swylce oncȳððe ealle gebētte,
inwid-sorge, þe hīe ǣr drugon
ǫnd for þrēa-nȳdum þolian scoldon,
torn unlȳtel. Þæt wæs tācen sweotol,
835 syððan hilde-dēor hǫnd ālęgde,
earm ǫnd eaxle (þǣr wæs eal geador
Gręndles [grāpe]) under gēapne hrōf.
[740.] þæt, the direct object of yldan, refers to the contest about to ensue. Beowulf, in the preceding lines, was wondering how it would result.
[746.] ætstōp. The subject of this verb and of nam is Grendel; the subject of the three succeeding verbs (rǣhte, onfēng, gesæt) is Beowulf.
[751-52.] The O.E. poets are fond of securing emphasis or of stimulating interest by indirect methods of statement, by suggesting more than they affirm. This device often appears in their use of negatives (ne, [l. 13]; [p. 140, l. 3]; nō, [p. 140, l. 1]), and in the unexpected prominence that they give to some minor detail usually suppressed because understood; as where the narrator, wishing to describe the terror produced by Grendel’s midnight visits to Heorot, says (ll. 138-139), “Then was it easy to find one who elsewhere, more commodiously, sought rest for himself.” It is hard to believe that the poet saw nothing humorous in this point of view.