The Long Ships

CHAPTER ONE

CONCERNING THE BATTLE THAT WAS FOUGHT AT MALDON, AND WHAT CAME AFTER IT

THAT spring many ships were timbered along the coasts of the northern countries, and keels were pitched which had long lain dry. Bays and sounds vomited forth navies, with kings and their wrath aboard; and when summer came, there was great unrest upon the seas.

Styrbjörn rowed early up through the Eastern Sea, with many ships and men from Jomsborg, Bornholm, and Skania. He put into Lake Mälaren and came at length to the plain before Uppsala, where he and King Erik joined battle. There he fell, in the first moments of the fight, and men say that he died laughing. For when he saw the battle array of the Swedes move forward, drawn up in the ancient manner behind horses’ heads borne high upon pikes, with King Erik seated in the midst of his army in an old sacred ox-chariot, he threw his head back in a wild frenzy of laughter. In the same instant a spear came between his beard and the rim of his shield and took him in the throat. When his followers saw this happen, their courage broke, and many of them fled there and then, so that King Erik won a great victory.

Then King Sven Forkbeard rowed down through the Danish islands with ships from Fyn and Jutland to take King Harald as the latter sat counting his herring tax at Skanör; for King Sven had at last lost patience at his father’s unwillingness to die. But King Harald fled to Bornholm and gathered his ships there, and sharp encounters were fought between these two until at length King Harald took refuge in his fortress at Jomsborg, sorely wounded. Then much of the Danish kingdom was split with strife, for some men held King Harald’s cause to be just and some King Sven’s; others preferred to fend for themselves and better their own fortunes while the land lay lawless under its warring kings.

But when the summer stood in its flower, King Erik of Uppsala came sailing southwards, with the greatest army that the Swedes had embarked in any man’s memory, driving before him the remnants of Styrbjörn’s fleet, which had been harrying his coasts and plundering his villages in revenge for their chieftain’s death. King Erik had a mind to punish both King Harald and King Sven for the aid they had lent to Styrbjörn, and many men thought it an unrewarding prospect to oppose the man who had conquered Styrbjörn and who was already being called “the Victorious.” He pursued King Sven to his islands and beyond to Jutland, leaving his own jarls to rule the places through which he passed. Soon the rumor spread that King Harald had died of his wounds at Joms-borg, a landless refugee, deserted by the luck that had hitherto favored all his enterprises; but the other two kings continued to war against each other. King Erik held the upper hand, but King Sven resisted him stubbornly. Men reported that the royal castle at Jellinge changed hands every few weeks, King Sven and King Erik taking it in turns to occupy King Harald’s old bedchamber; but it was generally agreed that King Sven was the more likely to have arrived first at his father’s treasure-chests.

But in Skania there were many chieftains who felt little inclined to involve themselves in this war of kings, thinking it better to let them settle their own differences, so that honest men might be left to occupy themselves with more profitable undertakings. One such was Thorkel the Tall, who had no desire to serve King Sven and was still less anxious to find himself a minor thane of King Erik. So he sent word to other thanes and chieftains that he had a mind to fare forth that summer to Frisia and England, if he could find sufficient good men willing to accompany him. Many thought this a good scheme, for Thorkel was an admired chieftain, and his luck was held to be excellent, ever since he had succeeded in escaping with his life from the battle at Jörundfjord. Masterless men of Styrbjörn’s army, who had managed to evade King Erik’s clutches, also came to join him, and before long he was lying at anchor in the Sound off the island of Hven with twenty-two ships; but he did not as yet reckon himself sufficiently strong to fare forth.

Among those who had joined his banner was Orm Tostesson, known as Red Orm, from the Mound in Skania. He had brought with him a large and well-manned ship. Thorkel remembered him from the Christmas feast at King Harald’s castle and welcomed him joyfully.

It had so turned out with Orm that he had quickly wearied of sitting at home and arranging the affairs of cattle and farmhands; and he had found it difficult to live peaceably with Asa, though she did her best to make him happy. For she still regarded him as a half-grown boy and fussed continually over him with motherly counsel, as though he lacked the sagacity to manage things for himself. He did his best to explain to her that he had, for some years, been accustomed to deciding the affairs of other men as well as his own, but this information did not appear to impress her; nor did her zealous endeavors to convert him to her new religion and find him a wife improve his humor.

The news of King Harald’s death had come as a great relief to them both; for when Asa had first learned the truth about how Toke had got his woman, she had been overcome with terror and had been convinced that there was nothing for it but to sell the house and flee to the estate she had inherited from her father in the forests on the Smaland border, where even King Harald’s arm would scarcely be able to reach them. Her fear had been ended by the news of King Harald’s death; but Orm could not keep his thoughts from Ylva, and he worried more about her safety than about his own. Often he wondered what had become of her when her father had died; whether King Sven had taken her under his wing, as a prospective wife for one of his berserks, or whether, perhaps, she had fallen into the hands of the Swedes, the thought of which troubled him no less. Since he was on evil terms with King Sven, he could not think of any way in which he might regain her for himself, least of all while war was raging through and around the islands.

He said nothing about Ylva to Asa, for he had no wish to listen to the fruitless advice he knew she would immediately shower upon him. But he profited little thereby, for Asa knew several maidens in the district who would admirably suit his needs, and their mothers, being of the same mind as she, brought them to the house and displayed them newly washed, with their plaits fastened with red silk ribbons. The maidens came willingly and sat high-bosomed, a-clink with ornaments, shooting large-eyed glances at him; but he showed no enthusiasm for any of them, for none of them resembled Ylva or was as witty and ready-tongued as she was, so that in the end Asa grew impatient with him, and thought that even Odd had hardly been more difficult to please.

