Page:Bedford-Jones--The Cross and the Hammer.djvu/84

 Assembly at Frosta, near the capital; but as the message went forth, the bonders seized the messengers, and substituted a war-arrow, so that all the chiefs and great leaders assembled with a huge host, armed and ready for war.

Olaf, who came to the Assembly with only Sigurd and a score of men, saw that he was taken in a trap; however, on the first day of the meeting he conciliated the Assembly, although when he mentioned Christ several of the leaders arose and forbade him to speak on religious subjects on that day.

Sigurd saw that the bonders were in a bad mood, and that a spark might inflame them; so that night, as he and King Olaf sat in their tent, he said:

"Olaf, I have a plan which I think will save us all from further trouble."

"Then, by St. Michael, let me have it!" cried Olaf, "for I am at my wits' end for want of one!"

So Sigurd talked long with the King that evening. The next morning, when the Assembly opened, Olaf arose, and after a short speech said:

"Let us preserve the compact that we made before, to strengthen and uphold each other. To this end I will attend your great sacrifice two weeks hence at the temple in Thrandheim, and after this we will take counsel together concerning the faith that will be held, and we will agree to hold to whatever faith we decide upon."

At this the bonders gave a great shout of joy, thinking that King Olaf was yielding, and the other matters for which the Assembly had been called passed off without trouble.

When Olaf returned to his new town of Nidaros a number of men from Iceland received baptism, shortly after Yuletide. Many traders and others who were in the new city of Nidaros, remained through the winter at Olaf's court, and most of these were also baptized in the end.

For the next two weeks both Sigurd and the King were busy perfecting Sigurd's plan. The chief opponent of Christianity among the bonders was Ironbeard, a very powerful chief who was also priest at Moeri, a town near Thrandheim. The winter sacrifice was to be held at the great temple in Moeri, and if Sigurd's plan went well, all resistance to Christianity in the district would be destroyed at one blow.

Invitations were sent out to all the chief men of the bonders, to a feast to be held at Nidaros three days before the winter sacrifice. The greatest chiefs and leaders of the Thrandheim districts were invited, and all accepted, save Ironbeard and one or two others.

On the morning bidden, the invited chiefs streamed into town, on foot, on horseback, and even on skis. Many came over the ice from across the bay, and by next morning the new city was filled with men, as each chief brought a party with him. Early in the morning Olaf and his court attended service in the new church, all the visitors refusing to watch the service.

Immediately afterward Sigurd led fifty men to the harbor. There they put on skates, and the young Jarl led them to Ladi, which was only three miles across the ice, though more by land.

Removing their skates, Sigurd and his men tramped up from the shore to the temple which stood on the hill, and raising his axe, Sigurd struck the door. In five minutes it was broken down, while the few priests who lived near by stood watching helplessly.

Carrying out all the images, Sigurd piled them in the snow and set fire to them as an object lesson to the watching priests and bonders that their gods were powerless. The temple was then stripped of its valuables and the building itself burned. When this was done, Sigurd and his men made a cross out of two beams of wood, and this