(25)
“Thou sayest my faith has been forfeit,
O fair in thy glittering raiment;
But I wearied my steed and outwore it,
And for what but the love that bare thee?
O fainer by far was I, lady,
To founder my horse in the hunting--
Nay, I spared not the jade when I spurred it--
Than to see thee the bride of my foe.”
After this Cormac and his men went home. When he told his mother how
things had gone, “Little good,” she said, “will thy luck do us. Ye have
slighted a fine offer, and you have no chance against Bersi, for he is a
great fighter and he has good weapons.”
Now, Bersi owned the sword they call Whitting; a sharp sword it was,
with a life-stone to it; and that sword he had carried in many a fray.
“Whether wilt thou have weapons to meet Whitting?” she asked. Cormac
said he would have an axe both great and keen.
Dalla said he should see Skeggi of Midfiord and ask for the loan of his
sword, Skofnung. So Cormac went to Reykir and told Skeggi how matters
stood, asking him to lend Skofnung. Skeggi said he had no mind to lend
it. Skofnung and Cormac, said he, would never agree: “It is cold and
slow, and thou art hot and hasty.”
Cormac rode away and liked it ill. He came home to Mel and told
his mother that Skeggi would not lend the sword. Now Skeggi had the
oversight of Dalla's affairs, and they were great friends; so she said,
“He will lend the sword, though not all at once.”
That was not what he wanted, answered Cormac,--“If he withhold it not
from thee, while he does withhold it from me.” Upon which she answered
that he was a thwart lad.
A few days afterwards Dalla told him to go to Reykir. “He will lend thee
the sword now,” said she. So he sought Skeggi and asked for Skofnung.
“Hard wilt thou find it to handle,” said Skeggi. “There is a pouch to
it, and that thou shalt let be. Sun must not shine on the pommel of the
hilt. Thou shalt not wear it until fighting is forward, and when ye come
to the field, sit all alone and then draw it. Hold the edge toward thee,
and blow on it. Then will a little worm creep from under the hilt. Then
slope thou the sword over, and make it easy for that worm to creep back
beneath the hilt.”
“Here's a tale of tricks, thou warlock!” cried Cormac
“Nevertheless,” answered Skeggi, “it will stand thee in good stead to
know them.”
So Cormac rode home and told his mother, saying that her will was of
great avail with Skeggi. He showed the sword, and tried to draw it, but
it would not leave the sheath.
“Thou are over wilful, my son,” said she.
Then he set his feet against the hilts, and pulled until he tore the
pouch off, at which Skofnung creaked and groaned, but never came out of
the scabbard.
Well, the time wore on, and the day came. He rode away with fifteen men;
Bersi also rode to the holm with as many. Cormac came there first, and
told Thorgils that he would sit apart by himself. So he sat down and
ungirt the sword.
Now, he never heeded whether the sun shone upon the hilt, for he had
girt the sword on him outside his clothes. And when he tried to draw it
he could not, until he set his feet upon the hilts. Then the little worm
came, and was not rightly done by; and so the sword came groaning and
creaking out of the scabbard, and the good luck of it was gone.
CHAPTER TEN. The Fight On Leidarholm.
After that Cormac went to his men. Bersi and his party had come by that
time, and many more to see the fight.
Cormac took up Bersi's target and cut at it, and sparks flew out.
Then a hide was taken and spread for them to stand on. Bersi spoke and
said, “Thou, Cormac, hast challenged me to the holmgang; instead of
that, I offer thee to fight in simple sword-play. Thou art a young man
and little tried; the holmgang needs craft and cunning, but sword-play,
man to man, is an easy game.”
Cormac answered, “I should fight no better even so. I will run the risk,
and stand on equal footing with thee, every way.”
“As thou wilt,” said Bersi.
It was the law of the holmgang that the hide should be five ells long,
with loops at its corners. Into these should be driven certain pins with
heads to them, called tjosnur. He who made it ready should go to the
pins in such a manner that he could see sky between his legs, holding
the lobes of his ears and speaking the forewords used in the rite called
“The Sacrifice of the tjosnur.” Three squares should be marked round
the hide, each one foot broad. At the outermost corners of the squares
should be four poles, called hazels; when this is done, it is a hazelled
field. Each man should have three shields, and when they were cut up
he must get upon the hide if he had given way from it before, and guard
himself with his weapons alone thereafter. He who had been challenged
should strike the first stroke. If one was wounded so that blood fell
upon the hide, he should fight no longer. If either set one foot outside
the hazel poles “he went on his heel,” they said; but he “ran” if both
feet were outside. His own man was to hold the shield before each of the
fighters. The one who was wounded should pay three marks of silver to be
set free.
