"I ask you," the judge now began, "King Ebarbold, son--"
"Spare your words. Count of the Linzgau," interrupted the other, with a gloomy, but fearless glance. "It is all true. Kill me: you have the power to do so, therefore you have the right. I do not wish to live! Had that been my desire, believe me, I might have fled into my own district or to the Roman camp long before you deprived me, by your men, of the royal insignia of my race or watched my every step, while you merely disarmed the insignificant fisherman. True, according to the new law of the league, you might have had me bound--me, the son of many kings, the descendant of a god! Since I have learned the disloyalty of my most faithful follower, my own old shield-bearer, I feel a loathing for the times. I no longer wish to live among a people, according to a law, which permits the horrible thing to happen that the native of a district values its King, the follower his lord, less than the empty sound of the word 'league,' the brief authority of a Duke from another district. I am too old and too proud to learn this new law. You, old man, with your greed for power, long ago, in your bloody thoughts, dedicated me to your savage Odin."
"Not I, you yourself, son of Ebor."
"Well then--slay me."
"Not I. You yourself have separated yourself from your people by such doctrines. Yes, it is better for such men as you to die than to live: the district kings, if they offer defiance, must be sacrificed to Odin, who, as King of the people, is above all our gods and all our peoples."
"My family," said the King proudly, "runs back through a hundred ancestors to the gods: not to that crafty one, whose secret wiles you are imitating, who scatters runes of discord among peoples and princes. We descend from the god of peace. Fro, who bestows fertility. He has set his golden-bristled boar for a sign upon the shields and helmets of us, his sons. I have ever honored him and peace above all."
"Aha, the god Fro," replied the old Duke, now incensed, for he could ill brook hearing his Odin upbraided, "the god Fro will have little cause to rejoice, when he looks down on his descendant dangling from the withered yew, like the long-billed snipe that is caught in a snare. For I ask the assembly,--his own words are the most open expression of guilt,--with what does the law threaten him?"
"The rope--the willow rope!" rang from a thousand voices. "The tree of shame! Hang him! Hang him up at once!"
"But between two dogs: wolves are too good for him."
A look of keen anguish flitted over the King's proud, bold face. He did not fear death, but disgrace. He shuddered slightly. The Duke had watched him intently.