The Tale of Beowulf/Chapter 9
IX. UNFERTH CONTENDETH IN WORDS WITH BEOWULF.
SPAKE out then Unferth that bairn was of Ecglaf,And he sat at the feet of the lord of the Scyldings,500He unbound the battle-rune; was Beowulf's faring,Of him the proud mere-farer, mickle unliking,Whereas he begrudg'd it of any man other That he glories more mighty the middle-garth overShould hold under heaven than he himself held:Art thou that Beowulf who won strife with BrecaOn the wide sea contending in swimming,When ye two for pride's sake search'd out the floodsAnd for a dolt's cry into deep waterThrust both your life-days? No man the twain of you,510Lief or loth were he, might lay wyte to stay youYour sorrowful journey, when on the sea row'd ye;Then when the ocean-stream ye with your arms deck'd,Meted the mere-streets, there your hands brandish'd!O'er the Spearman ye glided; the sea with waves welter'd,The surge of the winter. Ye twain in the waves' mightFor a seven nights swink'd. He outdid thee in swimming,And the more was his might; but him in the morn-tideTo the Heatho-Remes' land the holm bore ashore, And thence away sought he to his dear land and lovely,520The lief to his people sought the land of the Brondings,The fair burg peace-warding, where he the folk owned,The burg and the gold rings. What to theeward he boasted,Beanstan's son, for thee soothly he brought it about.Now ween I for thee things worser than erewhile,Though thou in the war-race wert everywhere doughty,In the grim war, if thou herein Grendel darestNight-long for a while of time nigh to abide.Then Beowulf spake out, the Ecgtheow's bairn:What! thou no few of things, O Unferth my friend,530And thou drunken with beer, about Breca hast spoken,Saidest out of his journey; so the sooth now I tell:To wit, that the more might ever I owned,Hard wearing on wave more than any man else.We twain then, we quoth it, while yet we were younglings,And we boasted between us, the twain of us being yet In our youth-days, that we out onto the SpearmanOur lives would adventure; and e'en so we wrought it.We had a sword naked, when on the sound row'd we,539Hard in hand, as we twain against the whale-fishesHad mind to be warding us. No whit from meIn the waves of the sea-flood afar might he floatThe hastier in holm, nor would I from him hie me.Then we two together, we were in the seaFor a five nights, till us twain the flood drave asunder,The weltering of waves. Then the coldest of weathersIn the dusking of night and the wind from the northwardBattle-grim turn'd against us, rough grown were the billows.Of the mere-fishes then was the mood all up-stirred;There me 'gainst the loathly the body-sark mine,The hard and the hand-lock'd, was framing me help,551My battle-rail braided, it lay on my breastGear'd graithly with gold. But me to the ground tugg'dA foe and fiend-scather; fast he had me in hold That grim one in grip: yet to me was it given,That the wretch there, the monster, with point might I reach,With my bill of the battle, and the war-race off boreThe mighty mere-beast through the hand that was mine.