ived at Thurso, and probably owned its valley up to its source in the
Halkirk and Latheron hills.

The death of Harald the Glib by poison left Paul _de facto_ sole jarl
of Orkney. We are told[8] that "Paul was a man of very many friends,
and no speaker at Things or meetings. He let many other men rule the
land with him, was courteous and kind to all the land-folk, liberal of
money, and he spared nothing to his friends. He was not fond of war,
and sate much in quiet." We may be sure that he was little, if
ever, in Sutherland, the country of his enemy Frakark. His rule was,
however, destined to be disturbed, on the one hand by the Moddan
family's plots, and, on the other hand, by a Norse competitor for the
jarldom, Kali, son of Kol and Gunnhild, Jarl St. Magnus' sister, who
had been re-named Ragnvald from his resemblance to the handsome Jarl
Ragnvald Brusi's son, and was afterwards designated Jarl of Orkney by
King Sigurd of Norway, as the representative of the line of Erlend,
Thorfinn's son.

With Jarl Ragnvald, Jarl St. Magnus' sequel in estate, and himself
afterwards St. Ragnvald, who was much in Caithness and Sutherland,
and seems to have held and acquired considerable estates there, begins
what is practically a new Saga, which may be styled "The Story of
Ragnvald, and of Sweyn" the great Viking. Of these two we have perhaps
the finest and most vividly painted pictures of the _Orkneyinga Saga_,
full of dramatic touches, full, too, of interesting historical detail.

First, we have a portrait of the young Ragnvald as Kali Kolson in his
youth at Agdir in Norway, with his mother Gunnhild, sister of Jarl St.
Magnus Erlend's son, and his shrewd old father Kol. We are told that
Kali was "the most hopeful man" or man of promise, "of middle stature,
fine of limb, with light brown hair"; how he "had many friends, and
was a more proper man both in body and mind than most of the other men
of his time, a good player at draughts, a facile writer of runes,
and a reader of books, good at smith's work, ski-ing, shooting, and
rowing, and as skilful at song as at the harp."[9]

At the age of fifteen, he traded to Grimsby, where many Norwegians
and Orkneymen came, and many from the Hebrides; and here he met Harald
Gillikrist, who became his firm friend, and confided in him alone that
he, Harald, was the son of King Magnus Barelegs, asking how he would
be received by King Sigurd of Norway, and obtaining the diplomatic
reply that he wo