struck inland again, from the hill-top, thinking to
find refuge in a forest of leafless oaks whose rattling branches
glittered in the pale sunlight; and when we reached it my lord sat down
on a great root of one of the trees and would go no farther into the
forest. So I stayed by him all day feeding him on the last of our fish,
and making him cold water to drink, for though he shivered very much he
drank always. Thus it was that midway between the noon and the evening
there came three men, cross-bowmen, suddenly, from over the hillside,
and seeing us they stopped; then after a moment's speaking one with
another they ran forward, their cross-bows stretched.

My lord was sitting dejectedly at the foot of the ice-sheaved oak, and I
was cooling water for him in my helmet. The three men ran toward us,
shouting. My lord heard the sound and looked up; then rising slowly to
his feet, he hesitated a moment and unbuckled his sword, at which the
three cross-bowmen stopped, for they were not great men. Then my lord
spoke to me, half turning: "You have followed me faithfully, though to a
bad end, and I can give you nothing; nor do you want it; but I will not
be killed by Bishop's men. My fathers knew how to die, and their Gods
took them, so I---- and my Gods will take me." Then ramming the hilt and
the upper part of his sword into the snow, my lord fell over it
awkwardly and lay groaning, the sword through him. All this before I
could do aught but cry out.

Well---- Then came the bowmen, who shot him so that, after a few minutes,
he was dead indeed, and they brought his body and his sword down to the
snow-covered keep in the valley, where they delivered it to the Bishop
of Lund's legate; and they showed me over the doorway the heads of many
old women whom they said had been "left behind." I do not know. And
there were children's heads hanging from them. What became of the men of
the hall? It is something that I cannot remember. They bound thongs of
leather round my brows to make me tell of Father Peter and how he died,
and again in Roskilde, and they twisted them. But at last they permitted
me to enter the church here, as a server, and I look out on the fair
fiord of Roskilde now.

I am very glad that the story is done.

THE STORY OF THE OAR-CAPTAIN

This is the story of the Oar-Captain, that they used to tell to harps;
and that, after, was made a saga of. The story is rough, like the
natures of men, and full of storm