e.

But before this time arrived he appeared again at Hlade and he now
brought with him a strong fleet and numerous armed warriors. Many guests
had been invited to meet him, and these were entertained until they were
all royally drunk. Then the king said to them:

"I have promised to sacrifice with you, and am here to keep my word. I
propose to make a royal sacrifice, not of thralls and criminals, but of
lords and chieftains, for thus we can best do honor to Odin."

He then selected six of his most powerful opponents and said that he
intended to sacrifice them to Odin and Frey, that the people might have
good crops. The dismayed chiefs were instantly seized and were offered
the alternative of being sacrificed or baptized. Taken by surprise, they
were not long in deciding upon the latter, the king making them give
hostages for their good faith.

Soon after came the Yuletide and Olaf was present with a strong force at
Moere, where the sacrifices were to be made. The peasants also came in
force, all armed, with the burly Ironbeard as their leader. They were
rude and noisy and it was some time before the king could make himself
heard. Then he called on them all to accept baptism and acknowledge
Christ the White in place of their bloodthirsty gods. Ironbeard haughtily
replied that they were supporters of the old laws and that the king must
make the sacrifices as all the kings before him had done.

Olaf heard him through and said that he was there to keep his promise.
Then, with many men, he entered the temple, leaving his arms outside as
the law required. All he carried was a stout, gold-headed stick. Stopping
before the statue of the god Thor, around which were rings of gold and
iron, he raised the stick and gave the idol a blow so fierce and strong
that it tumbled in pieces from its pedestal. At the same moment his
followers struck down the other idols. The peasants, thunderstruck at the
sacrilege, looked for support to Ironbeard, but the doughty warrior lay
dead. He had shared the fate of the idols he worshipped, being struck
down at the same moment with them. What to do the peasants knew not, and
when Olaf told them they must either be baptized or fight they chose the
former as the safest. The province of Haalogaland, still farther north,
was dealt with in the same arbitrary fashion, those of the chiefs who
refused baptism being put to death with torture. And in this fierce and
bloody way the dominion of Christ the W