One great mass after another seemed to float by them; but it was the dead hour of the night, and no sounds were heard from the sleeping crews. They kept lax watch, because they had no foe to dread. There was, alas! no English fleet.
One after another, until they had drifted into the centre of the fleet, where discovery must have been instant death. There above them rose the "Great Dragon," in all her hideous beauty, the gilded serpent reposing on the placid waves. Her people, even at that untimely hour, were engaged in revelry, and as they passed by the fugitives heard the words:
"Now the warrior's cup of joy was full,
When he drank the blood of his foe,
Where the slain lay thick on the gory hill,
And torrents of blood from every rill
reddened the river below,
For Odin's hall is the Northman's heaven--"
But they heard no more, for they had drifted beyond hearing.
They had now attained the last ship, when suddenly a watchman sprang to the side.
"Boat ahoy! Whence and where?"
"From the 'Great Dragon'--a poor gleeman and his attendant to his home on the shore."
"Come on board then, and wake us with a song. The watch is ours, and we will make it merry."
There was no help for it; and commending courage with a significant look to his companion, the gleeman and Alfgar ascended. It was yet dark, and the language and appearance of each might pass tolerably under ordinary circumstances for the characters they had assumed.
"Now a song, and we will keep it up till daylight."