No pursuit was attempted. Erling got back to his own ship, and, setting a watch, lay down to rest.
In the morning no notice was taken of what had occurred during the night. The King evidently pretended that he knew nothing about the matter. He again met with the chief men of the district, and made them many promises and many complimentary speeches, but in his heart he resolved that the day should come when every one of them should either bow before his will or lose his life. The bonders, on the other hand, listened with due respect to all the King said, but it need scarcely be added that their lips did not express all their thoughts; for while the sanguine and more trustful among them felt some degree of hope and confidence, there were others who could not think of the future except with the most gloomy forebodings.
In this mood the two parties separated. The King sailed with his warships out among the skerries, intending to proceed north to Drontheim, while Haldor the Fierce, with his friends and men, went back to Horlingdal.
Chapter Sixteen.
Relates to such Elementary Matters as the A B C, and touches on Love-making in the Olden Time
After the occurrence of the events just narrated, King Harald’s attention was diverted from the people of Horlingdal and the neighbouring districts by the doings of certain small kings, against whom it became necessary that he should launch his whole force. These were King Hunthiof, who ruled over the district of Möre, and his son Solve Klofe; also King Nokve, who ruled over Romsdal, and was the brother of Solve’s mother. These men were great warriors. Hearing that King Harald was sailing north, they resolved to give him battle.
For this purpose they raised a large force, and went out among the skerries to intercept him.
We do not intend here to go into the details of the fight that followed, or its consequences. It is sufficient for the proper development of our tale to say that they met at an island in North Möre named Solskiel, where a pitched battle was fought, and gained by Harald. The two kings were slain, but Solve Klofe escaped, and afterwards proved a great thorn in Harald’s side, plundering in North Möre, killing many of the King’s men, pillaging some places, burning others, and generally making great ravage wherever he went; so that, what with keeping him and similar turbulent characters in check, and establishing law and order in the districts of the two kings whom he had slain, King Harald had his hands fully occupied during the remainder of that summer, and was glad to go north to spend the winter peacefully in Drontheim.
The families and neighbours, therefore, of those with whom our tale has chiefly to do had rest during that winter. How some of them availed themselves of this period of repose may be gathered from a few incidents which we shall now relate.
In the first place, Erling the Bold spent a large proportion of his time in learning the alphabet! Now this may sound very strange in the ears of many people in modern times, but their surprise will be somewhat abated when we tell them that the art of writing was utterly unknown (though probably not unheard of) in Norway at the end of the ninth century, and long after that; so that Erling, although a gentleman of the period, and a Sea-king to boot, had not up to the time we write of, learned his A B C!
It is just possible that antiquaries, recalling to mind the fact that the art of writing was not introduced among the Norse colonists of Iceland until the eleventh century, may be somewhat surprised to learn that our hero acquired the art at all! But the fact is, that there always have been, in all countries, men who were what is popularly termed “born before their time”—men who were in advance, intellectually, of their age—men who, overleaping the barriers of prejudice, managed to see deeper into things in general than their fellows, and to become more or less famous.
Now our hero, Erling the Bold, was one of those who could see beyond his time, and who became almost prophetically wise; that is to say, he was fond of tracing causes onwards to their probable effects, to the amusement of the humorous, the amazement of the stupid, and the horrification of the few who, even in those days of turmoil, trembled at the idea of “change”! Everything, therefore, that came under his observation claimed and obtained his earnest attention, and was treated with a species of inductive philosophy that would have charmed the heart of Lord Bacon, had he lived in those times. Of course this new wonder of committing thoughts to parchment, which the hermit had revealed to him, was deeply interesting to Erling, who began to study it forthwith. And we beg leave to tell antiquaries that we have nothing to do with the fact that no record is left of his studies—no scrap of his writing to be found. We are not responsible for the stupidity or want of sympathy in his generation! Doubtless, in all ages there have been many such instances of glorious opportunities neglected by the world—neglected, too, with such contempt, that not even a record of their having occurred has been made. Perchance some such opportunities are before ourselves just now, in regard to our neglect of which the next generation may possibly have to hold up its hands and turn up its eyes in amazement! But be this as it may, the fact remains that although no record is handed down of any knowledge of letters at this period in Norway, Erling the Bold did nevertheless become acquainted with them to some extent.
