The Long Ships (43 page)

“The spirit of the Lord was upon me,” said Father Willibald humbly. “King Sven is God’s enemy, and so my weak hand brought him down.”

“We have heard it said,” remarked a man of note called Ivar the Smith who was seated near Orm, “that King Sven hates all Christians, and their priests especially, so that he kills all he can lay his hands on. It is not difficult to guess the reason for his hatred, if he received such a blow as this from the hand of one of them. For there are few greater indignities that a king could undergo, and few that would take longer to forget.”

“Especially if he lost a tooth or two,” said another good farmer farther down the table, whose name was Black Grim of the Fell.

“For every time he bites a crust of bread, or gnaws a knuckle of sheep, he will be reminded of the incident.”

“That is true,” said a third, by name Uffe Club-Foot. “It was so with me when I lost my foot, the time I fell out with my neighbor, Thorvald of Langaled. Midway through our argument he aimed a blow at my leg, and I jumped too late. Long after the stump had healed and I had learned to walk with a wooden peg, I still felt tired and feeble, not only when I was standing but also when I was sitting down, and even in bed, as my woman can attest, for she was for a long time no better off than if she had been a widow. But when at last my luck changed, so that I saw Thorvald lying before me on his doorstep with my arrow in his throat, I took a great leap over him and all but broke my good leg, so full of vigor I suddenly found myself. And I have kept that vigor ever since.”

“It is not because of Father Willibald that my brother kills Christians,” said Ylva. “He has always hated them bitterly, especially since my father took their part and allowed himself to be baptized. He could not set eyes even on the blessed Bishop Poppo, who was the mildest of men, without mumbling against him; though more than that he dared not do as long as my father retained his power. But now, if reports are true, he kills bishops and priests of all ranks whenever he can lay his hand on them, and it will be a good thing if he does not live too long.”

“The life of evil men is often long,” said Father Willibald, “but it is not so long as the arm of God. They shall not escape his vengeance.”

Down at the end of one of the tables, where the young people were seated and the merriment was greatest, they were now beginning to make verses; and there on this evening a lampoon was composed which was sung along the border for many years afterwards, at feasts, threshings, and flax-strippings, and which came to be known as the “Ballad of King Sven.” It was a young man called Gisle, son to Black Grim, who began it. He was a shapely youth, dark-haired and fair-skinned; and although there was nothing wrong with his head, it was a remarkable thing with him that he was shy of women, though he was often observed to cast by no means hostile glances in the direction of one or another of them. All his family regarded this as a peculiar and disturbing thing, which even the wisest among them knew no cure for; and hitherto he had been sitting bashful and silent in his place, devoting himself solely to his food and drink, though it was well known that he had as ready a tongue as any young man there. Opposite him there sat a girl called Rannvi, a comely virgin with a snub nose and a dimple in her chin, such a woman as might easily cause a young man to cease his chatter; and ever and anon, from the time that he had taken his seat on the bench on the first day of the feast, he had cast stealthy glances toward her, but had not dared to address her and had become stiff with terror whenever it had so happened that their eyes had met. Once or twice she had gone so far as to chide him for his word-meanness, but without avail. Now, however, the good ale had given him better courage, and the story of King Sven’s humiliation at the hand of Father Willibald had made him laugh very loudly; and of a sudden he began to rock backwards and forwards on his bench, opened his mouth wide, and roared in a high voice:

“You challenged a priest,
And that was the least.
For he toppled you into
The mud, King Sven!”

“Here is something new!” cried those who sat nearest to him. “Gisle has turned poet. He is making a ballad about King Sven. But this is only half a verse. Let us hear the rest.”

Many of the guests now made suggestions how he might finish his poem, but it was no easy thing to find words of the right length and ending; and in the end it was Gisle himself who found the answer and completed his poem so that it might be sung to an old and well-known melody:

“You were always greedy for
More, King Sven!
You thought yourself greater than
Thor, King Sven!
But the priest threw a stone
And down with a groan
You fell on your face to the
Floor, King Sven!”

