Page:Kalevala (Kirby 1907) v2.djvu/87

Runo XXXI]

For I go to clear the forest,

And to fell the slender birch-trees.”

So the smith forged what he needed,

And an axe he forged him quickly;

Such an axe as fits a hero,

Iron tool for skilful workman.

Kullervo, Kalervo’s offspring,

Set to work the axe to sharpen,

And he ground it in the daytime,

And at evening made a handle.

Then he went into the forest,

High upon the wooded mountains,

There to seek the best of planking,

And to seek the best of timber.

With his axe he smote the tree-trunks,

With the blade of steel he felled them,

At a stroke the best he severed,

And the bad ones at a half-stroke.

Five large trees at length had fallen,

Eight in all he felled before him,

And he spoke the words which follow,

And in words like these expressed him:

“Lempo may the work accomplish,

Hiisi now may shape the timber!”

In a stump he struck his axe-blade,

And began to shout full loudly,

And he piped, and then he whistled,

And he said the words which follow:

“Let the wood be felled around me,

Overthrown the slender birch-trees,

Far as sounds my voice resounding,

Far as I can send my whistle.

“Let no sapling here be growing,

Let no blade of grass be standing,

Never while the earth endureth,

Or the golden moon is shining,

Here in Kalervo’s son’s forest,

Here upon the good man’s clearing.

“If the seed on earth has fallen,

And the young corn should shoot upward,