Their vessels, as well as themselves, were admirably
adapted to the grand object of their lives; the former were well supplied
with stones, arrows, and strong ropes, with which they overset small
vessels, and with grappling irons to board them; and every individual was
skilful in swimming. Each band possessed its own ports, magazines, &c.
Their ships were at first small, being only a kind of twelve-oared barks;
they were afterwards so much enlarged, that they were capable of containing
100 or 120 men.
It is not our intention to notice the piratical expeditions of
Scandinavians, except so far as they tended to discovery, or commerce, or
were productive of permanent effects. Among the first countries to which
they directed themselves, and where they settled permanently, were England
and Ireland; the result of their settlement in England was the
establishment of the Anglo-Saxon dominion power in that kingdom; the result
of their expeditions to Ireland was their settlement on its eastern coasts.
In the middle of the ninth century, the native Irish had been driven by
them into the central and western parts of the country, while the
Scandinavian conquerors, under the appellation of Ostmen, or Eastmen,
possessed of all the maritime cities, carried on an extensive and lucrative
commerce, not only with their native land, but also with other places in
the west of Europe.
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