House of the Wolfings: The William Morris Book that Inspired J. R. R. Tolkiena *s The Lord of the Rings (25 page)

Said Otter: “My rede is that we abide him
here, and when we are all met and well ordered together, fall on
the Romans at once: for then shall we be more than they; whereas
now we are far fewer, and moreover we shall have to set on them in
their ground of vantage.”

Arinbiorn answered nothing; but an old man
of the Bearings, one Thorbiorn, came up and spake:

“Warriors, here are we talking and taking
counsel, though this is no Hallowed Thing to bid us what we shall
do, and what we shall forbear; and to talk thus is less like
warriors than old women wrangling over the why and wherefore of a
broken crock. Let the War-duke rule here, as is but meet and right.
Yet if I might speak and not break the peace of the Goths, then
would I say this, that it might be better for us to fall on these
Romans at once before they have cast up a dike about them, as Fox
telleth is their wont, and that even in an hour they may do
much.”

As he spake there was a murmur of assent
about him, but Otter spake sharply, for he was grieved.

“Thorbiorn, thou art old, and shouldest not
be void of prudence. Now it had been better for thee to have been
in the wood to-day to order the women and the swains according to
thine ancient wisdom than to egg on my young warriors to fare
unwarily. Here will I abide Thiodolf.”

Then Thorbiorn reddened and was wroth; but
Arinbiorn spake:

“What is this to-do? Let the War-duke rule
as is but right: but I am now become a man of Thiodolf’s company;
and he bade me haste on before to help all I might. Do thou as thou
wilt, Otter: for Thiodolf shall be here in an hour’s space, and if
much diking shall be done in an hour, yet little slaying, forsooth,
shall be done, and that especially if the foe is all armed and
slayeth women and children. Yea if the Bearing women be all slain,
yet shall not Tyr make us new ones out of the stones of the waste
to wed with the Galtings and the fish-eating Houses?—this is easy
to be done forsooth. Yea, easier than fighting the Romans and
overcoming them!”

And he was very wrath, and turned away; and
again there was a murmur and a hum about him. But while these had
been speaking aloud, Sweinbiorn had been talking softly to some of
the younger men, and now he shook his naked sword in the air and
spake aloud and sang:

Ye tarry, Bears of Battle! ye linger, Sons
of the Worm!

Ye crouch adown, O kindreds, from the
gathering of the storm!

Ye say, it shall soon pass over and we shall
fare afield

And reap the wheat with the war-sword and
winnow in the shield.

But where shall be the corner wherein ye
then shall abide,

And where shall be the woodland where the
whelps of the bears shall hide

When ’twixt the snowy mountains and the
edges of the sea

These men have swept the wild-wood and the
fields where men may be

Of every living sword-blade, and every
quivering spear,

And in the southland cities the yoke of
slaves ye bear?

Lo ye! whoever follows I fare to sow the
seed

Of the days to be hereafter and the deed
that comes of deed.

Therewith he waved his sword over his head,
and made as if he would spur onward. But Arinbiorn thrust through
the press and outwent him and cried out:

“None goeth before Arinbiorn the Old when
the battle is pitched in the meadows of the kindred. Come, ye sons
of the Bear, ye children of the Worm! And come ye, whosoever hath a
will to see stout men die!”

Then on he rode nor looked behind him, and
the riders of the Bearings and the Wormings drew themselves out of
the throng, and followed him, and rode clattering over the meadow
towards Wolfstead. A few of the others rode with them, and yet but
a few. For they remembered the holy Folk-mote and the oath of the
War-duke, and how they had chosen Otter to be their leader.
Howbeit, man looked askance at man, as if in shame to be left
behind.

But Otter bethought him in the flash of a
moment, “If these men ride alone, they shall die and do nothing;
and if we ride with them it may be that we shall overthrow the
Romans, and if we be vanquished, it shall go hard but we shall slay
many of them, so that it shall be the easier for Thiodolf to deal
with them.”

