No sooner had the king passed within the gates of Stockholm than he heard of the disorder and disturbances which filled the town. He gave orders to be taken straight to the castle; but a very strange sight met his eyes in the streets through which he had to pass. He saw them thronged with priests, tradesmen, women and children, who were running about in all directions, many of them uttering wild cries. On reaching the square he found there heaps of broken images and fragments of statues, with monks standing beside the _débris_, weeping and touching with trembling hands those heads and arms and mutilated bodies, crying out in piteous tones—‘Behold, our saints, the blessed patrons of the kingdom, how shamefully they have been treated!’ There were also some of the townsmen standing by, who looked on the destruction of these idols as a pious deed. Some giddy ones among them even bragged of their exploits. One young man beginning to laugh and to mock at the pope,[414] the populace had fallen on him and treated him in a horrible manner.
Gustavus could hardly suppress his astonishment and indignation. As soon as he arrived at the castle he sent for Olaf and his colleague Langerben, and asked them in angry tones what all this meant. They answered that they had nothing to do with these violent proceedings, but that they were instigated by certain merchants of the Netherlands who had lately arrived; that two of them especially, Knipperdolling and Melchior Rinck, declaring that the Holy Ghost spake by their lips, had secretly made partisans; and that then, feeling sure of their case, they had taken possession first of St. John’s Church, and afterwards of other churches, had preached in them on the Apocalypse, and had cast down the images and broken the organs to pieces.[415] ‘And how is it,’ said the king, ‘that you have tolerated such disorders?’ Olaf replied that the only effect of opposition on their part would have been to excite these enthusiasts still more; that the best course was to wait till the people came to their right mind, which they were sure to do ere long. Gustavus testified his displeasure at the toleration of disturbances calculated to undo all that he had done. He summoned the two iconoclasts to his presence, commanded them to depart the kingdom, and declared at the same time that if they ever entered it again, it would be under pain of death.