Egil’s Saga (12 page)

“You shall”, said the King, “fetch me the sons of Gutthorm, but his daughters shall be bred up there until I give them in marriage. I shall find men to take ward of the realm and to give fostering to the maidens.”

So when those brethren were ready, then fare they on their way, and had wind at will. They came in the spring-time into the Wick, east to Tunsberg, and there bare forward their errand. Hallvard and his take up the sons of Gutthorm and much of loose goods. Fare they then, when they are ready, on their way back. They were somewhat later then in getting a fair wind, but there befell nought to tell of in their journey until they were a-sailing north of the Sogn-sea, with a good breeze and bright weather, and were then all merry.

CHAPTER XXVII. THE SLAYING OF HALLVARD AND SIGTRYGG: AND HOW KVELDULF AND SKALLAGRIM FARED TO ICELAND.

K
VELDULF and Skallagrim and their folk held espial all the summer in along the highway of the sea. Skallagrim was of all men the keenest sighted: he saw the sailing of Hallvard and his and knew the ship, for he had seen that ship before, when Thorgils fared with her. Skallagrim kept watch on their faring, where they laid her in haven at eventide; and now fareth he back to his folk and saith to Kveldulf that which he had seen, and that, too, that he had known the ship for that which Hallvard and his men had taken from Thorgils, and had been Thorolf s, and that there would be some of those men along with her who should make them good hunting.

So now make they ready, and make ready both the boats, and had twenty men aboard of each: Kveldulf steered one, and the other Skallagrim. Row they now, and look for the ship; but
when they come there where the ship lay, then put they in to land.

Hallvard and his had tilted their ship and had then laid them down to sleep; but when Kveldulf and his came at them, then leapt up the watchmen that sat by the gangway head, and called out to the ship: bade men stand up: said that unpeace was come upon them. Hallvard and his leapt to their weapons. But when Kveldulf and his came to the gangway head,
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then went he out on the stern gangway, but Skallagrim went on the fore gangway. Kveldulf had in his hand a byrny-troll.
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But when he was come aboard the ship then bade he his men go on the outer side along the gunwale and hew the tilt out of its props, but himself raged aft towards the poop; and so it is said, that there he ran berserk, and many were they of his company that then ran berserk. They slew all those men that came in the way of them; in like same manner wrought Skallagrim, whereso he went upon the ship. That father and son slacked not until the ship was cleared.

But when Kveldulf came aft to the poop, he swung aloft the byrny-troll and hewed at Hallvard through helm and head, and it sank all in to the shaft: wrenched he it then so hard towards him that he bare Hallvard up in the air and slung him overboard.

Skallagrim cleared the fore-stem and slew Sigtrygg: a mort of men leapt into the water, but Skallagrim’s men took the boat that they had thither had and rowed to them and slew all them that were swimming: there perished of Hallvard’s men, in all, more than fifty men, but Skallagrim and his took the ship that Hallvard and his had had thither, and all the fee that was aboard her.

They laid hand on two or three men, them that seemed to them of least might or worth, and gave them peace and had of them tidings: learnt what men had been aboard that ship, and likewise what manner of journey they had been bound on. And when they understood all the truth, then kenned they the slain, that which lay on the ship: found they then that for sure, that a greater lot of the men had leapt overboard and had been lost than had fallen on the ship. Those sons of Gutthorm had leapt overboard and had been lost: then was one of them twelve winters old, and the other ten, and the hopefullest of men.

So now let Skallagrim go free those men that he had given peace to, and bade them go find Harald the King and say unto him carefully these tidings that were there come about, and this too, who had been in it. “You shall”, said he, “bear to the King this ditty:
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Now’s hersir righted
And King quited:
Corpse-bird and beast
On Yngling’s bairns feast.
Hurl’d hewn on the sea
Floats Hallvard’s bodie.
Grey eagles tear
Wounds of Sharp-fare.”

Thereafter Grim and his folk flitted the ship with her lading out to their own ships; changed then the ships: loaded her which they had then won, and emptied that which they had before and which was smaller: bare stones aboard of her, and brake holes in her, and sank her: sailed therewithal out into the deep, soon as a fair breeze blew.

