The Alliance against Olaf 195 



towards him. In reality, however, the earl was in the 

 secrets of the three leaguers, and had been deputed by 

 them to worm himself into the confidence of the Norse 

 king, in order to lead him to his destruction. Jomsborg, 

 the seat of that little republic of Scandinavians on the 

 German coast, of which Sigvald may be called the 

 president, lay almost within the territory of Burislaf. 

 Sigvald was the brother-in-law of this king ; and when 

 Olaf sailed to the mouth of the Oder the Viking chief 

 met him there and accompanied him to the court of 

 Burislaf. 



Meantime Svend had been doing his best to collect 

 the fleets of his allies ; and it was Sigvald's business to 

 detain Olaf as long as possible in order that they might 

 be more ready to strike at him as he sailed homewards. 

 The crew of the Norse fleet could not understand the 

 delay, as they waited with their ships bound for the 

 voyage, and ready for the first favourable gales ; but 

 still the order to sail never came. At length Sigvald 

 got news that the leaguers were ready and waiting in 

 a harbour in the Isle of Eiigen. Then he made no 

 further difficulties. He offered to accompany King Olaf 

 on his homeward voyage ; and it was reckoned in those 

 days no small thing to secure the consort of a Joms- 

 vikincj fleet. 



Olaf had sixty sail and Sigvald eleven ; and it may 

 safely be said that this fleet of seventy-one sail, com- 

 prising as it did ships like the Long Serpent, the Short 

 Serpent, and the Crane, and several others, of a size and 

 weight quite unusual for those days, would, unless there 

 had been treachery at work, have been a match for 

 any fleet which could have been brought against it. 



