King Harald Goes West-over-seas

Now many men hated King Harald. Many a man said:

"Why should he put himself up for king of all of us? He is no better

than I am. Am I not a king's son as well as he? And are not many of us

kings' sons? I will not kneel before him and promise to be his man. I

will not pay him taxes. I will not have his earl sitting over me. The

good old days have gone. This Norway has become a prison. I will go away

and find some other place."

So hundreds of men sailed away. Some went to France and got land and

lived there. Big Rolf-go-afoot and all his men sailed up the great

French River and won a battle against the French king himself. There was

no way to stop the flashing of his battle-axes but to give him what he

wanted. So the king made Rolf a duke, gave him broad lands and gave him

the king's own daughter for wife. Rolf called his country Normandy, for

old Norway. He ruled it well and was a great lord, and his sons' sons

after him were kings of England.

Other Norsemen went to Ireland and England and Scotland. They drew up

their boats on the river banks. The people ran away before them and

gathered into great armies that marched back to meet the vikings in

battle. Sometimes the Norsemen lost, but oftener they won, so that they

got land and lived in those countries. Their houses sat in these strange

lands like warriors' camps, and the Norsemen went among their new

neighbors with hanging swords and spears in hand, ever ready for fight.

There are many islands north of Scotland. They are called the Orkneys

and the Shetlands. They have many good harbors for ships. They are

little and rocky and bare of trees. Wild sea-birds scream around them.

On some of them a man can stand in the middle and see the ocean all

about him. Now the vikings sailed to these islands and were pleased.

"It is like being always in a boat," they said. "This shall be our

home."

So it went until all the lands round about were covered with vikings.

Norse carved and painted houses brightened the hillsides. Viking ships

sailed all the seas and made harbor in every river. Norsemen's thralls

plowed the soil and planted crops and herded cattle, and gold flowed

into their masters' treasure-chests. Norse warriors walked up and down

the land, and no man dared to say them nay.

These men did not forget Norway. In the summers they sailed back there

and harried the coast. They took gold and grain and beautiful cloth back

to their homes. In Norway they left burning houses and weeping women.

Every summer King Harald had out his ships and men and hunted these

vikings. There are many little islands about Norway. They have crags and

caves and deep woods. Here the vikings hid when they saw King Harald's

ships coming. But Harald ran his boat into every creek and fiord and

hunted in every cave and through all the woods and among the crags. He

caught many men, but most of them got away and went home laughing at

Harald. Then they came back the next summer and did the same deeds over

again. At last King Harald said:

"There is but one thing to do. I must sail to these western islands and

whip these robbers in their own homes."

So he went with a great number of ships. He found as brave men as he had

brought from Norway. These vikings had brought their old courage to

their new homes. King Harald's fine ships were scarred by viking stones

and scorched by viking fire. The shields of Harald's warriors had dents

from viking blows. Many of those men carried viking scars all their

lives. And many of King Harald's warriors walked the long, hard road to

Valhalla, and feasted there with some of these very vikings that had

died in King Harald's battles. But after many hard fights on land and

sea, after many men had died and many had fled away to other lands, King

Harald won, and he made the men that were yet in the islands take the

oath, and he left his earls to rule over them. Then he went back to

Norway.

"He has done more than he vowed to do," people said. "He has not only

whipped the vikings, but he has got a new kingdom west-over-seas."

Then they talked of that dream that his mother had.

"King Harald was that great tree," they said. "The trunk was red with

the blood of his many battles, but higher up the limbs were fair and

green like this good time of peace. The topmost branches were white

because Harald will live to be an old man. Just as that tree spread out

until all of Norway was in its shade, and even more lands, so Harald is

king of all this country and of the western islands. The many branches

of that tree are the many sons of Harald, who shall be earls and kings

in Norway, and their sons after them, for hundreds of years."