So the hide was taken and spread under their feet. Thorgils held his
brother's shield, and Thord Arndisarson that of Bersi. Bersi struck the
first blow, and cleft Cormac's shield; Cormac struck at Bersi to the
like peril. Each of them cut up and spoilt three shields of the
other's. Then it was Cormac's turn. He struck at Bersi, who parried with
Whitting. Skofnung cut the point off Whitting in front of the ridge. The
sword-point flew upon Cormac's hand, and he was wounded in the thumb.
The joint was cleft, and blood dropped upon the hide. Thereupon folk
went between them and stayed the fight.
Then said Cormac, “This is a mean victory that Bersi has gained; it is
only from my bad luck; and yet we must part.”
He flung down his sword, and it met Bersi's target. A shard was broken
out of Skofnung, and fire flew out of Thorveig's gift.
Bersi asked the money for release, Cormac said it would be paid; and so
they parted.
CHAPTER ELEVEN. The Songs That Were Made About The Fight.
Steinar was the name of a man who was the son of Onund the Seer, and
brother of Dalla, Cormac's mother. He was an unpeaceful man, and lived
at Ellidi.
Thither rode Cormac from the holme, to see his kinsman, and told him
of the fight, at which he was but ill pleased. Cormac said he meant to
leave the country,--“And I want thee to take the money to Bersi.”
“Thou art no bold man,” said Steinar, “but the money shall be paid if
need be.”
Cormac was there some nights; his hand swelled much, for it was not
dressed.
After that meeting, Holmgang Bersi went to see his brother. Folk asked
how the holmgang had gone, and when he told them they said that two bold
men had struck small blows, and he had gained the victory only through
Cormac's mishap. When Bersi met Steingerd, and she asked how it went, he
made this verse:--
(26)
“They call him, and truly they tell it,
A tree of the helmet right noble:
But the master of manhood must bring me
Three marks for his ransom and rescue.
Though stout in the storm of the bucklers
In the stress of the Valkyrie's tempest
He will bid me no more to the battle,
For the best of the struggle was ours.”
Steinar and Cormac rode from Ellidi and passed through Saurbae. They saw
men riding towards them, and yonder came Bersi. He greeted Cormac and
asked how the wound was getting on. Cormac said it needed little to be
healed.
“Wilt thou let me heal thee?” said Bersi; “though from me thou didst get
it: and then it will be soon over.”
Cormac said nay, for he meant to be his lifelong foe. Then answered
Bersi:--
(27)
“Thou wilt mind thee for many a season
How we met in the high voice of Hilda.
Right fain I go forth to the spear-mote
Being fitted for every encounter.
There Cormac's gay shield from his clutches
I clave with the bane of the bucklers,
For he scorned in the battle to seek me
If we set not the lists of the holmgang.”
Thus they parted; and then Cormac went home to Mel and saw his mother.
She healed his hand; it had become ugly and healed badly. The notch in
Skofnung they whetted, but the more they whetted the bigger it was.
So he went to Reykir, and flung Skofnung at Skeggi's feet, with this
verse:--
(28)
“I bring thee, thus broken and edgeless,
The blade that thou gavest me, Skeggi!
I warrant thy weapon could bite not:
I won not the fight by its witchcraft.
No gain of its virtue nor glory
I got in the strife of the weapons,
When we met for to mingle the sword-storm
For the maiden my singing adorns.”
Said Skeggi, “It went as I warned thee.” Cormac flung forth and went
home to Mel: and when he met with Dalla he made this song:--
(29)
“To the field went I forth, O my mother
The flame of the armlet who guardest,--
To dare the cave-dweller, my foeman
And I deemed I should smite him in battle.
But the brand that is bruited in story
It brake in my hand as I held it;
And this that should thrust men to slaughter
Is thwarted and let of its might.
(30)
For I borrowed to bear in the fighting
No blunt-edged weapon of Skeggi:
There is strength in the serpent that quivers
By the side of the land of the girdle.
But vain was the virtue of Skofnung
When he vanquished the sharpness of Whitting;
And a shard have I shorn, to my sorrow,
From the shearer of ringleted mail.
