joyed peace and plenty, and had shown their thankfulness and obedience by frequent offerings and vows. "But now" (said this pretended envoy of the deities), "the smoke of sacrifice seldom rises, the accustomed offerings and solemn feasts are neglected, and, what is more, and worst of all, ye have set another God above us in your hearts. Repent ye now, and render to us your accustomed vows, if ye would secure our favor for the future go not after strange gods, but if ye desire more gods, we will admit your deceased king, Erik, into our celestial company." The popular attachment to the faith of their fathers was rekindled by this awful appeal to their superstitious fears. The apotheosis of Erik was gratefully accepted by them, temples were raised to his honour, vows and sacrifices offered in his name, as one of the national deities. The friends of Ancharius were now alarmed for his safety, and the apostolic missionary threw himself on the protection of the king, whose favor he had won by splendid presents and flattering communications from the emperor. Olaf protested his willingness to tolerate and even to favor the new religion, at the same time declaring that the question depended, not on his pleasure, but on the will of the people. The popular assembly being consulted, tried the matter in discussion by lot, according to their favourite usage, and chance determined the question in favor of toleration. The people then concluded that Christ was a God as powerful as their ancient Gods, and permitted the new faith to be freely preached and embraced by those who preferred it to the ancient. This popular convention was the Diet of the Gothic kingdom-Ting allra Gota, and the decree was afterwards confirmed in the national assembly of the proper Sviar at Upsala. Ancharius availed him self of the toleration thus granted, to continue his labours, and afterwards sent other missionaries to forward the same object. But the seeds of the faith appear to have been sown on stony ground, for the ecclesiastical writers assert, that long after the death of Ancharius, not a single Christian priest, and hardly any trace of the new religion, was to be found in all Sweden.* (854.) On his return to Denmark from his second Swedish mission, Ancharius found his friend, Erik I, no longer living. That monarch was succeeded by his son, Erik II, under whom the nobility, who governed in his name, stirred up the people against the Christians, by representing the new religion as the moving cause of all the calamities that fell upon the land. Their aversion to it was increased by their hatred of the Franks and other southern nations, by whom it was professed. Christ was considered as the god of their enemies; Odin and Thor, Freyer, and the other Æsir, as the protecting deities of the great Northern family, who were bound together by the ties of a common origin, language, and religion. But owing to some cause, not precisely explained, the current of opinion soon turned in favour of the new religion. Ancharius was once more invited to visit Jutland, where he was received with open arms by the king, and pursued his great work of converting the heathen with success. Ancharius spent the remainder of his life in this and other labours of charity. He founded cloisters, schools, and hospitals; visited, with indefatigable industry, every part of his immense diocese; and when at last reluctantly compelled to decline its active duties, devoted him Ꮓ Rembert. S. Anchar. Vita, lib. xx-xxix. self to those practices of self-mortification, which, in that age, were considered so meritorious. St Martin of Tours was his pattern of the saintly character. He constantly wore the monastic habit of his order, and a hair shirt. His rule of life was the rule of St Benedict, and never did he avail himself of the privilege of his ecclesiastical dignity to claim an exemption from its utmost rigours. In his episcopal visitations, he constantly waited on the poor, at table, before he took his own frugal repast, and often retired from the world with a few select companions, to his solitary retreat, in the convent of Ramslo. Even the love of fame, that last infirmity of noble minds,' and which in his ardent breast was naturally strong, was anxiously suppressed and made subordinate to higher and purer motives of action. He died in the sixty-fourth year of his age (865), and was afterwards canonized by the papal authority. His memory was honored by the institution of festivals; magnificent shrines were built for the adoration of the new saint; and churches and cloisters dedicated to perpetuate his holy name. Ancharius continued to be worshipped, as the tutelary saint of the Northern nations, until the period of the Reformation, and still merits their reverence and gratitude as their deliverer from a bloody and barbarous superstition, and a benefactor who opened to them the career of civilization.* • Munter, Kirchengeschichte, tom.i. pp. 232, 234, 278, 310, 321. CHAPTER X. Expedition of the sons of Ragnar Lodbrok to England.-Defeat and death of king Ella.-Conquest of Northumbria.-Death of Edmund, king of East-Anglia.-Conquest of that kingdom.-Wars of Alfred, king of the West-Saxons, with the Northmen.-Peace between Alfred and Godrun, by which the Danes are permanently confirmed in the possession of East-Anglia.—Invasion of England by Hastings the Younger.-Desperate contest between him and Alfred.-Final expulsion of Hastings from the island. WHILST Ancharius and his successors were carrying into the benighted regions of the North the mild and peaceful light of the Gospel, the Vikingar were scattering the flames of destruction along the coasts of Europe and its isles, from the Baltic straits to those of Gibraltar. (866-867.) To avenge the fate of Ragnar Lodbrok, an expedition, headed by eight kings and twenty Jarls, and composed of all the various nations and tribes of Scandinavia, was directed against England.* Among these chieftains were the sons, or according to other authorities, the grandsons of king Ragnar.† Their names, as given in the Northern Sagas and in the Anglo-Saxon chronicles, are somewhat different: but making due allowances for the poetical and romantic colouring given to • Suhm, Historie af Danmark, tom. ii. p. 263. their characters and conduct by the Northern Skalds and Sagamen, the identity of the persons, and their actions is manifest, whatever chronological difficulties may attend their eventful story. According to the Sagas, the sons of Ragnar were waging war in the kingdoms of the South (Sudr-riki), when their royal father was slain, in Northumbria. After their return to Denmark, they received the first news of his tragical death, from the messengers of Ella, sent to propitiate their hostility. The messengers of the Anglo-Saxon king found them feasting in their hall. They entered, and approached the seat of Ivar. Sigurdr Snakes-eye (Snogoje) played at chess with Huitserk the Brave; whilst Bjorn Ironside polished the handle of his spear in the middle pavement of the hall. The messengers saluted Ivar with due reverence, and told him they were sent by king Ella, to announce the death of their royal father. As they began to unfold their tale, Sigurdr and Huitserk dropped their game, carefully weighing what was said. Bjorn stood in the midst of the hall, leaning on his spear: but Ivar diligently inquired by what means, and by what kind of death, his father had perished:, which the messengers related, from his first arrival in England, till his death. When, in the course of their narrative, they came to the words of the dying king, how the young whelps would roar, if they knew their father's fate,' Bjorn grasped the handle of his spear so fast, that the prints of his fingers remained; and when the tale was done, dashed the spear in pieces. Huitserk pressed the chess-board so hard with his hands, that they bled. Sigurdr was so wrapt in attention that he cut himself to the bone, with a knife, with which he was paring his nails. Ivar, above all, anxiously inquir |