of treasures, which were to pass with him far away into the watery realm. Not at all with less gifts, less stately opulence, did they outfit him, than those had done, who at the first had sent him forth; lone over the wave, when he was an infant. Furthermore, they set up by him a gold wrought banner, high over his head; they let the flood bear him, gave him over to the ocean; sad was their soul, mourning their mood. Who received that burthen, men, heads of Halls, heroes under heaven cannot for certain tell.

19. BEOWULF'S FUNERAL

SOURCE: The Deeds of Beowulf, III, XLII (Earle)

For him, then, did the Leeds of the Goths construct a pyre upon the earth, one of no mean dimensions, hung about with helmets, with battle swords, with bright byrnies,1 as he had requested; then did they, heaving deep sighs, lay in the midst of it the illustrious cheftain, the hero, the beloved lord. Then began the warriors to kindle upon the hill the highest of bale -fires; the wood smoke mounted up black over the combustive mass, the roaring blaze shot aloft, mingled with the howling of the wind-currents; until, the sweltering element had demolished the bone house. With hearts distressed and care-laden minds they mourned their liege lord's death. . .

Then did the people . . . construct a tumulus on the hill; it was high and broad, to sea-voyagers widely conspicuous; and during ten days they laboured about the building of the war-hero's beacon. They surrounded the ashes of the conflagration with an embankment in such wise as men of eminent skill could contrive it with noblest effort. They deposited in the barrow collars and brilliants, the whole of such trappings as war-breathing men had recently captured. ? Mourning.

1 Coats of mail

Then there rode around the tumulus war-chiefs, sons of ethelings, twelve in all; they would bewail their loss, bemoan the king, recite an elegy and celebrate his name.

20. VIKING VOYAGES

SOURCE: Icelandic Sagas, Vol. III. The Orkneyingers' Saga, translated by Sir G. W. Dasent. Rolls Series.

When Hacon was but a few winters old, Sweyn Asleif's son offered to take him as his foster child, and he was bred up there [the Orkneys], and as soon as ever he was so far fit, that he could go about with other men, the Sweyn had him away with him a sea-roving every summer, and led him to worthiness in everything. It was Sweyn's wont at that time that he sat through the winter at home in Gairsay, and there he kept always about him eight men at his beck. He had so great a drinking-hall, that there was not another as great in all the Orkneys. Sweyn had in the spring hard work, and made them lay down very much seed, and looked much after it himself, but when that toil was ended he fared away every spring on a viking voyage, and harried about the Southern Isles and Iceland, and came home after midsummer; That he called spring-viking. Then he was at home until the cornfields were reaped down, and the grain seen to, and stored; then he fared away on a viking voyage, and then he did not come home until the winter was one month spent, and that he called his autumnviking.

On the spring cruise they had five ships with oars and all of them large. They harried about among the Southern Isles. Then the folk was so scared at him in the Southern Isles that men hid all their goods and chattels in the earth or in piles of rocks. Sweyn sailed as far south as Man, and got ill off for spoil. But when they came about south under Dublin, then two keels sailed there from off the main, which

had come from England and meant to steer for Dublin; they were laden with English cloths, and great store of goods were aboard them. Sweyn and his men pulled up to the keels, and offered them battle. Little came of the defence of the Englishmen before Sweyn gave the word to board. Then the Englishmen were made prisoners. And then they robbed them of every penny which was aboard the keels, save that the Englishmen kept the clothes they stood in and some food, and went on their way afterwards with the keels, but Sweyn and his men fared to the Southern Isles, and shared their war spoil. They sailed from the west with great pomp. They did this as a glory for themselves when they lay in harbours, that they threw awnings of English cloth over their ships. But when they sailed into the Orkneys they sewed the cloth on to the forepart of the sails, so that it looked in that wise as though the sails were made altogether of broadcloth. This they called the broadcloth cruise. Sweyn fared home to his house in Gairsay. He had taken from the keels much wine and English mead.

THE WELDING OF THE RACE

21. THE FIRST MAKERS OF GLASS IN ENGLAND

SOURCE: William of Malmesbury, Chronicle, I, ш (Giles).

For even Britain, which by some is called another world since, surrounded by the ocean, it is not thoroughly known by many geographers, possesses, in its remotest region, bordering on Scotland, the place of his [the Venerable Bede's] birth and education. This region, formerly exhaling the grateful odour of monasteries, or glittering with a multitude of cities built by the Romans, now desolate through the ancient devastation of the Danes, or those

1

more recent of the Normans 1 presented little to allure the mind.

Here is the River Wear, of considerable breadth and rapid tide; which running into the sea, receives the vessels borne by gentle gales, on the calm bosom of its haven. Both its banks 2 have been made conspicuous by one Benedict who there built churches and monasteries; one dedicated to Peter and the other to Paul, united in the bond of brotherly love and of monastic rule. The industry and forebearance of the men, anyone will admire who reads the book which Bede composed concerning his life, and those of the succeeding abbots; his industry in bringing over a multitude of books and being the first person who introduced in England constructors of stone edifices as well as makers of glass windows; in which pursuits he spent almost his whole life abroad; the love of his country and his taste for elegance beguiling his painful labour, in the earnest desire of conveying something to his countrymen out of the common way; for very rarely before the time of Benedict were buildings of stone seen in Britain, nor did the Solar ray cast its light through the transparent glass.

22. THE EDUCATION OF ALFRED THE GREAT [A.D. 864] SOURCE: Asser, Life of Alfred, from the translation by J. A. Giles, in Six Old English Chronicles.

He was loved by his father and mother, and even by all the people, above all his brothers, and was educated altogether at the court of the king. As he advanced through the years of infancy and youth, his form appeared more

1 The Danes laid waste the North of England in A.D. 793 and continued their devastation throughout the reign of Alfred and Ethelred. William the Conqueror harried the whole of the country north of the Humber with fire and sword in A.D. 1069.

2 Not quite correct; Jarrow, one of Benedict's monasteries, is on the River Tyne.