste. It happened thus: some of his troops
had gone on in advance, and after a desperate struggle got possession of
the place, whilst Gustavus was still in the forest with the rear of his
army. After the affray they found some huge casks of wine and brandy, which
they carried off to the Council House, and foolishly regaled themselves
with until they all fell to quarrelling, or were heavy with sleep. The
greatest disorder prevailed; the Danes took advantage of the tumult to
renew the attack; and would have recovered the fortress had not Gustavus
appeared with the rest of the army. He was very angry indeed with his men,
and had to fight hard to drive back the Danes, so that a great number of
soldiers were killed on either side; and when the battle was over he caused
the hoops to be removed from the casks of wine that remained, and let it
all flow away on the ground in sight of his whole army. This was in the
month of May in the year 1521, when the short Swedish spring was changing
to summer, and the land, having cast off its mantle of snow, looked fresh,
and green, and full of hope. In the northern climes the flowers bloom, and
the leaves come back to the trees very quickly, and a few weeks sunshine is
sufficient to ripen the barley and the rye, or the corn, in the places
where it will grow.
After the battle of Westeras the peasants armed themselves in the plains of
Sweden; the nobles headed them, and many officers deserted from the
Viceroy whom King Christiern had left in Stockholm to manage the affairs of
the State. The Viceroy and Trolle were friends; they soon began to be
greatly alarmed; but they could get no succour from Denmark because the
people there disliked them so much, and were getting so tired of the evil
doings of their king. Many battles were fought, and the Swedes were not
always successful, but at last Gustavus got possession of Stockholm after
having besieged it three times; and a happy day came, when he entered the
capital surrounded by senators, officers, and the first nobles in the land,
and repaired to the great church, where--kneeling at the foot of the
altar,--he thanked the Almighty aloud, for having preserved him through so
many dangers, and granted him success. And then he went to the palace,
where he wept for those whom he had loved very dearly, and now missed on
this day of his triumph. Not only had his father and his brother-in-law
perished in the massacre at Stockholm, but his mother Cecilia, and two of
his sisters, had been cruelly put to death during the siege. It is said
that if the siege had been raised their lives would have been spared, but
these brave women knew in that case their country would have been lost, and
they were content to die for its sake.
In the year 1523 the Danes would not have Christiern to reign over them any
longer, and made his uncle Frederic, Duke of Holstein, king in his stead.
Christiern was forced to leave the country, and retired into Flanders, with
his wife and children. When Sigbritt had to leave the royal palace, she did
not dare venture out of it, even in disguise, and was carried to the
vessel destined to receive her concealed in a large chest.
The Swedes, full of gratitude and love for their preserver, wanted him to
be crowned King of Sweden. Gustavus, however, refused this honour, and
governed the country for some time as administrator. But as the years went
on and it was in danger from the plots made by the Roman Catholics and the
friends of Christiern, he yielded to the wishes of the people, and in June,
1527, was solemnly crowned King of Sweden under the title of Gustavus the
First. He had long forgiven all the offences that had been offered him,
whilst he remembered every little act of kindness that had been shown him
when he was wandering about, a wretched fugitive, in hourly danger of his
life. During the thirty-three years he reigned his great care was to make
his subjects happy, and he was fully employed in setting his country in
order, after the misery it had suffered for so many years. It was Gustavus
who settled the Protestant faith throughout the land, and Luther, and
Melancthon, and other great Protestant divines, used frequently to visit
his court. He wished to inspire his people with a taste for arts and
sciences, and encouraged learning by inviting studious and clever men to
Stockholm: printing had been already introduced into Sweden about the year
1483, when Sten Sture the Elder founded the famous School or University at
Stockholm. The king employed his peasants in working fresh mines and salt
springs; he caused hops to be grown in Sweden, so that the iron sent out
yearly in exchange for that produce might be kept in the country, and prove
the source of comfort and wealth. Any merchant or tradesman convicted of
dishonesty was punished with extreme rigour, and the bad laws were done
away with, and good ones ordained in their place. The palace was open to
all who demanded audience, when the king was ever ready to hear complaints,
or to give advice. He thought the Bible the best of all books, and grounded
his actions on its holy precepts; and the Swedes were so happy under his
just and merciful rule that they always cried when he went abroad, "Long
live Gustavus, the best loved of kings!" Soon after he came to the throne
he married Catherine, daughter of the Duke of Magnus, whose sister had just
espoused the Crown Prince of Denmark. Catherine died young, and Gustavus
next married Margaret, daughter of an ancient senator, the Governor of East
Gothnia: this lady was amiable and beautiful, and made her husband and her
children very happy. The king used to tell his children not to be proud of
their high estate, saying, "One man is as good as another, and when the
play is over we are all equal;" meaning, when the life of trial upon earth
was ended. The only approach to vanity in his character was to be seen in
his love for magnificent apparel; but this was quite an excusable fault,
when it is remembered how content he was to wear the coarse peasant's dress
in the days of his misfortunes.