| |
| THEN fashioned for him the folk of Geats | |
| firm on the earth a funeral-pile, | |
| and hung it with helmets and harness of war | |
| and breastplates bright, as the boon he asked; | |
| and they laid amid it the mighty chieftain, | 5 |
| heroes mourning their master dear. | |
| Then on the hill that hugest of balefires | |
| the warriors wakened. Wood-smoke rose | |
| black over blaze, and blent was the roar | |
| of flame with weeping (the wind was still), | 10 |
| till the fire had broken the frame of bones, | |
| hot at the heart. In heavy mood | |
| their misery moaned they, their master’s death. | |
| Wailing her woe, the widow 1 old, | |
| her hair upbound, for Beowulf’s death | 15 |
| sung in her sorrow, and said full oft | |
| she dreaded the doleful days to come, | |
| deaths enow, and doom of battle, | |
| and shame.—The smoke by the sky was devoured. | |
| The folk of the Weders fashioned there | 20 |
| on the headland a barrow broad and high, | |
| by ocean-farers far descried: | |
| in ten days’ time their toil had raised it, | |
| the battle-brave’s beacon. Round brands of the pyre | |
| a wall they built, the worthiest ever | 25 |
| that wit could prompt in their wisest men. | |
| They placed in the barrow that precious booty, | |
| the rounds and the rings they had reft erewhile, | |
| hardy heroes, from hoard in cave,— | |
| trusting the ground with treasure of earls, | 30 |
| gold in the earth, where ever it lies | |
| useless to men as of yore it was. | |
| Then about that barrow the battle-keen rode, | |
| atheling-born, a band of twelve, | |
| lament to make, to mourn their king, | 35 |
| chant their dirge, and their chieftain honor. | |
| They praised his earlship, his acts of prowess | |
| worthily witnessed: and well it is | |
| that men their master-friend mightily laud, | |
| heartily love, when hence he goes | 40 |
| from life in the body forlorn away. | |
| |
| Thus made their mourning the men of Geatland, | |
| for their hero’s passing his hearth-companions: | |
| quoth that of all the kings of earth, | |
| of men he was mildest and most belovéd, | 45 |
| to his kin the kindest, keenest for praise. | |