“He is a poet! He has written a whole poem!” cried those about him; and none cried with so loud a voice as Rannvi.

“Listen to the young people,” said the old ones higher up the table. “They have a poet there among them. Black Grim’s son has wrought a ballad about King Sven. Who would have thought such a thing possible? Has he inherited the gift from you, Grim? If not from you, then from whom, pray?”

“Let us all hear this poem,” said Orm.

So Gisle was called upon to declaim his verse aloud before the whole company. At first his voice trembled somewhat; but when he saw that his audience approved his work, and that Orm himself was nodding and smiling, his fear fell from him; and now he found himself able to meet Rannvi’s eyes without averting his own.

“I can write you more poems, and better,” he said to her proudly as he seated himself again.

Black Grim, Gisle’s father, sat beaming with pride and satisfaction. He said that he had often felt himself to have a talent for verse-making, in his younger days, but that something had always happened which had prevented him from putting his inspirations into words.

“All the same,” he said, “it is strange that he should have this gift; for he is folk-shy, especially when there are girls near him, though he would gladly have it otherwise.”

“Believe me, Grim,” said Ylva, “he will not need to be shy of them any more. Trust my word for that. For, now that he has shown himself to be a poet, as many as can find space to do so will hang themselves round his neck. My father, who was full of wisdom upon all subjects, often used to say that as flies swarm around food of any kind but abandon it as soon as they sniff the odor of the honey-pot, so is it with young women when they sense the presence of a poet.”

Orm sat staring into his ale-cup with an anxious expression on his face, deaf to what they were saying. Asa asked him if anything was on his mind, but he only mumbled abstractedly to himself and made no reply to her question.

“If I know him aright, he is composing a verse,” said Ylva. “He always wears that troubled look when the verse mood is upon him. It is a peculiar thing with poets that if there are two of them in the same room and one of them composes a verse, the other cannot rest until he has composed another which he thinks is better than his rival’s.”

Orm sat with his hands on his knees, rocking backwards and forwards on his bench, sighing deeply and mumbling cavernously to himself. At length, though, he found the words he wanted, gave two nods of relief, thumped his fist on the table for silence, and said:

“I hear you don’t think
Me your friend, King Sven!
They tell me you drink
To my end, King Sven!
Wouldst catch me off my guard?
God and my sharp-tongued sword
Caused you to blink,
Ay, and bend, King Sven!”

This was received with approbation by such of the company as were in a condition to appreciate the poem. Orm took a deep draught of his ale, and it could be seen that he was once again in excellent spirits.

“We have done well this evening,” he said, “for we have composed a poem that has given pleasure to us all, and that will undoubtedly displease King Sven. This is a remarkable coincidence, that two poets should be found at a single feast, for they seem to be somewhat thinly sown in these parts; and even if our quality is not fully commensurate, nevertheless you have acquitted yourself honorably, Gisle, and I shall therefore pledge you.”

But when Orm peered down toward the end of the church through the smoke of the pitch torches, Gisle was nowhere to be seen; nor could he be discovered among those who were asleep beneath the tables. But since Rannvi’s place was also empty, their parents thought it most likely that they had both become drowsy and, as befitted well-brought-up children, had retired to rest without disturbing their elders.

That evening Father Willibald, thanks partly to the good offices of Asa and Ylva, received promises from four of the women present that he might soon baptize their infants, provided that he did so in the same tub in which he had baptized Harald Ormsson and with equal ceremony. But still none of the guests was willing to be sprinkled personally, despite the merry humor they were all in as a result of the good food and drink they had consumed. So Father Willibald had to contain himself as patiently as he might, though he had hoped for more spectacular results.