So is it said of those men that were shape-strong or of them on whom was the berserk-gang, that for so long as that held, they were so strong that there was no holding against them, but forthwith when that was passed over, then were they unmightier than of wont. And it was so with Kveldulf that, as soon as the berserk rage was gone from him, then knew he his weariness after those onslaughts he had made, and then was he altogether without might, so that he laid him down in his bed.

Now the breeze bare them out into the deep. Kveldulf captained that ship which they had taken from Hallvard and his men. They had a fair breeze and held much together in their voyage, so that they had for long whiles sight each of other. But when the main deep was passed, then took Kveldulf’s sickness the upper hand with him. And when it drew toward this, that he was like to die, then called he his shipmates to him and said to them that he thought that likely, that now would soon be a parting of ways for them: “I have not”, said he, “been a man used to sickness, and if so it fare as methinks now likeliest, that I die, then make me a chest and let me fare overboard; and this
goeth all another way than I deemed it should be, if I shall not come to Iceland and there take land. Ye shall bear my greeting unto Grim, my son, then when ye find one another, and say to him this withal: if so betide that he come to Iceland, and it so come about (though that may be thought unlikely) that I be there before you, then let him take to him his dwelling as near as may be to that place where I shall have come aland”.

A little thereafter died Kveldulf. His shipmates did so, even as he before had spoken, and laid him in a chest and thereafter shot it overboard.

There was a man named Grim, the son of Thorir the son of Ketil Keelfarer, a man of great kindred and a wealthy. He was a shipmate of Kveldulf’s. He had been an old friend of that father and son, and had been on journeys both with them and with Thorolf. And he had gotten the wrath of the King for that sake. He took charge of the ship after Kveldulf was dead. But when they were come off Iceland, then sailed they from the south toward the land: they sailed west along the land, because they had heard say that Ingolf had there taken up his dwelling, but when they came round Reekness
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and they saw the firth open up before them, then stood they in to the firth with both their ships. The gale blew fierce, and great rain and fog; and now the ships parted. They sailed in up Burgfirth till there was an end of all skerries; then cast anchor till the gale abated and the air cleared; then waited they for flood-tide, and therewith flitted their ship up into a certain river-mouth: that is called Gufa. They brought the ship up the river so far as they might: and now bare the lading off the ship, and made their dwelling there the first winter. They kenned the land along by the sea both up the firth and down, and when they had fared but a short way, then found they where in a certain wick was cast ashore the chest of Kveldulf. They flitted the chest to that ness that was there,
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set it down there, and piled it with stones.

CHAPTER XXVIII. OF SKALLAGRIM’S LAND-TAKING.

S
KALLAGRIM came there aland where a great ness went out into the sea, and a narrow neck landward of the ness, and there bare the lading off the ship. That called they Knarrarness.

Thereafter Skallagrim kenned the land, and there was great marshlands and wide woods,
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long betwixt fell and foreshore, seal-takings enow and great catch of fish. But when they kenned the land south along the sea, then was there before them a great firth;
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but when they fared in along that firth then stayed they not from their faring until they found their fellows, Grim the Halogalander and those fellows of his. That was a joyful meeting: said they unto Skallagrim of his father’s death, and that withal, that Kveldulf was there come aland and they had laid him in earth there. And now brought they Skallagrim to the place, and so it seemed to him as if it should be but a short way thence to where a good stead would be for building of a house.

Fared Grim then away and back to his shipmates, and they sate there, of either part, through the winter where they had come aland. Then took Skallagrim land betwixt fell and foreshore, all the Myres out as far as Selalon and inland as far as Burglava, and south to Havenfell, and all that land that is marked off by the river-waters falling to the sea. He flitted his ship next spring south to the firth and in into that inlet which was nearest to that where Kveldulf had come to land, and set his house there, and called it Burg, and the firth Burgfirth; and so too the countryside up from there they named after the firth.

