SELECTIONS IN ENGLISH PQETBY
But the Gods went by starlight up the shore 865
To Asgard, and sate down in Odin's hall
At table, and the funeral-feast began.
All night they ate the boar Serimner's flesh,
And from their horns, with silver rimm'd, drank mead,
Silent, and waited for the sacred Morn, 370
And Morning over all the world was spread.
Then from their loathed feasts the Gods arose,
And took their horses, and set forth to ride
O'er the bridge Bifrost, where is HeimdalPs watch,
To the ash Igdrasil, and Ida's plain; 875
Thor came on foot, the rest on horseback rode.
And they found Mimir sitting by his Fount
Of Wisdom, which beneath the ash-tree springs;
And saw the Xornies watering the roots
Of that world-shadowing tree with Honey-dew. 880
There came the Gods, and sate them down on stones;
And thus the Father of the ages said :—
"Ye Gods, the terms ye know, which Hermod
brought.
Accept them or reject them ! both have grounds.
Accept them, and they bind us, unfulfilPd, 885
To leave for ever Balder in the grave,
An unrecover'd prisoner, shade with shades.
But how, ye say, should the fulfilment fail?—
Smooth sound the terms, and light to be fulfilled;
For dear-beloved was Balder while he lived 890
In Heaven and earth, and who would grudge him tears?
But from the traitorous seed of Lok they come,
These terms, and I suspect some hidden fraud.
Bethink ye, Gods, is there no other way?—
Speak, were not this a way, the way for Gods? 895
If I, if Odin, clad in radiant arms,
Mounted on Sleipner, with the Warrior Thor
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