en granted under the name of the cup, said:
"If I have taken more than thou gavest, or if I am rash to keep the
whole, let me at least get some." The king saw his mistake in his
promise, and gave him the maiden, being loth to undo his heedlessness
by fickleness, and that the weight of his pledge might seem the greater;
though it is held an act more of ripe judgment than of unsteadfastness
to take back a foolish promise.

Then, taking from Erik security that he would return, he sent him to the
ships; for the time appointed for the battle was at hand. Erik and his
men went on to the sea, then covered near with ice; and, thanks to the
stability of their sandals, felled the enemy, whose footing was slippery
and unsteady. For Frode had decreed that no man should help either side
if it wavered or were distressed. Then he went back in triumph to the
king. So Gotwar, sorrowing at the destruction of her children who had
miserably perished, and eager to avenge them, announced that it would
please her to have a flyting with Erik, on condition that she should
gage a heavy necklace and he his life; so that if he conquered he should
win gold, but if he gave in, death. Erik agreed to the contest, and the
gage was deposited with Gunwar. So Gotwar began thus:

"Quando tuam limas admissa cote bipennem,
Nonne terit tremulas mentula quassa nates?"

Erik rejoined:

"Ut cuivis natura pilos in corpore sevit,
Omnis nempe suo barba ferenda loco est.
Re Veneris homines artus agitare necesse est;
Motus quippe suos nam labor omnis habet.
Cum natis excipitur nate, vel cum subdita penem
Vulva capit, quid ad haec addere mas renuit?"

Powerless to answer this, Gotwar had to give the gold to the man
whom she had meant to kill, and thus wasted a lordly gift instead of
punishing the slayer of her son. For her ill fate was crowned, instead
of her ill-will being avenged. First bereaved, and then silenced
by furious words, she lost at once her wealth and all reward of her
eloquence. She made the man blest who had taken away her children, and
enriched her bereaver with a present: and took away nothing to make up
the slaughter of her sons save the reproach of ignorance and the loss of
goods. Westmar, when he saw this, determined to attack the man by force,
since he was the stronger of tongue, and laid down the condition that
the reward of the conqueror should be the death of the conquered, so
that the life of bot