of his arms. Alwin squatted down, his back planted against the fence,
the book open on his knees.

The reading-matter was attractive enough, with its glittering characters
and rose-tinted pages, and every initial letter inches high and shrined
in azure-blue traceries. But the splendor of the pictures!--no barbaric
heart could resist them. What if the straight lines were crooked,--if
the draperies were wooden,--the hands and the feet ungainly? They had
been drawn with sparkles of gold and gleams of silver, in blue and
scarlet and violet, until nothing less than a stained-glass window
glowing in the sun could even suggest their radiance. Rolf warmed into
unusual heartiness.

"By the hilt of my sword, he was an accomplished man who was able to
make such pictures! Look at that horse,--it does not keep you guessing a
moment to tell what it is. And yonder man with the red flames leaping
about him,--I wish I knew why he was bound to that post!"

Alwin also was bitten with curiosity. "I tell you what I will do," he
offered. "You must not suppose that reading is as easy as swimming, or
handling a sword. My father did not have the accomplishment, and his
hair was gray. Neither would my mother have learned it, had it not been
that Alfred was her kinsman and she was proud of his scholarship. Nor
should I have known how, if she had not taught me. And I have forgotten
much. But this I will offer you: I will read the Saxon words to myself,
and then tell you in the Northern tongue what they mean."

He spread the book open on a spot of clean turf, stretched himself on
his stomach, gripped one leg around the other, planted his chin on his
clenched fists, and began.