most ignominiously in
the face of the giver, and began again in a loud voice:

"Take hence, I pray thee, thy woman's gift, and set back thy headgear on
thy head; no brave man assumes the chaplets that befit Love only.

"For it is amiss that the hair of men that are ready for battle should
be bound back with wreathed gold; such attire is right for the throngs
of the soft and effeminate.

"But take this gift to thy husband, who loves luxury, whose finger
itches, while he turns over the rump and handles the flesh of the bird
roasted brown.

"The flighty and skittish wife of Ingild longs to observe the fashions
of the Teutons; she prepares the orgy and makes ready the artificial
dainties.

"For she tickles the palate with a new-fangled feast; she pursues the
zest of an unknown flavour, raging to load all the tables with dishes
yet more richly than before.

"She gives her lord wine to drink in bowls, pondering all things with
zealous preparation; she bids the cooked meats be roasted, and intends
them for a second fire.

"Wantonly she feeds her husband like a hog; a shameless whore,
trusting....

"She roasts the boiled, and recooks the roasted meats, planning the meal
with spendthrift extravagance, careless of right and wrong, practising
sin, a foul woman.

"Wanton in arrogance, a soldier of Love, longing for dainties, she
abjures the fair ways of self-control, and also provides devices for
gluttony.

"With craving stomach she desires turnip strained in a smooth pan, cakes
with thin juice, and shellfish in rows.

"I do not remember the Great Frode putting his hand to the sinews of
birds, or tearing the rump of a cooked fowl with crooked thumb.

"What former king could have been so gluttonous as to stir the stinking
filthy flesh, or rummage in the foul back of a bird with plucking
fingers?

"The food of valiant men is raw; no need, methinks, of sumptuous tables
for those whose stubborn souls are bent on warfare.

"It had been fitter for thee to have torn the stiff beard, biting hard
with thy teeth, than greedily to have drained the bowl of milk with thy
wide mouth.

"We fled from the offence of the sumptuous kitchen; we stayed our
stomach with rancid fare; few in the old days loved cooked juices.

"A dish with no sauce of herbs gave us the flesh of rams and swine. We
partook temperately, tainting nothing with bold excess.

"Thou who now lickest the milk-white fat, put on, prithee, the spirit of
a man;