lames,
as they also did the strong cities they captured and sacked. The small,
light boats with which they dared the sea in its wrath were able to go
far up the rivers, and wherever these fierce and bloodthirsty rovers
appeared wild panic spread far around. So fond were they of sword-thrust
and battle that one viking crew would often challenge another for the
pure delight of fighting. A torment and scourge they were wherever they
appeared.

The first we hear in history of the sea-kings is in the year 787, when a
small party of them landed on the English coast. In 794 came another
flock of these vultures of the sea, who robbed a church and a monastery,
plundering and killing, and being killed in their turn when a storm
wrecked their ships and threw them on shore. As a good monk writes of
them: "The heathen came from the northern countries to Britain like
stinging wasps, roamed about like savage wolves, robbing, biting, killing
not only horses, sheep, and cattle, but also priests, acolytes, monks,
and nuns."

The Norsemen had found a gold mine in the south and from this time on
they worked it with fierce hands. Few dared face them, and even in the
days of the great Charlemagne they ravaged the coast lands of France.
Once, when the great emperor was in one of his cities on the
Mediterranean coast, a fleet of the swift viking ships, known by their
square sails, entered the harbor. Soon word was brought that they had
landed and were plundering. Who they were the people knew not, some
saying that they were Jews, others Africans, and others that they were
British merchants.

"No merchants they," said the emperor. "Those ships do not bring us
goods, but fierce foes, bloody fighters from the north."

The warriors around him at once seized their weapons and hurried to the
shore, but the vikings had learned that the great emperor was in the city
and, not daring to face him, had sought their ships and spread their
sails again. Tears came to the eyes of Charlemagne as he watched them in
their outward flight. He said to those around him:

"It is not for fear that these brigands can do me any harm that I weep,
but for their daring to show themselves on this coast while I am alive.
Their coming makes me foresee and fear the harm they may do to my
descendants."

This story may be one of those legends which the monks were fond of
telling, but it serves to show how the dread Norsemen were feared. France
was one of their chief fiel