When, therefore, the news came that Thorkel intended to fare forth a-viking, Orm lost no time in procuring himself a good ship and hiring men from the district to come with him, paying little heed to Asa’s tears and entreaties. Everybody knew him to be a widely traveled man who had returned with much gold from his voyage, so that he found little difficulty in assembling a good crew. He told Asa that he did not expect to be away for as long this time as when he had previously set forth, and promised her that, when he returned, he would settle down to a peaceful life and take up farming in earnest. Asa wept, and protested that she could not endure such sorrow and loneliness, but Orm assured her that she would live much longer than he, and would help to birch his children, and his grandchildren to boot. But this only caused her to weep the more bitterly. So they parted, and Orm sailed to join Thorkel.

While Thorkel was still lying off Hven, waiting for a favorable wind, a fleet of twenty-eight ships came rowing up from the south; and from their banners and the cut of their stems it was apparent that they were Swedish. The weather was calm and good for fighting, and both sides made ready for battle; but Thorkel shouted across the water to the strangers, proclaiming his identity, and stating that he wished to speak with their chieftain. The Swedes were under the command of two chieftains, of equal sway. One was called Jostein, a man from Uppland, and the other Gudmund, an East Gute. They said they had come to help King Erik plunder in Denmark, and asked what more he wished to know.

“If our fleets join battle,” shouted Thorkel, “there will be little booty for the winners, and many men will be killed on both sides. I tell you this, though I am the more likely to prevail.”

“We have five ships more than you,” roared the strangers.

“That may be,” replied Thorkel. “But mine are all picked men, and we have just eaten our morning meal, while your men are weary from rowing, which makes a man less skillful with his spear and sword. But I have a better suggestion to make, which would redound to the advantage of us all; for I can name a more rewarding place than Denmark to go a-viking in.”

“We have come to aid King Erik,” shouted the Upplander.

“I do not doubt it,” replied Thorkel; “and if I join battle with you, I shall have given good aid to King Sven. But if, instead of fighting each other, we join forces and sail together to lands ripe for plunder, we shall have served our kings just as usefully as if we stay and battle it out here. For in either case none of us will take any further part in this war; and the difference will be that, if we do as I suggest, we shall all still be alive, with much fine booty waiting for us to come and collect it.”

“You use words skillfully,” said Gudmund. “There is wisdom in what you say, and I think we might profitably continue this discussion at closer quarters.”

“I know from report that you are both noble chieftains and honorable men,” said Thorkel. “Therefore I am not afraid that you will act treacherously if we meet to debate the matter.”

“I know your brother Sigvalde,” said Jostein, “but I have often heard it said that you, Thorkel, are of stouter mettle than he.”

So they agreed to meet on the island to debate the matter, on the beach at the foot of a cliff, in sight of the ships. Jostein and Gudmund were each to bring three men with them, and Thorkel five, bearing swords but no casting weapons. This was done, and from the ships the men of the opposing fleets marked how, at first, the chieftains kept their distance from each other, with their men standing close behind them. Then Thorkel ordered ale to be offered to the Swedes, together with pork and bread; and soon they were seen to sit down in a circle and talk as friends.

The more Jostein and Gudmund considered Thorkel’s proposition, the more excellent it appeared to them to be, and before long Gudmund was anxiously supporting it. Jostein at first held out against it, saying that King Erik had a savage memory for men who betrayed his trust in them; but Thorkel regaled them with details of the splendid plunder that awaited sea-rovers in the islands of the west, and Gudmund reckoned that they could worry about King Erik’s memory when the time came. Then they came to an agreement regarding the division of command during the voyage, and how the booty was to be shared out, so that no disputes should arise later; and Gudmund observed that so much meat and talk gave a man a fine thirst, and praised the excellence of Thorkel’s ale. Thorkel shook his head and said that it was, in truth, the best that he could offer them for the moment, but that it was nothing compared with the ale in England, where the best hops in the world grew. Then even Jostein had to agree that this sounded like a land worth voyaging to. So they took each other by the hand and swore to be faithful and to keep their word; then, when they had returned to their ships, three sheep were slaughtered over the bows of each chieftain’s vessel, as a sacrifice to the sea people for weather-luck and a good voyage. All the crews were well satisfied with the agreement that their chieftains had made; and Thorkel’s reputation, which was already great in the eyes of his men, waxed because of the wisdom he had displayed in this matter.

Several more ships came to join Thorkel, from Skania and Halland; and when, at last, a favorable wind arose, the fleet put forth, fifty-five sails strong, and spent the autumn plundering in Frisia, and wintered there.

Orm inquired of Thorkel and others of his comrades whether they knew what had become of King Harald’s household. Some said they had heard that Jellinge had been burned, others that Bishop Poppo had calmed the sea with psalms and escaped by ship, though King Sven had done his best to catch him. But none of them knew what had happened to the King’s women.

In England things were beginning to be as they had been in the old days, in the time of the sons of Ragnar Hairy-Breeks; for King Ethelred had come to the throne. He had not long come of age and taken the reins of government into his own hands before men began to call him the Irresolute, or the Redeless; and honest seafarers from the north flocked joyfully to his coasts to give him the chance to justify his reputation.

