It was on one of his expeditions against Dublin that Sweyn met his fate. This was when he was an old man. Not long before, Earl Harald, who had been feasting with him after his return from the “Broad-cloth Cruise,” on the English mead and the wine captured from the vessels, said to him: “I wish now, Sweyn, that you would leave off your marauding expeditions. Your plundering has been successful a long while, but it might take a turn the other way; and it is good to drive home with a whole wain. Men who live by unfair means often perish by them in the end.” Sweyn answered the earl with a smile: “Excellent advice, my lord, and spoken like a friend. A bit of good counsel from you is worth the having. But I have heard it said that you have some little matters on your own account to answer for, not unlike those of which you complain to me.” “No doubt,” said the earl, “I have my own share to answer for; I but spoke as it came into my head.” Sweyn answered: “I take your advice as it is offered to me, and, indeed, I begin to feel that I am growing old. Long fighting and hardships are beginning to tell upon me, and I had made up my mind to go only upon one expedition more. I will make my autumn viking as usual, and I hope it will go as well as my spring viking, and after that my warfaring shall be over.” “It is difficult to know, friend,” said the earl, “whether death or lasting fame will overtake you first,” and there their conversation ended. Shortly after this Sweyn prepared to go on his autumn viking cruise with seven warships. They found little booty in the Sudreyar, and went on to Ireland, getting again as far south as Dublin, and entering the town before the inhabitants were aware of their presence. His attack was so sudden that he took the rulers captive, and gathered a great deal of plunder, and the upshot of the matter was that the fort surrendered to Sweyn and promised him a heavy ransom, and that he might quarter his men on the town, and take hostages. That night the chief men of the town had a meeting to consider the difficulties in which they were placed. They thought it grievous hardship that they should have to surrender their town to the Orkneymen, especially to him whom they knew to be the most exacting man in the whole West; and they agreed that they would cheat Sweyn if they could. Sweyn and his men were gone down to their ships for the night, but in the morning they were to come into the town to receive the hostages. The inhabitants resolved to dig deep trenches inside the city gates, and in other places between the houses in the streets through which Sweyn and his followers must pass, and armed men were concealed in the houses. They placed planks over the pits, which would fall in as soon as men stepped upon them, and strewed straw over the planks, so that they might not be observed. All that night they worked and in the morning they were ready.