OF KARI SOLMUND'S SON.
Then the Vikings shot at them and the fight began, and the chapmen guard
themselves well. Snowcolf sprang aboard and at Olaf, and thrust his
spear through his body, but Grim thrust at Snowcolf with his spear, and
so stoutly, that he fell over-board. Then Helgi turned to meet Grim, and
they too drove down all the Vikings as they tried to board, and Njal's
sons were ever where there was most need. Then the Vikings called out to
the chapmen and bade them give up, but they said they would never yield.
Just then some one looked seaward, and there they see ships coming from
the south round the Ness, and they were not fewer than ten, and they
row hard and steer thitherwards. Along their sides were shield on
shield, but on that ship that came first stood a man by the mast, who
was clad in a silken kirtle, and had a gilded helm, and his hair was
both fair and thick; that man had a spear inlaid with gold in his hand.
He asked, "Who have here such an uneven game?"
Helgi tells his name, and said that against them are Gritgard and
Snowcolf.
"But who are your captains?" he asks.
Helgi answered, "Bard the black, who lives, but the other, who is dead
and gone, was called Olaf".
"Are ye men from Iceland?" says he.
"Sure enough we are," Helgi answers.
He asked whose sons they were, and they told him, then he knew them and
said--
"Well known names have ye all, father and sons both."
"Who art thou?" asks Helgi.
"My name is Kari, and I am Solmund's son."
"Whence comest thou?" says Helgi.
"From the Southern Isles."
"Then thou art welcome," says Helgi, "if thou wilt give us a little
help."
"I'll give ye all the help ye need," says Kari; "but what do ye ask?"
"To fall on them," says Helgi.
Kari says that so it shall be. So they pulled up to them, and then the
battle began the second time; but when they had fought a little while,
Kari springs up on Snowcolf's ship; he turns to meet him and smites at
him with his sword. Kari leaps nimbly backwards over a beam that lay
athwart the ship, and Snowcolf smote the beam so that both edges of the
sword were hidden. Then Kari smites at him, and the sword fell on his
shoulder, and the stroke was so mighty that he cleft in twain shoulder,
arm, and all, and Snowcolf got his death there and then. Gritgard hurled
a spear at Kari, but Kari saw it and sprang up aloft, and the spear
missed him. Just then Helgi and Grim came up both to meet Kari, and
Helgi springs on Gritgard and thrusts his spear through him, and that
was his death blow; after that they went round the whole ship on both
boards, and then men begged for mercy. So they gave them all peace, but
took all their goods. After that they ran all the ships out under the
islands.