In bays and creeks, and in the shadows of jutting headlands, they concealed themselves, where they were ever ready, at a moment's notice, to rush upon the passing prey. When out at sea, they cared not where they were driven to, so long as it was not to their own coast. They called the storm their servant, and wherever it carried them, they said "that was the spot where they desired to go—the tempest that hurled them along with its mighty breath but came, that the rowers might rest their weary arms." Those who were drowned, they believed, went safely to Odin; those who survived, but laughed at the storm they had escaped. Danger depressed them not, and death they but considered as a common and necessary companion, who went on his appointed mission to conduct them to the halls of Odin, and returned again unheeded, and dwelt amongst them from day to day; coming and going like a common messenger that scarcely merited a passing remark. They looked upon the Saxon Christians as traitors to their gods; and as they had been crushed under the iron hand of Charlemagne, and been subjected to revolting cruelties to compel them to renounce their ancient creed, they believed that they rendered true service to Odin by slaughtering the priests, and destroying the churches of Christ. Such of the unconverted Saxons as still inhabited the neighbourhood of Jutland, readily formed a league with the more distant sea-kings, and, thus banded together, they made head against their common enemies, though their near brethren; for they now looked upon them as renegades, and neither the resemblance which they bore to each other in feature or language, nor the remembrance that all were once of the same religion, checked for a moment their hostile spirit. In former times, they worked themselves up into fits of madness, bit their shields, and imitated the howling of wolves, and the barking of dogs; and, under this excitement, performed feats of unnatural strength, such as maniacs alone are capable of achieving. When in this state, woe to the warriors they rushed upon! Such savage deeds were common in early times amongst the followers of Odin. It is said that, in the darker centuries, they ate the flesh of horses raw, dragged the infant from the breast of its mother, and tossed it from one to another upon the points of their lances.
They decorated the prows of their ships with the figures of animals: the heads of shaggy lions, and savage bulls, and hideous dragons, were placed at the front of their vessels, and threw their grim shadows upon the waves. Along the sides of their ships they hung their shields, which, placed together, threw back the billows, and thus protected them from the surges of the sea, as they did from the blows dealt in battle. On their masts were placed the figures of birds, whose outstretched wings veered round with every wind that blew. Some of their vessels were built in the form of a serpent, the prow resembling the head, the long stern forming the tail; these they called the great sea-serpents, or sea-dragons. When they unloosed their cables, and left their ships to career freely over the waves, they called it giving their great sea-horses the rein. They lashed the prows of their vessels together, and while thus linked, steered right into their enemies' ships; over the dragons', and the bulls', and the lions' heads they leaped, and courageously boarded the foe. The huge club, studded with spikes, which dealt death wherever it fell, they called the "star of the morning." When they fought, they called their war-cry, "chaunting the mass of lances;" to show their contempt for the Christian creed, they stabled their horses in the Christian churches; and when they finished the repast which they had compelled the reluctant host to furnish, they slew him, and burnt his house.[5]
When they ascended the rivers, and found a convenient and secure station, they drew up their vessels, as the Romans had done beforetime, threw up intrenchments, and left a guard behind, while the bulk of their force sallied out to scour the country, burning and slaying wherever they came, seizing upon all the horses they could capture, to carry their plunder over-land; and when hotly pursued, or followed by a superior force, they broke up their encampment, and trusted for safety to their ships. After a time, they became bolder; drove away or slaughtered the natives, and settled down upon the land they had taken from the inhabitants. Some they allowed to reside amongst them, on condition that they renounced their religion; and the ceremony of a Christian becoming a pagan consisted of his partaking of the flesh of a horse, which was sacrificed on one of their altars dedicated to the worship of Odin. When the sea-kings made a solemn vow, they swore upon a golden bracelet. In their social hours, all were equal; no man was then addressed as chief; all distinction was levelled. They sat in a circle, and passed the drinking-horn from hand to hand. He whom they obeyed in battle, whom they followed wherever he chose to steer his ship—when the victory was won, laid his dignity aside; for the stormy spirit who ruled in the tempest and heralded the way in the fight, (though still a sea-king if the alarm was given,) was, while peace lasted, and the feast continued, on a level with the lowest of his followers. This very unbending, during these festive moments, linked the chief closer to his subjects, and made them feel that he was one of themselves; it left ambition less to aspire to, and lowly valour to receive the same meed of praise. He was chosen king, who was best fitted to endure the greatest hardships, and not for his high rank alone; one who had never slept under a house-roof, nor emptied a cup beside the domestic hearth, but whose habitation had, from childhood, ever been his ship, was the sea-king they would follow to the gates of the grave; such a one they chose, when the leader in whose veins the blood of Woden was believed to have flowed, either slept beneath the waves, or furnished a feast for the ravens in the deserted battle-field.
The dangers they recklessly dared, would necessarily require a frequent change of chieftains; and as such qualities as we have enumerated were essential to the character of a sea-king, the command was left open to all who, by their bravery, chose to aspire to it; and nothing could be more conducive to the cultivation of a high spirit of valour than that levelling of all distinction. He who in his social moments hailed all as his equals, would, in the hour of trial, rally around him the stoutest and the truest hearts; and to prove their devotedness, they would follow him through fire and flood, nor leave him when he fell across the dark threshold of death.
Such were the stormy sea-kings, whose ships were now darkening the ocean, who were soon to become sharers of the island which their adventurous brethren had wrested from the Britons, and who were destined to enrich the plains of England with each other's blood. The grim gods of the ancient Cymry seemed to require some savage sacrifice before they departed for ever from the wave-washed island on which their altars had for centuries blazed.
Through a land whose skies were reddened by the fires of the destroyer, and whose fields were heavy and wet with the blood of the slain, are we now about to journey; and after toiling through two weary centuries of slaughter, we shall but sit down upon the shore, to be startled again by the sound of the Norman trumpets. A king lives and dies, a battle is won and lost; and he who next succeeds to the throne, or wins the victory, sweeps over the dead who have passed away, as the autumn-blast whirls the withered leaves before it, until the very storm itself dies out, and others awaken from the caverned sleep in which they have grown strong enough to contend with the green array of a new summer. Briton, Saxon, Dane, and Norman, are like the four seasons which make up the long year of our history.
[CHAPTER XIX.]
FIRST SETTLEMENT OF THE DANES IN NORTHUMBRIA.
"On Norway's coast the widowed dame
May wash the rock with tears,
May long look o'er the shipless seas
Before her mate appears;
May sit and weep, and hope in vain,—
Her lord lies in the clay,
And never more will he again
Ride o'er the salt sea-spray."