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j FRITHIOF’S SAGA 149
" When a merchant sails by, spare his ship; by the weak let
a tribute for safety be told;
Thou art king on thy waves, he a slave to his gain, and thy
steel is as good as his gold.
" By the die and the lot all your prizes divide; how they fall,
to complain never care;
Your sea-king himself casteth never a lot, keepeth only his
fame as his share.
" Comes a Vikinga-ship, and we board it and fight, when the
strife waxeth hot ’neath each shield,
If thou yield but a pace, thou art parted from us; ’t is our
law, and so do as thou wilt.
" Hast thou conquered ? Give grace, he’s no longer a foe, who
defenceless for mercy doth pray;
Pale Prayer is Valhalla’s child; yield to its voice; he is
worthless who then sayeth Nay.
"Scars are gain to a Viking; a man they adorn, if on brow
or on bosom they stand;
Let them bleed on unbound until evening be come; if not,
thou must part from our band."
So wrote he his law, and his fame day by day to far-lying
borders was brought;
His like never sped o’er the blue heaving sea, and his
comrades full lustily fought.
But himself by the tiller sat, gloomy of mien, and gazed
into ocean, and thought:
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