nd with
Sigurd, and it was told to the troops that he was taken, the army set
up a shout of joy. When Sigurd heard it he said, "Many a bad man will
rejoice over my head this day." Then Thjostolf Alason went to where
Sigurd was sitting, struck from his head a silk hat with silver fringes,
and said. "Why wert thou so impudent, thou son of a slave! to dare to
call thyself King Magnus Barefoot's son?"

Sigurd replied, "Presume not to compare my father to a slave; for thy
father was of little worth compared to mine."

Hal, a son of the doctor Thorgeir Steinson, King Inge's court-man, was
present at this circumstance, and told it to Eirik Odson, who afterwards
wrote these relations in a book, which he called "Hryggjarstykke". In
this book is told all concerning Harald Gille and his sons, and Magnus
the Blind, and Sigurd Slembidjakn, until their deaths. Eirik was a
sensible man, who was long in Norway about that time. Some of his
narratives he wrote down from Hakon Mage's account; some were from
lendermen of Harald's sons, who along with his sons were in all this
feud, and in all the councils. Eirik names, moreover, several men of
understanding and veracity, who told him these accounts, and were so
near that they saw or heard all that happened. Something he wrote from
what he himself had heard or seen.

12. TORTURE OF SIGURD SLEMBE.

Hal says that the chiefs wished to have Sigurd killed instantly; but the
men who were the most cruel, and thought they had injuries to avenge,
advised torturing him; and for this they named Beintein's brothers,
Sigurd and Gyrd, the sons of Kolbein. Peter Byrdarsvein would also
avenge his brother Fin. But the chiefs and the greater part of the
people went away. They broke his shin-bones and arms with an axe-hammer.
Then they stripped him, and would flay him alive; but when they tried to
take off the skin, they could not do it for the gush of blood. They took
leather whips and flogged him so long, that the skin was as much taken
off as if he had been flayed. Then they stuck a piece of wood in his
back until it broke, dragged him to a tree and hanged him; and then
cut off his head, and brought the body and head to a heap of stones and
buried them there. All acknowledge, both enemies and friends, that no
man in Norway, within memory of the living, was more gifted with all
perfections, or more experienced, than Sigurd, but in some respects he
was an unlucky man. Hal says that he spoke little,