WILD DARING OF SIGURD THE VIKING.
"When Greeks joined Greeks, then was the tug of war."
Nathaniel Lee.
It was a most grievous disappointment to Sigurd when the Saxon leaders
finally decided not to attack the Normans, and thus checkmate them as
they sought to capture the Saxons whilst in council. When he saw that
there was no hope of the Saxons uniting in this, he appealed most
importunately to Hereward to join him, but in vain. When everything
failed, so insatiate was his thirst for vengeance that he determined to
attack them single-handed, trusting to his prowess, and his familiarity
with the passes and the mountain retreats, to secure for himself
immunity from capture.
"If I had but a dozen of my hardy mountaineers, I would lead these
Normans a dance before this day was done!" he muttered, as he saw the
remnant of the Saxons departing. His hatred of the Normans had so eaten
into his soul, that every opportunity to attack them was a favourable
one, and he was ready for any scheme of wild daring if only Norman blood
could be spilled. So, alone, he grimly and resolutely strode up the
pass, until he reached a spot he deemed suitable for his purpose.
Boulders and bushes intermingled thickly on one side; on the other was a
precipice--a sheer drop of twenty feet into a trout-stream, which
threaded its way amid limestone boulders.
Behind him the gaunt, gloomy mountains shot up far away, their lower
parts covered thickly with bracken, bushes, and boulders; behind and
amid which a retreating figure need never be exposed for more than a
second at a time. Looking around for a second or two, he gave a grunt of
satisfaction, and then he climbed a few yards from the path, and laid
himself down amid the bracken and deep grass, with his broad sword
unsheathed and laid by his side, ready for the fray. Thus he waited for
the oncoming Norman soldiery. For more than an hour he lay thus in
ambush, with wild and turbulent passions fermenting in his breast, and a
wild look in his eyes--reason for the moment dethroned by this one
overmastering passion.
Presently on the still night air was borne the sound of stealthy
footsteps. Sigurd bounded to his feet as the first sounds broke upon his
ear. He fixed tightly his helmet, closed his visor, and adjusted his
coat of link-mail, which had swung a little awry. Then, grasping his
powerful broadsword, he made a vigorous lunge at an invisible foe, and
then, with a grunt of satisfaction, he took his stand behind a massive
boulder, flanked on the side next the advancing foe with a thick network
of shrubs, through which, however, he could watch the movements of the
Normans. The darkness was ebbing away fast. Already the morning's sun
had smitten the head of mighty Helvellyn in the distance, and bathed his
kingly head in a halo of golden glory; but substantial remains of
laggard night still hung moodily about the bottom of the pass, as though
nature, in shame and sadness, would fain cast her mantle over this mad
strife of men, and over the deed about to be enacted before her eyes.
Slowly, with hushed voices and stealthy tread, on came the unsuspecting
foe. The head of the column threaded its way past the lurking-place.
Sigurd clenched his sword with an impatient grip, for the sight of
Norman foemen, within reach of his sword, was well nigh more than he
could resist. On they passed, all unconscious that a human tiger was
lurking near and making ready for his spring. File after file of the
Normans strode on, mostly afoot, but some were leading their horses. Now
the rear men are abreast. A second more, their backs are seen. A spring
and a blow, and the hindmost Norman is cloven to the waist, and drops
with scarce a groan. There is a wild shriek, and consternation is
rampant amongst the rearmost ranks.
