Chapter 3: The Breaking Of London Bridge.

There was a fair wind for us into the Thames mouth, and all seemed to be going well. But when we came off the Medway it seemed that there was to be fighting, for our way was blocked by a fleet and that stronger than ours.

Now as the longships were cleared for the weapon play, Olaf wondered how the Danes should have had word of our coming, for it was plain that this fleet of ten ships was waiting for us. Yet we had kept well away from the forelands, lest we should make it too plain where we were going.

Then one ship left the rest and came swiftly towards us, under oars. And when the ship drew near, we saw that she bore the banner of Ethelred himself.

So the fair plans that had been made had come to naught, and when Olaf understood this his face grew dark with anger, and he said:

"Almost would I leave this foolish king to go his own way without help of mine. But I have promised Eadmund, and I must keep my word. Henceforward I shall know what I must look for."

Little, therefore, had Olaf to say to Ethelred when they met, nor would he go on board the English ship, but Ethelred must come to him. Eadmund was at his father's side, and his face was very wrathful, for he felt even as did Olaf.

"London is ours already," Ethelred said. "Wherefore I would join you."

"London by this time may be in other hands," answered Olaf; "but we shall see when we get there. Now must there be no more time lost but we must make all speed up the river, tarrying nowhere."

So we sailed on. When we came to Greenwich there were no Danes there, nor any Danish ships. I went ashore in a boat, and asked the men I saw what was become of them. And they told me that Thorkel's fleet had sailed northward on Swein's death, and that the thingmen whom he had left in the place had gone to London.

"That is as I thought," said Olaf. "Now there will be more trouble in driving them out than there has been in letting them in."

When we came at last in sight of London Bridge I knew that Olaf was right, for since the Danes had gained the city they had not been idle. They had built a great fort on the Southwark side of the river, girt with a wide moat, and all the stronger that the walls thus surrounded were partly of timber and stone. The road from across London Bridge runs through this fort, so that one might by no means pass over it until the place was won. And at the other end of the bridge the old Roman walls of London itself were far too strong for our force to take by storm.

But the strangest thing to me was to see what they had done to the great timber bridge itself, for they had made that also into a fortress. The old railing along the roadway was gone, and in its place were breast-high bulwarks of strong timber, and on each span of the bridge was a high wooden tower whose upper works overhung the water, looking downstream, as if they feared assault from the river itself.

We came up to the Pool on a good flood-tide, and as we dropped anchor there we saw all this, and, moreover, that the place was held by the Danes in force. The red cloaks of Cnut's thingmen were on bridge and walls and fort alike, and no few of them in either stronghold. There was work before us if we would win the place for our king.

Before any word had come to Olaf of what should be done, Eadmund had gone ashore with all his warriors, and had fallen on the Southwark earthwork. It was Olaf's first thought to follow him, but he held back.

"Let him go," he said. "Maybe he will like best to win his own city without my help at the first onset. Yet unless that fort is weaker than it looks, his attack will be of no use. For, see--all the Danes from the bridge are going to help."

So it was, and from the deck of Olaf's ship I looked on at the fight for half an hour. At one time I thought that we had won the place, for our men charged valiantly through the moat and up the steep sides of the earthworks.

There waited for them the Danish axes, and an axeman behind a wall is equal to two men below him.

I longed to be beside Eadmund, whom I could see now and then, and ever where the fighting was fiercest; but Olaf bade me be patient. There would be fighting enough for me presently, he said.

"You will see that we shall have to take the bridge, and so cut the Danish force in two. Then from the bridge we have but to fight our way either into the fort or into the town."

Presently our men gave back. The earthworks were too strong for them. Then I asked again that I might go.

"If you must fall, it shall be at my side, cousin," said Olaf, laying his hand on my arm. "Eadmund does not need you."

For now he and his men were coming back to the ships, having won nought but knowledge of the strength of the fort. The Danes would not leave their walls to follow the retreating English, though Eadmund halted just beyond bow shot, and waited as if to challenge them to fight in the open.

Now by this time the tide was almost full, and the stream of the flood was slackening. And it seemed as if one might easily scale the bulwarks of the great low-timbered bridge from the foredeck of a ship. Ethelred saw that, and as soon as his men were on board again the word was passed that attack on the bridge should be made by every vessel that could reach it.

As it fell out, we of Olaf's eight ships lay below the rest, and must have passed them to reach the bridge. All we might do, therefore, was to close up to the sterns of the vessels that were leading, and wait to send our men across their decks when the time came. That pleased not Olaf at first, for he thought that his turn had come; but in the end it was well for us.