At first they came in small bodies and were easily repelled. Beacons were lit along the coasts to signify their arrival, and stout warriors armed with broad shields rushed to meet them and drive them back into the sea. But King Ethelred yawned at his table and offered up prayers against the Northmen, and lay cheerfully with his chieftains’ women. He screamed with rage when they brought word to him in his boudoir that in spite of his prayers the long ships had returned; he listened, fatigued, to much counsel and complained loudly at being thus inconvenienced, and otherwise did nothing. Then the invaders began to arrive more frequently and in stronger companies, till the King’s levies became inadequate to deal with them, and the larger bands of them would sometimes drive deep inland and return to their ships bent double under the weight of their booty; and the word spread abroad, and many believed it, that no kingdom could now compare with King Ethelred’s in wealth and fatness for valiant seafarers who came in good strength. For it was by now many years since England had been properly plundered, save in her coastal areas.

But as yet no large fleet had sailed there, and no chieftains had learned the art of demanding danegeld in minted silver from King Ethelred’s coffers. But in the year of grace 991 both these deficiencies were remedied; and thereafter there was no lack of men willing to be instructed in this art as long as King Ethelred was there to pay good silver to such as came and asked for it.

Soon after the Easter of that year, which was the fifth year after King Ethelred’s coming of age, the beacons were lit along the Kentish coasts. Men gazed pale-faced into the morning mists and turned and ran to hide what they could and drive their cattle into the forests and take themselves into hiding with them, and word was sent to King Ethelred and his jarls as fast as horse could ride that the biggest fleet that had been sighted for many years was rowing along his coasts, and that the heathens had already begun to wade ashore.

The levies were assembled, but could achieve nothing against the invaders, who split up into powerful bands and plundered the district, gathering into one place everything that they laid hands on. Then the English fell into a panic lest they should drive inland, and the Archbishop of Canterbury betook himself in person to the King to crave help for his city. However, after the invaders had enjoyed themselves for a short while in the coastal area and had carried off to their ships everything that they found worth taking, they embarked again and sailed away up the coast. Then they landed in the country of the East Saxons and did likewise there.

King Ethelred and his Archbishop, whose name was Sigerik, promptly offered up longer prayers than ever; and when they heard that the heathens, after sacking a few villages, had put out to sea again, they had rich gifts distributed among those priests who had prayed most assiduously, believing themselves to be rid at last of these unwelcome visitors. No sooner had this been done than the Vikings rowed in to a town called Maldon, at the mouth of the river Pant, pitched camp on an island in the middle of the estuary, and prepared to assault the town.

The Jarl of the East Saxons was called Byrhtnoth. He had a great name in his country, and was bigger than other men and very proud and fearless. He assembled a powerful army and marched against them, to see whether blows might prove more effectual than prayers against the invaders. On reaching Maldon, he marched past the town toward the Vikings’ camp until only the arm of the river separated the two forces. But now it was difficult for him to attack the Vikings, and equally difficult for them to attack him. The tide came in, filling the river arm to the level of its banks. It was no broader than a spear’s-throw, so that the armies were able to hail one another, but it did not appear as though they would be able to come to close grips. So they stood facing each other in merry spring weather.

A herald of Thorkel the Tall’s army, a man skilled in speech, stepped forward to the river’s edge, raised his shield, and cried across the water: “The seamen of the north, who fear no man, bid me address you thus: give us silver and gold, and we will give you peace. You are richer than we, and it will be better for you to buy peace with tribute than to meet men of our mettle with spear and sword. If you have wealth enough, it will not be necessary for us to kill each other. Then, when you have bought your freedom, and freedom for your families and your houses and all that you possess, we shall be your friends and will return to our ships with your freeing-money and will sail away from this place and will remain faithful to our word.”

But Byrhtnoth himself stepped forward and, brandishing his spear, roared back: “Hearken well, sea-rover, to our reply! Here is all the tribute you will get from us: pointed spears and keenedged swords! It would ill become such a jarl as I, Byrhtnoth, Byrhthelm’s son, whose name is without spot, not to defend my country and the land of my King. This matter shall be settled by point and blade, and hard indeed must you hew before you find aught else in this land.”

They stood facing each other until the tide turned and began again to run toward the sea.

Then the herald of the Vikings cried across the river: “Now we have stood idle long enough. Come over to us, and we will let you have our soil as battleground; or, if you prefer it, choose a place on your bank and we will come over to you.”

Jarl Byrhtnoth was unwilling to wade across the river, for the water was cold and he feared lest it might make his men’s limbs stiff and their clothing heavy. At the same time he was eager to join battle before his men should begin to feel tired and hungry. So he cried back: “I will give you ground here, and do not delay but come now to fight us. And God alone knows which of us will hold the field.”

And these are the words of Byrhtnoth’s bard, who was present at this battle and escaped with his life:

The sea-men’s army feared not the flood.

Blood-wolves waded west through Panta.

Clear through the current’s crystal water

Bore they their linden shields to the strand.