Then he spake hastily, and bade certain men
abide at the ford for a guard; then he drew his sword and rode to
the front of his folk, and cried out aloud to them:

“Now at last has come the time to die, and
let them of the Markmen who live hereafter lay us in howe. Set on,
Sons of Tyr, and give not your lives away, but let them be dearly
earned of our foemen.”

Then all shouted loudly and gladly; nor were
they otherwise than exceeding glad; for now had they forgotten all
other joys of life save the joy of fighting for the kindred and the
days to be.

So Otter led them forth, and when he heard
the whole company clattering and thundering on the earth behind him
and felt their might enter into him, his brow cleared, and the
anxious lines in the face of the old man smoothed themselves out,
and as he rode along the soul so stirred within him that he sang
out aloud:

Time was when hot was the summer and I was
young on the earth,

And I grudged me every moment that lacked
its share of mirth.

I woke in the morn and was merry and all the
world methought

For me and my heart’s deliverance that hour
was newly wrought.

I have passed through the halls of manhood,
I have reached the doors of eld,

And I have been glad and sorry, but ever
have upheld

My heart against all trouble that none might
call me sad,

But ne’er came such remembrance of how my
heart was glad

In the afternoon of summer ’neath the still
unwearied sun

Of the days when I was little and all deeds
were hopes to be won,

As now at last it cometh when e’en in
such-like tide,

For the freeing of my trouble o’er the
fathers’ field I ride.

Many men perceived that he sang, and saw
that he was merry, howbeit few heard his very words, and yet all
were glad of him.

Fast they rode, being wishful to catch up
with the Bearings and the Wormings, and soon they came anigh them,
and they, hearing the thunder of the horse-hoofs, looked and saw
that it was the company of Otter, and so slacked their speed till
they were all joined together with joyous shouting and laughter. So
then they ordered the ranks anew and so set forward in great joy
without haste or turmoil toward Wolfstead and the Romans. For now
the bitterness of their fury and the sourness of their abiding
wrath were turned into the mere joy of battle; even as the clear
red and sweet wine comes of the ugly ferment and rough trouble of
the must.

Chapter 23

Thiodolf Meeteth the Romans in the Wolfing
Meadow

It was scarce an hour after this that the
footmen of Thiodolf came out of the thicket road on to the meadow
of the Bearings; there saw they men gathered on a rising ground,
and they came up to them and saw how some of them were looking with
troubled faces towards the ford and what lay beyond it, and some
toward the wood and the coming of Thiodolf. But these were they
whom Otter had bidden abide Thiodolf there, and he had sent two
messengers to them for Thiodolf’s behoof that he might have due
tidings so soon as he came out of the thicket: the first told how
Otter had been compelled in a manner to fall on the Romans along
with the riders of the Bearings and the Wormings, and the second
who had but just then come, told how the Markmen had been worsted
by the Romans, and had given back from the Wolfing dwellings, and
were making a stand against the foemen in the meadow betwixt the
ford and Wolfstead.

Now when Thiodolf heard of these tidings he
stayed not to ask long questions, but led the whole host
straightway down to the ford, lest the remnant of Otter’s men
should be driven down there, and the Romans should hold the western
bank against him.

At the ford there was none to withstand
them, nor indeed any man at all; for the men whom Otter had set
there, when they heard that the battle had gone against their
kindred, had ridden their ways to join them. So Thiodolf crossed
over the ford, he and his in good order all afoot, he like to the
others; but for him he was clad in the Dwarf-wrought Hauberk, but
was unhelmeted and bare no shield. Throng-plough was naked in his
hand as he came up all dripping on to the bank and stood in the
meadow of the Wolfings; his face was stern and set as he gazed
straight onward to the place of the fray, but he did not look as
joyous as his wont was in going down to the battle.

Now they had gone but a short way from the
ford before the noise of the fight and the blowing of horns came
down the wind to them, but it was a little way further before they
saw the fray with their eyes; because the ground fell away from the
river somewhat at first, and then rose and fell again before it
went up in one slope toward the Wolfing dwellings.

But when they were come to the top of the
next swelling of the ground, they beheld from thence what they had
to deal with; for there round about a ground of vantage was the
field black with the Roman host, and in the midst of it was a
tangle of struggling men and tossing spears, and glittering
swords.

