laughing, shouted, 'Odin's sons, be still!
Count it no sin to battle with high gods!
Great-hearted they! They give the blow and take!
To Odin who was ever leal as I?'
As sudden as it rose the tumult fell:
So ceased the storm without: but with it ceased
The rapture and the madness, and the shout:
The wine-cup still made circuit; but the song
Froze in mid-air. Strange shadow hung o'er all:
Neighbour to neighbour whispered: courtiers slid
Through doors scarce open. Rumour had arrived,
If true or false none knew.
The morrow morn
From Penda's court the bravest fled in fear,
Questioning with white lips, 'Will he slay his son?'
Or skulked at distance. Penda by the throat
Catching a white-cheeked courtier, cried: 'The truth!
What whisper they in corners?' On his knees
That courtier made confession. Penda then,
'Live, since my son is yet a living man!
A Christian, say'st thou? Let him serve his Christ!
That man whom ever most I scorned is he
Who vows him to the service of some god,
Yet breaks his laws; for that man walks, a lie.
My son shall live, and after me shall reign:
Northumbrian realm shall die!'
Thus Penda spake
And sent command from tower and town to blow
Instant the trumpet of his last of wars,
Fanning from Odin's hall with airs ice-cold
Of doom the foes of Odin. 'Man nor child,'
He sware,'henceforth shall tread Northumbrian soil,
Nor hart nor hind: I spare the creeping worm:
My scavenger is he,' The Mercian realm
Rose at his call, innumerable mass
Of warriors iron-armed. East Anglia sent
Her hosts in aid. Apostate Ethelwald,
Though Oswy's nephew, joined the hostile league,
And thirty chiefs beside that ruled by right
Princedom or province. Mightier far than these
Old Cambria, brooding o'er the ancestral wrong,
The Saxon's sin original, met his call,
And vowed her to the vengeance.
Bravest hearts
Hate most the needless slaughter. Oswy mused:
'Long since too much of blood is on this hand:
Shall I for pride or passion risk once more
Northumbria, my mother;--rudely stain
Her pretty babes with blood?' To Penda then,
Camped on the confines of the adverse realms,
He sent an embassage of reverend men,
Warriors and prie