Page:The Heimskringla; or, Chronicle of the Kings of Norway Vol 2.djvu/167

 KINGS OF NORWAY. 159 stake, otherwise called a club, in his hands. The king saga vn. told Kolbein to stand nearest to him in the morning ; and gave orders to his people to go down in the night to where the ships of the bonders lay and bore holes in them, and to set loose their horses on the farms where they were : all which was done. Now the king was in prayer all the night, beseeching God of his goodness and mercy to release him from evil. When mass was ended, and morning was grey, the king went to the Thing. When he came there some bonders had already arrived, and they saw a great crowd coming along, and bearing among them a huge man's image glancing with gold and silver. When the bonders who were at the Thing saw it they started up, and bowed themselves down before the ugly idol. Thereupon it was set down upon the Thing-field ; and on the one side of it sat the bonders, and on the other the king and his people. Then Dale Gudbrand stood up, and said, " Where now, king, is thy god ? I think he will now carry his head lower ; and neither thou, nor the man with the horn whom ye call bishop, and sits there beside thee, are so bold to-day as on the former days ; for now our god, who rules over all, is come, and looks on you with an angry eye : and now I see well enough that ye are terrified, and scarcely dare to raise your eyes. Throw away now all your opposition, and believe in the god who has all your fate in his hands." The king now whispers to Kolbein Sterki, without the bonders perceiving it, " If it come so in the course of my speech that the bonders look another way than towards their idol, strike him as hard as thou canst with thy club." The king then stood up and spoke. " Much hast thou talked to us this morning, and greatly hast thou wondered that thou canst not see our God ; but we expect that he will soon come to us. Thou wouldst