C.D. Warner, et al., comp. The Library of the World’s Best Literature.
An Anthology in Thirty Volumes. 1917.
Thangbrand the Priest
By Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807–1882)
S
Burly face and russet beard,
All the women stared at him,
When in Iceland he appeared.
“Look!” they said,
With nodding head,
“There goes Thangbrand, Olaf’s Priest.”
He could preach like Chrysostome,
From the Fathers he could quote.
He had even been at Rome.
A learned clerk,
A man of mark,
Was this Thangbrand, Olaf’s Priest
And impatient of control,
Boisterous in the market crowd,
Boisterous at the wassail-bowl;
Everywhere
Would drink and swear,—
Swaggering Thangbrand, Olaf’s Priest
Could the King no longer bear,
So to Iceland he was sent
To convert the heathen there;
And away
One summer day
Sailed this Thangbrand, Olaf’s Priest.
Pored the people day and night;
But he did not like their looks,
Nor the songs they used to write.
“All this rhyme
Is waste of time!”
Grumbled Thangbrand, Olaf’s Priest.
Came the skalds and saga-men:
Is it to be wondered at
That they quarreled now and then,
When o’er his beer
Began to leer
Drunken Thangbrand, Olaf’s Priest?
Boasted of their island grand;
Saying in a single word,
“Iceland is the finest land
That the sun
Doth shine upon!”
Loud laughed Thangbrand, Olaf’s Priest.
Of this bragging up and down,
When three women and one goose
Make a market in your town!”
Every skald
Satires scrawled
On poor Thangbrand, Olaf’s Priest.
And what vexed him most of all
Was a figure in shovel hat,
Drawn in charcoal on the wall;
With words that go
Sprawling below,
“This is Thangbrand, Olaf’s Priest.”
Then he smote them might and main:
Thorvald Veile and Veterlid
Lay there in the alehouse slain.
“To-day we are gold,
To-morrow mold!”
Muttered Thangbrand, Olaf’s Priest.
Back to Norway sailed he then.
“O King Olaf! Little, hope
Is there of these Iceland men!”
Meekly said,
With bending head,
Pious Thangbrand, Olaf’s Priest.