Page:The Heimskringla; or, Chronicle of the Kings of Norway Vol 2.djvu/247

 KINGS OF NORWAY. 239 which Karl had with him, and sailed eastward to saga vie Olaf, and gave him these tidings. He was in no pleasant humour at it, and threatened a speedy ven- geance ; but it was not allotted by fate to King Olaf to revenge himself on Thrand and his relations, be- cause of the hostilities which had begun in Norway, and which are now to be related. And there is nothing more to be told of what happened after King Olaf sent men to "the Faroe Islands to take scatt of them. But great strife arose after Karl's death in the Faroe Islands between the family of Thrand of Gata and Leif Ossursson, and of which there are great sagas. Now we must proceed with the relation we began Chapter cliv lew. before, — that King Olaf set out with his men, and Kui£ raised a levv over the whole countrv. All lendermen 01 ?f. s ex " petition in the North followed him excepting Einar Tambar- with hL skelver, who sat quietly at home upon his farm since his return to the country, and did not serve the king. Einar had great estates and wealth, although he held no fiefs from the king, and he lived splendidly. King Olaf sailed with his fleet south around Stad, and many people from the districts around joined him. King Olaf himself had a ship which he had got built the winter before, and which was called the Bison.* It was a very large ship, with a bison's head gilded all over upon the bow. Sigvat the scald speaks thus of it : — " Tryggvesson's Long Serpent bore, Grim gaping o'er the waves before, A dragon's head with open throat, When last the hero was afloat : His cruise was closed, As God disposed. animal of that name, might have been known through the Greenland colonists, who in this reign had visited some parts of America.
 * Visundr is the buffalo ; although the modern bison, or American