"For my thought flashes out as a sword, cleaving counsel as
clottage of cream;
And your incense and chanting are but as the smoke of burnt
towns and the scream;
And I quaff me the thick mead of triumph from enemies' skulls
in my dream!

"And 'tis therefore this day I resolve me,--for King Raedwald
will cringe not, nor lie!--
I will bring back the altar of Woden; in the temple will have it,
hard by
The new altar of this your white Christ. As my mood may decide,
worship I!"

So he spake in his large self-reliance,--he, a man open-browed
as the skies;
Would not measure his soul by a standard that was womanish-weak
to his eyes,
Smite his breast and go on with his sinning,--savage Raedwald,
the simple yet wise!

And the centuries bloom o'er his barrow. But for us,--have we
mastered it quite,
The old riddle, that sweet is strong's outcome, the old marvel,
that meekness is might,
That the child is the leader of lions, that forgiveness is force
at its height?

When we summon the shade of rude Raedwald, in his candor how