The House of the Wolfings
until they came, he sent other men to the wood to bring tree-boles to
batter the gate, and to make bridges whereby to swarm over the wall,
which was but breast-high on the Roman side, though they had worked at it
ceaselessly since yesterday morning.
In a long half-hour, therefore, the horns of the men of Up-mark sounded,
and they came forth from the wood a very great company, for with them
also were the men of the stay-at-homes and the homeless, such of them as
were fit to bear arms. Amongst these went the Hall-Sun surrounded by a
band of the warriors of Up-mark; and before her was borne her namesake
the Lamp as a sign of assured victory. But these stay-at-homes with the
Hall-Sun were stayed by the command of Thiodolf on the crown of the slope
above the dwellings, and stood round about the Speech-Hill, on the
topmost of which stood the Hall-Sun, and the wondrous Lamp, and the men
who warded her and it.
When the Romans saw the new host come forth from the wood, they might
well think that they would have work enough to do that day; but when they
saw the Hall-Sun take her stand on the Speech-Hill with the men-at-arms
about her, and the Lamp before her, then dread of the Gods fell upon
them, and they knew that the doom had gone forth against them.
Nevertheless they were not men to faint and die because the Gods were
become their foes, but they were resolved rather to fight it out to the
end against whatsoever might come against them, as was well seen
afterwards.
Now they had made four gates to their garth according to their custom,
and at each gate within was there a company of their mightiest men, and
each was beset by the best of the Markmen. Thiodolf and his men beset
the western gate where they had made that fierce onset. And the northern
gate was beset by the Elkings and some of the kindreds of the
Nether-mark; and the eastern gate by the rest of the men of Nether-mark;
and the southern gate by the kindreds of Up-mark.
All this the Romans noted, and they saw how that the Markmen were now
very many, and they knew that they were men no less valiant than
themselves, and they perceived that Thiodolf was a wise Captain; and in
less than two hours' space from the Storm of Dawning they saw those men
coming from the wood with plenteous store of tree-trunks to bridge their
ditch and rampart; and they considered how the day was yet very young, so
that they might look for no shelter from the night-tide; and as for any
aid from their own folk at the war-garth aforesaid, they hoped not for
it, nor had they sent any messenger to the Captain of the garth; nor did
they know as yet of his overthrow on the Ridge.
Now therefore there seemed to be but two choices before them; either to
abide within the rampart they had cast up, or to break out like valiant
men, and either die in the storm, or cleave a way through, whereby they
might come to their kindred and their stronghold south-east of the Mark.
This last way then they chose; or, to say the truth, it was their chief
captain who chose it for them, though they were nothing loth thereto: for
this man was a mocker, yet hot-headed, unstable, and nought wise in war,
and heretofore had his greed minished his courage; yet now, being driven
into a corner, he had courage enough and to spare, but utterly lacked
patience; for it had been better for the Romans to have abided one or two
onsets from the Goths, whereby they who should make the onslaught would
at the least have lost more men than they on whom they should fall,
before they within stormed forth on them; but their pride took away from
the Romans their last chance. But their captain, now that he perceived,
as he thought, that the game was lost and his life come to its last hour
wherein he would have to leave his treasure and pleasure behind him, grew
desperate and therewith most fierce and cruel. So all the captives whom
they had taken (they were but two score and two, for the wounded men they
had slain) he caused to be bound on the chairs of the high-seat clad in
their war-gear with their swords or spears made fast to their right
hands, and their shields to their left hands; and he said that the Goths
should now hold a Thing wherein they should at last take counsel wisely,
and abstain from folly. For he caused store of faggots and small wood
smeared with grease and oil to be cast into the hall that it might be
fired, so that it and the captives should burn up altogether; "So," said
he, "shall we have a fair torch for our funeral fire;" for it was the
custom of the Romans to burn their dead.
Thus, then, he did; and then he caused men to do away the barriers and
open all the four gates of the new-made garth, after he had manned the
wall with the slingers and bowmen, and slain the horses, so that the
woodland folk should have no gain of them. Then he arrayed his men at
the gates and about them duly and wisely, and bade those valiant footmen
fall on the Goths who were getting ready to fall on them, and to do their
best. But he himself armed at all points took his stand at the Man's-
door of the Hall, and swore by all the Gods of his kindred that he would
not move a foot's length from thence either for fire or for steel.
So fiercely on that fair morning burned the hatred of men about the
dwellings of the children of the Wolf of the Goths, wherein the children
of the Wolf of Rome were shut up as in a penfold of slaughter.
Meanwhile the Hall-Sun standing on the Hill of Speech beheld it all,
looking down into the garth of war; for the new wall was no hindrance to
her sight, because the Speech-Hill was high and but a little way from the
Great Roof; and indeed she was within shot of the Roman bowmen, though
they were not very deft in shooting.
