same cold, steely sunshine. In the midst stands a stalwart
form, in quaint but regal attire. Hot blood deepens the
colour of his sun-bronzed cheek; an iron purpose gleams
in his earnest eyes, like the flash of a drawn sword; a
circlet of gold binds the massive brow, and from beneath
it stream to below his waist thick masses of hair, of
that dusky red which glows like the heart of a furnace
in the sunlight, but deepens earth-brown in the shadow.
By his side stands a fair woman; her demure and heavy-lidded
eyes are seldom lifted from the earth, which yet they
seem to scorn, but the king's eyes rest on her, and many
looks are turned towards him. A multitude is present,
moved by one great event, swayed by a thousand
passions,--some with garrulous throats full of base
adulation and an unworthy joy,--some pale, self-scorning,
with averted looks, and hands that twitch instinctively
at their idle daggers, then drop hopeless, harmless at
their sides.
The king is Harald Haarfager, "of the fair hair," the
woman is proud and beautiful Gyda, whose former scorn
for him, in the days when he was nothing but the petty
chief of a few barren mountains, provoked that strange
wild vow of his, "That he would never clip or comb his
locks till he could woo her as sole king of Norway."
Among the crowd are those who have bartered, for ease,
and wealth, and empty titles born of the king's
breath--their ancient Udal rights, their Bonder privileges;
others have sunk their proud hearts to bear the yoke of
the stronger hand, yet gaze with yearning looks on the
misty horizon that opens between the hills. A dark speck
mars that shadowy line. Thought follows across the space.
It is a ship. Its sides are long, and black, and low;
but high in front rises the prow, fashioned into the
semblance of a gigantic golden dragon, against whose
gleaming breast the divided waters angrily flash and
gurgle. Along the top sides of the deck are hung a row
of shining shields, in alternate breadths of red and
white, like the variegated scales of a sea-monster, whilst
its gilded tail curls aft over the head of the steersman.
From either flank projects a bank of some thirty oars,
that look, as they smite the ocean with even beat, like
the legs on which the reptile crawls over its surface.
One stately mast of pine serves to carry a square sail
made of cloth, brilliant with stripes of red, white, and
blue.
And who are they who navigate this strange, barbaric
vessel?--why leave they the sheltering fiords of their
beloved Norway? They are the noblest hearts of that noble
land--freemen, who value freedom,--who have abandoned
all rather than call Harald master, and now seek a new
home even among the desolate crags of Iceland, rather
than submit to the tyranny of a usurper.
"Rorb--ober Gud! wenn nur bie Geelen gluben!"
Another picture, and a sadder story; but the scene is
now a wide dun moor, on the slope of a seaward hill; the
autumn evening is closing in, but a shadow darker than
that of evening broods over the desolate plain,--the
shadow of DEATH. Groups of armed men, with stern sorrow
in their looks, are standing round a rude couch, hastily
formed of fir branches. An old man lies there--dying.
His ear is dulled even to the shout of victory; the mists
of an endless night are gathering in his eyes; but there
is passion yet in the quivering lip, and triumph on the
high-resolved brow; and the gesture of his hand has kingly
power still. Let me tell his saga, like the bards of that
old time.
HACON'S LAST BATTLE.
I.
All was over: day was ending
As the foeman turned and fled.
Gloomy red
Glowed the angry sun descending;
While round Hacon's dying bed,
Tears and songs of triumph blending,
Told how fast the conqueror bled
II.
"Raise me," said the King. We raised him--
Not to ease his desperate pain;
That were vain!
"Strong our foe was--but we faced him
Show me that red field again."
Then, with reverent hands, we placed him
High above the bloody plain.
III.
Silent gazed he; mute we waited,
Kneeling round-a faithful few,
Staunch and true,--
Whilst above, with thunder freighted,
Wild the boisterous north wind blew,
And the carrion-bird, unsated,
On slant wing around us flew.
IV.
Sudden, on our startled hearing,
Came the low-breathed, stern command--
"Lo! ye stand?
Linger not, the night is nearing;
Bear me downwards to the strand,
Where my ships are idly steering
Off and on, in sight of land."
V.
Every whispered word obeying,
Swift we bore him down the steep,
O'er the deep,
Up the tall ship's side, low swaying
To the storm-wind's powerful sweep,
And--his dead companions laying
Round him,--we had time to weep.
VI.
But the King said--"Peace! bring hither
Spoil and weapons--battle-strown,
Make no moan;
Leave me and my dead together,
Light my torch, and then--begone."
But we murmured, each to other,
"Can we leave him thus alone?"
