kings and earls mention is made both in the Danelagh and also in the Western Islands of _lawmen_. It is difficult exactly to define their position and function. Originally these men were simply experts in the law who expounded it in the popular _thing_ or assembly, and were the spokesmen of the people as against the king and the court, but sometimes they assumed judicial functions, acting for example in Sweden as assessors to the king, who was supreme judge. In their home life we find the same strange mixture of civilisation and barbarism which marks them elsewhere. Their houses were built of timber, covered with clay. There was no proper hearth and the smoke from the fire made its way out as best it could through the turf-covered roof. The chief furniture of the room consisted in beds, benches, long tables and chests, and in the houses of the rich these would at the close of our period often be carved with stories from the old heroic or mythologic legends, while the walls might be covered with tapestry. Prominent in the chieftain's hall stood the carved pillars which supported his high-seat and were considered sacred. When some of the settlers first sailed to Iceland they threw overboard their high-seat pillars which they had brought with them, and chose as the site of their new abode the place where these pillars were cast ashore. In clothing and adornment there can be no question that our Viking forefathers had attained a high standard of luxury. Any visitor to the great national museums at Copenhagen, Stockholm or Christiania must be impressed by the wealth of personal ornaments displayed before him: magnificent brooches of silver and bronze, arm-rings and neck-rings of gold and silver, large beads of silver, glass, rock-crystal, amber and cornelian. At one time it was commonly assumed that these ornaments, often displaying the highest artistic skill, were simply plunder taken by the Vikings from nations more cultured and artistic than themselves, but patient investigation has shown that the majority of them were wrought in Scandinavia itself. [Illustration: _PLATE II_ Ornaments of the Viking period]