eemed these things imported much, and asked him what
man he was in good sooth. So he told her the truth, and prayed that
the priest might be fetched, for that he would fain see him: and so it
was done.

But when Stein the priest came to Sand-heaps, he knew forthwith, that
thither was come Grettir Asmundson, under the name of Guest.

So the priest asked what he deemed had become of those men who had
vanished; and Grettir said that he thought they would have gone into
the gulf: the priest said that he might not trow that, if no signs
could be seen thereof: then said Grettir that later on that should be
known more thoroughly. So the priest went home.

Grettir lay many nights a-bed, and the mistress did well to him, and
so Yule-tide wore.

Now Grettir's story is that the troll-wife cast herself into the gulf
when she got her wound; but the men of Bard-dale say that day dawned
on her, while they wrestled, and that she burst, when he cut the arm
from her; and that there she stands yet on the cliff, a rock in the
likeness of a woman.

Now the dale-dwellers kept Grettir in hiding there; but in the winter
after Yule, Grettir fared to Isledale-river, and when he met the
priest, he said, "Well, priest, I see that thou hadst little faith in
my tale; now will I, that thou go with me to the river, and see what
likelihood there is of that tale being true."

So the priest did; and when they came to the force-side, they saw a
cave up under the cliff; a sheer rock that cliff was, so great that in
no place might man come up thereby, and well-nigh fifty fathoms was it
down to the water. Now they had a rope with them, but the priest said:

"A risk beyond all measure, I deem it to go down here."

"Nay," said Grettir, "it is to be done, truly, but men of the greatest
prowess are meetest therefor: now will I know what is in the force,
but thou shall watch the rope."

The priest bade him follow his own rede, and drave a peg down into the
sward on the cliff, and heaped stones up over it, and sat thereby.

CHAP. LXVI.

<i>Of the Dweller in the Cave under the Force</i>.

Now it is to be told of Grettir that he set a stone in a bight of the
rope and let it sink down into the water.

"In what wise hast thou mind to go?" said the priest.

"I will not go bound into the force," said Grettir; "such things doth
my heart forebode."

With that he got ready for his journey, and was lightly clad, and girt
with the short-sword, and