第37章

"Not far off is an island rising in delicate slopes, hiding treasure in its hills and ware of its rich booty.Here a noble pile is kept by the occupant of the mount, who is a snake wreathed in coils, doubled in many a fold, and with tail drawn out in winding whorls, shaking his manifold spirals and shedding venom.If thou wouldst conquer him, thou must use thy shield and stretch thereon bulls' hides, and cover thy body with the skins of kine, nor let thy limbs lie bare to the sharp poison; his slaver burns up what it bespatters.Though the three-forked tongue flicker and leap out of the gaping mouth, and with awful yawn menace ghastly wounds remember to keep the dauntless temper of thy mind; nor let the point of the jagged tooth trouble thee, nor the starkness of the beast, nor the venom spat from the swift throat.Though the force of his scales spurn thy spears, yet know there is a place under his lowest belly whither thou mayst plunge the blade; aim at this with thy sword, and thou shalt probe the snake to his centre.Thence go fearless up to the hill, drive the mattock, dig and ransack the holes; soon fill thy pouch with treasure, and bring back to the shore thy craft laden."Frode believed, and crossed alone to the island, loth to attack the beast with any stronger escort than that wherewith it was the custom for champions to attack.When it had drunk water and was repairing to its cave, its rough and sharp hide spurned the blow of Frode's steel.Also the darts that he flung against it rebounded idly, foiling the effort of the thrower.But when the hard back yielded not a whit, he noted the belly heedfully, and its softness gave entrance to the steel.The beast tried to retaliate by biting, but only struck the sharp point of its mouth upon the shield.Then it shot out its flickering tongue again and again, and gasped away life and venom together.

The money which the King found made him rich; and with this supply he approached in his fleet the region of the Kurlanders, whose king Dorn, dreading a perilous war, is said to have made a speech of the following kind to his soldiers:

"Nobles! Our enemy is a foreigner, begirt with the arms and the wealth of almost all the West; let us, by endeavouring to defer the battle for our profit, make him a prey to famine, which is all inward malady; and he will find it very hard to conquer a peril among his own people.It is easy to oppose the starving.

Hunger will be a better weapon against our foe than arms; famine will be the sharpest lance we shall hurl at him.For lack of food nourishes the pestilence that eats away men's strength, and lack of victual undermines store of weapons.Let this whirl the spears while we sit still; let this take up the prerogative and the duty of fighting.Unimperilled, we shall be able to imperil others; we can drain their blood and lose no drop of ours.One may defeat an enemy by inaction.Who would not rather fight safely than at a loss? Who would strive to suffer chastisement when he may contend unhurt? Our success in arms will be more prosperous if hunger joins battle first.Let hunger captain us, and so let us take the first chance of conflict.Let it decide the day in our stead, and let our camp remain free from the stir of war; if hunger retreat beaten, we must break off idleness.He who is fresh easily overpowers him who is shaken with languor.

The hand that is flaccid and withered will come fainter to the battle.He whom any hardship has first wearied, will bring slacker hands to the steel.When he that is wasted with sickness engages with the sturdy, the victory hastens.Thus, undamaged ourselves, we shall be able to deal damage to others."Having said this, he wasted all the places which he saw would be hard to protect, distrusting his power to guard them, and he so far forestalled the ruthlessness of the foe in ravaging his own land, that he left nothing untouched which could be seized by those who came after.Then he shut up the greater part of his forces in a town of undoubted strength, and suffered the enemy to blockade him.Frode, distrusting his power of attacking this town, commanded several trenches of unwonted depth to be made within the camp, and the earth to be secretly carried out in baskets and cast quietly into the river bordering the walls.

Then he had a mass of turf put over the trenches to hide the trap: wishing to cut off the unwary enemy by tumbling them down headlong, and thinking that they would be overwhelmed unawares by the slip of the subsiding earth.Then he feigned a panic, and proceeded to forsake the camp for a short while.The townsmen fell upon it, missed their footing everywhere, rolled forward into the pits, and were massacred by him under a shower of spears.