Byrhtnoth’s men stood awaiting them like a hedge of shields. He had ordered them first to cast their spears, and then to advance with their swords and drive the heathens back into the river. But the Vikings formed into battle-order along the bank as they emerged from the water, each ship’s crew keeping together, and straightway raised their battle-cries and charged, with the captain of each ship running at the head of his crew. A swarm of spears flew toward them, bringing many of them to the ground, whence they did not rise; but they continued to advance relentlessly until they found themselves shield to shield with the Englishmen. Then there was fierce hewing and loud alarums; and the Vikings’ right and left wings were halted and hard pressed. But Thorkel the Tall and the two captains nearest to him—Orm was one, and the other was Fare-Wide Svensson, a famous chieftain from Sjælland, whom King Harald had proclaimed outlaw throughout the Danish kingdom, and who had fought with Styrbjörn at the battle on Fyris Plain before Uppsala—assaulted Byrhtnoth’s own phalanx and broke it. Thorkel cried to his men to fell the tall man in the silver helmet, for then the day would be theirs. Straightway the fighting became fiercest in this part of the field, and there was little elbow-room for men of small stature. Fare-Wide hewed his way forward, slew Byrhtnoth’s standard-bearer, and aimed a blow at Byrhtnoth, wounding him; but he fell himself in the same instant, with a spear through his beard. Many of the chieftains on both sides were killed; and Orm slipped on a fallen shield that was greasy with blood, and tumbled headlong over the body of a man he had just slain. As he fell, he received a blow on the back of his neck from a club, but at once those of his men who were closest to him threw their shields over his body to cover him and protect his back.

When he regained his senses and was able, with Rapp’s assistance, to get to his feet again, the battle had moved away from that part of the field, and the Vikings had gained the upper hand. Byrhtnoth had fallen, and many of his men had fled, but others had formed themselves into a tight ring and, though surrounded, were still resisting valiantly. Thorkel shouted to them over the noise of the battle that he would spare their lives if they cast down their arms; but the cry came back from their midst: “The fewer we be, the fiercer we shall hew, and the shrewder shall be our aim and our courage crueller.”

They fought on until they all lay dead upon the ground, together with many of their foemen, about their chieftain’s corpse. The Vikings marveled at the valor of these Englishmen, praising the dead; nevertheless, this battle at Maldon, fought three weeks before Whitsun in the year 991, was a grievous setback for King Ethelred and a disaster for his realm. For now, far and wide about them, the land lay helpless before the fury of the invaders from the north.

The Vikings buried their dead and pledged them and the victory they had won. They handed Byrhtnoth’s corpse over to the sorrowful envoys who came to beg for it that they might give it Christian burial; then they sent proclamations to Maldon and other towns in the district commanding that the inhabitants should pay fire-tribute and ransom without delay, lest a heavier penalty be demanded of them. They rejoiced at the thought of so much wealth lying in store for them, counting it already as their own; and their anger mounted as the days passed and no Englishman came with surrender and gold. So they rowed up to Maldon and set fire to the stockade on the riverbank and stormed the town and sacked it fearfully. Then they wept because so much had been burned that there was little left for booty. They swore that in the future they would be more sparing in their use of fire, for it was silver that they yearned for and not destruction, which swallowed up silver with all else; and they set to work to whip in horses from the whole district, that they might the more speedily descend on those parts of the land which reckoned themselves safe from the invaders’ wrath. Soon bands of them rode forth in all directions, and returned to the camp laden with booty; and there was now such dire panic throughout the land that no chieftain dared to emulate Byrhtnoth and challenge them to battle. Prisoners whom they took reported that King Ethelred was sitting pasty-faced behind his walls, mumbling prayers with his priests, wholly redeless.

In the church at Maldon, which was of stone, some of the English were still holding out. They had fled up into the tower when the Vikings had stormed the city, priests and women being among them; and they had drawn the steps up with them as they ascended, that they might not be pursued into their retreat. The Vikings suspected that they had taken much treasure with them, and strove their utmost to persuade them to descend from their tower and bring their treasure with them. But neither by fire nor by force of arms could they achieve anything; and the people had plenty of food and drink with them in the tower, and sang psalms and appeared to be in good heart. When the Vikings approached the tower to try to induce them by words to act sensibly and come down and part with their treasure, they cast down stones, curses, and filth upon their heads, yelling with triumph when any of their missiles met their mark. All the Vikings agreed that stone churches and their towers were among the most vexatious obstacles that a man could find himself confronted with.

Jostein, who was an old, hard man, very greedy for gold, said that he could think of only one way to break down these people’s obstinacy: namely, that they should bring their prisoners to within sight of the tower and there kill them, one by one, until the people in the tower could endure it no more and so would be forced to surrender. A number of the men agreed with him in this, for he had a great name for wisdom; but Gudmund and Thorkel thought such a plan unwarriorlike and were unwilling to be parties to it. It would be better, said Thorkel, to bring them down by guile; he added that he was well acquainted with the foibles of priests and knew how best to approach them and get them to do what one wanted.

He ordered his men to remove a great cross from above the altar in the church. Then he approached the tower, with two men carrying the cross before him, and, halting at its foot, cried up to the people there that he needed priests to tend the wounded and also, which was more urgent, to instruct him personally in the Christian faith. Of late, he explained, he had begun to feel strongly attracted toward the new religion; and he would act toward them as though he was already a Christian, for he would allow everyone in the tower to leave it unscathed in life and limb.

He had proceeded thus far in his discourse when a stone shot out of the tower and struck his shield-arm near the shoulder, knocking him to the ground and breaking his arm. At this the two men dropped the cross and assisted him to safety, while the people in the tower cheered in triumph. Jostein, who had been watching, curled his lip and observed that guile in war was not such a simple matter as inexperienced young men sometimes appeared to imagine.

