[121] Rensel, Berättelse, pp. 45-47; Svart, Gust. I.'s krön., pp. 89-92; Handl. rör. Skand. hist., vol. xiv. pp. 72-73; and Kon. Gust. den Förstes registrat., vol. ii. pp. 143-146, 155-158, 160-165, 168-169, 181-183 and 188.
Chapter VII.
DEALINGS WITH FOREIGN POWERS. 1525-1527.
Negotiations between Fredrik and Gustavus.—Treachery of Norby.—Sunnanväder and the Cabinet of Norway.—Overthrow and Death of Norby.—Trial and Execution of Knut and Sunnanväder.—Debt to Lubeck.—Treaty with Russia; with the Netherlands.—Dalarne and the Lubeck Envoys.—Swedish Property in Denmark.—Province of Viken.—Refugees in Norway.
THE Swedish Revolution was the work of three nations, all foes at heart, endeavoring to effect a common object on utterly divergent grounds. Gustavus wished to free his country from a tyrant's rule, while Fredrik's purpose was to gain the throne of Denmark, and Lubeck's was to crush her rival in the Baltic trade. Without the alliance of these three parties, it is not likely that any one of them could have gained his end. So long, therefore, as the common object was in view, each felt an assurance that the others would not fail. It was only when Christiern's power was altogether gone that this triple alliance was dissolved.
The varying hopes of Christiern may be gauged with singular accuracy by Fredrik's show of friendship to Gustavus. One cannot read the despatches sent from Denmark without observing a constant change of attitude; the monarch's feelings cooling somewhat as the chance that Christiern would recover Denmark grew more remote. At the moment when Norby returned to Bleking, the movements of Christiern caused the monarch much alarm, and his letters to Gustavus were filled with every assurance of good-will. This assurance, however, Gustavus took at little more than it was worth. So long as Knut and Sunnanväder were protected by Fredrik's officers in Norway, the Danish monarch's assurances of friendship carried little weight. Gustavus seems not to have appealed to Fredrik in this matter till every effort to persuade the Danish officers in Norway had been tried. He wrote even to the Norwegian Cabinet, and begged them to keep the promises made to him in Malmö. While in the midst of these entreaties, a letter came from Fredrik asking for the release of certain prisoners, among them Norby's daughter, whom Gustavus had captured in the war with Norby. This was the very opportunity which Gustavus craved. He wrote back that in the same war in which these prisoners had been taken, some guns belonging to him had been lost, and he offered to exchange the prisoners for the guns. He requested, further, that Fredrik command his officers in Norway to yield the refugees. While this answer was on the road, Fredrik received a note from Norby, to whom Gustavus had written to say that Fredrik had promised that the guns should be returned. Fredrik, therefore, wrote Gustavus that these guns were not in his possession, but if the Danish prisoners were surrendered, he would try to get them. When this letter came, the monarch was indignant. Fredrik, it was clear, was playing with him, and hoped to get the prisoners and give nothing in return. The answer which the monarch made was this: "We have just received your letter with excuses for the detention of our guns and ammunition, along with a request for the surrender of Søren Brun, whom you assert we captured in a time of truce. Of such a truce we wish to inform you we are ignorant. He was lawfully taken, inasmuch as he was one of Norby's men.... As to our ammunition you say that it was captured from you and carried off to Gotland. If so, it was no fault of ours. We have written frequently about it, but have met with nothing but delays. If Norby, who you say has sworn allegiance to you, holds this ammunition in Visby Castle, it is unquestionably in your power to order that it be returned. So soon as this is done, the prisoners shall be released." Before this determined letter arrived in Denmark, Fredrik had modified his plans, for news had come that Christiern's fleet was on the way to Norway, intending to winter there and make an incursion into Denmark in the spring. Fredrik, therefore, despatched a note to Norby telling him to yield the ammunition, and wrote Gustavus that the guns were ready, and if he would send his officers to Denmark for them they should be delivered. A few days later an officer of Fredrik wrote Gustavus that property of Danish subjects had been seized in Sweden, and begged that the persons wronged be recompensed. To this Gustavus answered that Swedish subjects had been treated in the same way in Denmark, and promised to observe the treaty if the Danes would do so in return. He likewise wrote to Fredrik thanking him for his action relating to the guns, declaring that he would send for them as requested, and as soon as they were yielded would set the prisoners free.[122]
This amicable adjustment of their difficulty was on paper, but much more shuffling was required before it was reduced to fact. Gustavus feared that Fredrik was in league with Norby, and rumor had it that Norby was preparing for another war. Late in 1525, the pirate wrote the Swedish officer in Kalmar that he had come to terms with Fredrik, and that all the injury which he had done to Sweden had been forgiven. To this the officer replied: "I fail to see how Fredrik can have promised that you may keep our ammunition." Norby at all events did keep it, and early in 1526 Gustavus wrote: "We hear that Norby has let fall calumnies against us. We place no confidence whatever in him, especially as he is growing stronger every day.... From his own letters we discover he has no thought of giving up our ammunition." To Fredrik himself the monarch wrote: "From Norby's letters we learn he has no intention of obeying your commands." In the same strain Gustavus addressed the Danish