a ship
or two by Athelstan, suddenly appeared in Norway got acknowledged by
the Peasant Thing in Trondhjem "the news of which flew over Norway, like
fire through dried grass," says an old chronicler. So that Eric, with
his Queen Gunhild, and seven small children, had to run; no other shift
for Eric. They went to the Orkneys first of all, then to England, and
he "got Northumberland as earldom," I vaguely hear, from Athelstan.
But Eric soon died, and his queen, with her children, went back to
the Orkneys in search of refuge or help; to little purpose there or
elsewhere. From Orkney she went to Denmark, where Harald Blue-tooth took
her poor eldest boy as foster-child; but I fear did not very faithfully
keep that promise. The Danes had been robbing extensively during the
late tumults in Norway; this the Christian Hakon, now established there,
paid in kind, and the two countries were at war; so that Gunhild's
little boy was a welcome card in the hand of Blue-tooth.

Hakon proved a brilliant and successful king; regulated many things,
public law among others (_Gule-Thing_ Law, _Frost-Thing_ Law: these
are little codes of his accepted by their respective Things, and had a
salutary effect in their time); with prompt dexterity he drove back the
Blue-tooth foster-son invasions every time they came; and on the whole
gained for himself the name of Hakon the Good. These Danish invasions
were a frequent source of trouble to him, but his greatest and continual
trouble was that of extirpating heathen idolatry from Norway, and
introducing the Christian Evangel in its stead. His transcendent anxiety
to achieve this salutary enterprise was all along his grand difficulty
and stumbling-block; the heathen opposition to it being also rooted
and great. Bishops and priests from England Hakon had, preaching and
baptizing what they could, but making only slow progress; much too slow
for Hakon's zeal. On the other hand, every Yule-tide, when the chief
heathen were assembled in his own palace on their grand sacrificial
festival, there was great pressure put upon Hakon, as to sprinkling
with horse-blood, drinking Yule-beer, eating horse-flesh, and the other
distressing rites; the whole of which Hakon abhorred, and with all
his steadfastness strove to reject utterly. Sigurd, Jarl of Lade
(Trondhjem), a liberal heathen, not openly a Christian, was ever a wise
counsellor and conciliator in such affairs; and proved of great help
to Hakon. Once, for exam