The next day, which was the concluding day of Orm’s feast, the drinking reached its climax. Orm still had plenty of smoked mutton uneaten, and the greater part of a fresh ox, as well as two tubfuls of feast-ale and a small tubful of strong mead, made from lime honey, and he said that it would reflect little credit on him or his guests if any of this was left when the feast ended. All the guests were anxious to ensure that his honor, and theirs, should not thus be sullied. They therefore promised to do their best and, from the first moment after they awoke that morning, set to with a will. It was their intention, they said, that both their host and his priest should find themselves beneath the table before the last cup was drained to its dregs.

Orm now took the priest to one side to ask his opinion on an important matter. He wanted to know, he said, whether God would regard it as lawful to baptize heathens while they were unconscious from drink. “For, if so,” he said, “it seems to me that a good work might be performed this evening, the way the day is beginning.”

Father Willibald replied that Orm had raised a moot point, and one that had been much debated by holy men who had devoted their whole lives to studying the craft of conversion.

“Some scholars,” he said, “hold it to be lawful, in circumstances when the Devil shows himself particularly unwilling to yield. They support their contention by quoting the example of the great Emperor Charles, who, when he desired to baptize some wild Saxons who held fast to their ancient idolatry, had the more obstinate of them stunned with a club as they were dragged forth to baptism, to quell their violence and blasphemous outpourings. It cannot be denied that such treatment must cause the Devil considerable vexation, and I do not see that there is much difference between stunning heathens with a club and befuddling them with ale. On the other hand, the blessed Bishop Piligrim of Salzburg, who lived in the time of the old Emperor Otto, held the opposite view, and expressed it in a pastoral letter of great wisdom. My good master, Bishop Poppo, always used to hold that Bishop Piligrim was right; for, he used to say, while it is true that the Devil must be discomforted by seeing his followers baptized while they are unconscious, still, such discomfiture can only be temporary, for, once they have recovered their senses and have learned what has happened to them, they lose all the feelings of reverence and love of God that the sacrament has imparted to them. They re-admit the Devil to their hearts, opening them wider than before to let him in, and rage more furiously than ever against Christ and His servants; so that no good results from the ceremony having been performed. For this reason the holy men whom I have named to you, and many others besides, hold it inadvisable to baptize men when they are in this condition.”

Orm sighed. “It may be as you say,” he said, “since you have it from Bishop Poppo’s own lips; for he understands the ways of God better than any other man. But it is a great pity that he should be of that mind.”

“It is God’s will,” replied Father Willibald, nodding sadly. “Our task would be rendered too simple if we could enlist the assistance of ale in our endeavors to baptize the heathens. More is required than ale: eloquence, good deeds, and great patience, which last is the most difficult of all virtues to acquire and, once acquired, to retain.”

“I wish to serve God as well as I can,” said Orm. “But how we are to further His cause among these good neighbors of mine is more than I know.”

So they left the matter at that, and the drinking proceeded merrily and apace. Later in the day, when most of the guests were still more or less upright on their benches, the married women went in to Ylva’s son to bring him name-gifts and good-luck wishes, after their ancient custom; while the men, feeling the need for air, went out on the grass to indulge in games and tests of strength, such as finger-tug, wrestling, and flat-buttock lifting, amid shouts of encouragement and laughter; and many a good somersault was turned; while some of the more daring among them tried their hands at the difficult sport known as knot-lifting,
1
without, luckily, anyone overtasking his strength and breaking a limb or dislocating his neck.

It was while these sports were in progress that the four strange beggars arrived at Gröning.

1.
A sort of invitation to break one’s neck, played by strong, drunken men after a feast. One (the weaker) sits on the ground, while the other (the stronger) kneels on his hands and knees. The latter is the man who risks his neck. The weaker man sits with his knees drawn up and wide apart, puts his arms outside his thighs and locks his hands under his knees. The strong man then puts his head forward between the other man’s knees and into his locked hands, and tries to rise to a standing position, while the victim does his worst by pressing his knees and his locked hands round the strong man’s neck. It was (says the author, in a letter to the translator) “a frightful game, only played by drunk men.”