All Thorkel’s followers were inflamed with fury at seeing their chieftain wounded thus, and flights of arrows were loosed at the loopholes in the tower; but this achieved nothing, and the situation appeared to be insoluble. Orm said that in the southland he had sometimes seen Almansur’s men drive Christians from their church towers by smoking them out; and they at once set to work to try to do this. Wood and wet straw were piled together inside the church and around the foot of the tower and were lit; but the tower was high and a breeze dispersed most of the smoke before it could ascend. In the end the Vikings lost patience and decided to leave things until the inhabitants of the tower should begin to feel the pangs of hunger.

Thorkel was dejected by the failure of his stratagem, and feared lest his men should taunt him on the subject. Apart from this, he was irked at the prospect of having to sit idly in Maldon guarding the camp, for it was clear that it would be some time before he would be able to ride out and plunder; and he was anxious that men knowledgeable in medicine should come and examine his injury. Orm came to commiserate with him as he sat before a fire drinking mulled ale with his broken arm hanging at his side. Many men thumbed his arm, but none of them knew how to put it in splints.

Thorkel groaned uncomfortably as they thumbed the fracture, and said it would be medicine enough for the moment if they could bind up his arm as well as it would allow, with or without splints.

“Now the words I spoke at the foot of the tower have come true,” he said. “I need a priest badly, for priests understand such matters as this.”

Orm nodded in agreement and said that priests were cunning doctors; after the Yule feast at King Harald’s he had had a much worse wound than Thorkel’s healed by a priest. Indeed, he added, he would welcome a priest no less than Thorkel, for the blow he had received on his skull from a shoed club was causing him incessant headaches, so that he was beginning to wonder whether something might not have come loose inside his head.

When they were alone, Thorkel said to him: “I hold you to be the wisest of my ship’s captains, and the best warrior, too, now that Fare-Wide is dead. None the less, it is clear that you easily lose your courage when your body is afflicted, even when the injury is but a slight one.”

Orm replied: “It is so with me that I am a man who has lost his luck. Formerly, my luck was good, for I survived unscathed more dangers than most men face in the whole of their lives, and emerged from all of them with profit. But since I returned from the southland, everything has gone wrong for me. I have lost my gold chain, my sweetheart, and the man whose company pleased me best; and as for battle, it has come to such a pass that nowadays I can scarcely draw my sword without coming to some harm. Even when I advised you to smoke these English out of their church tower, nothing came of it.”

Thorkel said that he had seen unluckier men than Orm, but Orm shook his head sadly. He sent his men off plundering with Rapp in command, and remained himself in the town with Thorkel, spending most of the time sitting by himself and contemplating his woes.

One morning not long afterwards the bells in the church tower rang long and loud, and the people there sang psalms very zealously, causing the Vikings to shout up and ask them what all the fuss might be about. The people had no stones left to throw down at them, but they shouted back that it was now Whitsun, and that this day was for them a day of rejoicing.

The Vikings found this reply astonishing, and several of them asked the English what on earth they could have to rejoice about, and how they were placed as regards meat and ale. They replied that in that matter things were as they were; nevertheless, they would continue to rejoice, because Christ was in heaven and would surely help them.

Thorkel’s men roasted fat sheep over their fires, and the odor of roasting was wafted up to the tower, where all the people were hungry. The men cried up to them to be sensible and come down and taste their roast, but they paid no attention to this invitation and began shortly to sing afresh.

Thorkel and Orm sat munching together, listening to the singing from the tower.

“Their singing is hoarser than usual,” said Thorkel. “They are beginning to get dry in the throat. If their drink is finished, it cannot be long before they will have to come down.”

“Their plight is worse than mine, and yet they sing,” said Orm; and he contemplated a fine piece of mutton mournfully before putting it in his mouth.

“I think you would make a poor songster in any church tower,” said Thorkel.

The same day, around dinnertime, Gudmund returned from a-viking inland. He was a large, merry man, with a face that still bore traces of old wounds he had received when a bear had clawed him; and he now rode into the camp, drunken and voluble, with a costly scarlet cloak flung across his shoulders, two heavy silver belts around his waist, and a broad grin in the center of his yellow beard.

This, he cried, as soon as he spied Thorkel, was a land after his own heart, wealthy beyond imagination; as long as he lived, he would never cease to be grateful to Thorkel for having tempted him to come here. He had plundered nine villages and a market, losing only four men; his horses were tottering beneath the weight of their booty, though only the choicest articles had been selected, and following them were ox-carts loaded with strong ale and other delicacies. It would be necessary in due course, he added, to get hold of several more ships, with plenty of cargo-room, to take home all the booty that they would, in a short time and with little expense of effort, have gathered in this excellent land.

“Besides all this,” he concluded, “I found a procession of people on the road—two Bishops and their suites. They said they were envoys from King Ethelred, so I offered them ale and bade them follow me here. The Bishops are old and ride slowly, but they should be here soon; though what they can want with us is not easy to guess. They say they are coming with an offer of peace from their King, but it is we, and not he, who shall decide when there is to be peace. I suspect that they also want to teach us Christianity; but we shall have little time to listen to their teaching with such fine plunder to be had everywhere.”

Thorkel roused himself at these tidings and said that priests were what he had most need of just now, for he was anxious to get his arm set properly; and Orm, too, was pleased at the prospect of being able to talk to a priest about his sore head.

“But I shall not be surprised,” Thorkel said, “if the errand on which they have come is to ransom our prisoners and those people up in the tower.”

