University of Virginia Library

Search this document 
The Collected Works of William Morris

With Introductions by his Daughter May Morris

collapse sectionI. 
  
expand section 
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
expand section 
collapse section 
  
expand section 
expand section 
expand section 
expand section 
expand section 
  
expand sectionII. 
expand sectionIII, IV, V, VI. 
expand sectionVII. 
expand sectionIX. 
expand sectionX. 
expand sectionXII. 
expand sectionXIV. 
expand sectionXV. 
expand sectionXVI. 
expand sectionXVII. 
expand sectionXXI. 
expand sectionXXIV. 

“Then the three Gods waded the river, and no word Hænir spake,
For his thoughts were set on God-home, and the day that is ever awake.
But Odin laughed in his wrath, and murmured: ‘Ah, how long,
Till the iron shall ring on the anvil for the shackles of thy wrong!’

78

“Then Loki takes up the quarry, and is e'en as a man again;
And the three wend on through the wild-wood till they come to a grassy plain
Beneath the untrodden mountains; and lo a noble house,
And a hall with great craft fashioned, and made full glorious;
But night on the earth was falling; so scantly might they see
The wealth of its smooth-wrought stonework and its world of imagery:
Then Loki bade turn thither since day was at an end,
And into that noble dwelling the lords of God-home wend;
And the porch was fair and mighty, and so smooth-wrought was its gold,
That the mirrored stars of heaven therein might ye behold:
But the hall, what words shall tell it, how fair it rose aloft,
And the marvels of its windows, and its golden hangings soft,
And the forest of its pillars! and each like the wave's heart shone,
And the mirrored boughs of the garden were dancing fair thereon.
—Long years agone was it builded, and where are its wonders now?