VII.
Angrily the King replieth;
Flash the awful eyes again,
With disdain--
"Call him not alone who lieth
Low amidst such noble slain;
Call him not alone who dieth
Side by side with gallant men."
VIII.
Slowly, sadly, we departed:
Reached again that desolate shore,
Nevermore
Trod by him, the brave true-hearted--
Dying in that dark ship's core!
Sadder keel from land ne'er parted,
Nobler freight none ever bore!
IX.
There we lingered, seaward gazing,
Watching o'er that living tomb,
Through the gloom--
Gloom! which awful light is chasing--
Blood-red flames the surge illume!
Lo! King Hacon's ship is blazing;
'Tis the hero's self-sought doom.
X.
Right before the wild wind driving,
Madly plunging--stung by fire--
No help nigh her--
Lo! the ship has ceased her striving!
Mount the red flames higher--higher!
Till--on ocean's verge arriving,
Sudden sinks the Viking's pyre--
Hacon's gone!
Let me call one more heroic phantom from Norway's romantic
past.
A kingly presence, stately and tall; his shield held high
above his head--a broken sword in his right hand. Olaf
Tryggvesson! Founder of Nidaros;--that cold Northern Sea
has rolled for many centuries above your noble head, and
yet not chilled the battle heat upon your brow, nor
staunched the blood that trickles down your iron glove,
from hidden, untold wounds, which the tender hand of
Thyri shall never heal!
To such ardent souls it is indeed given "to live for
ever" (the for ever of this world); for is it not "Life"
to keep a hold on OUR affections, when their own passions
are at rest,--to influence our actions (however
indirectly)--when action is at an end for them? Who shall
say how much of modern heroism may owe its laurels to
that first throb of fiery sympathy which young hearts
feel at the relation of deeds such as Olaf Tryggvesson's?
The forms of those old Greeks and Romans whom we are
taught to reverence, may project taller shadows on the
world's stage; but though the scene be narrow here, and
light be wanting, the interest is not less intense, nor
are the passions less awful that inspired these ruder
dramas.
There is an individuality in the Icelandic historian's
description of King Olaf that wins one's interest--at
first as in an acquaintance--and rivets it at last as in
a personal friend. The old Chronicle lingers with such
loving minuteness over his attaching qualities, his
social, generous nature, his gaiety and "frolicsomeness;"
even his finical taste in dress, and his evident proneness
to fall too hastily in love, have a value in the portrait,
as contrasting with the gloomy colours in which the story
sinks at last. The warm, impulsive spirit speaks in every
action of his life, from the hour when--a young child,
in exile--he strikes his axe into the skull of his
foster-father's murderer, to the last grand scene near
Svalderoe. You trace it in his absorbing grief for the
death of Geyra, the wife of his youth; the saga says,
"he had no pleasure in Vinland after it," and then naively
observes, "he therefore provided himself with war-ships,
and went a-plundering," one of his first achievements
being to go and pull down London Bridge. This peculiar
kind of "distraction" (as the French call it) seems to
have had the desired effect, as is evident in the romantic
incident of his second marriage, when the Irish Princess
Gyda chooses him--apparently an obscure stranger--to be
her husband, out of a hundred wealthy and well-born
aspirants to her hand. But neither Gyda's love, nor the
rude splendours of her father's court, can make Olaf
forgetful of his claims upon the throne of Norway--the
inheritance of his father; and when that object of his
just ambition is attained, and he is proclaimed King by
general election of the Bonders, as his ancestor Harald
Haarfager had been, his character deepens in earnestness
as the sphere of his duties is enlarged. All the energies
of his ardent nature are put forth in the endeavour to
convert his subjects to the true Faith. As he himself
expresses it, "he would bring it to this,--that all
Norway should be Christian or die!" In the same spirit
he meets his heretic and rebellious subjects at the Thing
of Lade, and boldly replies, when they require him to
sacrifice to the false gods, "If I turn with you to offer
sacrifice, then shall it be the greatest sacrifice that
can be made; I will not offer slaves, nor malefactors to
your gods,--I will sacrifice men;--and they shall be the
noblest men among you!" It was soon after this that he
despatched the exemplary Thangbrand to Iceland.
With a front not less determined does he face his country's
foes. The king of Sweden, and Svend "of the forked beard,"
king of Denmark, have combined against him. With them
is joined the Norse jarl, Eric, the son of Hacon. Olaf
Tryggvesson is sailing homewards with a fleet of seventy
ships,--himself commanding the famous "Long Serpent,"
the largest ship built in Norway. His enemies are lying
in wait for him behind the islands.
