Grettir the Outlaw 1

Grettir the Outlaw 1

Grettir the Outlaw

A Story of Iceland

Author: S. Baring-Gould

*PREFACE.*

 

 

TO MY YOUNG READERS.

 

 

It is now just thirty years since I first began to read the "Saga of

Grettir the Strong" in Icelandic. At that time I had only a Danish

grammar of Icelandic and an Icelandic-Danish dictionary, and I did not

know a word of Danish. So I had to learn Danish in order to learn

Icelandic.

 

It was laborious work making out the Saga, and every line when I began

took me some time to understand. Moreover, I had not much time at my

disposal, for then I was a master in a school.

 

Now, after I had worked a little way into the Saga, I became intensely

interested in it myself, and it struck me that my boys whom I taught

might like to hear about Grettir. So I tried every day to translate,

after school hours, a chapter, hardly ever more at first, and sometimes

not even as much as that. Then, when on half-holidays I proposed a walk

to some of my scholars, they were keen to hear the story of Grettir.

Well, Grettir went on for some months in this way, a fresh instalment of

the tale coming every half-holiday, and it was really wonderful how

interested and delighted the boys were with the story. Nor was I less

so; the labour of translation which was so great at first became rapidly

lighter, and I was as much interested in the adventures of the hero as

were the boys. The other day I met an old pupil of mine, and almost the

first thing he said to me was: "Oh! do you remember Grettir? Thirty

years ago! Fancy! I am a married man and have boys of my own, and I

have often tried to tell them the story which made such an impression on

me, but I cannot remember all the incidents nor their order. I do wish

you would write it as a story for boys. I should like to read it myself

again, and my boys would love it." "Very well," I said, "I will do so."

 

Now my boy readers must understand that I have told them the story in my

own words and in my own way. I went to Iceland in 1861, and went over

nearly every bit of the ground made famous by the adventures of Grettir.

Consequently, I am able to help out and illustrate the tale by what I

actually saw. In the original book there is a great deal more than I

have attempted to retell, but much has to do with the ancestors of

Grettir, and there are other incidents introduced of no great importance

and very confusing to the memory. So I have taken the leading points in

the story, and given them.

 

S. BARING-GOULD.

 

 

 

 

*CONTENTS.*

 

CHAP.

 

I. Winter Tales

II. How Grettir played on the Ice

III. Of the Ride to Thingvalla

IV. The Doom-day

V. The Voyage

VI. The Red Rovers

VII. The Story of the Sword

VIII. Of the Bear

IX. The Slaying of Biorn

X. Of Grettir’s Return

XI. The Horse-fight

XII. Of the Fight at the Neck

XIII. How Grettir and Audun made Friends

XIV. The Vale of Shadows

XV. How Grettir fought with Glam

XVI. How Grettir Sailed to Norway

XVII. The Hostel-burning

XVIII. The Ordeal by Fire

XIX. The Winter in Norway

XX. Of what Befell at Biarg

XXI. The Return of Grettir

XXII. The Slaying of Oxmain

XXIII. At Learwood

XXIV. The Foster-brothers

XXV. How Grettir was well nigh Hung

XXVI. In the Desert

XXVII. On the Great Eagle Lake

XXVIII. On the Fell

XXIX. The Fight on the River

XXX. A Mysterious Vale

XXXI. The Death of Hallmund

XXXII. Of Another Attempt against Grettir

XXXIII. At Sandheaps

XXXIV. How Grettir was Driven About

XXXV. On the Isle

XXXVI. Of Grettir on Heron-ness

XXXVII. Of Hœring’s Leap

XXXVIII. Of the Attempt made by Grettir’s Friends

XXXIX. Of the Old Hag

XL. How the Log came to Drangey

XLI. The End of the Outlaw

XLII. How Asdis received the News

XLIII. How Dromund kept his Word

 

Epilogue

 

 

 

 

*ILLUSTRATIONS.*

 

 

Thorkell and the outlawed Grettir leave the Assize, _Frontis_.

 

Grettir challenges Kormak and his Party

 

Grettir defends Himself from the Mob

 

Grettir attacked in the Rift by Thorir’s Party

 

Fording the quivering flood

 

Illugi defends the dying Grettir

 

 

 

 

[Illustration: PEDIGREE OF THE FAMILY OF ASMUND OF BIARG]

 

 

 

 

*GRETTIR THE OUTLAW.*

 

 

 

*CHAPTER I.*

 

*WINTER TALES.*

 

 

_The Birthplace of Grettir—The Peopling of Iceland—A History of

Quarrels—Stories Round the Hearth—Biarg—The Great Blue Bay—The

Boy Grettir—The Saga of Onund Treefoot—The Northern Pirates—The

Fight with King Harald—Onund’s Wound—After the Battle_

 

 

It was night—drawing on to midnight—in summer, that I who write this

book arrived at the little lonely farm of Biarg, on the Middle River, in

the north of Iceland. It was night, near on midnight, and yet I could

hardly call it night, for the sky overhead was full of light of the

clearest amethyst, and every stock and stone was distinctly visible.

Across the valley rose a rugged moor, and above its shoulder a snow-clad

mountain, turned to rosy gold by the night sun. As I stood there

watching the mist form on the cold river in the vale below, all at once

I heard a strange sound like horns blowing far away in the sky, and

looking up, I saw a train of swans flying from west to east, bathed in

sunlight, their wings of silver, and their feathers as gold.

 

I had come all the way from England to see Biarg, for there was born,

about the year A.D. 997, a man called Grettir, whose history I had read,

and which interested me so much that I was resolved to see his native

home, and the principal scenes where his stormy life was passed.

 

The landscape was the same as that on which Grettir’s childish eyes had

looked more than eight hundred and fifty years ago. The same outline of

dreary moor, the same snowy ridge of mountain standing above it,

catching the midnight summer sun, the same mist forming over the river;

but the house was altogether different. Now there stood only a poor

heap of farm-buildings, erected of turf and wood, where had once been a

noble hall of wood, with carved gable-ends, surrounded by many

out-houses.

 

Before we begin on the story of Grettir, it will be well to say a few words about its claim to be history.