ey got them a passage with Bard the black, and Olaf Kettle's son
of Elda; and it is the talk of the whole country that all the better men
in that district were leaving it.

By this time Gunnar's sons, Hogni and Grani, were grown up; they were
men of very different turn of mind. Grani had much of his mother's
temper, but Hogni was kind and good.

Gunnar made men bear down the wares of his brother and himself to the
ship, and when all Gunnar's baggage had come down, and the ship was all
but "boun," then Gunnar rides to Bergthorsknoll, and to other homesteads
to see men, and thanked them all for the help they had given him.

The day after he gets ready early for his journey to the ship, and told
all his people that he would ride away for good and all, and men took
that much to heart, but still they said that they looked to his coming
back afterwards.

Gunnar threw his arms round each of the household when he was "boun,"
and every one of them went out of doors with him; he leans on the butt
of his spear and leaps into the saddle, and he and Kolskegg ride away.

They ride down along Markfleet, and just then Gunnar's horse tripped and
threw him off. He turned with his face up towards the Lithe and the
homestead at Lithend, and said--

"Fair is the Lithe; so fair that it has never seemed to me so fair; the
corn fields are white to harvest, and the home mead is mown; and now I
will ride back home, and not fare abroad at all."

"Do not this joy to thy foes," says Kolskegg, "by breaking thy atonement,
for no man could think thou wouldst do thus, and thou mayst be sure that
all will happen as Njal has said."

"I will not go away any whither," says Gunnar, "and so I would thou
shouldest do too."

"That shall not be," says Kolskegg; "I will never do a base thing in
this, nor in anything else which is left to my good faith; and this is
that one thing that could tear us asunder; but tell this to my kinsmen
and to my mother, that I never mean to see Iceland again, for I shall
soon learn that thou art dead, brother, and then there will be nothing
left to bring me back."

So they parted there and then. Gunnar rides home to Lithend, but
Kolskegg rides to the ship, and goes abroad.

Hallgerda was glad to see Gunnar when he came home, but his mother said
little or nothing.

Now Gunnar sits at home that fall and winter, and had not many men with
him.

Now the winter leaves the farmyard. Olaf the peacock asked Gunnar and
Hall