be troubled by these hateful monsters, but
that the ploughers might plough, and the shepherds might lead their
sheep, and brave men might sleep at night, without fear any more of
Grendel and his mother."

"Oh, father!" said Milly, breathlessly, when he stopped. "Is that all?"

But Olly sat quite still, without speaking, gazing at his father with
wide open brown eyes, and a face as grave and terrified as if Grendel
were actually beside him.

"That's all for this time," said Mr. Norton. "Why, Olly, where are your
little wits gone to? Did it frighten you, old man?"

"Oh!" said Olly, drawing a long breath. "I did think he would never have
comed up out of that bog!"

"It was splendid," said Milly. "But, father, I don't understand about
that pool. Why didn't Beowulf get drowned when he went down under the
water?"

"The story doesn't tell us anything about that," said Mr. Norton. "But
heroes in those days, Milly, must have had something magical about them
so that they were able to do things that men and women can't do now. Do
you know, children, that this story that you have been listening to is
more than a thousand years old? Can you fancy that?"

"No," said Milly, shaking her head. "I can't fancy it a bit, father.
It's too long. It makes me puzzled to think of so many years."

"Years and years and years and _years_!" said Olly. "When father's
grandfather was a little boy."

Mr. Norton laughed. "Can't you think of anything farther back than that,
Olly? It would take a great many grandfathers, and grandfathers'
grandfathers, to get back to the time when the story of Beowulf was
made. And here am I telling it to you just in the same way as fathers
used to tell it to their children a thousand years ago."

"I suppose the children liked it so, they wouldn't let their fathers
forget it," said Milly. "And then when they grew up they told it to
their children. I shall tell it to my children when I grow up. I think I
shall tell it to Katie to-morrow."

"Father," said Olly, "did Beowulf die--ever?"

"Yes. When he was quite an old man he had another great fight with a
dragon, who was guarding a cave full of golden treasure on the
sea-shore; and though he killed the dragon, the dragon gave him a
terrible wound, so that when his friends came to look for him they found
him lying all but dead in the cave. He was just able to tell them to
make a great mound of earth over him when he was dead, on a high rock
close by, that sail