Erling began his alphabet after he had passed the mature age of twenty years, and his teacher was the fair Hilda. It will be remembered that in one of their meetings the hermit had informed Erling of his having already taught the meaning of the strange characters which covered his parchments to the Norse maiden, and that she had proved herself an apt scholar. Erling said nothing at the time, except that he had a strong desire to become better acquainted with the writing in question, but he settled it then and there in his heart that Hilda, and not the hermit, should be his teacher. Accordingly, when the fishings and fightings of the summer were over, the young warrior laid by his sword, lines, and trident, and, seating himself at Hilda’s feet, went diligently to work.
The schoolroom was the hermit’s hut on the cliff which overlooked the fiord. It was selected of necessity, because the old man guarded his parchments with tender solicitude, and would by no means allow them to go out of his dwelling, except when carried forth by his own hand. On the first occasion of the meeting of the young couple for study, Christian sat down beside them, and was about to expound matters, when Erling interposed with a laugh.
“No, no, Christian, thou must permit Hilda to teach me, because she is an old friend of mine, who all her life has ever been more willing to learn than to teach. Therefore am I curious to know how she will change her character.”
“Be it so, my son,” said the hermit, with a smile, folding his hands on his knee, and preparing to listen, and if need be to correct.
“Be assured, Erling,” said Hilda, “that I know very little.”
“Enough for me, no doubt,” returned the youth.
“For a day or two, perhaps,” said the too-literal Hilda; “but after that Christian will have—”
“After that,” interrupted Erling, “it will be time enough to consider that subject.”
Hilda laughed, and asked if he were ready to begin. To which Erling replied that he was, and, sitting down opposite to his teacher, bent over the parchment, which for greater convenience she had spread out upon her knee.
“Well,” began Hilda, with a slight feeling of that pardonable self-importance which is natural to those who instruct others older than themselves, “that is the first letter.”
“Which?” asked Erling, gazing up in her face.
“That one there, with the long tail to it. Dost thou see it?”
“Yes,” replied the youth.
“How canst thou say so, Erling,” remonstrated Hilda, “when thou art looking all the time straight in my face!”
“But I do see it,” returned he, a little confused; “I am looking at it now.”
“Well,” said she, “that is—”
“Thou art looking at it upside down, my son,” said the hermit, who had been observing them with an amused expression of countenance.
“Oh, so he is; I never thought of that,” cried Hilda, laughing; “thou must sit beside me, Erling, so that we may see it in the same way.”
“This one, now, with the curve that way,” she went on, “dost thou see it?”
“See it!” thought Erling, “of course I see it: the prettiest little hand in all the dale!” But he only said—
“How can I see it, Hilda, when the point of thy finger covers it?”
“Oh! well,” drawing the finger down a little, “thou seest it now?”
“Yes.”
“Well, that is—why! where is Christian?” she exclaimed, looking up suddenly in great surprise, and pointing to the stool on which the hermit certainly had been sitting a few minutes before, but which was now vacant.
“He must have gone out while we were busy with the—the parchment,” said Erling, also much surprised.
“He went like a mouse, then,” said Hilda, “for I heard him not.”
“Nor I,” added her companion.
“Very strange,” said she.
Now there was nothing particularly strange in the matter. The fact was that the old man had just exercised a little of Erling’s philosophy in the way of projecting a cause to its result. As we have elsewhere hinted, the hermit was not one of those ascetics who, in ignorance of the truth, banished themselves out of the world. His banishment had not been self-imposed. He had fled before the fierce persecutors. They managed to slay the old man’s wife, however, before they made him take to flight and seek that refuge and freedom of conscience among the Pagan Northmen which were denied him in Christian Europe. In the first ten minutes after the A B C class began he perceived how things stood with the young people, and, wisely judging that the causes which were operating in their hearts would proceed to their issue more pleasantly in his absence, he quietly got up and went out to cut firewood.
After this the hermit invariably found it necessary to go out and cut firewood when Erling and Hilda arrived at the school, which they did regularly three times a week.
This, of course, was considered a very natural and proper state of things by the two young people, for they were both considerate by nature, and would have been sorry indeed to have interrupted the old man in his regular work.
