Then up speedily
The Weather people
On the land went,
The sea-bark moored,

Their mail-sarks shook,

Their war-weeds.

God thanked they,

That to them the sea-journey

Easy had been.

Then from the wall beheld
The warden of the Scyldings,
He who the sea-cliffs

Had in his keeping,

Bear o'er the balks

The bright shields,

The war-weapons speedily.
Him the doubt disturbed
In his mind's thought,
What these men might be.

Went then to the shore,
On his steed riding,
The Thane of Hrothgar.
Before the host he shook
His warden's staff in hand,
In measured words demanded:
"What men are ye
War-gear wearing,

Host in harness,

Who thus the brown keel

Over the water-street

Leading come

Hither over the sea?

I these boundaries

As shore-warden hold;

That in the Land of the Danes

Nothing loathsome

With a ship-crew

Scathe us might.

Ne'er saw I mightier

Earl upon earth

Than is your own,
Hero in harness.

Not seldom this warrior

Is in weapons distinguished;
Never his beauty belies him,
His peerless countenance!
Now would I fain

Your origin know,

Ere ye forth

As false spies

Into the Land of the Danes
Farther fare.

Now, ye dwellers afar off!
Ye sailors of the sea!

Listen to my
One-fold thought.

Quickest is best

To make known

Whence your coming may be."

THE SOUL'S COMPLAINT AGAINST THE BODY. FROM THE ANGLO-SAXON.

MUCH it behoveth

Each one of mortals,

That he his soul's journey

In himself ponder,

How deep it may be.
When Death cometh,

The bonds he breaketh
By which united
Were body and soul.

Long it is thenceforth
Ere the soul taketh
From God himself
Its woe or its weal;
As in the world erst,
Even in its earth-vessel,
It wrought before.

The soul shall come
Wailing with loud voice,
After a sennight,
The soul, to find
The body

That it erst dwelt in;

Three hundred winters,

Unless ere that worketh

The eternal Lord,

The Almighty God,

The end of the world.

Crieth then, so care-worn,

With cold utterance,

And speaketh grimly,

The ghost to the dust:

"Dry dust! thou dreary one!

How little didst thou labour for me!

In the foulness of earth

Thou all wearest away

Like to the loam !
Little didst thou think
How thy soul's journey
Would be thereafter,
When from the body
It should be led forth."

SONG.

FROM THE PORTUGESE.

IF thou art sleeping, maiden,
Awake, and open thy door:

'Tis the break of day, and we must away,
O'er meadow, and mount, and moor.
Wait not to find thy slippers,

But come with thy naked feet:

We shall have to pass through the dewy grass,

And waters wide and fleet.

FRITHIOF'S HOMESTEAD.

FROM THE SWEDISH.

THREE miles extended around the fields of the homestead; on three sides

Valleys, and mountains, and hills, but on the fourth side was the

ocean.

Birch-woods crowned the summits, but over the down-sloping hill-sides

Flourished the golden corn, and man-high was waving the rye-field. Lakes, full many in number, their mirror held up for the mountains, Held for the forests up, in whose depths the high-antlered reindeers Had their kingly walk, and drank of a hundred brooklets.

But in the valleys, full widely around, there fed on the greensward Herds with sleek, shining sides, and udders that longed for the

milk-pail.

'Mid these were scattered, now here and now there, a vast countless number

Of white-wooled sheep, as thou seest the white-looking stray clouds, Flock-wise, spread o'er the heavenly vault, when it bloweth in spring-time.

Twice twelve swift-footed coursers, mettlesome, fast-fettered stormwinds,

Stamping stood in the line of stalls, all champing their fodder, Knotted with red their manes, and their hoofs all whitened with steel shoes.

The banquet-hall, a house by itself, was timbered of hard fir.
Not five hundred men (at ten times twelve to the hundred)
Filled up the roomy hall, when assembled for drinking at Yule-tide.
Thorough the hall, as long as it was, went a table of holm-oak,
Polished and white, as of steel; the columns twain of the high-seat
Stood at the end thereof, two gods carved out of an elm-tree;
Odin with lordly look, and Frey with the sun on his frontlet.
Lately between the two, on a bear-skin (the skin it was coal-black,
Scarlet-red was the throat, but the paws were shodden with silver).
Thorsten sat with his friends, Hospitality sitting with Gladness.
Oft, when the moon among the night-clouds flew, related the
old man

Wonders from far-distant lands he had seen, and cruises of Vikings
Far on the Baltic and Sea of the West, and the North Sea.

