“And I was born in mountains where
The highland heroes wield the spear.
My war-ships, fear’d by men of flocks,
I guide across the ocean-rocks,
And long o’er ocean’s waves have bounded,
And many an ocean-isle surrounded.
Yet Gardar’s Gerda—gold-ring’d maid!
Flings scorn upon the hero’s head.”
It had before been translated by several writers, especially by Mr. Herbert, in a very different manner: that gentleman, however, had not seen the original Knytlinga Saga.
[141]. In the original—the planks—the keel.