But Erling soon began to feel that it was absolutely essential for one of them to be in advance of the other in regard to knowledge, if the work of teaching was to go on; for, while both remained equally ignorant, the fiction could not be kept up with even the semblance of propriety. To obviate this difficulty he paid solitary nocturnal visits to the hut, on which occasions he applied himself so zealously to the study of the strange characters that he not only became as expert as his teacher, but left her far behind, and triumphantly rebutted the charge of stupidity which she had made against him.
At the same time our hero entered a new and captivating region of mental and spiritual activity when the hermit laid before him the portions of Holy Scripture which he had copied out before leaving southern lands, and expounded to him the grand, the glorious truths that God had revealed to man through Jesus Christ our Lord. And profoundly deep, and startling even to himself, were the workings of the young Norseman’s active mind while he sat there, night after night, in the lone hut on the cliff, poring over the sacred rolls, or holding earnest converse with the old man about things past, present, and future.
Chapter Seventeen.
In which Glumm takes to hunting on the Mountains for Consolation, and finds it unexpectedly, while Alric proves himself a Hero
“I go to the fells to-day,” said Glumm to Alric one morning, as the latter opened the door of Glummstede and entered the hall.
“I go also,” said Alric, leaning a stout spear which he carried against the wall, and sitting down on a stool beside the fire to watch Glumm as he equipped himself for the chase.
“Art ready, then? for the day is late,” said Glumm.
“All busked,” replied the boy.—“I say, Glumm, is that a new spear thou hast got?”
“Aye; I took it from a Swedish viking the last fight I had off the coast. We had a tough job of it, and left one or two stout men behind to glut the birds of Odin, but we brought away much booty. This was part of it,” he added, buckling on a long hunting-knife, which was stuck in a richly ornamented sheath, “and that silver tankard too, besides the red mantle that my mother wears, and a few other things—but my comrades got the most of it.”
“I wish I had been there, Glumm,” said Alric.
“If Hilda were here, lad, she would say it is wrong to wish to fight.”
“Hilda has strange thoughts,” observed the boy.
“So has Erling,” remarked his companion.
“And so has Ada,” said Alric, with a sly glance.
Glumm looked up quickly. “What knowest thou about Ada?” said he.
The sly look vanished before Glumm had time to observe it, and an expression of extreme innocence took its place as the lad replied—
“I know as much about her as is usual with one who has known a girl, and been often with her, since the day he was born.”
“True,” muttered Glumm, stooping to fasten the thongs that laced the untanned shoes on his feet. “Ada has strange thoughts also, as thou sayest. Come now, take thy spear, and let us be gone.”
“Where shall we go to-day?” asked Alric.
“To the wolf’s glen.”
“To the wolf’s glen? that is far.”
“Is it too far for thee, lad?”
“Nay, twice the distance were not too far for me,” returned the boy proudly; “but the day advances, and there is danger without honour in walking on the fells after dark.”
“The more need for haste,” said Glumm, opening the door and going out.
Alric followed, and for some time these two walked in silence, as the path was very steep, and so narrow for a considerable distance, that they could not walk abreast.
Snow lay pretty thickly on the mountains, particularly in sheltered places, but in exposed parts it had been blown off, and the hunters could advance easily. In about ten minutes after setting out they lost sight of Glummstede. As they advanced higher and deeper into the mountains, the fiord and the sea, with its innumerable skerries, was lost to view, but it was not until they had toiled upwards and onwards for nearly two hours that they reached those dark recesses of the fells to which the bears and wolves were wont to retreat after committing depredations on the farms in the valleys far below.
There was something in the rugged grandeur of the scenery here, in the whiteness of the snow, the blackness of the rocks which peeped out from its voluminous wreaths, the lightness of the atmosphere, and, above all, the impressive silence, which possessed an indescribable charm for the romantic mind of Alric, and which induced even the stern matter-of-fact Glumm to tread with slower steps, and to look around him with a feeling almost akin to awe. No living thing was to be seen, either among the stupendous crags which still towered above, or in the depths which they had left below; but there were several footprints of wolves, all of which Glumm declared, after careful examination, to be old.