(31)
Yon tusker, my foe, wrought me trouble
When targe upon targe I had carven:
For the thin wand of slaughter was shattered
And it sundered the ground of my handgrip.
Loud bellowed the bear of the sea-king
When he brake from his lair in the scabbard,
At the hest of the singer, who seeketh
The sweet hidden draught of the gods.
(32)
Afar must I fare, O my mother,
And a fate points the pathway before me,
For that white-wreathen tree may woo not
--Two wearisome morrows her outcast.
And it slays me, at home to be sitting,
So set is my heart on its goddess,
As a lawn with fair linen made lovely
--I can linger no third morrow's morn.”
After that, Cormac went one day to Reykir and talked with Skeggi, who
said the holmgang had been brought to scorn. Then answered Cormac:--
(33)
“Forget it, O Frey of the helmet,
--Lo, I frame thee a song in atonement--
That the bringer of blood, even Skofnung,
I bare thee so strangely belated.
For by stirrers of storm was I wounded;
They smote me where perches the falcon:
But the blade that I borrowed, O Skeggi,
Was borne in the clashing of edges.
(34)
I had deemed, O thou Grey of fighting,
Of the fierce song of Odin,--my neighbour,
I had deemed that a brand meet for bloodshed
I bare to the crossways of slaughter.
Nay,--thy glaive, it would gape not nor ravin
Against him, the rover who robbed me:
And on her, as the surge on the shingle,
My soul beats and breaks evermore.”
CHAPTER TWELVE. Bersi's Bad Luck At The Thor's-Ness Thing.
In the winter, sports were held at Saurbae. Bersi's lad, Asmund, was
there, and likewise the sons of Thord; but they were younger than he,
and nothing like so sturdy. When they wrestled Asmund took no heed
to stint his strength, and the sons of Thord often came home blue and
bleeding. Their mother Thordis was ill pleased, and asked her husband
would he give Bersi a hint to make it up on behalf of his son. Nay,
Thord answered, he was loath to do that.
“Then I'll find my brother Bork,” said she, “and it will be just as bad
in the end.”
Thord bade her do no such thing. “I would rather talk it over with him,”
said he; and so, at her wish, he met Bersi, and hinted that some amends
were owing.
Said Bersi, “Thou art far too greedy of getting, nowadays. This kind of
thing will end in losing thee thy good name. Thou wilt never want while
anything is to be got here.”
Thord went home, and there was a coolness between them while that winter
lasted.
Spring slipped by, until it was time for the meeting at Thor's-ness.
By then, Bersi thought he saw through this claim of Thord's, and found
Thordis at the bottom of it. For all that, he made ready to go to the
Thing. By old use and wont these two neighbours should have gone riding
together; so Bersi set out and came to Muli, but when he got there Thord
was gone.
“Well,” said he, “Thord has broken old use and wont in awaiting me no
longer.”
“If breach there be,” answered Thordis, “it is thy doing. This is
nothing to what we owe thee, and I doubt there will be more to follow.”
They had words. Bersi said that harm would come of her evil counsel; and
so they parted.
When he left the house he said to his men, “Let us turn aside to the
shore and take a boat; it is a long way to ride round the waterhead.” So
they took a boat--it was one of Thord's--and went their way.
They came to the meeting when most other folks were already there, and
went to the tent of Olaf Peacock of Hjardarholt (Herdholt), for he was
Bersi's chief. It was crowded inside, and Bersi found no seat. He used
to sit next Thord, but that place was filled. In it there sat a big and
strong-looking man, with a bear-skin coat, and a hood that shaded his
face. Bersi stood a while before him, but the seat was not given up. He
asked the man for his name, and was told he might call him Bruin, or
he might call him Hoodie--which-ever he liked; whereupon he said in
verse:--
(35)
“Who sits in the seat of the warriors,
With the skin of the bear wrapped around him,
So wild in his look?--Ye have welcomed
A wolf to your table, good kinsfolk!
Ah, now may I know him, I reckon!
Doth he name himself Bruin, or Hoodie?--
We shall meet once again in the morning,
And maybe he'll prove to be--Steinar.”
“And it's no use for thee to hide thy name, thou in the bearskin,” said
he.
“No more it is,” he answered. “Steinar I am, and I have brought money
to pay thee for Cormac, if so be it is needed. But first I bid thee to
fight. It will have to be seen whether thou get the two marks of silver,
or whether thou lose them both.”