Now will I spur again my wit, and use Poetic skill to weave words into song, Telling of one among the race of fish, The great asp-turtle. Men who sail the sea Often unwillingly encounter him, Dread preyer on mankind. His name we know, The ocean-swimmer, Fastitocalon. Dun, like rough stone in color, as he floats He seems a heaving bank of reedy grass Along the shore, with rolling dunes behind, So that sea-wanderers deem their gaze has found An island. Boldly then their high-prowed ships They moor with cables to that shore, a land That is no land. Still floating on the waves, Their ocean-coursers curvet at the marge; * * * * * This time I will with poetic art rehearse, by means of words and wit, a poem about a kind of fish, the great sea-monster which is often unwillingly met, terrible and cruel-hearted to seafarers, yea, to every man; this swimmer of the ocean-streams is known as the asp-turtle. His appearance is like that of a rough boulder, as if there were tossing by the shore a great ocean-reedbank begirt with sand-dunes, so that seamen imagine they are gazing upon an island, and moor their high-prowed ships with cables to that false land, make fast the ocean-coursers at the sea's end, and, bold of heart, climb up * * * * * and þonne in þæt ēglond ūp gewītað collenfer[_h_]þe; cēolas stondað bi staþe fæste strēame biwunden. Ðonne gewīciað wērigfer[_h_]ðe, 20 faroðlācende, frēcnes ne wēnað. On þām ēalonde ǣled weccað, hēah fyr ǣlað. Hæleþ bēoþ on wynnum, rēonigmōde, ræste gel[y]ste. Þonne gefēleð fācnes cræftig 25 þæt him þā fērend on fæste wuniaþ, wīc weardiað, wedres on luste, ðonne semninga on sealtne wǣg mid þā nōþe niþer gewīteþ, gārsecges gæst, grund gesēceð, 30 and þonne in dēaðsele drence bifæsteð scipu mid scealcum. Swā bið scinn[_en_]a þēaw, dēofla wīse, þæt hī droht[i]ende þurh dyrne meaht duguðe beswīcað, and on teosu tyhtaþ tilra dǣda, 35 wēmað on willan, þæt hȳ wraþe sēcen, * * * * *