第96章

"Why stand ye aghast, who see me colourless? Surely every live man fades among the dead.

"By some strange enterprise of the power of hell the spirit of Aswid was sent up from the nether world, and with cruel tooth eats the fleet-footed (horse), and has given his dog to his abominable jaws.Not sated with devouring the horse or hound, he soon turned his swift nails upon me, tearing my cheek and taking off my ear.Hence the hideous sight of my slashed countenance, the blood-spurts in the ugly wound.Yet the bringer of horrors did it not unscathed; for soon I cut off his head with my steel, and impaled his guilty carcase with a stake.

"Why stand ye aghast who see me colourless? Surely every live man fades among the dead."Frode had by this taken his fleet over to Halogaland; and here, in order to learn the numbers of his host, which seemed to surpass all bounds and measure that could be counted, he ordered his soldiers to pile up a hill, one stone being cast upon the heap for each man.The enemy also pursued the same method of numbering their host, and the hills are still to be seen to convince the visitor.Here Frode joined battle with the Norwegians, and the day was bloody.At nightfall both sides determined to retreat.As daybreak drew near, Erik, who had come across the land, came up and advised the king to renew the battle.In this war the Danes suffered such slaughter that out of 3,000 ships only 170 are supposed to have survived.The Northmen, however, were exterminated in such a mighty massacre, that (so the story goes) there were not men left to till even a fifth of their villages.

Frode, now triumphant, wished to renew peace among all nations, that he might ensure each man's property from the inroads of thieves and now ensure peace to his realms after war.So he hung one bracelet on a crag which is called Frode's Rock, and another in the district of Wik, after he had addressed the assembled Norwegians; threatening that these necklaces should serve to test the honesty which he had decreed, and threatening that if they were filched punishment should fall on all the governors of the district.And thus, sorely imperilling the officers, there was the gold unguarded, hanging up full in the parting of the roads, and the booty, so easy to plunder, a temptation to all covetous spirits.(a) Frode also enacted that seafarers should freely use oars wherever they found them; while to those who wished to cross a river he granted free use of the horse which they found nearest to the ford.He decreed that they must dismount from this horse when its fore feet only touched land and its hind feet were still washed by the waters.For he thought that services such as these should rather be accounted kindness than wrongdoing.Moreover, he ordained that whosoever durst try and make further use of the horse after he had crossed the river should be condemned to death.(b) He also ordered that no man should hold his house or his coffer under lock and key, or should keep anything guarded by bolts, promising that all losses should be made good threefold.

Also, he appointed that it was lawful to claim as much of another man's food for provision as would suffice for a single supper.

If anyone exceeded this measure in his takings, he was to be held guilty of theft.Now, a thief (so he enacted) was to be hung up with a sword passed through his sinews, with a wolf fastened by his side, so that the wicked man might look like the savage beast, both being punished alike.He also had the same penalty extended to accomplices in thefts.Here he passed seven most happy years of peace, begetting a son Alf and a daughter Eyfura.

It chanced that in these days Arngrim, a champion of Sweden, who had challenged, attacked, and slain Skalk the Skanian because he had once robbed him of a vessel, came to Frode.Elated beyond measure with his deed, he ventured to sue for Frode's daughter;but, finding the king deaf to him, he asked Erik, who was ruling Sweden, to help him.Erik advised him to win Frode's goodwill by some illustrious service, and to fight against Egther, the King of Permland, and Thengil, the King of Finmark, since they alone seemed to repudiate the Danish rule, while all men else submitted.Without delay he led his army to that country.Now, the Finns are the uttermost peoples of the North, who have taken a portion of the world that is barely habitable to till and dwell in.They are very keen spearmen, and no nation has a readier skill in throwing the javelin.They fight with large, broad arrows; they are addicted to the study of spells; they are skilled hunters.Their habitation is not fixed, and their dwellings are migratory; they pitch and settle wherever they have caught game.Riding on curved boards (skees or snow-skates), they run over ridges thick with snow.These men Arngrim attacked, in order to win renown, and he crushed them.They fought with ill success; but, as they were scattering in flight, they cast three pebbles behind them, which they caused to appear to the eyes of the enemy like three mountains.Arngrim's eyes were dazzled and deluded, and he called back his men from the pursuit of the enemy, fancying that he was checked by a barrier of mighty rocks.Again, when they engaged and were beaten on the morrow, the Finns cast snow upon the ground and made it look like a mighty river.So the Swedes, whose eyes were utterly deluded, were deceived by their misjudgment, for it seemed the roaring of an extraordinary mass of waters.Thus, the conqueror dreading the unsubstantial phantom of the waters, the Finns managed to escape.They renewed the war again on the third day; but there was no effective means of escape left any longer, for when they saw that their lines were falling back, they surrendered to the conqueror.Arngrim imposed on them the following terms of tribute: that the number of the Finns should be counted, and that, after the lapse of (every) three years, every ten of them should pay a carriage-full of deer-skins by way of assessment.