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| Now Beowulf bode in the burg of the Scyldings, |
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| leader beloved, and long he ruled |
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| in fame with all folk, since his father had gone |
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| away from the world, till awoke an heir, |
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| haughty Healfdene, who held through life, |
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| sage and sturdy, the Scyldings glad. |
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| Then, one after one, there woke to him, |
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| to the chieftain of clansmen, children four: |
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| Heorogar, then Hrothgar, then Halga brave; |
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| and I heard that—was—'s queen, |
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| the Heathoscylfing's helpmate dear. |
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| To Hrothgar was given such glory of war, |
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| such honor of combat, that all his kin |
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| obeyed him gladly till great grew his band |
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| of youthful comrades. It came in his mind |
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| to bid his henchmen a hall uprear, |
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| ia master mead-house, mightier far |
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| than ever was seen by the sons of earth, |
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| and within it, then, to old and young |
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| he would all allot that the Lord had sent him, |
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| save only the land and the lives of his men. |
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| Wide, I heard, was the work commanded, |
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| for many a tribe this mid-earth round, |
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| to fashion the folkstead. It fell, as he ordered, |
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| in rapid achievement that ready it stood there, |
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| of halls the noblest: Heorot[1] he named it |
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| whose message had might in many a land. |
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| Not reckless of promise, the rings he dealt, |
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| treasure at banquet: there towered the hall, |
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| high, gabled wide, the hot surge waiting |
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| of furious flame.[2] Nor far was that day |
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| when father and son-in-law stood in feud |
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| for warfare and hatred that woke again.[3] |
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| With envy and anger an evil spirit |
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| endured the dole in his dark abode, |
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| that he heard each day the din of revel |
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| high in the hall: there harps rang out, |
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| clear song of the singer. He sang who knew[4] |
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| tales of the early time of man, |
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| how the Almighty made the earth, |
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| fairest fields enfolded by water, |
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| set, triumphant, sun and moon |
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| for a light to lighten the land-dwellers, |
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| and braided bright the breast of earth |
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| with limbs and leaves, made life for all |
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| of mortal beings that breathe and move. |
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| So lived the clansmen in cheer and revel |
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| a winsome life, till one began |
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| to fashion evils, that field of hell. |
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| Grendel this monster grim was called, |
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| march-riever[5] mighty, in moorland living, |
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| in fen and fastness; fief of the giants |
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| the hapless wight a while had kept |
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| since the Creator his exile doomed. |
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| On kin of Cain was the killing avenged |
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| by sovran God for slaughtered Abel. |
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| Ill fared his feud,[6] and far was he driven, |
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| for the slaughter's sake, from sight of men. |
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| Of Cain awoke all that woful breed, |
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| Etins[7] and elves and evil-spirits, |
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| as well as the giants that warred with God |
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| weary while: but their wage was paid them! |
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| [1] That is, "The Hart," or "Stag," so called from decorations in |
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| the gables that resembled the antlers of a deer. This hall has |
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| been carefully described in a pamphlet by Heyne. The building was |
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| rectangular, with opposite doors—mainly west and east—and a |
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| hearth in the middle of th single room. A row of pillars down |
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| each side, at some distance from the walls, made a space which |
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| was raised a little above the main floor, and was furnished with |
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| two rows of seats. On one side, usually south, was the |
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| high-seat midway between the doors. Opposite this, on the other |
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| raised space, was another seat of honor. At the banquet soon to |
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| be described, Hrothgar sat in the south or chief high-seat, and |
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| Beowulf opposite to him. The scene for a flying (see below, |
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| v.499) was thus very effectively set. Planks on trestles—the |
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| "board" of later English literature—formed the tables just in |
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| front of the long rows of seats, and were taken away after |
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| banquets, when the retainers were ready to stretch |
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| out for sleep on the benches. [2] Fire was the usual end of these |
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| halls. See v. 781 below. One thinks of the splendid scene at the |
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| end of the Nibelungen, of the Nialssaga, of Saxo's story of |
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| Amlethus, and many a less famous instance. [3] It is to be |
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| supposed that all hearers of this poem knew how Hrothgar's hall |
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| was burnt,—perhaps in the unsuccessful attack made on him by |
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| his son-in-law Ingeld. [4] A skilled minstrel. The Danes are |
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| heathens, as one is told presently; but this lay of beginnings is |
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| taken from Genesis. [5] A disturber of the border, one who |
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| sallies from his haunt in the fen and roams over the country near |
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| by. This probably pagan nuisance is now furnished with biblical |
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| credentials as a fiend or devil in good standing, so that all |
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| Christian Englishmen might read about him. "Grendel" may mean one |
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| who grinds and crushes. [6] Cain's. [7] Giants. |
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|
