University of Virginia Library

BOOK I. SIGMUND

OF THE DWELLING OF KING VOLSUNG, AND THE WEDDING OF SIGNY HIS DAUGHTER.

HOW THE VOLSUNGS FARED TO THE LAND OF THE GOTHS, AND OF THE FALL OF KING VOLSUNG.

Now or ever the sun shone houseward, unto King Volsung's bed
Came Signy stealing barefoot, and she spake the word and said:
“Awake and hearken, my father, for though the wedding be done,
And I am the wife of the Goth-king, yet the Volsungs are not gone.
So I come as a dream of the night, with a word that the Gods would say,
And think thou thereof in the day-tide, and let Siggeir go on his way
With me and the gifts and the gold, but do ye abide in the land,
Nor trust in the guileful heart and the murder-loving hand,
Lest the kin of the Volsungs perish, and the world be nothing worth.”
So came the word unto Volsung, and wit in his heart had birth;
And he sat upright in the bed and kissed her on the lips;
But he said: “My word is given, it is gone like the spring-tide ships:
To death or to life must I journey when the months are come to an end,
Yet my sons my words shall hearken, and shall nowise with me wend.”
Then she answered, speaking swiftly: “Nay, have thy sons with thee;
Gather an host together and a mighty company,
And meet the guile and the death-snare with battle and with wrack.”
He said: “Nay, my troth-word plighted e'en so should I draw aback:
I shall go a guest, as my word was; of whom shall I be afraid?
For an outworn elder's ending shall no mighty moan be made.”
Then answered Signy, weeping: “I shall see thee yet again
When the battle thou arrayest on the Goth-folks' strand in vain.
Heavy and hard are the Norns: but each man his burden bears;
And what am I to fashion the fate of the coming years?”
She wept and she wended back to the Goth-king's bolster blue,
And Volsung pondered awhile till slumber over him drew;
But when once more he wakened, the kingly house was up,
And the homemen gathered together to drink the parting cup:
And grand amid the hall-floor was the Goth king in his gear,
And Signy clad for faring stood by the Branstock dear
With the earls of the Goths about her: so queenly did she seem,
So calm and ruddy coloured, that Volsung well might deem
That her words were a fashion of slumber, a vision of the night.
But they drank the wine of departing, and brought the horses dight,
And forth abroad the Goth-folk and the Volsung Children rode,
Nor ever once would Signy look back to that abode.
So down over acre and heath they rode to the side of the sea,
And there by the long-ships' bridges was the ship-host's company.
Then Signy kissed her brethren with ruddy mouth and warm,
Nor was there one of the Goth-folk but blessed her from all harm;
Then sweet she kissed her father and hung about his neck,
And sure she whispered him somewhat ere she passed forth toward the deck,
Though nought I know to tell it: then Siggeir hailed them fair,
And called forth many a blessing on the hearts that bode his snare.
Then were the gangways shipped, and blown was the parting horn,
And the striped sails drew with the wind, and away was Signy borne
White on the shielded long-ship, a grief in the heart of the gold;
Nor once would she turn her about the strand of her folk to behold.
Thenceforward dwelt the Volsungs in exceeding glorious state,
And merry lived King Volsung, abiding the day of his fate;
But when the months aforesaid were well-nigh worn away
To his sons and his folk of counsel he fell these words to say:
“Ye mind you of Signy's wedding and of my plighted troth
To go in two months' wearing to the house of Siggeir the Goth:
Nor will I hide how Signy then spake a warning word
And did me to wit that her husband was a grim and guileful lord,
And would draw us to our undoing for envy and despite
Concerning the Sword of Odin, and for dread of the Volsung might.
Now wise is Signy my daughter and knoweth nought but sooth:
Yet are there seasons and times when for longing and self-ruth
The hearts of women wander, and this maybe is such;
Nor for her word of Siggeir will I trow it overmuch,
Nor altogether doubt it, since the woman is wrought so wise;
Nor much might my heart love Siggeir for all his kingly guise.