So now she lifted up her voice and sang so that many heard her; for at
this moment of time there was a lull in the clamour of battle both within
the garth and without; even as it happens when the thunder-storm is just
about to break on the world, that the wind drops dead, and the voice of
the leaves is hushed before the first great and near flash of lightening
glares over the fields.
So she sang:
"Now the latest hour cometh and the ending of the strife;
And to-morrow and to-morrow shall we take the hand of life,
And wend adown the meadows, and skirt the darkling wood,
And reap the waving acres, and gather in the good.
I see a wall before me built up of steel and fire,
And hurts and heart-sick striving, and the war-wright's fierce desire;
But there-amidst a door is, and windows are therein;
And the fair sun-litten meadows and the Houses of the kin
Smile on me through the terror my trembling life to stay,
That at my mouth now flutters, as fain to flee away.
Lo e'en as the little hammer and the blow-pipe of the wright
About the flickering fire deals with the silver white,
And the cup and its beauty groweth that shall be for the people's
feast,
And all men are glad to see it from the greatest to the least;
E'en so is the tale now fashioned, that many a time and oft
Shall be told on the acre's edges, when the summer eve is soft;
Shall be hearkened round the hall-blaze when the mid-winter night
The kindreds' mirth besetteth, and quickeneth man's delight,
And we that have lived in the story shall be born again and again
As men feast on the bread of our earning, and praise the grief-born
grain."
As she made an end of singing, those about her understood her words, that
she was foretelling victory, and the peace of the Mark, and for joy they
raised a shrill cry; and the warriors who were nighest to her took it up,
and it spread through the whole host round about the garth, and went up
into the breath of the summer morning and went down the wind along the
meadow of the Wolfings, so that they of the wain-burg, who were now
drawing somewhat near to Wolf-stead heard it and were glad.
But the Romans when they heard it knew that the heart of the battle was
reached, and they cast back that shout wrathfully and fiercely, and made
toward the foe.
Therewithal those mighty men fell on each other in the narrow passes of
the garth; for fear was dead and buried in that Battle of the Morning.
On the North gate Hiarandi of the Elkings was the point of the Markmen's
wedge, and first clave the Roman press. In the Eastern gate it was
Valtyr, Otter's brother's son, a young man and most mighty. In the South
gate it was Geirbald of the Shieldings, the Messenger.
In the west gate Thiodolf the War-duke gave one mighty cry like the roar
of an angry lion, and cleared a space before him for the wielding of
Ivar's blade; for at that moment he had looked up to the Roof of the
Kindred and had beheld a little stream of smoke curling blue out of a
window thereof, and he knew what had betided, and how short was the time
before them. But his wrathful cry was taken up by some who had beheld
that same sight, and by others who saw nought but the Roman press, and
terribly it rang over the swaying struggling crowd.
Then fell the first rank of the Romans before those stark men and mighty
warriors; and they fell even where they stood, for on neither side could
any give back but for a little space, so close the press was, and the men
so eager to smite. Neither did any crave peace if he were hurt or
disarmed; for to the Goths it was but a little thing to fall in hot blood
in that hour of love of the kindred, and longing for the days to be. And
for the Romans, they had had no mercy, and now looked for none: and they
remembered their dealings with the Goths, and saw before them, as it
were, once more, yea, as in a picture, their slayings and quellings, and
lashings, and cold mockings which they had dealt out to the conquered
foemen without mercy, and now they longed sore for the quiet of the dark,
when their hard lives should be over, and all these deeds forgotten, and
they and their bitter foes should be at rest for ever.
Most valiantly they fought; but the fury of their despair could not deal
with the fearless hope of the Goths, and as rank after rank of them took
the place of those who were hewn down by Thiodolf and the Kindred, they
fell in their turn, and slowly the Goths cleared a space within the
gates, and then began to spread along the wall within, and grew thicker
and thicker. Nor did they fight only at the gates; but made them bridges
of those tree-trunks, and fell to swarming over the rampart, till they
had cleared it of the bowmen and slingers, and then they leaped down and
fell upon the flanks of the Romans; and the host of the dead grew, and
the host of the living lessened.
Moreover the stay-at-homes round about the Speech-Hill, and that band of
the warriors of Up-mark who were with them, beheld the Great Roof and saw
the smoke come gushing out of the windows, and at last saw the red flames
creep out amidst it and waver round the window jambs like little banners
of scarlet cloth. Then they could no longer refrain themselves, but ran
down from the Speech-Hill and the slope about it with great and fierce
cries, and clomb the wall where it was unmanned, helping each other with
hand and back, both stark warriors, and old men and lads and women: and
thus they gat them into the garth and fell upon the lessening band of the
Romans, who now began to give way hither and thither about the garth, as
they best might.
Thus it befell at the West-gate, but at the other gates it was no worser,
for there was no diversity of valour between the Houses; nay, whereas the
more part and the best part of the Romans faced the onset of Thiodolf,
which seemed to them the main onset, they were somewhat easier to deal
with elsewhere than at the West gate; and at the East gate was the place