Page:The Early Kings of Norway.djvu/113

 KING OLAF THE THICK-SET's VIKING DAYS. 103 all his strength, when strength and authority were lent him, to establishing the Christian religion in his country, and suppressing and abolishing Vikingism there ; both of which objects, and their respective worth and unworth, he must himself have long known so well. It was well on in a.d. 1016 that Bjiut gained his last victory, at Ashdon, in Essex, where the earth pyramids and antique church near by still testify the thankful piety of Knut,— or, at lowest, his joy at having won instead of lost and perished, as he was near doing there. And it was still this same year when the noble Edmund Ironside, after forced par- tition-treaty ' in the Isle of Alney,' got scandalously murdered, and Knut became indisputable sole King of England, and decisively settled himself to his work of governing there. In the year before either of which events, while all still hung uncertain for Knut, and even Eric Jarl of Norway had to be summoned in aid of him, — ^in that year 1015, as one might naturally guess, and as all Icelandic hints and indications lead us to date the thing, Olaf had decided to give up Vikingism in all its forms ; to return to ^Norway and