One day in November, a singular procession approached the castle of Sjoeborg. From two Hanseatic merchant vessels, which had anchored off the fishing station, there landed a number of foreign seamen, who, carrying the Rostock flag, and with large broad swords at their sides, proceeded to the castle, amid the dissonant sound of pipes and trumpets. At the head of the procession marched a tall stout man, in a burgher's coat of fine cloth, trimmed with broad borders of costly fur. It was the rich trader, Berner Kopmand of Rostock, well known at the great fairs of Skanoer and Falsterbo, whither he was wont to bring rich cargoes of cloth and costly spices. He was notorious for his authoritative and overbearing deportment, and for the ostentatious pomp by which he sought to acquire the reputation of a merchant prince. By his side walked the almost equally noted Henrik Gullandsfar of Visbye, also one of the most influential Hanseatic merchants, and an adroit and politic negociator between the Hanse towns and the northern princes,[10] They announced themselves at the castle as Hanseatic ambassadors, and were admitted into the upper hall, while their train was served with refreshments below. A long conference took place between the king and the foreign merchants, in the presence of the Drost and council, during which Berner Kopmand was especially loud tongued, and the king preserved his patience for an unwonted length of time. The great privileges which had been granted by the king to the Hanseatic towns four years before, and which he had since augmented and confirmed at Nyborg, had not satisfied the expectations of the Rostockers; who demanded besides, the recognition of their self-assumed right, to pronounce and execute sentence of death on board their own vessels upon every Danish subject who had injured them, and fallen into their hands. The Vandal towns, together with the merchants of Mecklenborg and Lubec, were unanimously agreed, on their own responsibility, and without distinction, to hang every knight and noble who should molest them on their journeyings through Germany.