and then with the boldness natural to him exclaimed—‘What a tyrannical and monstrous deed! To have treated thus so worthy a bishop!’ He had scarcely uttered these words when his brother and himself were seized by the hair of their heads and dragged by the Danish soldiers to the place where the executioner was at his work. The sword was already drawn, and their heads were just on the point of being struck off, when from the midst of the royal retinue a voice cried—‘Spare those two young men! They are Germans, not Swedes.’ The headsman paused, and the lives of Olaf and Lawrence were saved. Their deliverer was a young man who, while studying at Wittenberg, had lived in close intimacy with them. The two brothers quitted the capital without delay, and returned to Strengnaes, terrified at the frightful slaughter of which they had been eye-witnesses. Their protector had just been assassinated; what was to become of them? Would the work be interrupted? God took care for that.[386] Towards the close of the fifteenth century, a child born of poor parents in this very town had at an early age displayed great intelligence; and his father had applied his small savings to the cost of having the lad educated by the monks. He frequently embarrassed his masters by the unexpected questions which he put to them. Lawrence Anderson (this was his name) devoted himself to the Church; spent, it seems, some time at Rome in his youth, visited other European countries, and, after his return to his native land, became one of the priests of the cathedral of Strengnaes. Olaf, on his arrival at this town, made the acquaintance of Lawrence, talked with him of the faith which inspired him, and had no difficulty in inducing him to receive the evangelical doctrine. Anderson, who had some time before been appointed archdeacon, felt the inadequacy of the Roman system. To have won him over to the side of the Reformation in Sweden was a fact of great importance, for he was distinguished not only for his intelligence, his attainments, and his eloquence, but his prudence and enterprising spirit.