Note 2
XI. ALL SLEEP SAVE ONE.

B. in his masterly articles on Beowulf (P. and B. XII.) rejects the division usually made at this point, ‘Þá.’ (711), usually rendered ‘then,’ he translates ‘when,’ and connects its clause with the foregoing sentence. These changes he makes to reduce the number of ‘cóm’s’ as principal verbs. (Cf. 703, 711, 721.) With all deference to this acute scholar, I must say that it seems to me that the poet is exhausting his resources to bring out clearly the supreme event on which the whole subsequent action turns. First, he (Grendel) came in the wan night; second, he came from the moor; third, he came to the hall. Time, place from which, place to which, are all given.