The University Press, Cambridge , U.S.A.
When Alcuin taught the sons of Charlemagne,
In the free schools of Aix, how kings should rule.
LONGFELLOW.
To the Memory ? of ? My Mother
All the chapter headings of this story are taken from lays which
were sung by harpers and skalds before the high-seats of heathen
Norse chiefs and in the halls of the Anglo-Saxon kings, while
England was yet a heptarchy and the name of Mohammed but little
known to men even on the shores of the far-distant Bosphorus.
In most instances the selections are from Magnusson and
Morris's beautiful translations of "The Volsunga Saga, and Certain
Songs from the Elder Edda." The spirited lines from "Beowulf,"
"Maldon," "Finnesburh," and "Andreas" were found in Gummerle's
"Germanic Origins." The translation of "Brunanburh" is by
Tennyson.
Apology is due for occasional alterations and elisions, all of
which will readily be detected by students of the wonderful poetic
fragments which have come down to us from our Norse and
