Kolbeinsstad and out to Borgarhraun.
By that time he had nothing left on him but his shirt, and was terribly
exhausted. Grettir still followed, keeping now within reach of him.
He pulled off a great branch. Gisli did not stop till he reached
Haffjardara river, which was all swollen and difficult to ford. Gisli
was going right out into the river when Grettir pressed forward and
seized him and showed him the difference in their strength.
Grettir got him down, sat on the top of him and asked: "Are you the
Gisli who wanted to meet Grettir?"
"I have found him now," he answered; "but I know not how I shall part
with him. Keep what you have taken and let me go free."
Grettir said: "You will not understand what I am going to tell you, so
I must give you something to remember it by." Then he pulled up Gisli's
shirt over his head and let the rod play on both sides of his back.
Gisli struggled to get away, but Grettir gave him a sound whipping and
then let him go. Gisli thought that he would sooner not learn anything
from Grettir than have another such flogging, nor did he do anything
more to earn it. Directly he got his feet under him again he ran off to
a large pool and swam across the river. In the evening he reached the
settlement called Hrossholt, very exhausted. There he lay for a week,
his body covered with blisters, and afterwards went on to his own place.
Grettir turned back, gathered up all the things which Gisli had thrown
away and took them home. Gisli never got them back again; many thought
he had only got what he deserved for his noisy boasting. Grettir made a
verse about their encounter:
"The horse whose fighting teeth are blunted
runs from the field before his foe.
With many an afterthought ran Gisli.
Gone is his fame, his glory lost!"
In the spring after this Gisli prepared to go on board his ship and
forbade in the strongest terms anything which belonged to him being
carried South by the way of the mountains; for he said that the Fiend
himself was there. Gisli when he went South to join his ship kept
all the way along the coast and he never met Grettir again. Nobody
considered him worth thinking about, nor do we hear any more of him in
this saga. Grettir's relations with Thord the son of Kolbeinn became
worse than ever, and Thord tried every means to get Grettir driven away
or killed.
CHAPTER LX. THE BATTLE WITH THE MYRAMEN
When Grettir had been two winters in Fag
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