The lord-friend of folk, from my father me took,
Held me and had me Hrethel the king,
Gave me treasure and feast, and remember'd the friendship.
For life thence I was not to him a whit loather,
A berne in his burgs than his bairns were, or each one,
Herebeald, or Hæthcyn, or Hygelac mine.
For the eldest there was in unseemly wise
By the mere deed of kinsman a murder-bed strawen,
Whenas him did Hæthcyn from out of his horn-bow,
His lord and his friend, with shaft lay alow: