ul adventures of their youth, when they
travelled to strange lands in their swift-moving boats. They had been
friends through good fortune and ill, with hands clasped together and
hearts united. In battle they had stood back to back, facing their
enemies. If one was threatened by an enemy, the other was on guard and
defended his friend.

The king spoke much of the bravery of Frithiof, and said that his
heroic power was better than all royal birth. Thorsten in return
praised the gifts of Helge and Halfdan. Thus did they give an example
of friendship between a king and his man. With the memory of their
long friendship King Bele urged his sons and Frithiof to be friends too.

"But hold ye fast together, ye children three,
The Northland then your conqueror shall never see;
For royalty and power, when duly ordered,
Are like a bright shield golden, by blue steel bordered."

Then again spoke Bele: "These are my last commands. On you, O Helge,
my eldest son, I place a father's care. Guard and love your sister
Ingeborg. Be gentle and guide her with loving words. Noble spirits
fret under harshness, but loving and gentle manners win all to right
and honour.

"And now, farewell, my children. Together Thorsten and I go to the
All-father gladly. Lay us in mounds close to the waves of the restless
gulf singing the song of the sea."

[Illustration: Burial mounds]

Framness

So the old king and his faithful friend were united in death as they
had been in life, and were buried on the shore of the loud-singing sea.
Together by the wish of the people did his sons, Helge and Halfdan,
rule the kingdom.

Frithiof, the son of Thorsten, went to his father's hall, the mighty
Framness. For twelve miles in all directions stretched his broad
acres. The hilltops were covered with birch forests. On the sloping
sides grew the golden corn and the tall rye. Many blue lakes gleamed
like mirrors. Streams rippled over the pebbly beds. In the wide
valleys herds of oxen and sheep were quietly grazing, and in the
stables were twenty-four steeds swift as the whirlwind.

In the great hall built of choicest fir more than five hundred warriors
gathered at Yule-time. A great table of oak, polished and shining, ran
through the middle from end to end. The floor was covered with straw,
and on the hearth in the centre of the hall a warm and cheerful fire
was always burning.

On the great nails in the hall hung helmets