So at the Hus-Ting he appeared,
    The farmer of Yriar, Iron-Beard,
On horseback, in an attitude defiant.

    And to King Olaf he cried aloud,
    Out of the middle of the crowd,
That tossed about him like a stormy ocean: 

    “Such sacrifices shalt thou bring;
    To Odin and to Thor, O King,
As other kings have done in their devotion!”

    King Olaf answered:  “I command
    This land to be a Christian land;
Here is my Bishop who the folk baptizes!

    “But if you ask me to restore
    Your sacrifices, stained with gore,
Then will I offer human sacrifices!

    “Not slaves and peasants shall they be,
    But men of note and high degree,
Such men as Orm of Lyra and Kar of Gryting!”

   Then to their Temple strode he in,
   And loud behind him heard the din
Of his men-at-arms and the peasants fiercely fighting.

    There in the Temple, carved in wood,
    The image of great Odin stood,
And other gods, with Thor supreme among them.

    King Olaf smote them with the blade
    Of his huge war-axe, gold inlaid,
And downward shattered to the pavement flung them.

    At the same moment rose without,
    From the contending crowd, a shout,
A mingled sound of triumph and of wailing.

    And there upon the trampled plain
    The farmer iron-Beard lay slain,
Midway between the assailed and the assailing.

    King Olaf from the doorway spoke. 
    “Choose ye between two things, my folk,
To be baptized or given up to slaughter!”

    And seeing their leader stark and dead,
    The people with a murmur said,
“O King, baptize us with thy holy water”;

    So all the Drontheim land became
    A Christian land in name and fame,
In the old gods no more believing and trusting.

    And as a blood-atonement, soon
    King Olaf wed the fair Gudrun;
And thus in peace ended the Drontheim Hus-Ting!

VIII

GUDRUN

On King Olaf’s bridal night
Shines the moon with tender light,
And across the chamber streams
    Its tide of dreams.

At the fatal midnight hour,
When all evil things have power,
In the glimmer of the moon
    Stands Gudrun.

Close against her heaving breast
Something in her hand is pressed
Like an icicle, its sheen
    Is cold and keen.

On the cairn are fixed her eyes
Where her murdered father lies,
And a voice remote and drear
    She seems to hear.

What a bridal night is this! 
Cold will be the dagger’s kiss;
Laden with the chill of death
    Is its breath.

Like the drifting snow she sweeps
To the couch where Olaf sleeps;
Suddenly he wakes and stirs,
    His eyes meet hers.