hip to ship at
least, if our foe was larger and higher and swifter than ours; for
I thought that he would hardly have a crew like mine.

We up helm and stood away on the new course the foe had taken,
leaving the crippled ship astern very fast. And now we began to
edge up towards the other vessel, meaning to go about under her
stern, and so shoot to windward of her on the other tack. But then
I thought of a plan which might help us in the fighting. There had
seemed little order and much shouting on board the ship we had left
when her sail fell, and maybe there was the same want of discipline
here.

"Out oars, men! Keep them swinging, but put no weight on them. Let
them pull after us and tire themselves. I have a mind to see how
our dragon looks on yonder high stem head."

The men laughed grimly, and the oars were run out. One called to
me:

"Maybe they beat us in sailing, king; we can teach them somewhat in
weapon play."

"See how they get their oars out," said Kolgrim, with a sour grin;
"a set of lubbers they are."

One by one, and in no order, the long oars were being got to work.
The great ship was half as long again as ours, pulling twenty-eight
oars a side to our twenty. But while ours rose and fell as if
worked by one man, theirs were pulled anyhow, as one might say.

"Better are they at sailing than rowing," said Thord.

Nevertheless they flew down on us, and that because we only made a
show of rowing.

Then we laid on the oars, and came head to wind. The sail rattled
down, and was stowed on deck; and silently we waited, arrows on
string, for the fight that was now close at hand.

Then the great ship hove up, head to wind, right ahead of us, and a
loud hail came from her.

"Who knows what tongue he talks?" I said. "I cannot make him out
rightly."

"'Tis West Saxon," said an old warrior from the waist. "He asks who
we are and what is our business."

"Tell him therefore, if you can speak in his way," I answered; "and
ask the same of him."

So a hail or two went backwards and forwards, and then:

"Says he is Odda, jarl or somewhat of Devon in Wessex, and bids us
yield to Alfred the king."

"In truth," said I, "if he had not spoken of yielding, I had had
more to say to a king who can build ships like these. Now we will
speak with him on his own deck. Tell him he will have to fight us
first."

The old warrior sent a mighty curt hail back in answer to Odda's
summons; then our war horns blew, an