Yet, shall a king hear murder when a king's mouth blessing saith?
So maybe he is bidding me honour, and maybe he is bidding me death:
Let him do after his fashion, and I will do no less.
In peace will I go to his bidding let the spae-wrights ban or bless;
And no man now or hereafter of Volsung's blenching shall tell.
But ye, sons, in the land shall tarry, and heed the realm right well,
Lest the Volsung Children fade, and the wide world worser grow.”
So now, when all things were ready, in the first of the autumn tide
Adown unto the swan-bath the Volsung Children ride;
And lightly go a-shipboard, a goodly company,
Though the tale thereof be scanty and their ships no more than three:
But kings' sons dealt with the sail-sheets and earls and dukes of war
Were the halers of the hawsers and the tuggers at the oar.
So they drew the bridges shipward, and left the land behind,
And fair astern of the longships sprang up a following wind;
So swift o'er Ægir's acre those mighty sailors ran,
And speedier than all other ploughed down the furrows wan.
And they came to the land of the Goth-folk on the even of a day;
And lo by the inmost skerry a skiff with a sail of grey
That as they neared the foreshore ran Volsung's ship aboard,
And there was come white-hand Signy with her latest warning word.
“O strange,” she said, “meseemeth, O sweet, your gear to see,
And the well-loved Volsung faces, and the hands that cherished me.
But short is the time that is left me for the work I have to win,
Though nought it be but the speaking of a word ere the worst begin.
For that which I spake aforetime, the seed of a boding drear,
It hath sprung, it hath blossomed and borne rank harvest of the spear;
Siggeir hath dight the death-snare; he hath spread the shielded net.
But ye come ere the hour appointed, and he looks not to meet you yet.
Now blest be the wind that wafted your sails here over-soon,
For thus have I won me seaward 'twixt the twilight and the moon,
To pray you for all the world's sake turn back from the murderous shore.
—Ah take me hence, my father, to see my land once more!”
Then sweetly Volsung kissed her: “Woe am I for thy sake,
But earth the word hath hearkened, that yet unborn I spake;
How I ne'er would turn me backward from the sword or the fire of bale;
—I have held that word till today, and today shall I change the tale?
And look on these thy brethren, how goodly and great are they,
Wouldst thou have the maidens mock them, when this pain hath past away
And they sit at the feast hereafter, that they feared the deadly stroke?
Let us do our day's work deftly for the praise and the glory of folk;
And if the Norns will have it that the Volsung kin shall fail,
Yet I know of the deed that dies not, and the name that shall ever avail.”
But she wept as one sick-hearted: “Woe's me for the hope of the morn!
Yet send me not back unto Siggeir and the evil days and the scorn:
Let me bide the death as ye bide it, and let a woman feel
That hope of the death of battle and the rest of the foeman's steel.”
“Nay, nay,” he said, “go backward: this too thy fate will have;
For thou art the wife of a king, and many a matter mayst save.
Farewell! as the days win over, as sweet as a tale shall it grow,
This day when our hearts were hardened; and our glory thou shalt know,
And the love wherewith we loved thee mid the battle and the wrack.”
She kissed them and departed, and mid the dusk fared back,
And she sat that eve in the high-seat; and I deem that Siggeir knew
The way that her feet had wended, and the deed she went to do:
For the man was grim and guileful, and he knew that the snare was laid
For the mountain bull unblenching and the lion unafraid.
But when the sun on the morrow shone over earth and sea
Ashore went the Volsung Children a goodly company,
And toward King Siggeir's dwelling o'er heath and holt they went.
But when they came to the topmost of a certain grassy bent,
Lo there lay the land before them as thick with shield and spear
As the rich man's wealthiest acre with the harvest of the year.
There bade King Volsung tarry and dight the wedge-array;
“For duly,” he said, “doeth Siggeir to meet his guests by the way.