Sigurd, in mad rage, hacks and hews at the panic-stricken crew, cutting
down man after man with terrific celerity, whilst some, in their efforts
to escape his onslaught, fall over the precipice. Presently the Normans
discover that but one solitary Saxon attacks them. A shout goes up, "The
mad Saxon! Cut him down! Down with him! Run him through!" Immediately a
hundred swords are whipped from their scabbards, and a united rush is
directed towards him. Sigurd sees his chance is gone; he dashes along
the path in swift retreat, followed by the yelling foe. Presently he
darts from the path and makes for the hills, tearing through bracken,
furze, and brushwood, and leaping boulders with an agility none but a
mountaineer and a hunter who had been wont all his life to go swinging
over these mountain sides, until the sinews of his legs had become like
thongs of steel, could make pretence to imitate. Presently he turns to
glance at the crew behind, and he laughs a savage laugh as he sees them
huddling together like sheep at the bottom of the pass, some afraid to
follow, and all of them conscious of the hopelessness of it. With an
exclamation of contempt, he catches up a fragment of rock and hurls it
with terrific energy amongst them, striking one of them on the shoulder,
and knocking him to the ground with a broken shoulder-blade. Then, with
a hysterical laugh, and a fierce brandish aloft of his sword, he dashes
off again towards the summit. With wondering gaze the Normans watch him
scaling, ridge after ridge, the beetling brow of the hill far above
them, like a stag bounding from the hunter. Presently he darts over the
topmost ridge, and is lost to view. He halts in a tiny hollow of the
mountain's brow, and, pulling out his sword, dripping with gore, he
wipes it on the sward.
"Aha!" he cried, apostrophising the fearsome weapon; "One more taste of
blood! Norman blood, too. I love to see Norman blood. It drips, too;
that means more will soon be shed."[5] Then, running his hand along its
edge, he exclaimed, "Nothing blunted, my trusty friend Tyrfing,[6] ready
as ever for the fray!" he shouted in frenzy, and commenced to hack and
hew as though in deadly conflict with an invisible foe, the perspiration
pouring off him in streams. But human nature, though it be never so
strong, has its limits. This frenzied, this almost maniacal outburst,
was followed by complete physical exhaustion. Like a stone, he dropped
flat upon the ground, and there he lay without motion or any sign of
existence whatever for a full hour or more. Had the Normans but known of
the wild drama being enacted beyond the brow of the mountain, it would
have been a fatal day to Sigurd, for the Normans had had so many tastes
of his prowess, and of his mad daring, that they would have given large
treasure to have this dreaded foe within their power. But this was not
destined to be the last time when he should strike terror into their
ranks when they least suspected him.
[Footnote 5: It was a Norse superstition that if the blood flowed, more
would soon be shed.]
[Footnote 6: The foe hater.]
The sun had performed a considerable part of his day's journey when
Sigurd began to manifest signs of returning consciousness. First there
were sundry stretchings of the muscles, followed by a momentary
unclosing of the eyelids. Then he sat up and gazed around, as though
bewildered with his surroundings. By-and-by he seemed to recover a
recollection of the incidents preceding the stupor he had been passing
through. By an effort he rose to his feet, and staggered rather than
walked to a cool spring of water, which, born of the clouds which
constantly encircled these lofty peaks, was hurrying away with musical
ripple to the lowlands. He drank a hearty draught of the ice-cold water;
then he bathed his throbbing temples with it. Sitting down then, and
taking from a wallet slung behind him a substantial piece of roast kid's
flesh and a hunch of bread, he ate a hearty meal, and washed it down
with another copious draught of water. Much refreshed by this, he next
mounted to the topmost ridge. There, lying at full length, he ran his
eye most minutely over every inch of the valleys on either side,
carefully noting every suspicious object that came within the sweep of
his vision. Then, with equal care, he searched the adjacent hills. The
Normans he could see hurrying to and fro near their camp, some five
miles away. But apparently there was nothing at all menacing to his
position.
Rising to his feet, he strode along the ridge for a mile or two, then
commenced to descend for another mile or two, in an oblique direction,
until he disappeared from view in a dense wood, which covered the lower
reaches of the valley on either side. Holding a downward course, and
pushing aside the brushwood, he came ultimately to a stream of water,
which, with one gigantic leap, started from its rocky bed and leaped
unimpeded full eighty feet, falling into a deep, surging pool, where the
waters, finding a level, flowed sluggishly away. The vast amphitheatre
appeared to have been worn away by this leap of the waters, and by the
crumbling away of the softer shale below, which had undermined and
brought down the rocks from above.
