e Danish war ships, and our hour of peril draws
near. We must drop down with the tide, which is running out strongly,
and I must steer. You can row, I suppose?"

"Yes."

"Well, get the oars ready to pull for your life, if I give the word,
but not till then. Now silence."

In perfect silence they drifted down upon the ships. Happily for them
there was no moon, and although the stars were bright, there was
little danger that their dark-painted bark would be seen at any
distance.

One great mass after another seemed to float by them; but it was the
dead hour of the night, and no sounds were heard from the sleeping
crews. They kept lax watch, because they had no foe to dread. There
was, alas! no English fleet.

One after another, until they had drifted into the centre of the
fleet, where discovery must have been instant death. There above them
rose the "Great Dragon," in all her hideous beauty, the gilded serpent
reposing on the placid waves. Her people, even at that untimely hour,
were engaged in revelry, and as they passed by the fugitives heard the
words:

"Now the warrior's cup of joy was full,
When he drank the blood of his foe,
Where the slain lay thick on the gory hill,
And torrents of blood from every rill
reddened the river below,
For Odin's hall is the Northman's heaven--"

But they heard no more, for they had drifted beyond hearing.

They had now attained the last ship, when suddenly a watchman sprang
to the side.

"Boat ahoy! Whence and where?"

"From the 'Great Dragon'--a poor gleeman and his attendant to his home
on the shore."

"Come on board then, and wake us with a song. The watch is ours, and
we will make it merry."

There was no help for it; and commending courage with a significant
look to his companion, the gleeman and Alfgar ascended. It was yet
dark, and the language and appearance of each might pass tolerably
under ordinary circumstances for the characters they had assumed.

"Now a song, and we will keep it up till daylight."

Thus pressed, the gleeman took his harp and sang an old Scandinavian
song of the first sea king who invaded England, Ragnar Lodbrok.

He told how the fierce Ragnar sailed for England, how his fleet was
wrecked, but still how, with the relics of his forces, he assaulted
Northumbria, and was taken captive by Ella the king, who threw him
into a hole filled with vipers and toads.

"Sharp the adder's tooth, but sharper
Spake the sea king to his foes,
Spake