So shield by shield they serried, nor ever hath been told
Of any host of battle more glorious with the gold;
And there stood the high King Volsung in the very front of war;
And lovelier was his visage than ever heretofore,
As he rent apart the peace-strings that his brand of battle bound,
And the bright blade gleamed to the heavens, and he cast the sheath to the ground.
Then up the steep came the Goth-folk, and the spear-wood drew anigh,
And earth's face shook beneath them, yet cried they never a cry;
And the Volsungs stood all silent, although forsooth at whiles
O'er the faces grown earth-weary would play the flickering smiles,
And swords would clink and rattle: not long had they to bide,
For soon that flood of murder flowed round the hillock-side;
Then at last the edges mingled, and if men forebore the shout,
Yet the din of steel and iron in the grey clouds rang about;
But how to tell of King Volsung, and the valour of his folk!
Three times the wood of battle before their edges broke;
And the shield-wall, sorely dwindled and reft of the ruddy gold,
Against the drift of the war-blast for the fourth time yet did hold.
But men's shields were waxen heavy with the weight of shafts they bore,
And the fifth time many a champion cast earthward Odin's door
And gripped the sword two-handed; and in sheaves the spears came on.
And at last the host of the Goth-folk within the shield-wall won,
And wild was the work within it, and oft and o'er again
Forth brake the sons of Volsung, and drave the foe in vain;
For the driven throng still thickened, till it might not give aback.
But fast abode King Volsung amid the shifting wrack
In the place where once was the forefront: for he said: “My feet are old,
And if I wend on further there is nought more to behold
Than this that I see about me.”—Whiles drew his foes away
And stared across the corpses that before his sword-edge lay.
But nought he followed after: then needs must they in front
Thrust on by the thickening spear-throng come up to bear the brunt,
Till all his limbs were weary and his body rent and torn:
Then he cried: “Lo now, Allfather, is not the swathe well shorn?
Wouldst thou have me toil for ever, nor win the wages due?”
And mid the hedge of foemen his blunted sword he threw,
And, laid like the oars of a longship the level war-shafts pressed
On 'gainst the unshielded elder, and clashed amidst his breast,
And dead he fell, thrust backward, and rang on the dead men's gear:
But still for a certain season durst no man draw anear.
For 'twas e'en as a great God's slaying, and they feared the wrath of the sky;
And they deemed their hearts might harden if awhile they should let him lie.
Lo, now as the plotting was long, so short is the tale to tell
How a mighty people's leaders in the field of murder fell.
For but feebly burned the battle when Volsung fell to field,
And all who yet were living were borne down before the shield:
So sinketh the din and the tumult; and the earls of the Goths ring round
That crown of the Kings of battle laid low upon the ground,
Looking up to the noon-tide heavens from the place where first he stood:
But the songful sing above him and they tell how his end is as good
As the best of the days of his life-tide; and well as he was loved
By his friends ere the time of his changing, so now are his foemen moved
With a love that may never be worsened, since all the strife is o'er,
And the warders look for his coming by Odin's open door.
But his sons, the stay of battle, alive with many a wound,
Borne down to the earth by the shield-rush amid the dead lie bound,
And belike a wearier journey must those lords of battle bide
Ere once more in the Hall of Odin they sit by their father's side.
Woe's me for the boughs of the Branstock and the hawks that cried on the fight!
Woe's me for the fireless hearthstones and the hangings of delight,
That the women dare not look on lest they see them sweat with blood!
Woe's me for the carven pillars where the spears of the Volsungs stood!
And who next shall shake the locks, or the silver door-rings meet?
Who shall pace the floor beloved, worn down by the Volsung feet?
Who shall fill the gold with the wine, or cry for the triumphing?
Shall it be kindred or foes, or thief, or thrall, or king?

OF THE ENDING OF ALL VOLSUNG'S SONS SAVE SIGMUND ONLY, AND OF HOW HE ABIDETH IN THE WILD WOOD.

