The Swedes fought bravely, but they were soon overcome, and in a battle at Bogisund, Sture received a wound in the head, of which he died a few days after. The state of the country now seemed hopeless; its regular army only numbered 500 men; those who had crowded its ranks when the war began were brave-hearted men, eager to defend the right, but they were not trained and skilful soldiers. Sture dead, and Gustavus Vasa in prison, there was neither ruler in the land nor leader in strife. The Swedes began indeed to be disheartened; a few of the bravest clung to the hope that a fresh attempt might yet be made to resist the tyrant's power; some, less hopeful, thought it best to lay down their swords and submit; others again, said that they would rather die first. Sture's widow, Christina--herself of royal birth--and a woman of great spirit, came forward to revenge her husband's death, and to implore the Swedes not to desert the cause of freedom. She sent her little son Nil Sture to Dantzig to be out of danger, and went to Stockholm, where she made the people swear rather to bury themselves beneath the ruins of the city, than become the slaves of the Danish king.
For a short time a little gleam of hope broke over the land, but Christiern feeling assured that he could not really call himself King of Sweden until he had Stockholm in his power, resolved to come in person with a great fleet and besiege the capital.
In the meantime Gustavus was sorrowing for the troubles of his fatherland, and his face was clouded and sad when he followed his kinsman Banner to the gay festivals of the Danish court, and heard people tell how the king had triumphed over his countrymen, and was bending by degrees their proud spirit. He was heartily tired, too, of his prison, although he was guarded less strictly now than he had been at first, and was allowed to wander about by himself within one mile of the castle. During his lonely walks he revolved many plans in his mind, and at last one morning at sunrise he put on the disguise of a peasant, and made his escape from Calloë. The first day he wandered about a part of the country unknown to him, and the next day at noon he reached the town of Flensburg, where he feared he should have been betrayed. But outside the town, for his good fortune, he found a number of Saxon merchants who had been buying oxen in Jutland, and were on their way back to Germany; without much trouble he entered their service, and thus got safely out of Denmark.