Viking Boys   By: Jessie Margaret Edmondston Saxby (1842-1940)

by

J. M. E. SAXBY

Author of "The Yarl's Yacht" Etc.

[Frontispiece: "Then there came a sudden flare of light, which showed that Yaspard was trying to illuminate the scene." Page 216]

London Nisbet & Co. Ltd. 22 Berners Street. W.1 1892

CONTENTS.

CHAP.

I. "CALLED AFTER THAT WORK WHICH HE HAD TO DO" II. "AH, MANY A MEMORY OF HOW YE DEALT WITH ME" III. "WIDE TOLD OF IS THIS" IV. "HAPPY WAS HE IN HIS WARRING" V. "THOU ART YOUNG AND OVER BOLD" VI. "NOW EACH GOES HIS WAY" VII. "THE CARL ON THE CLIFF TOP" VIII. "THEREFORE THEY GO THEIR WAYS" IX. "NO NEED OF BINDING OR SALVING HERE" X. "MAY THE GODS GIVE US TWAIN A GOOD DAY" XI. "FAIR FELLOW DEEM I THE DARK WINGED RAVEN" XII. "ENOUGH AND TO SPARE OF BALE IS IN THY SPEECH" XIII. "HE IS YOUNG AND OF LITTLE KNOWLEDGE" XIV. "OH, BE THOU WELCOME, HERE" XV. "AND PEACE SHALL BE SURER" XVI. "FOR NAUGHT HE WOTTED, NOR MIGHT SEE CLEARLY" XVII. "NO GOOD IT BETOKENETH" XVIII. "OH, NEED SORE AND MIGHTY" XIX. "SO HE SHUT ME IN SHIELD WALL" XX. "FROM THE HANDS OF MY KINSFOLK" XXI. "NOUGHT HAD'ST THOU TO PRAISE" XXII. "GIVE YE GOOD COUNSEL" XXIII. "AND BOUND FAST THEIR SWORDS IN WEBS GOODLY WOVEN" XXIV. "MEET AND RIGHT IT IS, FAIR LORD, THAT I SHOULD GO" XXV. "AND THERETO THEY PLIGHTED TROTH BOTH OF THEM" XXVI. "THAT WORK SHALL BE WROUGHT" XXVII. "OF THE VOLSUNGS' KIN IS HE" XXVIII. "SEA RUNES GOOD AT NEED" XXIX. "GREAT IS THE TROUBLE OF FOOT ILL TRIPPING" XXX. "SWEET SIGHT FOR ME THOU TWAIN TO SET EYES ON" XXXI. "HILD UNDER HELM" XXXII. "HAIL FROM THE MAIN THEN COMEST THOU HOME"

VIKING BOYS.

CHAPTER 1

"CALLED AFTER THAT WORK WHICH HE HAD TO DO."

"How I wish I had lived hundreds of years ago, when the Vikings lived; it must have been prime!"

He was a Shetland boy of fifteen who so spoke, and he was addressing his young sister of eleven. They were sitting on a low crag by the shore, dangling their feet over the water, which flowed clear and bright within a short distance of their toes. They were looking out upon a grand stretch of ocean studded with islands of fantastic shape, among which numerous boats were threading their way. It was a fair summer afternoon, and the fishing boats were returning from the far haaf[1] laden with spoil. It had not required a great stretch of imagination to carry Yaspard Adiesen's thoughts from the scene before him to the olden days, when his native Isles were the haunts of Vikinger, whose ships were for ever winging their way over those waters bearing the spoils of many a stormy fight.

"Yes," the boy went on; "what glorious fun it must have been in those days; such fighting and sailing and discovering new places; such heaps of adventures of all sorts. Oh, how grand it must have been!"

"I suppose it was," answered Signy; "but then these people long ago did not have all the nice things we have books, you know, and and everything!"

"Oh, tuts! They had Scalds to sing their history much nicer than your musty books."

"Perhaps!" said the girl. She loved books with a mighty love, but she adored her brother, and what he said she accepted, whether it commended itself to her judgment or not.

"There is no 'perhaps' about it, Signy," he retorted a little sharply. "It is fact so there! It must have been far more jolly in Shetland then than it is now. Everything so tame and commonplace: mail day once a week, sermon every Sunday, custom house officers about, chimney pot hats and tea! Bah!" Yaspard caught up a pebble and flung it to skim over the water as a relief to his feelings, which received a little additional comfort from Signy's next words.