OF THE BIRTH AND FOSTERING OF SINFIOTLI, SIGNY'S SON.

So wrought is the will of King Siggeir, and he weareth Odin's sword,
And it lies on his knees in the council and hath no other lord:
And he sendeth earls o'er the sea-flood to take King Volsung's land,
And those scattered and shepherdless sheep must come beneath his hand.
And he holdeth the milk-white Signy as his handmaid and his wife,
And nought but his will she doeth, nor raiseth a word of strife;
So his heart is praising his wisdom, and he deems him of most avail
Of all the lords of the cunning that teacheth how to prevail.
Now again in a half-month's wearing goes Signy into the wild,
And findeth her way by her wisdom to the dwelling of Volsung's child.
It was e'en as a house of the Dwarfs, a rock, and a stony cave,
In the heart of the midmost thicket by the hidden river's wave.
There Signy found him watching how the white-head waters ran,
And she said in her heart as she saw him that once more she had seen a man.
His words were few and heavy, for seldom his sorrow slept,
Yet ever his love went with them; and men say that Signy wept
When she left that last of her kindred: yet wept she never more
Amid the earls of Siggeir, and as lovely as before
Was her face to all men's deeming: nor aught it changed for ruth,
Nor for fear nor any longing; and no man said for sooth
That she ever laughed thereafter till the day of her death was come.
So is Volsung's seed abiding in a rough and narrow home;
And wargear he gat him enough from the slaying of earls of men,
And gold as much as he would; though indeed but now and again
He fell on the men of the merchants, lest, wax he overbold,
The tale of the wood-abider too oft to the king should be told.
Alone in the woods he abided, and a master of masters was he
In the craft of the smithying folk; and whiles would the hunter see,
Belated amid the thicket, his forge's glimmering light,
And the boldest of all the fishers would hear his hammer benight.
Then dim waxed the tale of the Volsungs, and the word mid the wood-folk rose
That a King of the Giants had wakened from amidst the stone-hedged close,
Where they slept in the heart of the mountains, and had come adown to dwell
In the cave whence the Dwarfs were departed, and they said: It is aught but well
To come anigh to his house-door, or wander wide in his woods,
For a tyrannous lord he is, and a lover of gold and of goods.
So win the long years over, and still sitteth Signy there
Beside the King of the Goth-folk, and is waxen no less fair,
And men and maids hath she gotten who are ready to work her will,
For the worship of her fairness, and remembrance of her ill.
And no more word spake the maiden, but turned and gat her gone,
And there by the side of the river the child abode alone:
But Sigmund stood on his feet, and across the river he went,
For he knew how the child was Siggeir's, and of Signy's fell intent.
So he took the lad on his shoulder, and bade him hold his sword,
And waded back to his dwelling across the rushing ford:
But the youngling fell a-prattling, and asked of this and that,
As above the rattle of waters on Sigmund's shoulder he sat,
And Sigmund deemed in his heart that the boy would be bold enough.
So he fostered him there in the woodland in life full hard and rough
For the space of three months' wearing; and the lad was deft and strong,
Yet his sight was a grief to Sigmund because of his father's wrong.
“Tell me, O Son of the Goth-king,” quoth Sigmund, “how thou hast fared?
Forsooth, is the baking of bread so mighty a thing to be dared?”
Then said the son of King Siggeir: “I am young as yet for the war,
Yet e'en such a blade shall I carry ere many a month be o'er.”
Then abroad went the King in the wind, and leaned on his naked sword
And stood there many an hour, and mused on Signy's word.
But at last when the moon was arisen, and the undark night begun,
He sheathed the sword and cried: “Come forth, King Siggeir's son,
Thou shalt wend from out of the wild-wood and no more will I foster thee.”
Long while she mused and pondered while day was thrust on day,
Till the king and the earls of the strangers seemed shades of the dreamtide grey,
And gone seemed all earth's people, save that woman mid the gold
And that man in the depths of the forest in the cave of the Dwarfs of old.
