bailiff escaped with a wound from an arrow, of which he died after
rejoining his master at Stockholm.
This prelate, Archbishop Gustavus Trolle, had lately returned from a
journey to Helsingland, undertaken in order to retain this part of his
diocese in its allegiance to the King. Shortly afterward he received, by
a messenger from Gustavus, who had himself come to Upsala at
Whitsuntide, a letter exhorting him to embrace the cause of his country,
to which his chapter had been persuaded to annex a memorial to the same
effect. The Archbishop detained the messenger, saying that he would
carry the answer himself. He broke up immediately with five hundred
German horse and three thousand foot of the garrison of Stockholm, and
had come within half a mile of Upsala before Gustavus received
intelligence of his approach. This the latter did not at first credit,
but remained, expecting an answer to his overture of negotiation, until,
about six in the morning, being on horseback upon the sand-hill near
Upsala, the spot where he afterward built a royal castle, he saw the
Archbishop marching across the King's Mead (Kungsang) toward the town.
Gustavus had but two hundred of his so-called foot-goers and a small
number of horse with him, for the peasants had returned to their homes.
He made a hasty retreat, but was overtaken by Trolle's horsemen at the
Ford of Laby. Here a young Finnish noble, who was next to him, in the
confusion rode down his horse in the midst of the stream; and he would
have been lost had not the rest of his followers turned upon the enemy
with such effect as to make them desist from the pursuit.
Gustavus now betook himself to the forest of Rymningen, raised the
peasantry of the adjoining districts, and sent out young men under his
best captains to surprise the Archbishop on his return. The remains of
cattle slaughtered on the road betrayed the ambush to the prelate, who
drew off in another direction. He was nevertheless overtaken and
attacked, escaping the spear of Lawrence Olaveson only by bending
downward on his horse, so that the weapon pierced his neighbor; and he
brought back to Stockholm hardly a sixth part of his army. Gustavus
followed close after with his collected force, and encamped under the
Brunkeberg. Four gibbets on this eminence, stocked with corpses of
Swedish inhabitants, attested the character of the government in the
capital.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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