This untamed warrior stood on the brink of the precipice with folded
arms. There was something in the scene which consorted with his rude and
rugged nature, and wonderfully soothed his warring passions. The daws,
with cawing clamorousness, flew to and fro across the abyss, and crept
into the crevices of the rock where their nests were. The swallows
skimmed along the surface of the waters, ever and anon darting upwards
to some skilfully made nest of baked clay, clinging to the rocky sides,
and from which little black heads were anxiously peeping, and twittering
lustily. Bird life here seemed to have found a veritable paradise, and
they literally thronged bush and tree, and rock and bank, everywhere.
Sigurd stood gazing down the ravine through an interminable labyrinth of
foliage-laden trees. Here was a grand solitude such as his soul loved,
and he regarded every tree in the forest as a personal friend. Presently
he turned to one side of this abyss, and steadfastly regarded three
stones which were laid side by side for a moment or two; then he altered
the position of one of them, and immediately dropped down on to a
shelving rock, and from that to another, and so on, until he had
descended a considerable distance. Then suddenly he disappeared on hands
and knees into an aperture of the rock which was completely hidden from
the view of any one standing above. As soon as this portal was passed,
he found himself in a spacious cavern, where evidently men were wont to
resort, for there were many things denoting human occupation. Sigurd
hastily threw off his armour and reared his sword, with the belt
appended, against the rock. Then he threw himself upon a couch of dried
bracken and grass, and was soon fast asleep.
Presently two wild-looking men appeared on the scene. One carried a
brace of rabbits, and the other had over his shoulder a young fawn;
whilst at their heels there followed a couple of fierce-looking hounds.
They looked at the three stones, and one of them exclaimed,--
"The Jarl is here!"
"Doubtful luck that," growled the other.
They, however, changed the position of the other two stones, and then
they followed their chieftain to his retreat. No sooner did they enter
than one prepared to light a fire, and the other to skin and dress the
animals they had brought. As soon as this was done, a huge iron pot was
suspended on cross-poles over the fire, with about a gallon of water. In
this were thrown a couple of haunches of venison with the rabbits. Then
one of them turned to a vessel in which a quantity of corn was steeping
in water. Two or three pounds of this, along with some savoury herbs and
roots, and a quantity of salt, were deposited in the pot. Then the pair
sat down to await the cooking of this substantial and savoury mess.
Whilst this was being done, Sigurd slept soundly, and the pair carried
on a conversation in a low tone, and interspersing their talk with
sundry nods and motions towards the sleeping chieftain.
"There will be stirring times again, now, I warrant," said one.
"Yes; plenty of blood-letting, and plenty of scurrying over the
mountains with the Normans at our heels," said the other.
"There will soon be none of us left, either for fight or aught else.
There has been a desperate thinning going on."
"Well, it won't be a cow's death, anyhow, and that is some comfort for
us."
Soon the boiling-pot began to send forth a most savoury and appetising
smell, to these half-famished men.
"Wake the Jarl," said one to the other; "he must first break his fast."
So one of them gave Sigurd a rough shaking, and he presently sat up and
rubbed his eyes; then he saluted his men.
"Skalds, how fare ye?"
"The hawks have not been so much abroad of late, so we have fared
tolerably."
"But ye'll soon have to be on the alert, for the old eagle has been
playing havoc with the hawks down in the pass yonder; a dozen of them at
least will swoop upon their prey no more. But I'll taste your stew. Hot
victuals have not been plentiful lately. Where are your comrades?"
"Scattered a good deal. There are a dozen lurking among the pikes. Some,
the family men, have snug quarters near Deepwaters."
"Make signals for them. We have been idle long enough. We must bestir
ourselves, for the Norman gets a tighter grip upon us every day we are
idle."