Now the ships slipped their cables, and drifted up to the bridge steadily, with a few oars going aft to guide them, and as they came the Danes crowded above them, manning their towers and lining the whole long length with savage faces and gleaming weapons. They howled at us as we drew near, and as the bows of the leading ships almost touched the piles, they hove grappling irons into them from above, holding them fast. Whereat Eadmund thanked them for saving trouble, while the arrows fell round him like hail.

But in a moment that word of his was changed, for now fell from towers and bulwarks a fearsome rain of heavy darts and javelins, and the men fell back from the crowded fore decks to seek safety aft until the store of weapons was spent. Truly, there must have been sheaves of throwing weapons piled ready on the roadway of the bridge.

Then Eadmund's voice cried:

"Steady, men--this cannot last!"

And even as they heard him the warriors swarmed back across the corpse-cumbered decks, and began to climb up the piles, for the tide held the ships strongly against the bridge. Yet when the ships were there the height of the bridge above them was far greater than it had seemed from a distance. Now their fore decks were under the towers, for the upper works of these overhung the water.

Then the Danish war horns blew, and the men raised a great shout, and down from those towers and from openings in the bridge rained and thundered great ragged blocks of stone--masses rent from the old Roman city walls--and into the ships they crashed, and there rose a terrible cry from our men, for no ship that was ever built could stand so fierce a storm as this.

Two good ships swayed and sank, and their men climbed on bridge and piling, or leapt into the stream to reach the ships that yet were afloat. Then the storm stayed for lack of rocks within reach, as it would seem, for I saw men hoisting more into the towers as fast as crane and windlass would serve them.

Now fell the javelins again, and still the grappling irons held the ships, though the oars were manned. Then dared a man in each ship to do the bravest deed of that day. Through rain of falling javelins each ran forward, axe in hand, and cut the grappling lines as our Norsemen cheered them in wild praise. Yet I know that not one of those men lived to see that his deed had saved the ships, for our oars were out and swiftly we towed them away to safety.

Aye, but I saw one tall Dane on the bridge strive to hold the hands of his fellows that he might save at least the brave man in the ship below him. And that should be told of him, for such a deed is that of a true warrior.

All this I watched in dismay, for it seemed to me that we could in no way take the town. As for Olaf, he said nought; and when we had come to anchor again he sat on the steersman's bench, looking at the bridge and saying no word to any of us. The Danes were crowding the bridge and jeering at us, as one might well see.

Then Rani came aft and sat on the rail by me.

"Well," he said, "how like you this business?"

"Ill enough," I answered. "What can be done?"

He nodded towards Olaf, smiling grimly.

"I know of nothing; but if your king lets him go his own way he will find out some plan. Know you what he did when the Swedes blocked us into a lake some years ago?"

"I have not heard," I said.

"Why, seeing that we might not go out by the way in which we came, Olaf made us dig a new channel, and we went out by that, laughing. We all had to dig for our lives, grumbling, but we got away."

Now Olaf looked up and saw us, and his face was bright again.

"I am going to see Ethelred," he said, "for I think that I can take the bridge."

A boat shot alongside even as he spoke, and a thane came to bid Olaf to a council of the leaders on Ethelred's ship. So Olaf went with him, and was long away. The tide was almost low, and darkness had fallen before he came back in high spirits.

"Ethelred was sorely downcast, even to weeping," he told us, "and so had almost given up hope of taking London. He thought of sailing away and landing elsewhere. Then I said that I would take the bridge tomorrow if I had help in what I needed tonight."

Then he looked round on us, and what he saw in our faces made him laugh a little.

"It seems to me that you are over fearful of stone throwing after the Danish sort," he said. "Had I not a plan that will save our heads and the ship's timbers alike, I would not go. I am not the man to risk both for nought. We will build roofs over the fore decks and try again."

Then Rani growled:

"How are we to climb out from under your roofs so as to get upon the bridge? We have already seen that ladders are needed for that also."

"Nay," said Olaf, "we will bring the bridge down to us," and so he went forward laughing to find his shipwrights.

So all that night long we wrought as he bade us, and Ethelred's men came with spars and timber from houses they pulled down ashore, and when morning broke we had on each ship the framework of a strong, high-pitched roof that covered the vessels from stem to midships or more, and stretched out beyond the gunwales on either board.

