|
Support the Monkey! Tell All your Friends and Teachers |
||||
 |
||||
|
Support the Monkey! Tell All your Friends and Teachers |
||||
|
|
||||
|
67 CHAPTER XXVII The Scop chants how the Coast Guard, who had challenged Beowulf so sternly when he had landed on the Danish Shore, now rode to meet him in welcoming wise, and how Beowulf gave to the Dane who had guarded his craft golden sword; how the craft, laden with treasures (armor and horses), sped over the sea under sail in a fair brisk wind, and how Beowulf and his band were met on the home-shore by the Haven Guard who had long been watching for their return, and how they saw Hygelac’s castle not far away. And here the Scop is reminded of Hygelac’s young queen Hygd in the castle, and, while we are impatient to have him chant how Beowulf reported his adventure to his King, our Scop makes a curious and annoying digression, chanting the cruelties of another royal lady (contrasted with the admirable Hygd, as cruel King Heremod had been contrasted with Beowulf). This lady was named Thryth, and she had the very wicked habit of causing every man who gazed upon her eyes (presumably as a wooer) to be put to death, until a certain bold Prince, called Offa, managed to become her husband,- when, lo, ever afterwards she was docile and genial enough. So came the press of henchmen, these bold ones, to the bark; Each bare his ringed harness, the linked battle- sark. The Land Guard, as erst, spied the jarls again on quest; But not with any words of harm, from the headland’s crest, Greeted he the strangers. Toward he rode with hail; Welcomed, as the scathers fared to ship in shining mail. Then on the sand was laden the boat of bulwarks wide,The ringed craft was laden with armor side by side, With horses and with treasures. The mast aloft it soared Over Hrothgar’s olden piled treasure-hoard. Beowulf gave the Boat Guard a gold-bound sword; And ever thereafter upon the mead-bench he Was worthier for that heirloom that gift from o’er the sea. The craft it clave deep water; from Daneland far it passed, Upon the mast a sea-cloth, a sail by rope made fast; Groaned and creaked the sea-wood; the wind it never drave From off its billowy course there that bounder-on-the-wave; Foamy-necked it floated over the billows free, Over the streams of ocean, that goer-on-the-seaUntil the cliffs of Geatland the sailors sighted plain, The old familiar nesses. The keel upsprang amain, Speeded by the wildwinds, and rested on the land. |
