Book is xiii + 1158 pp.; map of England on front and back endpapers. An anthology of English poetry and prose from the beginnings through Matthew Arnold; a revised edition would be published in 1950, discarding the Leonard translation in favor of the Charles W. Kennedy one. The anthology is divided into periods, the first being "The Beginnings and the Middle Ages [to 1400]," with an introductory essay on pp. 3-14. Beowulf is the sole representative of Old English literature.

The excerpts from Beowulf go from the start of the poem through Beowulf's departure from Daneland, then skip to the making of Beowulf's funeral pyre and his funeral. A portion of Leonard's introduction to his 1923 full translation is included (15-17), as well as a facsimile page from the manuscript (18), and the translation is followed by a line-drawn map of southern Scandinavia and the Baltic (54), also from the 1923 book. The text of the translation omits Leonard's prose notes that were interjected between sections in the 1923 text.

The Beowulf translation begins:

                                       THE OPENING

What ho! We've heard the glory     of Spear-Danes, clansmen-kings,
Their deeds of olden story,—     how fought the aethelings!
Often Scyld Scefing     reft his foemen all,
Reft the tribes at wassail     of bench and mead in hall.
Smote the jarls with terror;     gat good recompense
For that he came a foundling,     a child with no defense:
He waxed beneath the welkin,     grew in honors great,
Till each and every people,     of those around who sate
Off beyond the whale-road,     to him was underling,
To him must tender toll-fee.     That was a goodly King! (19)

And ends:

Then around the mound rode,     with cry and call,
Bairns of the aethelings,     twelve of all,
To mourn for their Master,     their sorrow to sing,
Framing a word-chant,     speaking of the King:
They vaunted his earlship,     they honored doughtily
His wonder-works of glory.     Let it ever be,
That heart of man shall cherish     and word of man shall praise
The Master-Friend, when in the end     his spirit goes its ways.
So the Geatish clansmen     bemoanèd their dearth,
The passing-forth of Beowulf,     these comrades of his hearth,
Calling him a World-King,     the mildest under crown,
And to his kin the kindest,     and keenest for renown. (54)

BAM (from unaltered 10th printing, 1947).