And once in the dark she murmured: “Where then was the ancient song
That the Gods were but twin-born once, and deemed it nothing wrong
To mingle for the world's sake, whence had the Æsir birth,
And the Vanir and the Dwarf-kind, and all the folk of earth?”
Now amidst those days that she pondered came a wife of the witch-folk there,
A woman young and lovesome, and shaped exceeding fair,
And she spake with Signy the Queen, and told her of deeds of her craft,
And how the might was with her her soul from her body to waft
And to take the shape of another and give her fashion in turn.
Fierce then in the heart of Signy a sudden flame 'gan burn,
And the eyes of her soul saw all things, like the blind, whom the world's last fire
Hath healed in one passing moment 'twixt his death and his desire.
And she thought: “Alone I will bear it; alone I will take the crime;
On me alone be the shaming, and the cry of the coming time.
Yea, and he for the life is fated and the help of many a folk,
And I for the death and the rest, and deliverance from the yoke.”
Then wan as the midnight moon she answered the woman and spake:
“Thou art come to the Goth-queen's dwelling, wiltthou do so much for my sake,
And for many a pound of silver and for rings of the ruddy gold,
As to change thy body for mine ere the night is waxen old?”
Nought the witch-wife fair gainsaid it, and they went to the bower aloft,
And hand in hand and alone they sung the spell-song soft:
Till Signy looked on her guest, and lo, the face of a queen
With the steadfast eyes of grey, that so many a grief had seen:
But the guest held forth a mirror, and Signy shrank aback,
From the laughing lips and the eyes, and the hair of crispy black,
But though she shuddered and sickened, the false face changed no whit;
But ruddy and white it blossomed and the smiles played over it;
And the hands were ready to cling, and beckoning lamps were the eyes,
And the light feet longed for the dance, and the lips for laughter and lies.
So that eve in the mid-hall's high-seat was the shape of Signy the Queen,
While swiftly the feet of the witch-wife brushed over the moonlit green,
But the soul mid the gleam of the torches, her thought was of gain and of gold;
And the soul of the wind-driven woman, swift-foot in the moonlight cold,
Her thoughts were of men's lives' changing, and the uttermost ending of earth,
And the day when death should be dead, and the new sun's nightless birth.
Men say that about that midnight King Sigmund wakened and heard
The voice of a soft-speeched woman, shrill-sweet as a dawning bird:
So he rose, and a woman indeed he saw by the door of the cave
With her raiment wet to her midmost, as though with the river-wave:
And he cried: “What wiltthou, what wilt thou? be thou womankind or fay,
Here is no good abiding, wend forth upon thy way!”
She said: “I am nought but a woman, a maid of the earl-folk's kin:
And I went by the skirts of the woodland to the house of my sister to win,
And have strayed from the way benighted: and I fear the wolves & the wild:
By the glimmering of thy torchlight from afar was I beguiled.
Ah, slay me not on thy threshold, nor send me back again
Through the rattling waves of thy ford, that I crossed in terror and pain;
Drive me not to the night and the darkness, for the wolves of the wood to devour.
I am weak and thou art mighty: I will go at the dawning hour.”
So Sigmund looked in her face and saw that she was fair;
And he said: “Nay, nought will I harm thee, and thou mayst harbour here,
God wot if thou fear'st not me, I have nought to fear thy face:
Though this house be the terror of men-folk, thou shalt find it as safe a place
As though I were nought but thy brother; and then mayst thou tell, if thou wilt,
Where dwelleth the dread of the woodland, the bearer of many a guilt,
Though meseems for so goodly a woman it were all too ill a deed
In reward for the wood-wight's guesting to betray him in his need.”