Hush sat the listening bench, and their glances hung on the gray

beard's

Lips, as a bee on the rose; but the Skald was thinking of Bragé,
Where, with silver beard, and runes on his tongue, he is seated
Under the leafy beech, and tells a tradition by Mimer's
Ever-murmuring wave, himself a living tradition.

Mid-way the floor (with thatch was it strewn), burned for ever the fire-flame

Glad on its stone-built hearth; and through the wide-mouthed smoke-flue

Looked the stars, those heavenly friends, down into the great hall, But round the walls, upon nails of steel, were hanging in order Breastplate and helm with each other, and here and there in among them

Downward lightened a sword, as in winter evening a star shoots. More than helmets and swords, the shields in the banquet-hall glistened,

White as the orb of the sun, or white as the moon's disc of silver. Ever and anon went a maid round the board and filled up the drink-horns;

Ever she cast down her eyes and blushed; in the shield her reflection Blushed too, even as she;-this gladdened the hard-drinking champions.

FRITHIOF'S TEMPTATION.

FROM THE SWEDISH.

SPRING is coming, birds are twittering, forests leaf, and smiles the sun,
And the loosened torrents downward singing to the ocean run;
Glowing like the cheek of Freya, peeping rosebuds 'gin to ope,
And in human hearts awaken love of life, and joy, and hope.
Now will hunt the ancient monarch, and the queen shall join the
sport;

Swarming in its gorgeous splendour is assembled all the court;
Bows ring loud, and quivers rattle, stallions paw the ground alway,
And, with hoods upon their eyelids, falcons scream aloud for prey.
See, the queen of the chase advances! Frithiof, gaze not on the sight!
Like a star upon a spring-cloud sits she on her palfrey white,
Half of Freya, half of Rota, yet more beauteous than these two,
And from her light hat of purple wave aloft the feathers blue.
Now the huntsman's band is ready. Hurrah! over hill and dale!
Horns ring, and the hawks right upward to the hall of Odin sail.
All the dwellers in the forest seek in fear their cavern homes,
But, with spear outstretched before her, after them Valkyria comes.
Then threw Frithiof down his mantle, and upon the greensward
spread,

And the ancient king so trustful laid on Frithiof's knees his head;
Slept, as calmly as the hero sleepeth after war's alarms

On his shield, calm as an infant sleepeth in its mother's arms.
As he slumbers, hark! there sings a coal-black bird upon a bough:
"Hasten, Frithiof, slay the old man, close your quarrel at a blow;
Take his queen, for she is thine, and once the bridal kiss she gave;
Now no human eye beholds thee; deep and silent is the grave."

Frithiof listens; hark! there sings a snow-white bird upon the bough:

Though no human eye beholds thee, Odin's eye beholds thee now. Coward, wilt thou murder slumber? a defenceless old man slay? Whatsoe'er thou winn'st, thou canst not win a hero's fame this way." Thus the two wood-birds did warble; Frithiof took his war-sword good,

With a shudder hurled it from him, far into the gloomy wood. Coal-black bird flies down to Nastrand; but on light unfolded wings, Like the tone of harps, the other, sounding towards the sun upsprings. Straight the ancient king awakens. "Sweet has been my sleep,"

he said;

"Pleasantly sleeps one in the shadow, guarded by a brave man's

blade.

But where is thy sword, O stranger? Lightning's brother, where is he? Who thus parts you, who should never from each other parted be?" "It avails not," Frithiof answered; "in the North are other swords; Sharp, O monarch, is the sword's tongue, and it speaks not peaceful words;

Murky spirits dwell in steel blades, spirits from the Niffelhem,
Slumber is not safe before them, silver locks but anger them."

THERE was a time when I was very small,

When my whole frame was but an ell in height,

Sweetly, as I recall it, tears do fall,

And therefore I recall it with delight.

I sported in my tender mother's arms,

And rode a-horseback on best father's knee;

Alike were sorrows, passions, and alarms,

And gold, and Greek, and love, unknown to me.

Then seemed to me this world far less in size,
Likewise it seemed to me less wicked far;
Like points in heaven, I saw the stars arise,
And longed for wings that I might catch a star.

I saw the moon behind the island fade,

And thought, "O, were I on that island there,
I could find out of what the moon is made,
Find out how large it is, how round, how fair!”