Nothing can be more dramatic than the description of
the sailing of this gallant fleet--(piloted by the treacherous
Earl Sigwald)--within sight of the ambushed Danes and
Swedes, who watch from their hiding-place the beautiful
procession of hostile vessels, mistaking each in turn for the
"Long Serpent," and as often undeceived by a new and yet
more stately apparition. She appears at length, her dragon
prow glittering in the sunshine, all canvas spread, her
sides bristling with armed men; "and when they saw her,
none spoke, all knew it to be indeed the 'Serpent,'--and
they went to their ships to arm for the fight." As soon as
Olaf and his forces had been enticed into the narrow
passage, the united fleets of the three allies pour out of the
Sound; his people beg Olaf to hold on his way and not
risk battle with such a superior force; but the King replied,
high on the quarter-deck where he stood, "Strike the
sails! I never fled from battle: let God dispose of my life,
but flight I will never take!" He then orders the warhorns
to sound, for all his ships to close up to each other.
"Then," says Ulf the Red, captain of the forecastle, "if
the 'Long Serpent' is to lie so much a-head of the other
vessels, we shall have hot work of it here on the forecastle."
The King replies, "I did not think I had a forecastle
man afraid, as well as red." [Footnote: There is a play
on these two words in the Icelandic, "Raudau oc Ragan."]
Says Ulf, "Defend thou the quarter-deck, as _I_ shall
the forecastle."
The King had a bow in his hands; he laid an arrow on the
string, and made as if he aimed at Ulf.
Ulf said, "Shoot another way, King, where it is more
needful,--my work is thy gain."
Then the King asks, "Who is the chief of the force right
opposite to us?" He is answered, "Svend of Denmark, with
his army."
Olaf replies, "We are not afraid of these soft Danes!
Who are the troops on the right?"
They answer, "Olaf of Sweden, and his forces."
"Better it were," replies the King, "for these Swedes to
be sitting at home, killing their sacrifices, than
venturing under the weapons of the 'Long Serpent.' But
who owns the large ships on the larboard side of the
Danes?"
"That is Jarl Eric, son of Hacon," say they.
The King says, "He has reason for meeting us; we may
expect hard blows from these men; they are Norsemen like
ourselves."
The fierce conflict raged for many hours. It went hard
with the "soft Danes," and idolatrous Swedes, as Olaf
had foreseen: after a short struggle they turn and fly.
But Jarl Eric in his large ship the "Iron Beard" is more
than a match for Olafs lighter vessels. One by one their
decks are deluged with blood, their brave defenders swept
into the sea; one by one they are cut adrift and sent
loose with the tide. And now at last the "Iron Beard"
lies side by side with the "Long Serpent," and it is
indeed "hot work" both on forecastle and quarter-deck.
"Einar Tambarskelvar, one of the sharpest of bowmen,
stood by the mast, and shot with his bow." His arrow hits
the tiller-end, just over the Earl's head, and buries
itself up to the shaft in the wood. "Who shot that bolt?"
says the Jarl. Another flies between his hand and side,
and enters the stuffing of the chief's stool. Then said
the Jarl to a man named Fin, "Shoot that tall archer by
the mast!" Fin shoots; the arrow hits the middle of
Einar's bow as he is in the act of drawing it, and the
bow is split in two.
"What is that," cried King Olaf, "that broke with such
a noise?"
"NORWAY, King, from thy hands!" cried Einar.
"No! not so much as that," says the King; "take my bow,
and shoot,"--flinging the bow to him.
Einar took the bow, and drew it over the head of the
arrow. "Too weak, too weak," said he, "for the bow of a
mighty King!" and throwing the bow aside, "he took sword
and buckler, and fought valiantly."
But Olaf's hour is come. Many slain lie around him, many
that have fallen by his hand, more that have fallen at
his side. The thinned ranks on board the "Iron Beard"
are constantly replenished by fresh combatants from other
vessels, even by the Swedes and soft Danes, now "strong,
upon the stronger side,"--while Olaf, cut off from succour,
stands almost alone upon the "Serpent's" deck, made
slippery by his people's blood. The jarl had laid out
boats to intercept all who might escape from the ship;
but escape is not in the King's thoughts. He casts one
look around him, glances at his sword--broken like Einar's
bow--draws a deep breath, and, holding his shield above
his head, springs overboard. A shout--a rush! who shall
first grasp that noble prisoner? Back, slaves! the shield
that has brought him scathless through a hundred fights,
shall yet shelter him from dishonour.