So he took the hand of the woman and straightway led her in
Where days agone the Dwarf-kind would their deeds of smithying win:
And he kindled the half-slaked embers, and gave her of his cheer
Amid the gold and the silver, and the fight-won raiment dear;
And soft was her voice, and she sung him sweet tales of yore agone,
Till all his heart was softened; and the man was all alone,
And in many wise she wooed him; so they parted not that night,
Nor slept till the morrow morning, when the woods were waxen bright:
And high above the tree-boughs shone the sister of the moon,
And hushed were the water-ouzels with the coming of the noon
When she stepped from the bed of Sigmund, and left the Dwarf's abode;
And turned to the dwellings of men, and the ways where the earl-folk rode.
But next morn from the house of the Goth-king the witch-wife went her ways
With gold and goods and silver, such store as a queen might praise.
But the lad still gazed on Sigmund, and he said: “A wondrous thing!
Here is the cave and the river, and all tokens of the place:
But my mother Signy told me none might behold that face,
And keep his flesh from quaking: but at thee I quake not aught:
Sure I must journey further, lest her errand come to nought:
Yet I would that my foster-father should be such a man as thou.”
But Sigmund answered and said: “Thou shalt bide in my dwelling now;
And thou mayst wot full surely that thy mother's will is done
By this token and no other, that thou lookedst on Volsung's son
And smiledst fair in his face: but tell me thy name and thy years:
And what are the words of Signy that the son of the Goth-king bears?”
“Sinfiotli they call me,” he said, “and ten summers have I seen;
And this is the only word that I bear from Signy the Queen,
That once more a man she sendeth the work of thine hands to speed,
If he be of the Kings or the Gods thyself shalt know in thy need.”
So Sigmund looked on the youngling and his heart unto him yearned;
But he thought: “Shall I pay the hire ere the worth of the work be earned?
And what hath my heart to do to cherish Siggeir's son;
A brand belike for the burning when the last of its work is done?”
But there in the wild and the thicket those twain awhile abode,
And on the lad laid Sigmund full many a weary load,
And thrust him mid all dangers, and he bore all passing well,
Where hardihood might help him; but his heart was fierce and fell;
And ever said Sigmund the Volsung: The lad hath plenteous part
In the guile and malice of Siggeir, and in Signy's hardy heart:
But why should I cherish and love him, since the end must come at last?
Now a summer and winter & spring o'er those men of the wilds had pass'd,
And summer was there again, when the Volsung spake on a day:
“I will wend to the wood-deer's hunting, but thou at home shalt stay,
And deal with the baking of bread against the even come.”
So he went and came on the hunting and brought the venison home,
And the child, as ever his wont was, was glad of his coming back,
And said: “Thou hast gotten us venison, and the bread shall nowise lack.”
“Yea,” quoth Sigmund the Volsung, “hast thou kneaded the meal that was yonder?”
“Yea, and what other?” he said; “though therein forsooth was a wonder:
For when I would handle the meal-sack therein was something quick,
As if the life of an eel-grig were set in an ashen stick:
But the meal must into the oven, since we were lacking bread,
And all that is kneaded together, and the wonder is baked and dead.”
Then Sigmund laughed and answered: “Thou hast kneaded up therein
The deadliest of all adders that is of the creeping kin:
So tonight from the bread refrain thee, lest thy bane should come of it.”
For here, the tale of the elders doth men a marvel to wit,
That such was the shaping of Sigmund among all earthly kings,
That unhurt he handled adders and other deadly things,
And might drink unscathed of venom: but Sinfiotli so was wrought,
That no sting of creeping creatures would harm his body aught.
But now full glad was Sigmund, and he let his love arise
For the huge-limbed son of Signy with the fierce and eager eyes;
And all deeds of the sword he learned him, and showed him feats of war
Where sea and forest mingle, and up from the ocean's shore
The highway leads to the market, and men go up and down,
And the spear-hedged wains of the merchants fare oft to the Goth-folk's town.
Sweet then Sinfiotli deemed it to look on the bale-fires' light,
And the bickering blood-reeds' tangle, and the fallow blades of fight.
And in three years' space were his war-deeds far more than the deeds of a man:
But dread was his face to behold ere the battle-play began,
And grey and dreadful his face when the last of the battle sank.
