e to Mermedonia to
deliver St. Matthew from the savages. The Savior in disguise is the
Pilot. The dialogue between him and St. Andrew is specially fine. The
saint has all the admiration of a Viking for his unknown Pilot, who
stands at the helm in a gale and manages the vessel as he would a
thought.

Although the poet tells of a voyage in eastern seas, he is describing
the German ocean:--

"Then was sorely troubled,
Sorely wrought the whale-mere. Wallowed there the Horn-fish,
Glode the great deep through; and the gray-backed gull
Slaughter-greedy wheeled. Dark the storm-sun grew,
Waxed the winds up, grinded waves;
Stirred the surges, groaned the cordage,
Wet with breaking sea."[21]

Cynewulf is also the probable author of the _Phoenix_, which is in
part an adaptation of an old Latin poem. The _Phoenix_ is the only
Saxon poem that gives us the rich scenery of the South, in place of
the stern northern landscape. He thus describes the land where this
fabulous bird dwells:--

"Calm and fair this glorious field, flashes there the sunny grove;
Happy is the holt of trees, never withers fruitage there.
Bright are there the blossoms...
In that home the hating foe houses not at all,
* * * * *
Neither sleep nor sadness, nor the sick man's weary bed,
Nor the winter-whirling snow...
...but the liquid streamlets,
Wonderfully beautiful, from their wells upspringing,
Softly lap the land with their lovely floods."[22]

GENERAL CHARACTERISTICS OF ANGLO-SAXON POETRY

Martial Spirit.--The love of war is very marked in Anglo-Saxon
poetry. This characteristic might have been expected in the songs of a
race that had withstood the well-nigh all-conquering arm of the vast
Roman Empire.

Our study of _Beowulf_ has already shown the intensity of the martial
spirit in heathen times. These lines from the _Fight at Finnsburg_,
dating from about the same time as _Beowulf_, have only the flash of
the sword to lighten their gloom. They introduce the raven, for whom
the Saxon felt it his duty to provide food on the battlefield:--

"...hraefen wandrode
sweart and sealo-br=un; swurd-l=eoma st=od
swylce eal Finns-buruh f=yrenu w=aere."

...the raven wandered
Swart and sallow-brown; the sword-flash stood
As if all Finnsburg were afire.

The love of war is almost as marked in the Christian poetry. There are
vivid pictures of battle against the heat