Countless hands are stretched to snatch him back to
worthless life, but the shield alone floats on the swirl
of the wave;--King Olaf has sunk beneath it.
Perhaps you have already had enough of my Saga lore; but
with that grey cathedral full in sight, I cannot but
dedicate a few lines to another Olaf, king and warrior
like the last, but to whom after times have accorded a
yet higher title.
Saint Olaf's--Saint Olave, as we call him--early history
savours little of the odour of sanctity, but has rather
that "ancient and fish-like smell" which characterised
the doings of the Vikings, his ancestors. But those were
days when honour rather than disgrace attached to the
ideas of booty and plunder, especially in an enemy's
country; it was a "spoiling of the Egyptians" sanctioned
by custom, and even permitted by the Church, which did
not disdain occasionally to share in the profits of a
successful cruise, when presented in the decent form of
silver candlesticks and other ecclesiastical gauds. As
to the ancient historian, he mentions these matters as
a thing of course. "Here the King landed, burnt, and
ravaged;" "there the Jarl gained much booty;" "this
summer, they took a cruise in the Baltic, to gather
property," etc., much as a modern biographer would speak
of a gentleman's successful railroad speculations, his
taking shares in a coal mine, or coming into a "nice
little thing in the Long Annuities." Nevertheless, there
is something significant of his future vocation, in a
speech which Olaf makes to his assembled friends and
relations, imparting to them his design of endeavouring
to regain possession of the throne: "I and my men have
nothing for our support save what we captured in war,
FOR WHICH WE HAVE HAZARDED BOTH LIFE AND SOUL; for many
an innocent man have we deprived of his property, and
some of their lives, and foreigners are now sitting in
the possessions of my fathers." One sees here a faint
glimmer of the Saint's nimbus, over the helmet of the
Viking, a dawning perception of the "rights of property,"
which, no doubt, must have startled his hearers into the
most ardent conservative zeal for the good old marauding
customs.
But though years elapsed, and fortunes changed, before
this dim light of the early Church became that scorching
and devouring flame which, later, spread terror and
confusion among the haunts of the still lingering ancient
gods, an earnest sense of duty seems to have been ever
present with him. If it cannot be denied that he shared
the errors of other proselytizing monarchs, and put down
Paganism with a stern and bloody hand, no merely personal
injury ever weighed with him. How grand is his reply to
those who advise him to ravage with fire and sword the
rebellious district of Throndhjem, as he had formerly
punished numbers of his subjects who had rejected
Christianity:--"We had then GOD'S honour to defend; but
this treason against their sovereign is a much less
grievous crime; it is more in my power to spare those
who have dealt ill with me, than those whom God hated."
The same hard measure which he meted to others he applied
to his own actions: witness that curiously characteristic
scene, when, sitting in his high seat, at table, lost in
thought, he begins unconsciously to cut splinters from
a piece of fir-wood which he held in his hand. The table
servant, seeing what the King was about, says to him,
(mark the respectful periphrasis!) "IT IS MONDAY, SIRE,
TO-MORROW." The King looks at him, and it came into his
mind what he was doing on a Sunday. He sweeps up the
shavings he had made, sets fire to them, and lets them
burn on his naked hand; "showing thereby that he would
hold fast by God's law, and not trespass without
punishment."
But whatever human weaknesses may have mingled with the
pure ore of this noble character, whatever barbarities
may have stained his career, they are forgotten in the
pathetic close of his martial story.
His subjects,--alienated by the sternness with which he
administers his own severely religious laws, or corrupted
by the bribes of Canute, king of Denmark and England,
are fallen from their allegiance. The brave, single-hearted
monarch is marching against the rebellious Bonders, at
the head of a handful of foreign troops, and such as
remained faithful among his own people. On the eve of
that last battle, on which he stakes throne and life, he
intrusts a large sum of money to a Bonder, to be laid
out "on churches, priests, and alms-men, as gifts for
the souls of such as may fall in battle AGAINST
HIMSELF,"--strong in the conviction of the righteousness
of his cause, and the assured salvation of such as upheld
it.
He makes a glorious end. Forsaken by many whom he had
loved and served,--yet forgiving and excusing them;
rejecting the aid of all who denied that holy Faith which
had become the absorbing interest of his life,--but
surrounded by a faithful few, who share his fate; "in
the lost battle, borne down by the flying"--he falls,
transpierced by many wounds, and the last words on his
fervent lips are prayer to God. [Footnote: The exact date
of the battle of Sticklestad is known: an eclipse of the
sun occurred while it was going on.]