So when they beheld the battle of their
kindred they gave a great shout and hastened onward the faster; and
they were ordered into the wedge-array and Thiodolf led them, as
meet it was. And now even as they who were on the outward edge of
the array and could see what was toward were looking on the battle
with eager eyes, there came an answering shout down the wind, which
they knew for the voice of the Goths amid the foemen, and then they
saw how the ring of the Romans shook and parted, and their array
fell back, and lo the company of the Markmen standing stoutly
together, though sorely minished; and sure it was that they had not
fled or been scattered, but were ready to fall one over another in
one band, for there were no men straggling towards the ford, though
many masterless horses ran here and there about the meadow. Now,
therefore, none doubted but that they would deliver their friends
from the Romans, and overthrow the foemen.

But now befel a wonder, a strange thing to
tell of. The Romans soon perceived what was adoing, whereupon the
half of them turned about to face the new comers, while the other
half still withstood the company of Otter: the wedge-array of
Thiodolf drew nearer and nearer till it was hard on the place where
it should spread itself out to storm down on the foe, and the Goths
beset by the Romans made them ready to fall on from their side.
There was Thiodolf leading his host, and all men looking for the
token and sign to fall on; but even as he lifted up Throng-plough
to give that sign, a cloud came over his eyes and he saw nought of
all that was before him, and he staggered back as one who hath
gotten a deadly stroke, and so fell swooning to the earth, though
none had smitten him. Then stayed was the wedge-array even at the
very point of onset, and the hearts of the Goths sank, for they
deemed that their leader was slain, and those who were nearest to
him raised him up and bore him hastily aback out of the battle; and
the Romans also had beheld him fall, and they also deemed him dead
or sore hurt, and shouted for joy and loitered not, but stormed
forth on the wedge-array like valiant men; for it must be told that
they, who erst out-numbered the company of Otter, were now much
out-numbered, but they deemed it might well be that they could
dismay the Goths since they had been stayed by the fall of their
leader; and Otter’s company were wearied with sore fighting against
a great host. Nevertheless these last, who had not seen the fall of
Thiodolf (for the Romans were thick between him and them) fell on
with such exceeding fury that they drove the Romans who faced them
back on those who had set on the wedge-array, which also stood fast
undismayed; for he who stood next to Thiodolf, a man big of body,
and stout of heart, bight Thorolf, hove up a great axe and cried
out aloud:

“Here is the next man to Thiodolf! here is
one who will not fall till some one thrusts him over, here is
Thorolf of the Wolfings! Stand fast and shield you, and smite,
though Thiodolf be gone untimely to the Gods!”

So none gave back a foot, and fierce was the
fight about the wedge-array; and the men of Otter—but there was no
Otter there, and many another man was gone, and Arinbiorn the Old
led them—these stormed on so fiercely that they cleft their way
through all and joined themselves to their kindred, and the battle
was renewed in the Wolfing meadow. But the Romans had this gain,
that Thiodolf’s men had let go their occasion for falling on the
Romans with their line spread out so that every man might use his
weapons; yet were the Goths strong both in valiancy and in numbers,
nor might the Romans break into their array, and as aforesaid the
Romans were the fewer, for it was less than half of their host that
had pursued the Goths when they had been thrust back from their
fierce onset: nor did more than the half seem needed, so many of
them had fallen along with Otter the War-duke and Sweinbiorn of the
Bearings, that they seemed to the Romans but a feeble band easy to
overcome.

So fought they in the Wolfing meadow in the
fifth hour after high-noon, and neither yielded to the other: but
while these things were a-doing, men laid Thiodolf adown aloof from
the battle under a doddered oak half a furlong from where the fight
was a-doing, round whose bole clung flocks of wool from the sheep
that drew around it in the hot summer-tide and rubbed themselves
against it, and the ground was trodden bare of grass round the
bole, and close to the trunk was worn into a kind of trench. There
then they laid Thiodolf, and they wondered that no blood came from
him, and that there was no sign of a shot-weapon in his body.