Page:Gummere (1909) The Oldest English Epic.djvu/112

96 aught ill for thy earls, as erst thou must!” Then the golden hilt, for that gray-haired leader, hoary hero, in hand was laid, giant-wrought, old. So owned and enjoyed it after downfall of devils, the Danish lord, wonder-smiths’ work, since the world was rid of that grim-souled fiend, the foe of God, murder-marked, and his mother as well. Now it passed into power of the people’s king, best of all that the oceans bound who have scattered their gold o’er Scandia’s isle. Hrothgar spake—the hilt he viewed, heirloom old, where was etched the rise of that far-off fight when the floods o’erwhelmed, raging waves, the race of giants (fearful their fate!), a folk estranged from God Eternal: whence guerdon due in that waste of waters the Wielder paid them. So on the guard of shining gold in runic staves it was rightly said for whom the serpent-traced sword was wrought, best of blades, in bygone days, and the hilt well wound.—The wise-one spake, son of Healfdene; silent were all:— “Lo, so may he say who sooth and right follows ’mid folk, of far times mindful, a land-warden old, that this earl belongs