Page:Poeticedda00belluoft.djvu/556

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Poetic Edda

Swift shall ye do it,  to serpents now cast him."
  Hogni spake:56.[1] "Do now as thou wilt,  for glad I await it,Brave shalt thou find me,  I have faced worse before;We held thee at bay  while whole we were fighting,Now with wounds are we spent,  so thy will canst thou work."
57.[2] Then did Beiti speak,  he was Atli's steward:"Let us seize now Hjalli,  and Hogni spare we!Let us fell the sluggard,  he is fit for death,He has lived too long,  and lazy men call him."
58.[3] Afraid was the pot-watcher,  he fled here and yon,And crazed with his terror  he climbed in the corners:
  1. ↑ The text of the first half of line 3 is somewhat uncertain, but the general meaning of it is clear enough.
  2. ↑ Beiti: not elsewhere mentioned. The Atlakvitha version of this episode (stanzas 23-25) does not mention Beiti, and in the Volsungasaga the advice to cut out Hjalli's heart instead of Hogni's is given by an unnamed "counsellor of Atli." In the Atlakvitha Hjalli is actually killed; the Volsungasaga combines the two versions by having Hjalli first let off at Hogni's intercession and then seized a second time and killed, thus introducing the Atlakvitha episode of the quaking heart (stanza 24). The text of the first half of line 3 is obscure, and there are many and widely varying suggestions as to the word here rendered "sluggard."
  3. ↑ Some editions mark line 5 as probably interpolated.

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