"Lay me thy ships alongside mine, king, close to this barricaded
bridge," said the valorous boy, "and I will vow to break it down,
or ye may call me caitiff and coward."

"Be it so," said Ethelred, the English king; and all the war-chiefs
echoed: "Be it so!" So Olaf and his trusty Rane made ready the
war-forces for the destruction of the bridge.

Old London Bridge was not what we should now call an imposing
structure, but our ancestors of nine centuries back esteemed it
quite a bridge. The chronicler says that it was "so broad that two
wagons could pass each other upon it," and "under the bridge were
piles driven into the bottom of the river."

So young Olaf and old Rane put their heads together, and decided
to wreck the bridge by a bold viking stroke. And this is how it is
told in the "Heimskringla," or Saga of King Olaf the Saint:

"King Olaf ordered great platforms of floating wood to be tied
together with hazel bands, and for this he took down old houses;
and with these, as a roof, he covered over his ships so widely that
it reached over the ships' sides. Under this screen he set pillars,
so high and stout that there both was room for swinging their
swords, and the roofs were strong enough to withstand the stones
cast down upon them."

"Now, out oars and pull for the bridge," young Olaf commanded; and
the roofed-over war-ships were rowed close up to London Bridge.

And as they came near the bridge, the chronicle says: "There were