Early Kings of Norway [28]
little more than two centuries later.
"Jarl Hakon was led up to the king's ship. He was the handsomest man that could be seen. He had long hair as fine as silk, bound about his head with a gold ornament. When he sat down in the forehold the king said to him:
_King._ "'It is not false, what is said of your family, that ye are handsome people to look at; but now your luck has deserted you.'
_Hakon._ "'It has always been the case that success is changeable; and there is no luck in the matter. It has gone with your family as with mine to have by turns the better lot. I am little beyond childhood in years; and at any rate we could not have defended ourselves, as we did not expect any attack on the way. It may turn out better with us another time.'
_King._ "'Dost thou not apprehend that thou art in such a condition that, hereafter, there can be neither victory nor defeat for thee?'
_Hakon._ "'That is what only thou canst determine, King, according to thy pleasure.'
_King._ "'What wilt thou give me, Jarl, if, for this time, I let thee go, whole and unhurt?'
_Hakon._ "'What wilt thou take, King?'
_King._ "'Nothing, except that thou shalt leave the country; give up thy kingdom; and take an oath that thou wilt never go into battle against me.'"[12]
Jarl Hakon accepted the generous terms; went to England and King Knut, and kept his bargain for a good few years; though he was at last driven, by pressure of King Knut, to violate it,--little to his profit, as we shall see. One victorious naval battle with Jarl Svein, Hakon's uncle, and his adherents, who fled to Sweden, after his beating,--battle not difficult to a skilful, hard-hitting king,--was pretty much all the actual fighting Olaf had to do in this enterprise. He various times met angry Bonders and refractory Things with arms in their hand; but by skilful, firm management,--perfectly patient, but also perfectly ready to be active,--he mostly managed without coming to strokes; and was universally recognized by Norway as its real king. A promising young man, and fit to be a king, thinks Snorro. Only of middle stature, almost rather shortish; but firm-standing, and stout-built; so that they got to call him Olaf the Thick (meaning Olaf the Thick-set, or Stout-built), though his final epithet among them was infinitely higher. For the rest, "a comely, earnest, prepossessing look; beautiful yellow hair in quantity; broad, honest face, of a complexion pure as snow and rose;" and finally (or firstly) "the brightest eyes in the world; such that, in his anger, no man could stand them." He had a heavy task ahead, and needed all his qualities and fine gifts to get it done.
CHAPTER X.
REIGN OF KING OLAF THE SAINT.
The late two Jarls, now gone about their business, had both been baptized, and called themselves Christians. But during their government they did nothing in the conversion way; left every man to choose his own God or Gods; so that some had actually two, the Christian God by land, and at sea Thor, whom they considered safer in that element. And in effect the mass of the people had fallen back into a sluggish heathenism or half-heathenism, the life-labor of Olaf Tryggveson lying ruinous or almost quite overset. The new Olaf, son of Harald, set himself with all his strength to mend such a state of matters; and stood by his enterprise to the end, as the one highest interest, including all others, for his People and him. His method was by no means soft; on the contrary, it was hard, rapid, severe,--somewhat on the model of Tryggveson's, though with more of _bishoping_ and preaching superadded. Yet still there was a great deal of mauling, vigorous punishing, and an entire intolerance of these two things: Heathenism and Sea-robbery, at least of Sea-robbery in the old style; whether in the style we moderns still practise, and call privateering, I do not quite know. But Vikingism proper had to cease in Norway; still more, Heathenism, under penalties too severe to he borne; death, mutilation of limb, not to mention forfeiture and
"Jarl Hakon was led up to the king's ship. He was the handsomest man that could be seen. He had long hair as fine as silk, bound about his head with a gold ornament. When he sat down in the forehold the king said to him:
_King._ "'It is not false, what is said of your family, that ye are handsome people to look at; but now your luck has deserted you.'
_Hakon._ "'It has always been the case that success is changeable; and there is no luck in the matter. It has gone with your family as with mine to have by turns the better lot. I am little beyond childhood in years; and at any rate we could not have defended ourselves, as we did not expect any attack on the way. It may turn out better with us another time.'
_King._ "'Dost thou not apprehend that thou art in such a condition that, hereafter, there can be neither victory nor defeat for thee?'
_Hakon._ "'That is what only thou canst determine, King, according to thy pleasure.'
_King._ "'What wilt thou give me, Jarl, if, for this time, I let thee go, whole and unhurt?'
_Hakon._ "'What wilt thou take, King?'
_King._ "'Nothing, except that thou shalt leave the country; give up thy kingdom; and take an oath that thou wilt never go into battle against me.'"[12]
Jarl Hakon accepted the generous terms; went to England and King Knut, and kept his bargain for a good few years; though he was at last driven, by pressure of King Knut, to violate it,--little to his profit, as we shall see. One victorious naval battle with Jarl Svein, Hakon's uncle, and his adherents, who fled to Sweden, after his beating,--battle not difficult to a skilful, hard-hitting king,--was pretty much all the actual fighting Olaf had to do in this enterprise. He various times met angry Bonders and refractory Things with arms in their hand; but by skilful, firm management,--perfectly patient, but also perfectly ready to be active,--he mostly managed without coming to strokes; and was universally recognized by Norway as its real king. A promising young man, and fit to be a king, thinks Snorro. Only of middle stature, almost rather shortish; but firm-standing, and stout-built; so that they got to call him Olaf the Thick (meaning Olaf the Thick-set, or Stout-built), though his final epithet among them was infinitely higher. For the rest, "a comely, earnest, prepossessing look; beautiful yellow hair in quantity; broad, honest face, of a complexion pure as snow and rose;" and finally (or firstly) "the brightest eyes in the world; such that, in his anger, no man could stand them." He had a heavy task ahead, and needed all his qualities and fine gifts to get it done.
CHAPTER X.
REIGN OF KING OLAF THE SAINT.
The late two Jarls, now gone about their business, had both been baptized, and called themselves Christians. But during their government they did nothing in the conversion way; left every man to choose his own God or Gods; so that some had actually two, the Christian God by land, and at sea Thor, whom they considered safer in that element. And in effect the mass of the people had fallen back into a sluggish heathenism or half-heathenism, the life-labor of Olaf Tryggveson lying ruinous or almost quite overset. The new Olaf, son of Harald, set himself with all his strength to mend such a state of matters; and stood by his enterprise to the end, as the one highest interest, including all others, for his People and him. His method was by no means soft; on the contrary, it was hard, rapid, severe,--somewhat on the model of Tryggveson's, though with more of _bishoping_ and preaching superadded. Yet still there was a great deal of mauling, vigorous punishing, and an entire intolerance of these two things: Heathenism and Sea-robbery, at least of Sea-robbery in the old style; whether in the style we moderns still practise, and call privateering, I do not quite know. But Vikingism proper had to cease in Norway; still more, Heathenism, under penalties too severe to he borne; death, mutilation of limb, not to mention forfeiture and