Besides the _Paraphrase_ we have a few fragments of the same general character which are attributed to the school of Cædmon. The longest of these is _Judith_, in which the story of an apocryphal book of the Old Testament is done into vigorous poetry. Holofernes is represented as a savage and cruel Viking, reveling in his mead hall; and when the heroic Judith cuts off his head with his own sword and throws it down before the warriors of her people, rousing them to battle and victory, we reach perhaps the most dramatic and brilliant point of Anglo-Saxon literature. CYNEWULF (Eighth Century) Of Cynewulf, greatest of the Anglo-Saxon poets, excepting only the unknown author of _Beowulf_, we know very little. Indeed, it was not till 1840, more than a thousand years after his death, that even his name became known. Though he is the only one of our early poets who signed his works, the name was never plainly written, but woven into the verses in the form of secret runes,[32] suggesting a modern charade, but more difficult of interpretation until one has found the key to the poet's signature. WORKS OF CYNEWULF. The only signed poems of Cynewulf are _The Christ, Juliana, The Fates of the Apostles_, and _Elene_. Unsigned poems attributed to him or his school are _Andreas_, the _Phoenix_, the _Dream of the Rood_, the _Descent into Hell_, _Guthlac_, the _Wanderer_, and some of the Riddles. The last are simply literary conundrums in which some well-known object, like the bow or drinking horn, is described in poetic language, and the hearer must guess the name. Some of them, like "The Swan"[33] and "The Storm Spirit," are unusually beautiful. Of all these works the most characteristic is undoubtedly _The Christ_, a didactic poem in three parts: the first celebrating the Nativity; the second, the Ascension; and the third, "Doomsday," telling the torments of the wicked and the unending joy of the redeemed. Cynewulf takes his subject-matter partly from the Church liturgy, but more largely from the homilies of Gregory the Great. The whole is well woven together, and contains some hymns of great beauty and many passages of intense dramatic force. Throughout the poem a deep love for Christ and a reverence for the Virgin Mary are manifest. More than any other poem in any language, _The Christ_ reflects the spirit of early Latin Christianity. Here is a fragment comparing life to a sea voyage,--a comparison which occurs sooner or later to every thoughtful person, and which finds perfect expression in Tennyson's "Crossing the Bar."