Legends of the Middle Ages

ips. Then she bestowed upon him a costly necklace (the famous Brisinga-men, according to some authorities)[1] and a ring of the finest gold. [Footnote 1: See Guerber's Myths of Northern Lands, p. 127.]

"'Wear these,' she cried, 'since thou hast in the fight So borne thyself, that wide as ocean rolls Round our wind-beaten cliffs his brimming waves, All gallant souls shall speak thy eulogy.'" Beowulf (Conybeare's tr.).

When the banquet was ended, Hrothgar escorted his guests to more pleasant sleeping apartments than they had occupied the night before, leaving his own men to guard the hall, where Grendel would never again appear. The warriors, fearing no danger, slept in peace; but in the dead of night the mother of the giant, as grewsome and uncanny a monster as he, glided into the hall, secured the bloody trophy still hanging from the ceiling, and carried it away, together with Aeschere (Askher), the king's bosom friend.

When Hrothgar l