“See here, lad,” he said, turning up one of these footprints with the butt of his spear; “observe the hardish ball of snow just under the print; that shows that the track is somewhat old. If it had been quite fresh there would have been no such ball.”
“Thou must think my memory of the shortest, Glumm, for I have been told that every time I have been out with thee.”
“True, but thou art so stupid,” said Glumm, laying his spear lightly across the boy’s shoulders, “that I have thought fit to impress it on thee by repetition, having an interest in thine education, although thou dost not deserve it.”
“I deserve it, mayhap, more than ye think.”
“How so, boy?”
“Why, because I have for a long time past taken an uncommon interest in thy welfare.”
Glumm laughed, and said he did not know that there was any occasion to concern himself about his welfare.
“Oh yes, there is!” cried Alric, “for, when a man goes moping about the country as if he were fey, or as if he had dreamed of seeing his own guardian spirit, his friends cannot help being concerned about him.”
“Why, what is running in the lad’s head?” said Glumm, looking with a perplexed expression at his young companion.
“Nothing runs in my head, save ordinary thoughts. If there be any unusual running at all, it must be in thine own.”
“Speak, thou little fox,” said Glumm, suddenly grasping Alric by the nape of the neck and giving him a shake.
“Nay then, if that is thy plan,” said the boy, “give it a fair trial. Shake away, and see what comes of it. Thou mayest shake out blood, bones, flesh, and life too, and carry home my skin as a trophy, but be assured that thou shalt not shake a word off my tongue!”
“Boldly spoken,” said Glumm, laughing, as he released the lad; “but I think thy tone would change if I were to take thee at thy word.”
“That it would not. Thou art not the first man whom I have defied, aye, and drawn blood from, as that red-haired Dane—”
Alric stopped suddenly. He had reached that age when the tendency to boast begins, at least in manly boys, to be checked by increasing good sense and good taste. Yet it is no disparagement of Alric’s character to say that he found it uncommonly difficult to refrain, when occasion served, from making reference to his first warlike exploit, even although frequent rebukes and increasing wisdom told him that boasting was only fit for the lips of cowards.
“Why do ye stop?” asked Glumm, who quite understood the boy’s feelings, and admired his exercise of self-control.
“Be—because I have said enough.”
“Good is it,” observed the other, “when man or boy knows that he has said enough, and has the power to stop when he knows it. But come, Alric, thou hast not said enough to me yet on the matter that—that—”
“What matter?” asked Alric, with a sly look.
“Why, the matter of my welfare, to be sure.”
“Ah, true. Well, methinks, Glumm, that I could give thee a little medicine for thy mind, but I won’t, unless ye promise to keep thy spear off my back.”
“I promise,” said Glumm, whose curiosity was aroused.
“It is a sad thing when a man looks sweet and a maid looks sour, but there is a worse thing; that is when the maid feels sour. Thou lovest Ada—”
“Hold!” cried Glumm, turning fiercely on his companion, “and let not thy pert tongue dare to speak of such things, else will I show thee that there are other things besides spears to lay across thy shoulders.”
“Now art thou truly Glumm the Gruff,” cried Alric, laughing, as he leaped to the other side of a mass of fallen rock; “but if thy humour changes not, I will show thee that I am not named Lightfoot for nothing. Come, don’t fume and fret there like a bear with a headache, but let me speak, and I warrant me thou wilt be reasonably glad.”
“Go on, then, thou incorrigible.”
“Very well; but none of thy hard names, friend Glumm, else will I set my big brother Erling at thee. There now, don’t give way again. What a storm-cloud thou art! Will the knowledge that Ada loves thee as truly as thou lovest her calm thee down?”
“I see thou hast discovered my secret,” said Glumm, looking at his little friend with a somewhat confused expression, “though how the knowledge came to thee is past my understanding. Yet as thou art so clever a warlock I would fain know what ye mean about ‘Ada’s love for me.’ Hadst thou said her hatred, I could have believed thee without explanation.”
“Let us go on, then,” said Alric, “for there is nothing to be gained and only time to be lost by thus talking across a stone.”