To Grim the Halogalander gave he dwelling south of Burgfirth, there where it was called Hvanneyri.
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A short way out from thence stretches inland a wick, nought great: they found there many ducks, and called it Andakil,
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and Andakilswater that which there fell into the sea. Up from that river to the river that was called Grimswater, there between them had Grim his land.

In the spring, when Skallagrim let drive his livestock up along the sea-shore then came they to a certain little ness, and caught there some swans, and called it Alptaness.

Skallagrim gave land to his shipmates.
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To Ani gave he land betwixt Longwater and Hafslech, and he dwelt at Anisbrent: his son was Onund Sjoni,
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by whom arose the strife between Thorstein and Odd-a-Tongue.

Grani dwelt at Granistead in Digraness.

To Thorbiorn Krumm gave he land up by Gufa, and to Thord Beigaldi. Krumm dwelt at Krummsknolls and Thord at Beigaldi.

To Thorir the Giant, him and his brother, gave he land up from Einkunnir and to the outer side along Longwater. Thorir the Giant dwelt at Giantstead; his daughter was Thordis Stang that dwelt at Stangarholt thereafter. Thorgeir dwelt at Jardlangstead.

Skallagrim kenned the land up about the countryside: fared first in along Burgfirth till the firth ended, and after that along the river on the western side, that he called Whitewater
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because he and his fellows had never before seen those waters that were fallen out of the jokulls: it seemed to them that river was of a wondrous look. They fared up along Whitewater, till that river was before them that fell out of the north from the fells: that called they Northwater, and fared up along that river till there was yet again a river before them, and therein was but little fall of water. Fared they over that river and still up along Northwater: saw then soon where the little river fell out of gorges, and called that Gorgewater. And now fared they over Northwater and fared back again to Whitewater and up along it; it was then but a short way to that river that was athwart their way before them and fell into Whitewater; that called they Thwartwater; they were ware of this, that there was every water full of fishes.

And now fared they out again, back to Burg.

CHAPTER XXIX. OF THE WORKS OF SKALLAGRIM.

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KALLAGRIM was a great workman. He had with him always a mort of men: let fetch in much those takings that were at hand and were needful for the keep of men: because at first had they little livestock as against that which was needed for that throng of men there was; and what there
was of livestock went then every winter self-feeding in the woods.

Skallagrim was a great ship-builder, and there was no lack of driftwood west along the Myres. He let make a farmstead at Alptaness and had there a second dwelling: let work from there out-rowings and seal fisheries and egg-takings, seeing there was then enough of all those takings, and so too of driftwood to let flit home to him. Then also were there great comings of whales ashore, and a man might shoot as he would: all was then quiet in the fishing-steads, for the wild things were without knowledge of man.

A third dwelling had he by the sea-side in the westward Myres. It was there yet better for sitting for drifts, and there he let sow the land and call the place Acres. Isles lay there out from the land that whale was found in, and they called these Whale-isles.

Skallagrim had men of his also up by the salmon rivers for fishing. Odd Live-alone he set by Gorgewater to mind the salmon fisheries there. Odd dwelt under Live-alone Brents. After him is named Live-aloneness. Sigmund was a man named, whom Skallagrim set by Northwater. He dwelt there where it was called Sigmundstead: there it is now called the Howes. After him is called Sigmundness. Afterwards he moved his homestead in to Munodsness: that seemed a readier place for salmon fisheries.

But when Skallagrim’s livestock was much increased, then went the cattle all up into the fells in the summer. He found there was great odds in this, that those beasts became better and fatter which went on the heaths, and this too, that the sheep throve a-winters in the mountain dales, even though they could not be driven down. So now Skallagrim let make a farmstead up by the fell and had a dwelling there: let there tend his sheep. That dwelling Griss had ward of, and it is called after him Grisartongue.

And now stood Skallagrim’s estate on many feet.

Some while later than Skallagrim had come out, came a ship from the main sea into Burgfirth, and that man owned her who was called Oleif Hialti. He had with him his wife and children
and a band of kinsfolk of his beside, and had been so minded of his journey that he should find him a dwelling-place in Iceland. Oleif was a man wealthy and of great family and wise of wit.