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144 A History of Sweden
peoples, which was to be a long continued misfortune
to both of them.
In the reign of Charles IX, the throne of Denmark
was again occupied by a young and ambitious prince,
Christian IV, who determined to subdue all Sweden,
or at least to cripple it so that Denmark would never
again have to fear her neighbor.
When the war began, Charles IX was old and broken
down. His eldest son, the sixteen-year-old Gustavus
Adolphus, became the father’s prop in the war. He
had to conduct it alone when, in the autumn of 1611,
Charles IX closed his arduous life.
It was a difficult inheritance that Charles left to
his son. The country was involved in war with three
powers. At the thought of this situation Charles was
often troubled in spirit. But his look brightened when
it fell upon the promising young prince. He saw in
him the one who was to finish what he had not had
time to do. "Ille faciet" (he will do it) ,
he would say,
as he stroked the blonde locks of his son. Charles may
well be said to have been a strict and stern ruler. But
his people followed him willingly, for he was the man
"needed for those stormy times.
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