The path which they followed was broad at that part, and not quite so rugged, so that Alric could walk alongside of his stout friend as he related to him the incident that was the means of enlightening him as to Ada’s feelings towards her lover. It was plain from the expression on the Norseman’s face that his soul was rejoiced at the discovery, and he strode forward at such a pace that the boy was fain to call a halt.
“Thinkest thou that my legs are as long as thine?” he said, stopping and panting.
Glumm laughed; and the laugh was loud and strong. He would have laughed at anything just then, for the humour was upon him, and he felt it difficult to repress a shout at the end of it!
“Come on, Alric, I will go slower. But art thou sure of all this? Hast not mistaken the words?”
“Mistaken the words!” cried the boy; “why, I tell thee they were as plain to my ears and my senses as what thou hast said this moment.”
“Good,” said Glumm; “and now the question comes up, how must I behave to her? But thou canst not aid me herein, for in such matters thou hast had no experience.”
“Out upon thee for a stupid monster!” said the boy; “have I not just proved that my experience is very deep? I have not, indeed, got the length thou hast—of wandering about like a poor ghost or a half-witted fellow, but I have seen enough of such matters to know what common sense says.”
“And, pray, what does common sense say?”
“Why, it says, Act towards the maid like a sane man, and, above all, a true man. Don’t go about the land gnashing thy teeth until everyone laughs at thee. Don’t go staring at her in grim silence as if she were a wraith; and, more particularly, don’t pretend to be fond of other girls, for thou didst make a pitiful mess of that attempt. In short, be Glumm without being Gruff, and don’t try to be anybody else. Be kind and straightforward to her, worship her, or, as Kettle Flatnose said the other day, ‘kiss the ground she walks on,’ if thou art so inclined, but don’t worry her life out. Show that thou art fond of her, and willing to bide her time. Go on viking cruise, for the proverb says that an ‘absent body makes a longing spirit,’ and bring her back shiploads of kirtles and mantles and armlets, and gold and silver ornaments—that’s what common sense says, Glumm, and a great deal more besides, but I fear much that it is all wasted on thee.”
“Heyday!” exclaimed Glumm, “what wisdom do I hear? Assuredly we must call thee Alric hinn Frode hereafter. One would think thou must have been born before thine own grandfather.”
“Truly that is not so difficult to fancy,” retorted Alric. “Even now I feel like a great-grandfather while I listen to thee. There wants but a smooth round face and a lisping tongue to make thine appearance suitable to thy wisdom! But what is this that we have here?”
The boy pointed to a track of some animal in the snow a few yards to one side of the path.
“A wolf track,” said Glumm, turning aside.
“A notably huge one,” remarked the boy.
“And quite fresh,” said the man.
“Which is proved,” rejoined Alric in a slow, solemn voice, “by the fact that there is no ball of snow beneath the—”
“Hold thy pert tongue,” said Glumm in a hoarse whisper, “the brute must be close to us. Do thou keep in the lower end of this gorge—see, yonder, where it is narrow. I will go round to the upper end; perchance the wolf is there. If so, we stand a good chance of killing him, for the sides of the chasm are like two walls all the way up. But,” added Glumm, hesitating a moment, and looking fixedly at the small but sturdy frame of his companion, whose heightened colour and flashing eyes betokened a roused spirit, “I doubt thy—that is—I have no fear of the spirit, if the body were a little bigger.”
“Take thine own big body off, Glumm,” said Alric, “and leave me to guard the pass.”
Glumm grinned as he turned and strode away.
The spot which the hunters had reached merits particular notice. It was one of those wild deep rents or fissures which are usually found near the summits of almost inaccessible mountains. It was not, however, at the top of the highest range in that neighbourhood, being merely on the summit of a ridge which was indeed very high—perhaps five or six thousand feet—but still far below the serried and shattered peaks which towered in all directions round Horlingdal, shutting it out from all communication with the rest of the world except through the fiord and the pass leading over to the Springs.
On the place where Alric parted from his friend the rocks of the gorge or defile rose almost perpendicularly on both sides, and as he advanced he found that the space between became narrower, until, at the spot where he was to take his stand, there was an opening of scarcely six feet in width. Beyond this the chasm widened a little, until, at its higher end, it was nearly twenty yards broad; but, owing to the widening nature of the defile, the one opening could not be seen from the other, although they were little more than four hundred yards apart.
