Page:The Heimskringla; or, Chronicle of the Kings of Norway Vol 1.djvu/374

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360
CHRONICLE OF THE

night time to Tunsberg, and heard that Gudrod Biomeson was at a feast a little way up the country. Then King Harald set out immediately with his followers, came in the night, and surrounded the house. King Gudrod Biorneson went out with his people; but after a short resistance he fell, and many men with him. Then King Harald joined his brother King Gudrod, and they subdued all Viken.

Chapter XI.
Of Harald Grænske.

King Gudrod Biorneson had made a good and suitable marriage, and had by his wife a son called Harald, who had been sent to be fostered to Green¬ land to a lenderman called Hroe the White. Hroe's son, called Hrane the Far-travelled, was Harald's foster-brother, and about the same age. After his father Gudrod's fall, Harald, who was called Grænske, fled to the Uplands, and with him his foster-brother Hrane, and a few people. Harald staid a while there among his relations; but as Eric's sons sought after every man who interfered with them, and especially those who might oppose them, Harald Grænske's friends and relations advised him to leave the country. Harald therefore went westward into Sweden, and sought shipmates, that he might enter into company with those who went out a cruising to gather property. Harald became in this way a remarkably able man. There was a man in Sweden at that time called Toste, one of the most powerful and clever in the land among those who had no high name or dignity; and he Avas a great warrior, who had been often in battle, and was therefore called Skoglar[1] Toste. Harald Grænske came into his company, and cruised with Toste in summer; and wherever Harald came lie was Avell thought of by every one. In the winter Harald, after passing two years in the Uplands, took

  1. From the valkyriar or companion of Odin called Skögul. Therefore Skogle Toste was the warlike Toste.