Said Sweinbiorn:

  “We sought the feast-hall over, and nought we found therein

Of the bones of the ancient mothers, or the younglings of the kin.

The men are greedy, doubtless, to lose no whit of the prey,

And will try if the hoary elders may yet outlive the way

That leads to the southland cities, till at last they come to stand

With the younglings in the market to be sold in an alien land.”

  Arinbiorn’s brow lightened somewhat; but ere he could speak again an ancient thrall of the Galtings spake and said:

  “True it is, O warriors of the Bearings, that we might not see any war-thralls being led away by the Romans when they came away from the burning dwellings; and we deem it certain that they crossed the water before the coming of the Romans, and that they are now with the stay-at-homes of the Wolfings in the wild-wood behind the Wolfing dwellings, for we hear tell that the War-duke would not that the Hall-Sun should hold the Hall against the whole Roman host.”

  Then Sweinbiorn tossed up his sword into the air and caught it by the hilts as it fell, and cried out: “On, on to the meadow, where these thieves abide us!”  Arinbiorn spake no word, but turned his horse and rode down to the ford, and all men followed him; and of the Bearings there were an hundred warriors save one, and of the Wormings eighty and seven.

  So rode they over the meadow and into the ford and over it, and Otter’s company stood on the bank to meet them, and shouted to see them; but the others made but little noise as they crossed the water.

  So when they were on the western bank Arinbiorn came among them of Otter, and cried out: “Where then is Otter, where is the War-duke, is he alive or dead?”

  And the throng opened to him and Otter stood facing him; and Arinbiorn spake and said: “Thou art alive and unhurt, War-duke, when many have been hurt and slain; and methinks thy company is little minished though the kindred of the Bearings lacketh a roof; and its elders and women and children are gone into captivity.  What is this?  Was it a light thing that gangrel thieves should burn and waste in Mid-mark and depart unhurt, that ye stand here with clean blades and cold bodies?”

  Said Otter: “Thou grievest for the hurt of thine House, Arinbiorn; but this at least is good, that though ye have lost the timber of your house ye have not lost its flesh and blood; the shell is gone, but the kernel is saved: for thy folk are by this time in the wood with the Wolfing stay-at-homes, and among these are many who may fight on occasion, so they are safe as for this time: the Romans may not come at them to hurt them.”

  Said Arinbiorn: “Had ye time to learn all this, Otter, when ye fled so fast before the Romans, that the father tarried not for the son, nor the son for the father?”

  He spoke in a loud voice so that many heard him, and some deemed it evil; for anger and dissension between friends seemed abroad; but some were so eager for battle, that the word of Arinbiorn seemed good to them, and they laughed for pride and anger.

  Then Otter answered meekly, for he was a wise man and a bold: “We fled not, Arinbiorn, but as the sword fleeth, when it springeth up from the iron helm to fall on the woollen coat.  Are we not now of more avail to you, O men of the Bearings, than our dead corpses would have been?”

  Arinbiorn answered not, but his face waxed red, as if he were struggling with a weight hard to lift: then said Otter:

  “But when will Thiodolf and the main battle be with us?”

  Arinbiorn answered calmly: “Maybe in a little hour from now, or somewhat more.”

  Said Otter: “My rede is that we abide him here, and when we are all met and well ordered together, fall on the Romans at once: for then shall we be more than they; whereas now we are far fewer, and moreover we shall have to set on them in their ground of vantage.”

  Arinbiorn answered nothing; but an old man of the Bearings, one Thorbiorn, came up and spake:

  “Warriors, here are we talking and taking counsel, though this is no Hallowed Thing to bid us what we shall do, and what we shall forbear; and to talk thus is less like warriors than old women wrangling over the why and wherefore of a broken crock.  Let the War-duke rule here, as is but meet and right.  Yet if I might speak and not break the peace of the Goths, then would I say this, that it might be better for us to fall on these Romans at once before they have cast up a dike about them, as Fox telleth is their wont, and that even in an hour they may do much.”

  As he spake there was a murmur of assent about him, but Otter spake sharply, for he was grieved.

  “Thorbiorn, thou art old, and shouldest not be void of prudence.  Now it had been better for thee to have been in the wood to-day to order the women and the swains according to thine ancient wisdom than to egg on my young warriors to fare unwarily.  Here will I abide Thiodolf.”

  Then Thorbiorn reddened and was wroth; but Arinbiorn spake:

  “What is this to-do?  Let the War-duke rule as is but right: but I am now become a man of Thiodolf’s company; and he bade me haste on before to help all I might.  Do thou as thou wilt, Otter: for Thiodolf shall be here in an hour’s space, and if much diking shall be done in an hour, yet little slaying, forsooth, shall be done, and that especially if the foe is all armed and slayeth women and children.  Yea if the Bearing women be all slain, yet shall not Tyr make us new ones out of the stones of the waste to wed with the Galtings and the fish-eating Houses?—this is easy to be done forsooth.  Yea, easier than fighting the Romans and overcoming them!”

  And he was very wrath, and turned away; and again there was a murmur and a hum about him.  But while these had been speaking aloud, Sweinbiorn had been talking softly to some of the younger men, and now he shook his naked sword in the air and spake aloud and sang:

  “Ye tarry, Bears of Battle! ye linger, Sons of the Worm!

Ye crouch adown, O kindreds, from the gathering of the storm!

Ye say, it shall soon pass over and we shall fare afield

And reap the wheat with the war-sword and winnow in the shield.

But where shall be the corner wherein ye then shall abide,

And where shall be the woodland where the whelps of the bears shall hide

When ’twixt the snowy mountains and the edges of the sea

These men have swept the wild-wood and the fields where men may be

Of every living sword-blade, and every quivering spear,

And in the southland cities the yoke of slaves ye bear?

Lo ye! whoever follows I fare to sow the seed

Of the days to be hereafter and the deed that comes of deed.”

  Therewith he waved his sword over his head, and made as if he would spur onward.  But Arinbiorn thrust through the press and outwent him and cried out:

  “None goeth before Arinbiorn the Old when the battle is pitched in the meadows of the kindred.  Come, ye sons of the Bear, ye children of the Worm!  And come ye, whosoever hath a will to see stout men die!”

  Then on he rode nor looked behind him, and the riders of the Bearings and the Wormings drew themselves out of the throng, and followed him, and rode clattering over the meadow towards Wolfstead.  A few of the others rode with them, and yet but a few.  For they remembered the holy Folk-mote and the oath of the War-duke, and how they had chosen Otter to be their leader.  Howbeit, man looked askance at man, as if in shame to be left behind.