stratagem had surrounded one night, and at once bagged and subjected
when morning rose, all of them consenting; all of them except this
Raerik, whom Olaf, as the readiest sure course, took home with him;
blinded, and kept in his own house; finding there was no alternative
but that or death to the obstinate old dog, who was a kind of distant
cousin withal, and could not conscientiously be killed. Stone-blind
old Raerik was not always in murderous humor. Indeed, for most part
he wore a placid, conciliatory aspect, and said shrewd amusing things;
but had thrice over tried, with amazing cunning of contrivance, though
stone-blind, to thrust a dagger into Olaf and the last time had all
but succeeded. So that, as Olaf still refused to have him killed, it
had become a problem what was to be done with him. Olaf's good humor,
as well as _his_ quiet, ready sense and practicality, are manifested
in his final settlement of this Raerik problem. Olaf's laugh, I can
perceive, was not so loud as Tryggveson's but equally hearty, coming
from the bright mind of him!

Besides blind Raerik, Olaf had in his household one Thorarin, an
Icelander; a remarkably ugly man, says Snorro, but a far-travelled,
shrewdly observant, loyal-minded, and good-humored person, whom Olaf
liked to talk with. "Remarkably ugly," says Snorro, "especially in
his hands and feet, which were large and ill-shaped to a degree." One
morning Thorarin, who, with other trusted ones, slept in Olaf's
apartment, was lazily dozing and yawning, and had stretched one of his
feet out of the bed before the king awoke. The foot was still there
when Olaf did open his bright eyes, which instantly lighted on this
foot.

"Well, here is a foot," says Olaf, gayly, "which one seldom sees the
match of; I durst venture there is not another so ugly in this city of