holy standard fell, Absalon was quick to see his advantage, and got the King to order a general assault.  The besieged Wends, having no water, tried to put out the fire with milk, but, says the chronicle, “it only fed the flames.”  They fought desperately till, between fire and foe, they were seized with panic and, calling loudly upon Absalon in their extremity, offered to give up their city.  The army clamored for the revenge that was at last within their grasp, and the King hesitated; but Absalon met the uproar firmly, reminding them that they had crossed the seas to convert the heathen, not to sack their towns.

The city was allowed to surrender and the people were spared, but Svantevit and his temple were destroyed.  A great crowd of his followers had gathered to see him crush his enemies at the last, and Absalon cautioned the men who cut the idol down to be careful that he did not fall on them and so seem to justify their hopes.  “He fell with so great a noise that it was a wonder,” says Saxo, naively; “and in the same moment the fiend ran out of the temple in a black shape with such speed that no eye could follow him or see where he went.”  Svantevit was dragged out of the town and chopped into bits.  That night he fed the fires of the camp.  So fickle is popular favor that when the crowd saw that nothing happened, they spurned the god loudly before whom they had grovelled in the dust till then.

When they heard of Arcona’s fall in the royal city of Karents, they hastened with offers of surrender, and Absalon went there with a single ship’s crew to take possession.  They were met by 6000 armed Wends, who guarded the narrow approach to the city.  In single file they walked between the ranks of the enemy, who stood with inverted spears, watching them in sullen silence.  His men feared a trap, but Absalon strode ahead unmoved.  Coming to the temple of their local god, Rygievit, he attacked him with his axe and bade his guard fall to, which they did.  Saxo has left us a unique description of this idol that stood behind purple hangings, fashioned of oak “in every evil and revolting shape.  The swallows had made their nests in his mouths and throats” (there were seven in so many faces) “and filled him up with all manner of stinking uncleanness.  Truly, for such god was such sacrifice fit.”  He had a sword for every one of his seven faces, buckled about his ample waist, but for all that he went the way of the others, and even had to put up with the indignity of the Christian priests standing upon him while he was being dragged out.  That seems to have helped cure his followers of their faith in him.  They delivered the temple treasure into the hands of the King—­seven chests filled with money and valuables, among them a silver cup which the wretched King Svend had sent to Svantevit as a bribe to the Wends for joining him against his own country and kin.  But those days were ended.  It was the Danes’ turn now, and Wendland was laid waste until “the swallows found no eaves of any house whereunder to build their nests and were forced to build them on the ships.”  A sad preliminary to bringing the country under the rule of the Prince of Peace; but in the scheme of those days the sword was equal partner with the cross in leading men to the true God.