Cabinet, and expressed the hope that Norby was not acting under their behest. If the Cabinet's assertion can be trusted, he was not; for several of the Cabinet wrote Gustavus to keep an eye on Norby, as he was raising a large force in Bleking despite their orders to him to desist. There being little hope that Fredrik would force the pirate to obey, Gustavus ventured to arrange the matter for himself. It so happened at this moment that one of Norby's vessels, laden with arms and ammunition, stranded on the coast not far from Kalmar. The monarch's officers hurried to the spot, and seized what ammunition they could find. This stroke, however, was in some degree offset by a reprisal which Norby managed to secure upon the coast of Bleking. Matters now appeared so serious that the king addressed himself to Norby. "We find," he said, "that a part of the ammunition taken from the wreck off Kalmar is our own. All the rest of it you may have, provided we are given the guns and ammunition promised us by Fredrik.... As soon as these are handed over, your daughter and the other prisoners shall be freed." This proposition would have satisfied any man but Norby. To him it seemed unfair. The fleet of Christiern was looked for early in the spring, and Norby thought by waiting to obtain more favorable terms. He wrote back, therefore, that, though Fredrik may have told Gustavus he should have his guns, he could not have them, for in the treaty recently drawn up between himself and Fredrik, it had been stipulated that all injury done by him to Sweden should be forgotten, and a part of this injury consisted in the seizure of these guns. Norby closed his letter with an offer to hold a personal conference with the king. The reply which Norby had to this proposal was sharp and warm. "We shall permit no nonsense," wrote the king. If Norby wanted his daughter, let him return the guns. "As to a personal meeting with you, we cannot spare the time." Norby's pride apparently was not touched by this rebuke. He wrote again, simply repeating what he had said before, and in reply obtained another letter from the king. "We have already told you," wrote Gustavus, "that you may have your daughter when we get our guns. We were promised them by the treaty of Malmö, which we desire in every particular to observe. And we will hand over the property belonging to you in the wreck off Kalmar, if you will forward to that town our ammunition together with a promise in writing never from this day forth to wrong us or our men." This letter, dated on the 4th of March, was the last communication that passed between the pirate and the king. Norby had at length discovered that he could not dupe the king, and Gustavus deemed it folly to continue parley with one whose only object was to use up time.[123]
Unable to accomplish anything with Norby, it was more than ever important that Gustavus should be on terms of amity with Fredrik. For the moment it appeared that Fredrik would be fair. At all events, he had made Gustavus a generous promise about the guns, and his Cabinet kept Gustavus constantly informed about the acts of Norby. In February, when the lakes were frozen, the monarch sent, as Fredrik had suggested, for his ammunition, and intrusted to the same emissary a letter for the Danish king. This letter was in reply to one from Fredrik, asking for the surrender of a Danish refugee. Gustavus could not comply with his request, for the refugee was gone; but he seized again the opportunity to mention Sunnanväder. "We earnestly entreat you," were his words, "to write your Cabinet in Norway no longer to protect this man or any of his party." It was certainly time that something should be done by Fredrik, for at the very moment while Gustavus was writing this appeal, the Norwegian Cabinet were issuing a passport for the traitors through their realm; and to a request from Gustavus for their surrender, the Cabinet offered the absurd excuse that the fugitives themselves protested they were innocent. "However," it was added, "the fugitives will return if they are given your assurance that they may be tried, as priests, before a spiritual tribunal." In this reply the reason for the detention of the fugitives leaked out. They were high in office in the Church, and the archbishop of Trondhem, with whom they had taken refuge, feared the Lutheran tendencies of the king. Fredrik did not wholly share this fear, and on the 4th of March for the first time addressed the archbishop, commanding him to revoke the passport of the renegades. This letter producing no immediate effect, Gustavus waited about six weeks, and then despatched to the Cabinet of Norway a safe-conduct for the renegades to be tried before "a proper tribunal," and, if adjudged not guilty, to return to Norway. The passport was directed to the Cabinet of southern Norway, to whom the monarch used these words: "We marvel much at the language of your northern brothers, and particularly that they are deceived by the treachery of these rascals, which is well known hundreds of miles from here, and might be known in Norway if the people were not blind. I might tell you how they lay a long while in Dalarne, and in the name of the people sent deceitful letters through the land, to stir up hostility against us. But as soon as the people began to leave them, and the Dalesmen announced that these letters were not issued with their consent, they betook themselves to Norway.... If, now, the fugitives will come before a proper tribunal, we cannot and we would not refuse to let them do so. We therefore send a safe-conduct to guard them against all wrong, according to their request. If they do not come, it will be manifest whether they are innocent." The safe-conduct, it may be well to say, ran only to the 10th of August following, and no notice apparently was taken of it till near the expiration of that time.[124]