After a time the
Vikings who had settled in the Isles so worried Harold and his
kingdom, upon which they swooped every other while, that he drew
together a mighty force, and fell upon them wheresoever he could
find them, and followed them up with fire and sword; and this he
did twice, so that in those lands none could abide but folk who
were content to be his men, however lightly they might hold their
allegiance. Hence it was to Iceland that all turned who held to
the old ways, and for over sixty years from the first comer there
was a stream of hardy men pouring in, with their families and
their belongings, simple yeomen, great and warwise chieftains,
rich landowners, who had left their land "for the overbearing of
King Harold," as the "Landnamabok" (7) has it. "There also we
shall escape the troubling of kings and scoundrels", says the
"Vatsdaelasaga". So much of the best blood left Norway that the
king tried to stay the leak by fines and punishments, but in
vain.
As his ship neared the shore, the new-coming chief would leave it
to the gods as to where he settled.
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