Page:Aelfric's Lives of Saints Vol 2.djvu/331

 in the  thick  brambles,  that  it  might  not  be  buried.

Then after  a  space,  after  they  were  gone  away,

came the  country-folk,  who  were  still  left  there,

to where  their  lord's  body  lay  without  the  head,

and were  very  sore  at  heart  because  of  his  murder,

and chiefly  because  they  had  not  the  head  with  the  body.

Then said  the  spectator  who  previously  beheld  it

that the  seamen  had  taken  the  head  with  them,

and it  seemed  to  him,  even  as  it  was  quite  true,

that they  had  hidden  the  head  in  the  wood  somewhere  about.

Then they  all  went  seeking  at  last  in  the  wood.

seeking everywhere  among  the  thorns  and  brambles

if they  might  anywhere  find  the  head.

There was  eke  a  great  wonder,  that  a  wolf  was  sent,

by God's  direction,  to  guard  the  head

against the  other  animals  by  day  and  night.

They went  on  seeking  and  always  crying  out,

as is  often  the  wont  of  those  who  go  through  woods;

'Where art  thou  now,  comrade? '  (And  the  head  answered  them,

'Here, here,  here.'     And  so  it  cried  out  continually,

answering them  all,  as  oft  as  any  of  them  cried,

until they  all  came  to  it  by  means  of  those  cries.

There lay  the  gray  wolf  who  guarded  the  head,

and with  his  two  feet  had  embraced  the  head,

greedy and  hungry,  and  for  God's  care  durst  not

taste the  head,  but  kept  it  against  (other)  animals.

Then they  were  astonished  at  the  wolf's  guardianship,