roer. Skand. hist._, vol. xxiv, pp. 110-112, 117-130; and
_Skrift. och handl._, vol. i. pp. 363-364.

[34] Olaus Petri, _Svenska kroen._, pp. 315-316; and _Handl. roer. Skand.
hist._, vol. xxiv. pp. 245-247.

[35] Eliesen, _Chron. Skib._, p. 567.

CHAPTER III.

FLIGHT OF GUSTAVUS; UPRISING OF THE DALESMEN. 1519-1521.

Escape of Gustavus from Denmark.--Lubeck.--Return of Gustavus to
Sweden.--Excommunication of Sture.--Invasion of Sweden.--Death of
Sture.--Dissolution of the Swedish Army.--Heroism of
Christina.--Battle of Upsala.--Gustavus at Kalmar.--Fall of
Stockholm.--Coronation of Christiern II.--Slaughter of the
Swedes.--Flight of Gustavus to Dalarne.--Efforts to rouse the
Dalesmen.--Gustavus chosen Leader.

One morning, in the early autumn of 1519, a young man, clad in the
coarse garments of a drover, made a hasty exit from the gate of Kaloe
Castle, and turning into the forest proceeded along the western shore of
Kaloe Bay. His step was firm and vigorous, and indicated by its rapidity
that the wayfarer was endeavoring to elude pursuit. Though apparently
not over twenty-four, there was something about the traveller's face and
bearing that gave him the look of a person prematurely old. Of large
frame, tall and broad-shouldered, with heavy massive face, high
cheek-bones, a careworn dark blue eye, large straight nose, and
compressed lips,--the under lip projecting slightly,--he would have been
pointed out anywhere as a man not easily to be led. The face would not,
perhaps, be regarded as particularly intellectual; but determination
and energy were stamped on every feature, and every movement of the body
displayed strength and power of endurance. It was pre-eminently the face
and body of one made to govern rather than to obey. Such, in his
twenty-fourth year, was Gustavus Vasa. He had made his escape from Kaloe
Castle, and was fleeing with all speed to Lubeck, the busy, enterprising
head of the Hanseatic League.

His way led him through some of the most picturesque spots in Denmark.
It was a lovely rolling country, with fertile fields and meadows,
relieved in places by little clumps of forest, beneath which he could
often discern the time-worn front of some grim old mansion. Sheep and
cattle were grazing on the hillsides. Thatch-roofed huts, with plastered
walls, were all about him. The fields, in those September days, were red
with buckwheat. Occasionally a broad meadow spread out befo