Ulric the Jarl: A Story of the Penitent Thief

by William O. Stoddard

The fire ran everywhere along the bulwarks of The Sword and began to climb over the decks. It climbed the high mast and the wind blew it out like a banner.

"Odin!" shouted Ulric. "The Britons are on the rocks! Smite now!"

Fast flew the arrows and the spears, and almost useless were the wicker shields of the Britons. Many of them had none, and their blue bodies were plain marks for shaft and stone. They fell in heaps upon the ledge, but a score of them broke through the flames to the very fore deck of The Sword, and here too the fire was blazing hotly. Here before them lay Lars the Old, stretched out as on his funeral pyre. These were of the best armored of the Britons, and one could understand that they had thought to take The Sword and push her off, that by her means they might reach the trireme.

No good captain would so have planned, for such a thing might not be done; but these men were brave, for they stood well and some of them hurled their darts vigorously at the vikings, while others strove vainly to shove The Sword from the rocks into the sea.

This thing that came not any man had expected. Just as the strong fire in the cabin began to burst up redly through the fore deck, and a fiercer flame mounted the after deck, and all the bulwarks were ablaze, up to his feet sprang Lars the Old, his gray hair streaming in the wind. One blow he struck with his broken sword, burying it in the body of a British chief, and then he began to ply his long-handled ax with the strength of one who is dying. Upon him turned the spears and the swords of the Britons and he was stricken quickly. He did not shout, but he cleft one more while falling.

"The hero dieth!" said the jarl, hurling his spear, and it flew well, but there were not many now upon the fore deck.

More were swimming from the shore to the ledge, but the fire was completing its work, and the plan of the Druids was broken altogether. When once more the wind put aside the black curtain of the smoke it was seen that the entire prow had fallen in and that to the very helm the flames were fighting joyously.

"We will stay by until she is burned to her keel," said Ulric; "but now pull out a little further."

So did they, and the Britons came no more to the ledge, for the prize they had hoped for was a heap of ashes upon the rocks.