The track of the wolf led directly through the pass into the gorge. As the lad took his stand he observed with much satisfaction that it was that of an unusually large animal. This feeling was tempered, however, with some anxiety lest it should have escaped at the other opening. It was also mixed with a touch of agitation; for although Alric had seen his friend and Erling kill wolves and bears too, he had never before been left to face the foe by himself, and to sustain the brunt of the charge in his own proper person. Beyond an occasional flutter of the heart, however, there was nothing to indicate, even to himself, that he was not as firm as the rock on which he stood.
Now, let it not be supposed that we are here portraying a hero of romance in whom is united the enthusiasm of the boy with the calm courage of the man. We crave attention, more particularly that of boys, to the following observations:—
In the highly safe and civilised times in which we live, many thousands of us never have a chance, from personal experience, of forming a just estimate of the powers of an average man or boy, and we are too apt to ascribe that to heroism which is simply due to knowledge. A man knows that he can do a certain thing that seems extremely dangerous, therefore he does it boldly, not because he is superlatively bold by any means, but because he knows there is no risk—at least none to him. The proverb that “Familiarity breeds contempt” applies as truly to danger as to anything else; and well is it for the world that the majority of human beings are prone to familiarise themselves with danger in spite of those well-meaning but weak ones who have been born with a tendency to say perpetually, “Take care,” “Don’t run such risk”, etcetera. “Whatever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might;” and man has echoed the sentiment in the proverb, “Whatever is worth doing is worth doing well”. Do you climb?—then do it well—do it in such circumstances that your spirit will get used to seeing profound depths below you without your heart melting into hot water and your nerves quaking. Do you leap?—then do it well—do it so that you may be able to turn it to some good account in the day of trial; do it so that you may know how to leap off a runaway carriage, for instance, without being killed. Learn to jump off high cliffs into deep water, so that, should the opportunity ever offer, you may be able to plunge off the high bulwarks of a vessel to save a sister, or mother, or child, with as little thought about yourself as if you were jumping off a sofa. Observe, we do not advocate recklessness. To leap off a cliff so high that you will be sure to be killed is not leaping “well”; but neither is it well to content yourself with a jump of three or four feet as your utmost attainment, because that is far short of many a leap which may have to be taken in this world to save even your own life, not to mention the lives of others. But enough of this disquisition, which, the reader will observe, has been entered upon chiefly in order to prove that we do not ascribe heroic courage to Alric when we say that, having been familiar with danger from his birth, he prepared to face a wolf of unknown size and ferocity with considerable coolness, if not indifference to danger.
Glumm meanwhile reached the other end of the ravine, and there, to his intense disappointment, found the track of the wolf leading away towards the open mountains beyond. Just where it left the ravine, however, the animal had run about so much that the track was crossed and recrossed in confusion. Glumm therefore had difficulty at first in following it up, but when he did so, great was his joy to find that it doubled back and re-entered the defile. Pressing quickly forward, he came to a broken part, near the centre, where, among a heap of grey, weather-worn rocks he perceived two sharp-pointed objects, like a pair of erect ears! To make certain, he hurled a stone towards the place. The objects instantly disappeared!
Immediately afterwards, a long grey back and a bushy tail were visible as the wolf glided among the rocks, making for the side of the precipice, with the intention, doubtless, of rushing past this bold intruder.
Glumm observed the movement, and promptly went in the same direction. The wolf noticed this, and paused abruptly—remaining still, as if uncertain what to do. The hunter at once put to flight his uncertainty by gliding swiftly towards him. Seeing this, the wolf abandoned the attempt at concealment and bounded into the centre of the ravine, where, with his bristles erect, his back slightly arched, and all his glittering teeth and blood-red gums exposed, he stood for a moment or two the very picture of intensified fury. The hunter advanced with his spear levelled, steadily, but not hastily, because there was sufficient space on either hand to render the meeting of the animal in its rush a matter of extreme difficulty, while at every step he took, the precipices on either side drew closer together. The brute had evidently a strong objection to turn back, and preferred to run the risk of passing its foe, for it suddenly sprang to one side and ran up the cliff as far as possible, like a cat, while it made for the upper end of the ravine.