And then when the feast-tide is done in the morning,
Shall we whet the grey sickle that bideth the wheat,
Till wan grow the edges, and gleam forth a warning
Of the field and the fallow where edges shall meet.
And when cometh the harvest, and hook upon shoulder
We enter the red wheat from out of the road,
We shall sing, as we wend, of the bold and the bolder,
And the Burg of their building, the beauteous abode.
As smiteth the sickle amid the sun's burning
We shall sing how the sun saw the token unfurled,
When forth fared the Folk, with no thought of returning,
In the days when the Banner went wide in the world.
Many saw that he was singing, but heard not the words of his mouth,
for great was the noise and clamour. But he heard Bow-may, how she
laughed by his side, and cried out:
'Gold-mane, dear-heart, now art thou merry indeed; and glad am I,
though they told me that I am hurt.--Ah! now beware, beware!'
For indeed the Dusky Men, seeing the wall of steel rolling down on
them, and cooped up by the houses, so that they scarce knew how to
flee, turned in the face of death, the foremost of them, and rushed
furiously on the array of the Woodlanders, and all those behind
pressed on them like the big wave of the ebbing sea when the gust of
the wind driveth it landward.
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