Hero Tales of the Far North | Page 6

the quartermaster ran up yelling that the
ship was full of powder and was going to blow up. He tried to jump
overboard, but the lieutenant seized him by the collar and, stumping
along, made him lead the way to the magazine. A fuse had been laid to
an open keg of powder, and the fire was sputtering within an inch of it
when Lieutenant Tönder plucked it out, smothered it between thumb
and forefinger, and threw it through the nearest port-hole. There were
two hundred barrels of powder in the ship.
Tordenskjold had kept his word to the King. Not as much as a yawl of
the Dynekilen fleet was left to the enemy. He had sunk or burned
thirteen and captured thirty-one ships with his seven, and all the
piled-up munitions of war were in his hands. King Charles gave up the
siege, marched his army out of Norway, and the country was saved.
The victory cost Tordenskjold but nineteen killed and fifty-seven
wounded. On his own ship six men were killed and twenty wounded.
Of infinite variety was this sea-fighter. After a victory like this, one
hears of him in the next breath gratifying a passing whim of the King,
who wanted to know what the Swedish people thought of their
Government after Charles's long wars that are said to have cost their
country a million men. Tordenskjold overheard it, had himself rowed
across to Sweden, picked up there a wedding party, bridegroom,
minister, guests, and all, including the captain of the shore watch who
was among them, and returned in time for the palace dinner with his
catch. King Frederik was entertaining Czar Peter the Great, who had
been boasting of the unhesitating loyalty of his men which his Danish
host could not match. He now had the tables turned upon him. It is
recorded that the King sent the party back with royal gifts for the bride.
One would be glad to add that Tordenskjold sent back, too, the silver
pitcher and the parlor clock his men took on their visit. But he didn't.
They were still in Copenhagen a hundred years later, and may be they
are yet. It was not like his usual gallantry toward the fair sex. But

perhaps he didn't know anything about it.
Then we find him, after an unsuccessful attack on Göteborg that cost
many lives, sending in his adjutant to congratulate the Swedish
commandant on their "gallant encounter" the day before, and
exchanging presents with him in token of mutual regard. And before
one can turn the page he is discovered swooping down upon Marstrand,
taking town and fleet anchored there, and the castle itself with its whole
garrison, all with two hundred men, swelled by stratagem into an army
of thousands. We are told that an officer sent out from the castle to
parley, issuing forth from a generous dinner, beheld the besieging army
drawn up in street after street, always two hundred men around every
corner, as he made his way through the town, piloted by Tordenskjold
himself, who was careful to take him the longest way, while the men
took the short cut to the next block. The man returned home with the
message that the town was full of them and that resistance was useless.
The ruse smacks of Peder Wessel's boyish fight with a much bigger
fellow who had beaten him once by gripping his long hair, and so
getting his head in chancery. But Peder had taken notice. Next time he
came to the encounter with hair cut short and his whole head smeared
with soft-soap, and that time he won.
The most extraordinary of all his adventures befell when, after the
attack on Strömstad, he was hastening home to Copenhagen. Crossing
the Kattegat in a little smack that carried but two three-pound guns, he
was chased and overtaken by a Swedish frigate of sixteen guns and a
crew of sixty men. Tordenskjold had but twenty-one, and eight of them
were servants and non-combatants. They were dreadfully frightened,
and tradition has it that one of them wept when he saw the Swede
coming on. Her captain called upon him to surrender, but the answer
was flung back:
"I am Tordenskjold! Come and take me, if you can."
With that came a tiny broadside that did brisk execution on the frigate.
Tordenskjold had hauled both his guns over on the "fighting side" of
his vessel. There ensued a battle such as Homer would have loved to
sing. Both sides banged away for all they were worth. In the midst of

the din and smoke Tordenskjold used his musket with cool skill; his
servants loaded while he fired. At every shot a man fell on the frigate.
Word was brought that there was no more round