A short while afterwards the Bishops rode into the town. They were of venerable aspect, with staffs in their hands and hoods covering their heads. They had with them a great company of outriders and priests, grooms, stewards, and musicians; and they pronounced the peace of God upon all who met their eye. All of Thorkel’s men who were in the camp came to gaze at them, but some shrank away when the Bishops raised their hands. The people in the tower broke into loud acclamations at the sight of them and began again to ring their bells.

Thorkel and Gudmund showed them every hospitality; and when they had rested and had given thanks to God for their lucky journey, they explained their mission.

The Bishop who appeared to be the senior of the two, and who was called the Bishop of St. Edmund’s Bury, addressed Thorkel and Gudmund and such others of the Vikings as had gathered to hear what he had to say. These, he said, were evil times, and it was a great grief to Christ and His Church that men did not know how to live peacefully with one another in love and tolerance. Fortunately, however, he continued, they now had in England a King who loved peace above all other things, and this despite the magnitude of his power and the legions of warriors that lay awaiting his command. He preferred to win the love of his enemies rather than to destroy them by the sword. King Ethelred regarded the Northmen as zealous young men who lacked counsel and did not know what was best for them; and, after having consulted his own wise counselors, he had decided on this occasion not to march against them and put them to the sword, but rather to point out peacefully to them the error of their ways. He had, accordingly, sent his envoys to find out how the gallant chieftains of the north and their followers could be persuaded to turn their thoughts toward peace and abandon the dangerous paths which they were now treading. It was King Ethelred’s desire that they should return to their ships and depart from his coasts to dwell in their own land in peace and contentment; and to facilitate this and win their friendship for all time, he was ready to give them such presents as would fill them all with joy and gratitude. Such royal munificence would, he trusted, so soften the hardness of their young hearts that they would learn to love God’s holy law and Christ’s gospel. If this should come to pass, good King Ethelred’s joy would know no bounds and his love for them would become even greater.

The Bishop was bent with age and toothless, and few of the Vikings could understand what he said; but his words were translated for them by a wise priest of his suite, and all those who stood there listening turned and stared at one another in bewilderment. Gudmund was seated on an ale-butt, drunken and contented, rubbing a little gold cross to polish it, and when they explained to him what the Bishop had said, he began to rock backwards and forwards with delight. He shouted to Thorkel that the latter should lose no time in replying to this excellent discourse.

So Thorkel replied, in a manner befitting a chieftain. He said that what they had just heard was without doubt something worth pondering. King Ethelred had already a great name in the Danish kingdom, but it now appeared that he was an even finer king than they had been led to believe; and this proposal of his, to give them all presents, accorded well with the opinion of his worth that they had hitherto held.

“For,” he continued, “as we told Jarl Byrhtnoth, when we spoke with him across the river, you who dwell in this land are rich, and we poor seafarers are only too anxious to be your friends if you will but share your wealth with us. It is good to hear that King Ethelred himself shares our feelings in this matter; and, seeing that he is so rich and powerful and full of wisdom, I do not doubt that he will show himself most liberal toward us. How much he intends to offer us we have not yet been told; but we need a lot to make us merry, for we are a melancholy race. I think it best that his gifts should take the form of gold and minted silver, for this will be easiest to count, and easiest, too, for us to carry home. While everything is being settled, we shall be glad if he will permit us to remain here undisturbed, taking from the district what we need for our upkeep and pleasure. There is, though, someone who has as much say in this matter as Gudmund and myself, and that is Jostein. He is at present away plundering with many of his followers, and until he returns we cannot decide how large King Ethelred’s gift is to be. But there is one thing I should like to know at once, and that is whether you have any priest skilled in medicine among your followers; for, as you see, I have this damaged arm which needs plastering.”

The younger Bishop replied that they had with them two men who were learned in the craft of healing, and said he would be glad to bid them attend to Thorkel’s arm. He requested, however, that in return for this service Thorkel should allow the people who were shut up in the tower to descend and go their ways without hindrance; for it was a heavy thing, he said, to think of them up there tormented by hunger and thirst.

“As far as I am concerned,” said Thorkel, “they can come down as soon as they like. We have been trying to persuade them to do so ever since we took this town, but they have resisted our offers most obstinately; in fact, it was they who broke my arm. Half of what they have in the tower they must give to us. This is small repayment for the injury to my arm and all the bother they have caused us. But when they have done that, they may go whithersoever they please.”

Soon, therefore, all the people in the tower descended, looking pale and wasted. Some of them wept and threw themselves at the Bishop’s feet, while others cried piteously for water and food. Thorkel’s men were disappointed to find that there was little of value in the tower; nevertheless, they gave them food and did them no harm.

Orm happened to pass a water-trough where a number of those who had been in the tower were drinking. Among them was a little bald man in a priest’s cowl, with a long nose and a red scar across his forehead. Orm stared at him in astonishment. Then he went up and seized him by the shoulder.

“I am glad to see you again,” he said, “and I have something to thank you for since the last time we met. But I little thought to meet King Harald’s physician in England. How did you come here?”

“I came here from the tower,” retorted Brother Willibald wrathfully, “where you heathen berserks have compelled me to spend the last fortnight.”

“I have several things to discuss with you,” said Orm. “Come with me, and I will give you food and drink.”

“I have nothing to discuss with you,” replied Brother Willibald. “The less I see of Danes, the better it will be for me. That much, at least, I have learned by now. I will get my meat and drink elsewhere.”

