But you will not tell me that the fine rugged epic of _Beowulf_, to which the historians trace back all that is noblest in our poetry, had lost its generative impulse even so early as Alfred's time.

That were too extravagant!" "_Brekekekex, ten brink, ten brink!_" snapped Brother Copas.
"All the frogs in chorus around Charon's boat! Fine rugged fiddlestick--have you ever read _Beowulf_ ?" "In translation only." "You need not be ashamed of labour saved.

I once spent a month or two in mastering Anglo-Saxon, having a suspicion of Germans when they talk about English literature, and a deeper suspicion of English critics who ape them.

Then I tackled _Beowulf_, and found it to be what I guessed--no rugged national epic at all, but a blown-out bag of bookishness.

Impulse?
Generative impulse ?--the thing is wind, I tell you, without sap or sinew, the production of some conscientious Anglo-Saxon whose blue eyes, no doubt, watered with the effort of inflating it.