he country, and if any forces were assembled against
him. Thorgeir says that a great army was drawn together in the
Throndhjem country, and that there were some lendermen both from the
south of the country, and from Halogaland in the north; "but I do not
know," says he. "if they are intended against you, or going elsewhere."
Then he complained to the king of the damage and waste done him by the
people breaking and treading down all his corn fields. The king said it
was ill done to bring upon him any loss. Then the king rode to where the
corn had stood, and saw it was laid flat on the earth; and he rode round
the field, and said, "I expect, bonde, that God will repair thy loss, so
that the field, within a week, will be better;" and it proved the best
of the corn, as the king had said. The king remained all night there,
and in the morning he made himself ready, and told Thorgeir the bonde
to accompany him and Thorgear offered his two sons also for the journey;
and although the king said that he did not want them with him, the lads
would go. As they would not stay behind, the king's court-men were about
binding them; but the king seeing it said, "Let them come with us; the
lads will come safe back again." And it was with the lads as the king
foretold.

215. OF THE BAPTISM OF THE VAGABOND FOREST-MEN.

Thereafter the army advanced to Staf, and when the king reached Staf's
moor he halted. There he got the certain information that the bondes
were advancing with an army against him, and that he might soon expect
to have a battle with them. He mustered his force here, and, after
reckoning them up, found there were in the army 900 heathen men, and
when he came to know it he ordered them to allow themselves to be
baptized, saying that he would have no heathens with him in battle. "We
must not," says he, "put our confidence in numbers, but in God alone
must we trust; for through his power and favour we must be victorious,
and I will not mix heathen people with my own." When the heathens heard
this, they held a council among themselves, and at last 400 men agreed
to be baptized; but 500 men refused to adopt Christianity, and that
body returned home to their land. Then the brothers Gauka-Thorer and
Afrafaste presented themselves to the king, and offered again to follow
him. The king asked if they had now taken baptism. Gauka-Thorer replied
that they had not. Then the king ordered them to accept baptism and the
true faith, or o