For the battle began afresh by reason of the vast mass of the archers, and nothing damaged our men more.
But when Harald, being now blind with age, heard the lamentable murmur of his men, he perceived that fortune had smiled on his enemies.

So, as he was riding in a chariot armed with scythes, he told Brun, who was treacherously acting as charioteer, to find out in what manner Ring had his line drawn up.

Brun's face relaxed into something of a smile, and he answered that he was fighting with a line in the form of a wedge.
When the king heard this he began to be alarmed, and to ask in great astonishment from whom Ring could have learnt this method of disposing his line, especially as Odin was the discoverer and imparter of this teaching, and none but himself had ever learnt from him this new pattern of warfare.

At this Brun was silent, and it came into the king's mind that here was Odin, and that the god whom he had once known so well was now disguised in a changeful shape, in order either to give help or withhold it.

Presently he began to beseech him earnestly to grant the final victory to the Danes, since he had helped them so graciously before, and to fill up his last kindness to the measure of the first; promising to dedicate to him as a gift the spirits of all who fell.