Then the men who wrought ashore brought us boatloads of strong hurdles and the sides and roofs of the wattled huts of the Southwark thralls, and with them all our wooden shelters were covered so strongly that, if they might not altogether stand the weight of the greatest stones, these roofs would break their fall and save the ships.

When all this was finished, King Olaf told us what his plan was. We were not to try to storm the bridge, but were to break it.

"See," he said, "all night long the wagons that brought more stones have been rumbling and rattling into the middle of the bridge, and every Dane thereon will crowd into the centre to see the breaking of King Olaf's ships, and their weight will help us. We will go so far under the bridge that we may make fast our cables to the piles, and then will row hard down the falling tide at its swiftest. Whereupon the laugh will be on our side instead of with the Danes, as yesterday."

After that he bade us all sleep, for we had some long hours to wait for the falling tide when all was done. And we did so, after a good meal, as well as we could, while the wains yet brought stones, and arrows and darts in sheaves to the bridge. But forward in our ships the men were coiling the great cables that should, we hoped, bring the bridge and stones alike down harmlessly to us.

It was plain that the Danes knew what the roofs over the ships were for, since all the while that we wrought we could see them pointing and laughing one to another in scorn, from where we lay, not much beyond arrow shot below them. But not one of all the men on the bridge could have guessed what our real plan might be. Only we who looked at the ancient bridge from the water, and marked how frail and decaying some of the piles that upheld its narrow spans were, knew how likely it was that Olaf's plan would succeed. The wide roadway seemed to them to be strong enough for the wooden towers and the many tons of stones they had burdened it with; but now that Olaf had showed us, we saw that it was none so safe, so we waited in good spirits.

The tide reached its height and as the ships swung idly to their cables on the slack, the Danes thronged the bridge, thinking, doubtless, that we should attack when they were within reach, as yesterday.

The hum of their voices came down to us, and as the time went by, and the ebb tide set in, the hum strengthened into a long roar of voices, that broke out into a yelling laugh now and then, as some word of scorn went round. For they thought our Norsemen were afraid.

But they could not see beneath the penthouse roofs, where the men, three at each oar, were armed and ready. Nor could they see the gangs of twelve men told off to the cables on each foredeck. Six of these were to pass the cables round the piles and make fast while the other six were to stand by with shields ready, in case the roofs were broken. But even then it should not take long to do all we needed, and some of the roof would be left surely at the worst.

Four only of the ships were to touch the bridge, one at each of the four midmost pilings. The other four were made fast, stern to stern of the leading ships, so that their weight of oar play might be used to the full in the long pull to come, and two ships would haul at each set of piles where the weight was heaviest upon the bridge.

So we waited until the tide was at its fiercest ebb. The water rushed through the narrow waterways of the bridge in a broken torrent streaked with foam that swirled far down the stream towards us; so the time having come, Olaf gave the word. His own ship was one of the two in the middle, and Rani was in command of the other.

Then in a moment the oars flashed out, and the moorings were slipped; a shout went up from the bridge, and then the Danes were silent, wondering. The foam flew from our bows, and as we dashed up the stream the Danish war cry broke out again, while from end to end of the bridge the weapons flashed and sparkled.

Now the arrows rattled on the penthouse roofs, and one or two glanced from Olaf's armour and mine, and from the shields which Ottar and I held before him. For we were alone with him at the helm. He was steering his ship himself, as was Rani, and hardly would he suffer us to be beside him to shield him. But we would have it thus in the end.

At last we were almost on the bridge, and Olaf smiled and watched the ships to right and left of us--the oar blades were bending as the men struggled with clenched teeth against the fierce current that flew past us foaming.

Then the Danish grapnels were cast, as yesterday. The shadow of the bridge fell black upon us--the line of Danish faces were above our bows--and then down crashed the great stones from above, and I saw Olaf's lips tighten and set as he saw their work. Yet though the good ship quivered and reeled under the shock, the penthouse roofs were strong and steep, and but one great stone tore a hole for itself, crushing two men beneath it; but the rest bounded into the water, splintering an oar blade or two as they went. And all the while the arrows rained round us, and the javelins strove to pierce the roofs.

Then was a shout from forward of the ship, and Olaf's eyes brightened as he raised his hand. Instantly the rowers stayed, and the ships drifted away from the bridge more swiftly than they had come, while the Danish grappling irons ripped and tore along the roofs uselessly. There was no firm hold for them.

That made the Danes think that we were driven off, and their yells began afresh.

