[The Danish History<br> Books I-IX by Saxo Grammaticus (Saxo the Learned)]@TWC D-Link book
The Danish History
Books I-IX

BOOK ONE
19/47

But she paid the penalty of this act, presently being torn in pieces by her kindred of the same stock; nor did her constitution or her bodily size help her against feeling the attacks of her foes' claws.
Hadding, thus bereft of his foster-mother, chanced to be made an ally in a solemn covenant to a rover, Lysir, by a certain man of great age that had lost an eye, who took pity on his loneliness.

Now the ancients, when about to make a league, were wont to besprinkle their footsteps with blood of one another, so to ratify their pledge of friendship by reciprocal barter of blood.

Lysir and Hadding, being bound thus in the strictest league, declared war against Loker, the tyrant of the Kurlanders.

They were defeated; and the old man aforementioned took Hadding, as he fled on horseback, to his own house, and there refreshed him with a certain pleasant draught, telling him that he would find himself quite brisk and sound in body.

This prophetic advice he confirmed by a song as follows: "As thou farest hence, a foe, thinking thee a deserter, will assail thee, that he may keep thee bound and cast thee to be devoured by the mangling jaws of beasts.


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