Surely there was a gallant saint and soldier. Yet he was
not the only one who bore himself nobly on that day.
Here is another episode of that same fatal fight.
A certain Thormod is one of the Scalds (or Poets) in King
Olaf's army. The night before the battle he sings a
spirited song at the King's request, who gives him a gold
ring from his finger in token of his approval. Thormod
thanks him for the gift, and says, "It is my prayer,
Sire, that we shall never part, either in life or death."
When the King receives his death-wound Thormod is near
him,--but, wounded himself, and so weak and weary that
in a desperate onslaught by the King's men,--nicknamed
"Dag's storm,"--HE ONLY STOOD BY HIS COMRADE IN THE
RANKS, ALTHOUGH HE COULD DO NOTHING.
The noise of the battle has ceased; the King is lying
dead where he fell. The very man who had dealt him his
death-wound has laid the body straight out on the ground,
and spread a cloak over it. "And when he wiped the blood
from the face it was very beautiful, and there was red
in the cheeks, as if he only slept."
Thormod, who had received a second wound as he stood in
the ranks--(an arrow in his side, which he breaks off at
the shaft),--wanders away towards a large barn, where
other wounded men have taken refuge. Entering with his
drawn sword in his hand, he meets one of the Bonders
coming out, who says, "It is very bad there, with howling
and screaming; and a great shame it is, that brisk young
fellows cannot bear their wounds. The King's men may have
done bravely to-day, but truly they bear their wounds
ill."
Thormod asks what his name is, and if he was in the
battle. Kimbe was his name, and he had been "with the
Bonders, which was the best side." "And hast thou been
in the battle too?" asks he of Thormod.
Thormod replies, "I was with them that had the best."
"Art thou wounded?" says Kimbe.
"Not much to signify," says Thormod.
Kimbe sees the gold ring, and says, "Thou art a King's
man: give me thy gold ring, and I will hide thee."
Thormod replies, "Take the ring if thou canst get it;
_I_ HAVE LOST THAT WHICH IS MORE WORTH."
Kimbe stretches out his hand to seize the ring; but
Thormod, swinging his sword, cuts off his hand; "and it
is related, that Kimbe behaved no better under his wound
than those he had just been blaming."
Thormod then enters the house where the wounded men are
lying, and seats himself in silence by the door.
As the people go in and out, one of them casts a look at
Thormod, and says, "Why art thou so dead pale? Art thou
wounded?" He answers carelessly, with a half-jesting
rhyme; then rises and stands awhile by the fire. A woman,
who is attending on those who are hurt, bids him "go out,
and bring in firewood from the door." He returns with
the wood, and the girl then looking him in the face,
says, "Dreadfully pale is this man;" and asks to see his
wounds. She examines his wound in his side, and feels
that the iron of the arrow is still there; she then takes
a pair of tongs and tries to pull it out, "but it sat
too fast, and as the wound was swelled, little of it
stood out to lay hold of." Thormod bids her "cut deep
enough to reach the iron, and then to give him the tongs,
and let him pull." She did as he bade. He takes the ring
from his hand, and gives it to the girl, saying, "It is
a good man's gift! King Olaf gave it to me this morning."
Then Thormod took the tongs and pulled the iron out. The
arrow-head was barbed, and on it there hung some morsels
of flesh. When he saw that he said, "THE KING HAS FED US
WELL! I am fat, even at the heart-roots!" And so saying,
he leant back, and died. [Footnote: When a man was wounded
in the abdomen, it was the habit of the Norse leeches to
give him an onion to eat; by this means they learnt
whether the weapon had perforated the viscera.]
Stout, faithful heart! if they gave you no place in your
master's stately tomb, there is room for you by his side
in heaven!
I have at last received--I need not say how joyfully--two
letters from you; one addressed to Hammerfest. I had
begun to think that some Norwegian warlock had bewitched
the post-bags, in the approved old ballad fashion, to
prevent their rendering up my dues; for when the packet
of letters addressed to the "Foam" was brought on board,
immediately after our arrival, I alone got nothing. From
Sigurdr and the Doctor to the cabin-boy, every face was
beaming over "news from home!" while I was left to walk
the deck, with my hands in my pockets, pretending not to
care. But the spell is broken now, and I retract my evil
thoughts of the warlock and you.
Yesterday, we made an excursion as far as Lade, saw a
waterfall, which is one of the lions of this neighbourhood
(but a very mitigated lion, which "roars you as soft as
any sucking dove"), and returned in the evening to attend
a ball given to celebrate the visit of the Crown Prince.