Then came a quick word from Olaf, and the oars took the water to ease the sharp check as the length of the cables was reached, while the ship astern of us swung to her tow line. The king glanced to right and left of him, and saw that the other three ships had fared as well as we, and that they too were dropping down from the bridge.

How the Danes roared and howled with joy, thinking that we were all in full retreat! Yet, as the last ship tightened her cable, I saw the jerk shake one of them from his perch on the bridge bulwarks and send him headlong into the water.

Olaf saw it, and raised his hand and shouted. And with one accord the oars of the eight great ships smote the water, and bent, and tore the waves into foam--and London Bridge was broken!

The memory of that sight will never pass from my mind or from the mind of any man of us who saw all that the lifted hand and shout of Olaf the king brought about.

There was a slow groaning of timbers and a cracking, and then a dead silence. Then the silence was broken by a wild yell of terror from the swarming Danes, and ere they could fly from the crowded towers and roadway where the bridge was steepest, the whole length of three spans bent and swayed towards us, and a wide gap sprang open across the roadway. Into that gap crumbled a great stone-laden tower, and men like bees from a shaken swarm. And then those three spans seemed to melt away with a great rush and roar, and howl of men in mortal terror--and down the freed tide swept our ships, dragging after them the timbers that the cables yet held.

Then into the Southwark fortress went Eadmund and his men like fire, while from the London side of the river came the roar of a fight, as the citizens fell on the Danes who were fleeing terror smitten from the weakened spans that were left of London Bridge.

Then Olaf swung our ships to either bank, and past us went in confusion, on the rush of pent-up water, the great timbers and piles of the bridge, as it broke up piece by piece in the current. The men on Ethelred's ships had all they could do to save their vessels from being stove in by the heavier woodwork when it was swept down among them.

That danger passed; and now was our turn come to join in the fighting, for there were none to prevent us from getting the ships up to the bridge. And so we scaled from our decks the bulwarks that had been so terrible, and fell on the Danes in the rear as Eadmund in Southwark and the citizens in London took them in the front. It must have been that few Danes were left on either bank, for the fighting lasted no long time, and when we had done with these men from off the bridge there was no other attack.

So, before the evening came we knew that London was once more in the hands of Ethelred, and the bells were ringing to welcome back an English king to English land. For Olaf had brought him home.

There was high feasting in London town that night, and Ethelred deemed that England was already won. Nor was there any honour too great for him to show to the man who had wrought this for him.

But what Olaf said was this:

"To win London is much--though, indeed, it should never have been thus lost--but London is not England. There will be more fighting yet, if Cnut is a worthy son of Swein Forkbeard."

Now, in after years men made light of this breaking of London Bridge, and the reason is not far to seek. For, first of all, Cnut's folk, when they had the upper hand, liked not to hear thereof. And then the citizens would speak little among themselves of their thraldom to the Danes, and much of their welcome to Ethelred and their own share in the business when the bridge had been broken. And lastly, it was wrought by an outlander. Truly no Englishman, whether of Saxon or Danish kin, grudges praise to a stranger when he has won it well, but Olaf had few to speak for him after he had gone hence. But I have told what I saw, and think that it should not be forgotten, for it was a great deed. Men sing the song that Ottar the scald wrote thereon in Olaf's Norway, and I think that they will sing it for many an age to come.

We have forgotten that song; but the first time he sang it was at the great feast in the wide hall of the London merchants' guild that night, and sorely did the few Danish lords, who sat as captives among us unwillingly enough, scowl as they listened. But our folk held their breath lest they should lose aught of either voice or words of the singer, for they had never heard his like before, and this is part of what he sang {5}:

"Bold in the battle Bravest in sword play! Thou wert the breaker Of London's broad bridge. Wild waxed the warfare When thou gold wonnest Where the shields splintered 'Neath the stones' crashing-- When the war byrnies broke Beaten beneath them.

"Thine was the strong arm That Ethelred sought for; Back to his lost land Thou the king leddest. Then was the war storm Waged when thou earnest Safe to his high seat Leading that king's son, Throned by thy help On the throne of his fathers."

He ended, and our warriors rose and cheered both hero and singer, and when the noise ceased Ethelred gave Ottar his own bracelet; but to Olaf he gave his hand, and there in the presence of all the company thanked him for what he had wrought, giving more praise to him than Ottar had sung.

Then sang the English gleemen of the deeds of Eadmund the Atheling, and all were well pleased. Now those songs have bided in our minds while Ottar's song is forgotten, and maybe that is but natural. But Olaf was my kinsman and very dear to me, and I am jealous for his fame.