Orm was afraid lest the little priest, in his anger, might dart away and give him the slip, so he picked him up and carried him away under one arm, promising him as he did so that no harm should come to him. Brother Willibald struggled vigorously, demanding sternly to be put down and informing Orm that leprosy and fearful battle-wounds were the least retribution that would descend on any man who laid his hand on a priest; but Orm ignored his protests and carried him into a house he had chosen as his quarters after they had stormed the town, which now contained only a few members of his crew who had been wounded and two old women.

The little priest was obviously famished, but when meat and drink were placed before him, he sat for some time staring bitterly at the platter and tankard, making no effort to touch them. Then he sighed, muttered something to himself, made the sign of the cross over the food, and began to eat greedily. Orm refilled his tankard with ale and waited patiently until Brother Willibald had appeased his hunger. The good ale appeared to have no soothing effect upon his temper, for the harshness of his retorts did not diminish; he found it in himself to answer Orm’s questions, however, and before long he was talking as ebulliently as ever.

He had escaped from Denmark, he explained, with Bishop Poppo when the evil and unchristian King Sven had descended upon Jellinge to destroy God’s servants there. The Bishop, sick and fragile, was now living on the charity of the Abbot of Westminster, grieving over the destruction of all his work in the north. Brother Willibald, though, felt that there was in fact little to grieve about when you considered the matter aright; for there could be no doubt that what had happened was a sign from God that holy men should cease their efforts to convert the heathens of the north and should instead leave them to destroy one another by their evil practices, which were, in truth, past all understanding. For his own part, Brother Willibald added, he had no intention of ever again attempting to convert anyone from those parts; and he was prepared to proclaim the fact upon the Cross and Passion of Christ in the presence of anyone who wished to hear it, including, if necessary, the Archbishop of Bremen himself.

His eyes smoldering, he drained his tankard, smacked his lips, and observed that ale was more nourishing than meat for a starving man. Orm refilled his tankard, and he continued with his story.

When Bishop Poppo had heard that Danish Vikings had landed on the east coast of England, he had been anxious to try to learn from them how things now were in the Danish kingdom; whether any Christians were still alive, whether the rumor that King Harald had died was true, and many other things besides. But the Bishop had felt too weak to undertake the journey from Westminster himself, and so had sent Brother Willibald to get the information for him.

“For the Bishop told me I would run little risk of injury among the heathens, however inflamed their passions might be. He said they would welcome me on account of my knowledge of medicine; in addition to which, there would be men among them who had known me at King Harald’s court. I had my own feelings on the matter, for he is too good for this world, and knows you less well than I do. However, it is not seemly to contradict one’s Bishop; so I did as he bade me. I reached this town one evening, very exhausted, and, after celebrating evensong, laid myself down to sleep in the church house. There I was waked by screaming and thick smoke, and men and women came running in half-naked, crying that the foul fiends had descended on us. Fiends there were none, but worse adversaries, and it seemed to me that little was likely to be gained by greeting them with words of salutation from Bishop Poppo. So I fled with the rest up into the church tower, and there I should have perished, and the others with me, had God not elected to liberate us from our plight upon this blessed Whitsun day.”

He wagged his head mournfully and regarded Orm with weary eyes.

“All this was fourteen days ago,” he said, “and since then I have had little sleep. And my body is weak—nay, not weak, for it is as strong as the spirit that inhabits it; still, there are limits to its strength.”

“You can sleep later,” said Orm impatiently. “Do you know aught of what has happened to Ylva, King Harald’s daughter?”

“This much I know,” replied Brother Willibald promptly, “that unless she shortly mends her ways, she will burn in hell-fire for her brazenness of spirit and scandalous conduct. And what hope can one cherish that any daughter of King Harald will ever mend her ways?”

“Do you hate our women, too?” asked Orm. “What harm has she ever done to you?”

“It matters little what she has done to me,” said the little priest bitterly, “though she did, in fact, call me a bald old owl merely because I threatened her with the vengeance of the Lord.”

“You threatened her, priest?” said Orm, getting to his feet. “Why did you threaten her?”

“Because she swore that she would do as she pleased and marry a heathen, even though all the bishops in the world should strive to stop her.”

Orm clutched his beard and stared open-eyed at the little priest. Then he seated himself again.

“I am the heathen she wishes to marry,” he said quietly. “Where is she now?”

But he received no answer to his question that evening, for, as he spoke, Brother Willibald drooped slowly down on to the table and fell fast asleep with his head upon his arms. Orm did his best to wake him, but in vain; at length he picked him up, carried him to the settle, laid him there, and threw a skin over him. He noted with surprise that he was beginning to grow fond of this little priest. For a while he sat alone brooding over his ale. Then, as he found that he had no desire for sleep, his impatience began again to swell within him, and he got up, crossed to the settle, and gave Brother Willibald a vigorous shaking.

But Brother Willibald merely turned over in his sleep and muttered in a drowsy and peevish whisper: “Worse than fiends!”

When next morning the little priest at length awoke, he proved to be somewhat milder of temper and seemed fairly contented with his situation; so Orm lost no time in extracting from him details of everything that had happened to Ylva since he had last seen her. She had fled from Jellinge with the Bishop, preferring exile to remaining at home in her brother Sven’s care, and had spent the winter with him at Westminster, in great impatience to return home to Denmark as soon as good news should arrive of the situation there. Of late, however, the rumor had reached them that King Harald had died in exile. This had caused Ylva to consider journeying north to the home of her sister Gunhild, who was wedded to the Danish Jarl Palling of Northumberland. The Bishop was unwilling to allow her to undertake such a dangerous journey, preferring that she should remain in the south and marry some chieftain from those parts, whom he would help to find for her. But whenever he had brought this subject up, she had turned white with rage and had broken into fearful invective against anyone who happened to be near her, not excluding the Bishop himself.

