Chapter LXIX

OF SWEIN, ASLEIF’S SON’S, RETURN TO THE ORKNEYS.

ONE day Margaret announced that Swein, Asleif’s son, should go to the Orkneys to see Earl Rögnvald, and ask him whom he preferred to share in the dominion of the Orkneys with him—Earl Paul, or Harald, the son of (her husband) Maddad, who was then three winters old.

When Earl Paul heard this, he said: “So far as my mind is concerned, I will say that I have left my dominions in such a way as has never been heard of before, I think; and I shall never return to the Orkneys any more. I see that this must be God’s vengeance for the theft which I and my kinsmen committed. But if God thinks the dominion mine, then will I give it to Harald, if he may enjoy it; but I wish some money given to me, so that I may establish myself in some monastery, and you can take care that I do not escape. And you, Swein, shall go out to the Orkneys, and say that I have been blinded, or still more mutilated, because my friends will fetch me if I am an unmaimed man. In that case I may not be able to refuse to return to my dominions with them, for I suspect that they will consider our parting a greater loss than it is.”

What more the Earl said has not been placed on record.

Then Swein, Asleif’s son, went to the Orkneys, and Earl Paul remained behind in Scotland.

This is how Swein related these matters. But some men tell the story in a way by no means so creditable (to those concerned)—namely, that Margaret induced Swein, Asleif’s son, to blind her brother Earl Paul, then threw him into a dungeon, and subsequently induced another man to put him to death. We do not know which of these two statements is the more correct; but it is well known that Earl Paul came never again to the Orkneys, and that he had no dominions in Scotland.