The king’s chief huntsman at this time was Beorn, and Beorn soon became very envious and jealous of Lothbroc, on account of his superior power and skill, and of the honorable distinction which they procured for him.  One day, when they two were hunting alone in the woods with their dogs, Beorn killed his rival, and hid his body in a thicket.  Beorn went home, his own dogs following him, while the greyhound remained to watch mournfully over the body of his master.  They asked Beorn what was become of Lothbroc, and he replied that he had gone off into the wood the day before, and he did not know what had become of him.

In the mean time, the greyhound remained faithfully watching at the side of the body of his master until hunger compelled him to leave his post in search of food.  He went home, and, as soon as his wants were supplied, he returned immediately to the wood again.  This he did several days; and at length his singular conduct attracting attention, he was followed by some of the king’s household, and the body of his murdered master was found.

The guilt of the murder was with little difficulty brought home to Beorn; and, as an appropriate punishment for his cruelty to an unfortunate and homeless stranger, the king condemned him to be put on board the same boat in which the ill-fated Lothbroc had made his perilous voyage, and pushed out to sea.

The winds and storms—­entering, it seems, into the plan, and influenced by the same principles of poetical justice as had governed the king—­drove the boat, with its terrified mariner, back again across to the mouth of the Baltic, as they had brought Lothbroc to England.  The boat was thrown upon the beach, on Lothbroc’s family domain.

Now Lothbroc had been, in his own country, a man of high rank and influence.  He was of royal descent, and had many friends.  He had two sons, men of enterprise and energy; and it so happened that the landing of Beorn took place so near to them, that the tidings soon came to their ears that their father’s boat, in the hands of a Saxon stranger, had arrived on the coast.  They immediately sought out the stranger, and demanded what had become of their father.  Beorn, in order to hide his own guilt, fabricated a tale of Lothbroc’s having been killed by Edmund, the king of the East Angles.  The sons of the murdered Lothbroc were incensed at this news.  They aroused their countrymen by calling upon them every where to aid them in revenging their father’s death.  A large naval force was accordingly collected, and a formidable descent made upon the English coast.