Then said I: 

“These are the finest ships I have ever seen.  Where did they come from?”

“Alfred, our king, planned them,” said Odda, with much pride; “and they were built by our own men, working under Frisian shipwrights, in Plymouth.”

“How will you like to command one of these, Thord?” I asked then.

“I like the ship well enough.  The crew is bad.  And then, whose command is the fleet under?”

“Take the ship, Thord, and lick my crew into shape; and Ranald, your king, shall command the fleet,” Odda said plainly.

“Fair and softly,” said Thord bluntly.  “I can do the two things you ask me; but will your men follow Ranald?”

“Faith,” said Odda, “if I say they are to do so, they must.”

So in the end I left Thord and my seamen with Odda; but I would not take his place, only saying that I would lead the Norsemen, and that he could follow our plans.  I would put more good men into each of his five ships, and they should do what they could.  At least they could teach the Saxons how to board a ship, and how to man their own sides against boarders from a foe.

Those Norsemen said they would gladly follow the son of King Vemund and foster son of Einar the jarl; and so we led the strange fleet, and held on eastward with a light breeze all that day, making little way when the tide turned, and held back by the slower vessels.  Men in plenty there were, but ill fitted for aught but hand fighting; though I had more Norsemen sent into the larger ships, such as those that had been taken from the Danes and the better trading vessels.  One might soon see the difference in the trim and order on board as the vikings got to work and the Saxons overcame their sickness.

Now we might meet the Danes at any time, and I could not tell how matters would go.  One thing was certain, however, and that was that they looked for no gathering of ships by Alfred.  We should certainly take them by surprise, and I hoped, therefore, that they would be in no trim for fighting.

There was a very swift cutter belonging to the Norsemen, and as night fell I sent her on to keep watch along the shore for the first coming of the Danes, while we shortened sail; for the mouth of Poole Harbour was not far distant, and if we passed that we should be seen, and perhaps it would be guessed that we were not a friendly fleet.  Towards evening, too, the wind shifted, and blew more off the shore, and that might bring them out from their haven.  Kolgrim, who was weather wise, said that a shift of wind to the southward was coming presently.

When morning came, the high cliffs of Swanage were on our bow, the wind was yet steady from off shore, and beyond the headland lay Poole Harbour, at whose head is Wareham, where the Danes were.  It is a great sea inlet with a narrow mouth, and one must have water enough on a rising tide to enter it.  Now the ebb was running, and if the Danes came this morning, it would be soon.