freely give arms, gold, and every precious thing to feed the pyre in honour of so great a king, who had deserved so nobly of them all.  He also ordered that the ashes of his body, when it was quite burnt, should be transferred to an urn, taken to Leire, and there, together with the horse and armour, receive a royal funeral.  By paying these due rites of honour to his uncle’s shade, he won the favour of the Danes, and turned the hate of his enemies into goodwill.  Then the Danes besought him to appoint Hetha over the remainder of the realm; but, that the fallen strength of the enemy might not suddenly rally, he severed Skaane from the mass of Denmark, and put it separately under the governorship of Ole, ordering that only Zealand and the other lands of the realm should be subject to Hetha.  Thus the changes of fortune brought the empire of Denmark under the Swedish rule.  So ended the Bravic war.

But the Zealanders, who had had Harald for their captain, and still had the picture of their former fortune hovering before their minds, thought it shameful to obey the rule of a woman, and appealed to Ole not to suffer men that had been used to serve under a famous king to be kept under a woman’s yoke.  They also promised to revolt to him if he would take up arms to remove their ignominious lot.  Ole, tempted as much by the memory of his ancestral glory as by the homage of the soldiers, was not slow to answer their entreaties.  So he summoned Hetha, and forced her by threats rather than by arms to quit every region under her control except Jutland; and even Jutland he made a tributary state, so as not to allow a woman the free control of a kingdom.  He also begot a son whom he named Omund.  But he was given to cruelty, and showed himself such an unrighteous king, that all who had found it a shameful thing to be ruled by a queen now repented of their former scorn.

Twelve generals, whether moved by the disasters of their country, or hating Ole for some other reason, began to plot against his life.  Among these were Hlenni, Atyl, Thott, and Withne, the last of whom was a Dane by birth, though he held a government among the Sclavs.  Moreover, not trusting in their strength and their cunning to accomplish their deed, they bribed Starkad to join them.  He was prevailed to do the deed with the sword; he undertook the bloody work, and resolved to attack the king while at the bath.  In he went while the king was washing, but was straightway stricken by the keenness of his gaze and by the restless and quivering glare of his eyes.  His limbs were palsied with sudden dread; he paused, stepped back, and stayed his hand and his purpose.  Thus he who had shattered the arms of so many captains and champions could not bear the gaze of a single unarmed man.  But Ole, who well knew about his own countenance, covered his face, and asked him to come closer and tell him what his message was; for old fellowship and long-tried friendship made him the last to suspect