t._, vol. ii. pp. 143-146, 155-158, 160-165,
168-169, 181-183 and 188.

CHAPTER VII.

DEALINGS WITH FOREIGN POWERS. 1525-1527.

Negotiations between Fredrik and Gustavus.--Treachery of
Norby.--Sunnanvaeder and the Cabinet of Norway.--Overthrow and Death
of Norby.--Trial and Execution of Knut and Sunnanvaeder.--Debt to
Lubeck.--Treaty with Russia; with the Netherlands.--Dalarne and the
Lubeck Envoys.--Swedish Property in Denmark.--Province of
Viken.--Refugees in Norway.

The Swedish Revolution was the work of three nations, all foes at heart,
endeavoring to effect a common object on utterly divergent grounds.
Gustavus wished to free his country from a tyrant's rule, while
Fredrik's purpose was to gain the throne of Denmark, and Lubeck's was to
crush her rival in the Baltic trade. Without the alliance of these three
parties, it is not likely that any one of them could have gained his
end. So long, therefore, as the common object was in view, each felt an
assurance that the others would not fail. It was only when Christiern's
power was altogether gone that this triple alliance was dissolved.

The varying hopes of Christiern may be gauged with singular accuracy by
Fredrik's show of friendship to Gustavus. One cannot read the despatches
sent from Denmark without observing a constant change of attitude; the
monarch's feelings cooling somewhat as the chance that Christiern would
recover Denmark grew more remote. At the moment when Norby returned to
Bleking, the movements of Christiern caused the monarch much alarm, and
his letters to Gustavus were filled with every assurance of good-will.
This assurance, however, Gustavus took at little more than it was worth.
So long as Knut and Sunnanvaeder were protected by Fredrik's officers in
Norway, the Danish monarch's assurances of friendship carried little
weight. Gustavus seems not to have appealed to Fredrik in this matter
till every effort to persuade the Danish officers in Norway had been
tried. He wrote even to the Norwegian Cabinet, and begged them to keep
the promises made to him in Malmoe. While in the midst of these
entreaties, a letter came from Fredrik asking for the release of certain
prisoners, among them Norby's daughter, whom Gustavus had captured in
the war with Norby. This was the very opportunity which Gustavus craved.
He wrote back that in the same war in which these prisoners had been
taken, some guns belonging to him had been lost, an