holes necessary for the operation of the oars, a row of iron bucklers glistened in the rays of the setting sun, which also played upon the pirates' polished armor, that consisted of little iron scales, which, covering them from head to foot, imparted to the wearers the appearance of gigantic fishes.

Fierce people were these pirates! Sailing over the main from the shores of Sweden, Norway and Denmark, they arrived only after some days' journey at the coasts of Gaul. They boasted in their "sagas," or popular songs, of "never having slept under a board roof, or having emptied their cups near a sheltered fireplace." Pillaging churches, castles and abbeys, turning chapels into stables, cutting shirts and breeches for themselves out of altar-cloths, ravaging everything that they encountered—in this style, as they expressed themselves, they "sang the mass of the lances, beginning at dawn with the matins and closing at dusk with the vespers." To conduct his vessel as a skilful knight manages his horse, to be able to run over its oars while in motion, and to be able to hurl three successive javelins at the plate on the top of the mast, receive them back in his own hands and hurl them up again without once missing his aim—such were some of the essential accomplishments for an able pirate.

so ran their sea song,

These Northmans had for their divinity Odin, the God of the North, who promised to the brave, killed in battle, a home in Walhalla, the brilliant residence of the celestial heroes. Nevertheless, relying more on their own intrepidity than upon the aid of their God, they never invoked him. "My brother in arms and myself," thus did Gunkator, a famous sea-king who frequently ravaged the castles and churches of Gaul, speak of himself and his fellow pirates; "my brother in arms and myself never sacrifice to the Gods; we place our faith only upon our oars and our own strength; we get along very well in that way." Several of the chiefs of these pirates claimed to have issued from the embraces of Trolls, sea sprites, and the Ases and Dwalines, gentle fairies, who delighted in dancing by the light of the moon on the ice of the northern lakes, or in disporting themselves among the snow-covered branches of the tall fir-trees.

Well might Gaëlo, who was in command of the black holker with the sea-eagle ornament at its prow, trust to his own strength; it matched his bravery, and his bravery matched his skilfulness. Nevertheless, what surpassed his skilfulness, his bravery, and his strength, was the masculine beauty of the young pirate chief, as, with one hand resting on his harpoon, covered from head to foot in his flexible armor of iron scales, Gaëlo stood in the prow of his vessel. From his belt hung by his side his long sword and his ivory horn whose notes were well known of the pirates. His pointed casque, almost devoid of visor, exposed his features, browned by the sea air, because no less than the heroes of the Saga, Gaëlo "never slept under a roof, nor emptied his cup near a sheltered fireplace." It was easy to surmise from the intrepidity of his eyes, and the curve of his lip that he also had often "from dawn to dusk sung the mass of the lances," perchance also carved his own shirt from some altar-cloth, and, who knows, more than once, burnt down an abbey after having eaten the abbot's supper. But he certainly never killed the abbot, if the latter was defenceless and offered no resistance. No; the noble cast of Gaëlo's face bore no trace of ferocity. Though he was of those who practiced the principle of Trodd the Dane of the country of Garderig: "A good pirate never seeks for shelter during a tempest, and never binds his wounds before the end of the fray; he must attack an enemy single-handed, defend himself against two, never yield to three and flee without shame before four"—though Gaëlo followed this maxim, he also practiced this other given by the good chief. Half to his fellow champions: "Women must not be killed, nor must little children be tossed in the air to be received for amusement upon the points of your lances." No; Gaëlo had not a ferocious face. Far from that, particularly at this moment did his face denote the most tender sentiments. His eyes snapped with the fire of gentleness as from time to time he turned his head towards the other holker that was vying with his own in swiftness.

Indeed, never before did pirate vessel present to a mariner's eyes a more charming sight! Constructed in the same proportions as Gaëlo's, only finer and more dashing, the second holker was painted white. The spare oars and the bucklers ranged in a row like those of the black holker were of azure blue. A gilded swan ornamented its prow. On the top of its mast a swan with outspread wings and engraved upon a sheet of polished copper, responded to the rising evening breeze, which also raised a streamer of azure blue embroidered with a white swan. Within-board, swords, pikes and axes, symmetrically ranked, hung within easy reach of the rowers, who were clad in flexible armor, not of scales, but of iron mail, with casques with short visors on their heads.

Like Gaëlo, the chief of this second holker was standing near the craft's prow, with one hand upon a long harpoon which its holder frequently used in order to turn the vessel's head aside whenever it grazed the edges of several islets, grown with willows, that lay in the vessel's course. This Northman chief, slenderer but as tall as Gaëlo, was a woman, a virgin of twenty years, known as the Beautiful Shigne. Like the female warriors whom she chieftained, Shigne wore an armor of steel mail so fine and flexible that it might have been taken for a grey silk. This species of tunic descended from the maid's neck to just above her knees, and fitted so closely that it betrayed the robust contours of her bosom. An embroidered belt gathered the coat of mail around her waist, from the belt hung, on one side, her ivory horn, on the other her sword. No less plainly outlined were the Beautiful Shigne's nether limbs, likewise encased in flexible iron mail. Her shoes were made of the skin of the sea-lion, and they were tightly laced around her ankles.

The warrior maid had laid her casque at her feet. Her hair, of a pale blonde, parted over her wide forehead and cut short at the neck, framed in with its ringlets a daring white face slightly tinged with the rose. The cold azure of the northern heaven seemed to be reflected in her large, clear, blue and limpid eyes. Her aquiline nose, her serious and haughty mouth, imparted an austere expression to her masculine beauty.

Before now the sagas had sung the