Havelok the Dane: A Legend of Old Grimsby and Lincoln

by Charles W. Whistler

Easily we went ashore when the tide fell, across the spits of sand that ran between the mud banks, and we climbed the low sandhill range that hid the land from us, and saw the place where we should bide. And it might have been worse; for all the level country between us and the hills was fat, green meadow and marsh, on which were many cattle and sheep feeding. Here and there were groves of great trees, hemmed in with the quickset fences that are as good as stockades for defence round the farmsteads of the English folk, and on other patches of rising ground were the huts of thralls or herdsmen, and across the wide meadows glittered and flashed streams and meres, above which the wildfowl that the storm had driven inland wheeled in clouds. All the lower hills seemed to be wooded thickly, and the alder copses that would shelter boar and deer and maybe wolves stretched in some places thence across the marsh. Pleasant and homely seemed all this after long looking at the restless sea.

Then said my father, “Now am I no longer Grim the merchant, and that pride of mine is at an end. But here is a place where Grim the fisher may do well enough, if I am any judge of shore and sea. Here have we haven for the boats, and yonder swim the fish, and inland are the towns that need them. Nor have we seen a sign of a fisher so far as we have come.”

Now we had been seen as soon as we stood on the sandhills; and before long the herdsman and thralls began to gather to us, keeping aloof somewhat at first, as if fearing my father’s arms. But when we spoke with them we could learn nothing, for they were Welsh marshmen who knew but little of the tongue of their English masters. Serfs they were now in these old fastnesses of theirs to the English folk of the Lindiswaras, who had won their land and called it after their own name, Lindsey.

But before long there rode from one of the farmsteads an Englishman of some rank, who had been sent for, as it would seem, and he came with half a dozen armed housecarls behind him to see what was going on. Him we could understand well enough, for there is not so much difference between our tongue and that of the English; and when he learned our plight he was very kindly. His name was Witlaf Stalling, and he was the great man of these parts, being lord over many a mile of the marsh and upland, and dwelling at his own place, Stallingborough, some five miles to the north and inland hence.

Now it had been in this man’s power to seize us and all we had as his own, seeing that we were cast on his shore; but he treated us as guests rather, bidding us shelter in one of his near farmsteads as long as we would, and telling my father to come and speak with him when we had saved what we could from the wreck. He bade the thralls help at that also, so that we had fallen in with a friend, and our troubles were less for his kindness.

We saved what cargo we had left during the next few days, while we dwelt at the farm. Then at the height of the spring tides the ship broke up, for a second gale came before the sea that the last had raised was gone. And then I went with my father to speak with Witlaf the thane at Stallingborough, that we might ask his leave to make our home on the little haven, and there become fishers once more.

That he granted readily, asking many questions about our troubles, for he wondered that one who had owned so good a ship seemed so content to become a mere fisher in a strange land, without thought of making his way home. But all that my father told him was that he had had to fly from the new king of our land, and that he had been a fisher before, so that there was no hardship in the change.

“Friend Grim,” said Witlaf when he had heard this, “you are a brave man, as it seems to me, and well may you prosper here, as once before. I will not stand in your way. Now, if you will hold it from me on condition of service in any time of war, to be rendered by yourself and your sons and any men you may hire, I will grant you what land you will along the coast, so that none may question you in anything. Not that the land is worth aught to any but a fisher who needs a place for boats and nets; but if you prosper, others will come to the place, and you shall be master.”

One could hardly have sought so much as that, and heartily did we thank the kindly thane, gladly taking the fore shore as he wished. But he said that he thought the gain was on his side, seeing what men he had won.

“Now we must call the place by a name, for it has none,” he said, laughing. “Grim’s Stead, maybe?”