So sang the bard and ceased; his work was done: Abroad the tempest burst. 'Twas not his songs Alone that raised it! Memories which they waked, Memories of childhood, fainter year by year, Tripled his might. Meantime a Saxon priest Potential there, bent low, with eye-brow arched, O'er Eardulf's ear, Eardulf old warrior famed, And whispered long, and as he whispered glanced Oft at Birinus. Keen of eye the King, The action noting well, the aim divined, And thus to Offa near him spake, low-toned: 'The full-fed priest of Odin sends a sword To slay that naked babe he hates so sore, The Faith of Christ!' Rising with fiery face And thundering hand that shook the banquet board Eardulf began: '"Ye are not what ye were!" So saith our stranger kinsman from the north, A man plain-tongued; I would that all were such! Lords, and my King, this stranger speaks the truth! I tell you too, we are not what we were: Nor lengthened trail he hunts who seeks the cause. Lo, there the cause among us! Man from Rome! I ask who sent thee hither? From the first Rome and our native races stand at war; Her hope was this, to make our sons like hers Liars and slaves, our daughters false and vile, And, thus subverted, rule our land and us. Frustrate in war, now sends she forth her priests In peaceful gown to sap the manly hearts Her sword but manlier made. Ho, Wessex men! Ye see your foe! My counsel, Lords, is this: The worm that stings us tread we to the earth, Then spurn it from our coasts!' Ere ceased the acclaim Subdued and soft the Pagan pontiff rose, And three times half retired, as one who yields His betters place; and thrice, answering the call, Advanced, and leaning stood: at last he spake, Sweet-voiced, not loud; 'Ye Wessex Earls and Thanes, I stand here but as witness, not as judge; Ye are the judges. Late ye heard--yea, twice-- Words strange and new; "Ye are not what ye were!" I witness this; things are not what they were; For round me as I roll these sorrowing eyes, Now old and dim--perchance the fault is theirs-- They find no longer, ranged along your walls Amid the deep-dyed trophies of old time, That chiefest of your Standards, lost, men say, In that ill-omened battle lost which wrecked But late our Wessex kingdom. Odin's wrath-- I spare to task your time and patience, Lords, Enforcing truth which every urchin knows-- 'Twas Odin shamed his foe! Ah Cynegils! What made thee Odin's foe? Our friend was he! Base tolerance first, connivance next, then worse, Favoured that Faith perfidious! Stood and stands A bow-shot hence that church the strangers built; Their church, their font! The strangers, who are they? Snake-like and supple, winding on and on