Page:The Early Kings of Norway.djvu/23

 ERIC BLOOD-AXE AND BROTHERS. 13 valiant but too stubborn Norse spirits, and among the rest upon all his three brothers, which got him from the Norse populations the surname of Blod-axe, brothers he had killed in battle before his old father's life ended; this brother was Bjorn, a peaceable, improving, trading, economic, Under-king, whom the others mockingly called * Bjorn the Chapman.' The great-grandson of this Bjorn became extremely dis- tinguished by-and-by as Saint Olaf. Head-King Eric seems to have had a violent wife, too. She was thought to have poisoned one of her other brothers- in-law. Eric Blood- axe had by no means a gentle life of it in this world, trained to sea-robbery on the coasts of England, Scotland, Ireland, and France, since his twelfth year. Old King Fairhair, at the age of seventy, had another son, to whom was given the name of Hakon. His mother was a slave in Fairhair's house ; slave by ill-luck of war, though nobly enough born. A strange adventure connects this Hakon with England and King Athelstan, who was then entering upon his great career there. Short Avhile after this Hakon
 * Eric Blood-axe/ his title in history. One of his