GUSTAVUS, ERICKSON, better known as GUSTAVUS WASA, founder and first king of the dynasty of Wasa, was born in 1490, at the Castle of Lindholm, in Sweden. On reaching manhood, he found his country pining under the cruelty and tyranny of the Danes, and himself, from his connection with the old royal house, an object of peculiar suspicion. To save his life, he fled first to Lübeck, and afterwards to Dalecarlia, where he wrought for a time as a miner in the iron-works of Fahlun. Leaving the mines, he began a kind of vagabond life, wandering in the most remote and unknown parts of Sweden, till at length he came to Rattwik, where he formed the scheme of rescuing his country from the hated yoke of the stranger. Going about from house to house, he roused the peasants to a sense of their wrongs, and at length seduced them into open rebellion. In 1521 he had collected an army of 15,000 men, and taken the stronghold of Hestera. Town after town yielded on his advance, and Stockholm—thrice besieged in vain—at last fell into his hands, and the bloodthirsty Christian of Denmark was obliged to return in disgrace to his own kingdom. Gustavus was now solicited to accept the Swedish crown, but he steadfastly refused; and it was not till 1527 that he could be persuaded to mount the throne. He reigned with admirable success for more than thirty-three years, and his name is still held in reverence by his countrymen, in whose memories he holds much the same rank that Alfred does in that of every Englishman.