Whole from the column."

Saemund's Edda (Thorpe's tr.).

The giant's wife, however, prevailed upon her husband to welcome
Tyr and Thor, and he slew three oxen for their refection; but
great was his dismay to see the thunder-god eat two of these for
his supper. Muttering that he would have to go fishing early the
next morning to secure a breakfast for so voracious a guest, the
giant retired to rest, and when at dawn the next day he went down
to the shore, he was joined by Thor, who said that he had come to
help him. The giant bade him secure his own bait, whereupon Thor
coolly slew his host's largest ox, Himinbrioter (heaven-breaker),
and cutting off its head, he embarked with it and proceeded to row
far out to sea. In vain Hymir protested that his usual fishing-ground
had been reached, and that they might encounter the terrible Midgard
snake were they to venture any farther; Thor persistently rowed on,
until he fancied they were directly above this monster.

"On the dark bottom of the great salt lake,
Imprisoned lay the giant snake,
With naught his sullen sleep to break."

Thor's Fishing, Oehlenschlaeger (Pigott's tr.).

Baiting his powerful hook with the ox head, Thor angled for
Ioermungandr, while the giant meantime drew up two whales, which seemed
to him to be enough for an early morning meal. He was about to propose
to return, therefore, when Thor suddenly felt a jerk, and began pulling
as hard as he could, for he knew by the resistance of his prey, and the
terrible storm created by its frenzied writhings, that he had hooked
the Midgard snake. In his determined efforts to force the snake to rise
to the surface, Thor braced his feet so strongly against the bottom
of the boat that he went through it and stood on the bed of the sea.

After an indescribable struggle, the monster's terrible venom-breathing
head appeared, and Thor, seizing his hammer, was about to annihilate
it when the giant, frightened by the proximity of Ioermungandr, and
fearing lest the boat should sink and he should become the monster's
prey, cut the fishing-line, and thus allowed the snake to drop back
like a stone to the bottom of the sea.

"The knife prevails: far down beneath the main
The serpent, spent with toil and pain,
To the bottom sank again."

Thor's Fishing, Oehlenschlaeger (Pigott's tr.).

Angry with Hymir for his inopportune interference, Thor dealt him