appointed place of meeting was again a Hakon-Jarl Temple, not yet done
to ruin; chief shrine in those Trondhjem parts, I believe : there
should Tryggveson appear at Yule. Well, but before Yule came,
Tryggveson made a great banquet in his palace at Trondhjem, and
invited far and wide, all manner of important persons out of the
district as guests there. Banquet hardly done, Tryggveson gave some
slight signal, upon which armed men strode in, seized eleven of these
principal persons, and the king said: "Since he himself was to become
a heathen again, and do sacrifice, it was his purpose to do it in the
highest form, namely, that of Human Sacrifice; and this time not of
slaves and malefactors, but of the best men in the country!" In which
stringent circumstances the eleven seized persons, and company at
large, gave unanimous consent to baptism; straightway received the
same, and abjured their idols; but were not permitted to go home till
they had left, in sons, brothers, and other precious relatives,
sufficient hostages in the king's hands.

By unwearied industry of this and better kinds, Tryggveson had
trampled down idolatry, so far as form went,--how far in substance may
be greatly doubted. But it is to be remembered withal, that always on
the back of these compulsory adventures there followed English
bishops, priests and preachers; whereby to the open-minded,
conviction, to all degrees of it, was attainable, while silence and
passivity became the duty or necessity of the unconvinced party.

In about two years Norway was all gone over with a rough harrow of
conversion. Heathenism at least constrained to be silent and
outwardly conformable. Tryggveson, next turned his attention to
Iceland, sent one Thangbrand, priest from Saxony, of wonderful
qualities, military as well as theological, to try and convert