78 Norivay and the Norivegians 



first account we get of any organised Viking attack on 

 any country shows the Northmen proceeding on these 

 lines. We saw how they seized upon the island or 

 promontory of Lindisfarne, for, like our St Michael's 

 Mount or the French Mont, St. Michel, Lindisfarne 

 was then only an island at high tide. And though 

 the subsequent attacks of the Vikings on Northumbria 

 were not successful, this beginning gave the pattern 

 of their beoinning in most of their other adventures. 

 Their attacks on Ireland began with the seizure of an 

 island near Dublin Bay; at the mouth of the Scheldt 

 they made themselves masters of Walcheren ; at the 

 mouth of the Loire they took a little island called Noir- 

 moutiers, and made it their depot and their treasury. 



AVhen they were thus established, they seized their 

 opportunity, and keeping as much out of sight as pos- 

 sible, they sped up the river under the woody banks. 

 Their boats were constructed so as to draw very little 

 water, and they could pass up much smaller streams 

 and over much shallower places than might have been 

 expected. The history of all these early attacks is 

 much the same everywhere ; only that sometimes we 

 see the Vikings venturing C[uite alone, at other times 

 (too often, alas !) we find them in alliance with 

 some rebel part of the population, who no doubt fur- 

 nished them with pilots to take them up the streams. 

 In this wise, as we have already said, they first found 

 their way up the Loire, took and plundered Nantes, 

 killing a large number of the inhabitants, and among 

 them the bishop of the place. By the same means 

 they made their first expedition up the Garonne and 

 plundered Toulouse. The earliest Viking expeditions 