This was what the little priest had to tell Orm concerning Ylva. Orm was happy to know that she had escaped King Sven’s clutches, but it vexed him not to be able to think of any means of seeing her. He worried, too, about the blow he had received on his neck, and the pain he still suffered as a result of it; but Brother Willibald smiled disparagingly and said that skulls as thick as his would survive worse cracks than that. However, he put blood-leeches behind Orm’s ears, with the result that he soon began to feel better. Nevertheless, he could not keep his thoughts from Ylva. It occurred to him to try to talk Thorkel and the other chieftains into undertaking a great plundering expedition against London and Westminster, in the hope that this might enable him to make contact with her; but the chieftains were occupied in tedious conferences with the envoys, settling details regarding the gifts they were to receive from King Ethelred, and the whole army sat idle-fingered, doing nothing but eat and drink and speculate on how much so great a King could fittingly be asked to pay.

Both the old Bishops spoke out manfully on their master’s behalf, advancing many arguments to show why the sums suggested by the chieftains should be regarded as excessive. They regretted that the Vikings did not appear to realize that there were more valuable things in the world than gold and silver, and that for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven was more difficult than for an ox to pass through the smoke-hole of a roof. The chieftains heard them out patiently and then replied that, should any disadvantages accrue to them from the bargain, they would accept them stoically, but they could not accept a sum less than that which they had originally named. If, they added, what the Bishops had said about the kingdom of heaven and the smoke-hole was true, they would surely be doing King Ethelred a good service by relieving him of some of the burden of his wealth.

Sighing, the Bishops increased their offer, and at last agreement was reached as to the sum that King Ethelred was to pay. Every man in the fleet was to receive six marks of silver, in addition to what he had already taken by plunder. Every helmsman was to have twelve marks, and every ship’s captain sixty; and Thorkel, Gudmund, and Jostein were each to receive three hundred marks. The Bishops said that this was a sad day for them, and that they hardly knew what their King would say when he heard the sum they had agreed on. It would, they explained, fall all the more heavily on him because at this very moment other envoys of his were negotiating with a Norwegian chieftain named Olaf Tryggvasson, who, with his fleet, was plundering the south coast. They could not be sure, they said, that even King Ethelred’s wealth would suffice to meet both demands.

When they heard this, the chieftains began to worry lest they might have asked for too small a sum, and also lest the Norwegians should get in before them. They held a brief conference among themselves and then announced that they had decided not to increase their demand, but that the Bishops had better lose no time in fetching the silver, for, they said, they would take it ill if the Norwegians were paid before them.

The Bishop of London, who was a friendly and smiling man, assented to this and promised that they would do their best.

“I am surprised, however,” he said, “to see such valiant chieftains as yourselves bothering your heads about this Norwegian captain, whose fleet is much smaller than yours. Would it not be a good thing for you to row down to the south coast, where this captain is lying, and destroy him and his men, and so win all his treasure? He has lately come from Brittany, in fine ships, and men say that he took much booty there. If you were to do this, it would still further increase the love that our lord the King bears you; and in that case he would have no difficulty in finding the sum you demand, for he would not then have to appease this Norwegian captain’s greed.”

Thorkel nodded and looked uncertain, and Gudmund laughed and said that the Bishop’s suggestion was certainly worth considering.

“I have never myself met any of these Norwegians,” he said, “but everyone knows that an encounter with them always provides fine fighting and good tales for the survivors to tell their children. At home, in Bravik, I have heard it said that few men outside East Guteland are their superiors, and it might be worth finding out whether this reputation of theirs is justified. I have in my ships berserks from Aland who are beginning to complain that this expedition is providing them with splendid booty and excellent ale, but little in the way of good fighting; and they say they are not used to a peaceful life.”

Thorkel commented that he had, on one occasion, encountered Norwegians, but that he had no objection to doing so again, once his arm was healed; for in a battle with them much honor and wealth might be won.

Then Jostein burst into a great roar of laughter and took off his hat and flung it on the ground at his feet. He always wore an old red hat with a broad brim when he was not actually fighting, because his helmet chafed his skull.

“Look at me!” he cried. “I am old and bald; and where age is, there is also wisdom, as I am about to show you. This god-man can deceive you, Thorkel, and you, too, Gudmund, with his craft and cunning, but he cannot deceive me, for I am as old and as wise as he is. It will be a fine thing for him and his King if he can persuade us to fight against the Norwegian; for then we shall destroy each other, and King Ethelred will be quit of us all and will not need to squander any of his silver on such as survive the battle. But if you take my advice, you will not let any such thing happen.”

Gudmund and Thorkel had to admit that they had not thought of it in this light, and that Jostein was the wisest of them all; and the envoys found that they could not prevail upon them any further. So they made ready to return to King Ethelred, to tell him how everything had turned out and to make arrangements to have the silver collected as soon as possible.

But before they departed, they robed themselves in their finest garments, gathered their followers about them, and walked out in solemn procession to the field where the battle had taken place. There they read prayers over the bodies of the dead, who lay half-covered by the richly growing grass, while crows and ravens circled above them in their multitudes, complaining harshly at being thus rudely disturbed from their lawful feeding.