self be baptized, she
answered thus:--"I must not part from the faith which I have held,
and my forefathers before me; and, on the other hand, I shall make no
objection to your believing in the god that pleases you best." Then King
Olaf was enraged, and answered in a passion, "Why should I care to have
thee, an old faded woman, and a heathen jade?" and therewith struck her
in the face with his glove which he held in his hands, rose up, and they
parted. Sigrid said, "This may some day be thy death." The king set off
to Viken, the queen to Svithjod.

69. THE BURNING OF WARLOCKS.

Then the king proceeded to Tunsberg, and held a Thing, at which he
declared in a speech that all the men of whom it should be known to a
certainty that they dealt with evil spirits, or in witchcraft, or were
sorcerers, should be banished forth of the land. Thereafter the king had
all the neighborhood ransacked after such people, and called them all
before him; and when they were brought to the Thing there was a man
among them called Eyvind Kelda, a grandson of Ragnvald Rettilbeine,
Harald Harfager's son. Eyvind was a sorcerer, and particularly knowing
in witchcraft. The king let all these men be seated in one room, which
was well adorned, and made a great feast for them, and gave them strong
drink in plenty. Now when they were all very drunk, he ordered the house
be set on fire, and it and all the people within it were consumed, all
but Eyvind Kelda, who contrived to escape by the smoke-hole in the roof.
And when he had got a long way off, he met some people on the road going
to the king, and he told them to tell the king that Eyvind Kelda had
slipped away from the fire, and would never come again in King Olaf's
power, but would carry on his arts of witchcraft as much as ever. When
the people came to the king with such a message from Eyvind, the king
was ill pleased that Eyvind had escaped death.

70. EYVIND KELDA'S DEATH.

When spring (A.D. 998) came King Olaf went out to Viken, and was on
visits to his great farms. He sent notice over all Viken that he would
call out an army in summer, and proceed to the north parts of the
country. Then he went north to Agder; and when Easter was approaching
he took the road to Rogaland with 300 (=360) men, and came on Easter
evening north to Ogvaldsnes, in Kormt Island, where an Easter feast was
prepared for him. That same night came Eyvind Kelda to the island with
a well-manned long-ship, of w