286 MINING IN THE 



CHAP. X. 



Normen, rather than have their dominions laid 

 waste by the extension of their rapine. Thus, 

 as early as the year 845, a fleet of Danes or 

 Norwegians sailed up^the Seine to Paris, when 

 Charles the Bold was induced to pay them four- 

 teen thousand marcs of gold ; which, says Vol- 

 taire in his General History of Europe, only em- 

 boldened them the more. In England, during 

 the reign of Ethelred, a bribe of ten thousand 

 pounds was paid to the Danes to induce them 

 to desist from an invasion and to depart the 

 kingdom ; and a few years later that king paid 

 to Sweyn and Olave, who had established them- 

 selves at Southampton, sixteen thousand pounds 

 on condition of their leaving the kingdom. 

 About ten years afterwards the same prince 

 purchased another temporary peace at the ex- 

 pense of thirty thousand pounds, and at the end 

 of the next four years renewed the vain attempt 

 by a tribute of forty-eight thousand pounds. 

 This last payment was followed twelve years 

 later by a transfer of the crown of England to 

 Canute the Dane. 



Another mode by which these sea kings, as 

 they are called by their own countrymen, ob- 

 tained the precious metals, or at least gold, is 

 described by Adam of Bremen, who about the 

 year 1080 wrote his work " De Situ Dance, et 

 Reliquarum septentrionalium Regionum" That 

 author, without taking any notice of Copenhagen, 