And so the years won over, and the joy of the woods they drank,
And they gathered gold and silver, and plenteous outland goods.
But they came to a house on a day in the uttermost part of the woods
And smote on the door and entered, when a long while no man bade;
And lo, a gold-hung hall, and two men on the benches laid
In slumber as deep as the death; and gold-rings great and fair
Those sleepers bore on their bodies, and broidered southland gear,
And over the head of each there hung a wolf-skin grey.
Then the drift of a cloudy dream wrapt Sigmund's soul away,
And his eyes were set on the wolf-skin, and long he gazed thereat,
And remembered the words he uttered when erst on the beam he sat,
That the Gods should miss a man in the utmost Day of Doom,
And win a wolf in his stead; and unto his heart came home
That thought, as he gazed on the wolf-skin and the other days waxed dim,
And he gathered the thing in his hand, and did it over him;
And in likewise did Sinfiotli as he saw his fosterer do.
Then lo, a fearful wonder, for as very wolves they grew
In outward shape and semblance, and they howled out wolfish things,
Like the grey dogs of the forest; though somewhat the hearts of kings
Abode in their bodies of beasts. Now sooth is the tale to tell,
That the men in the fair-wrought raiment were kings' sons bound by a spell
To wend as wolves of the wild-wood, for each nine days of the ten,
And to lie all spent for a season when they gat their shapes of men.
So Sigmund and his fellow rush forth from the golden place;
And though their kings' hearts bade them the backward way to trace
Unto their Dwarf-wrought dwelling, and there abide the change,
Yet their wolfish habit drave them wide through the wood to range,
And draw nigh to the dwellings of men and fly upon the prey.
And lo now, a band of hunters on the uttermost woodland way,
And they spy those dogs of the forest, and fall on with the spear,
Nor deemed that any other but woodland beasts they were,
And that easy would be the battle: short is the tale to tell;
For every man of the hunters amid the thicket fell.
Then onwards fare those were-wolves, and unto the sea they turn,
And their ravening hearts are heavy, and sore for the prey they yearn:
And lo, in the last of the thicket a score of the chaffering men,
And Sinfiotli was wild for the onset, but Sigmund was wearying then
For the glimmering gold of his Dwarf-house, and he bade refrain from the folk,
But wrath burned in the eyes of Sinfiotli, and forth from the thicket he broke;
Then rose the axes aloft, and the swords flashed bright in the sun,
And but little more it needed that the race of the Volsungs was done,
And the folk of the Gods' begetting: but at last they quelled the war,
And no man again of the sea-folk should ever sit by the oar.
Now Sinfiotli lay weary and faint, but Sigmund howled over the dead,
And wrath in his heart there gathered, and a dim thought wearied his head
And his tangled wolfish wit, that might never understand;
As though some God in his dreaming had wasted the work of his hand,
And forgotten his craft of creation; then his wrath swelled up amain
And he turned and fell on Sinfiotli, who had wrought the wrack and the bane
And across the throat he tore him as his very mortal foe
Till a cold dead corpse by the sea-strand his fosterling lay alow:
Then wearier yet grew Sigmund, and the dim wit seemed to pass
From his heart grown cold and feeble; when lo, amid the grass
There came two weazles bickering, and one bit his mate by the head,
Till she lay there dead before him: then he sorrowed over her dead:
But no long while he abode there, but into the thicket he went,
And the wolfish heart of Sigmund knew somewhat his intent:
So he came again with a herb-leaf and laid it on his mate,
And she rose up whole and living and no worser of estate
Than ever she was aforetime, and the twain went merry away.
Then swiftly rose up Sigmund from where his fosterling lay,
And a long while searched the thicket, till that three-leaved herb he found,
And he laid it on Sinfiotli, who rose up hale and sound
As ever he was in his life-days. But now in hate they had
That hapless work of the witch-folk, and the skins that their bodies clad.
So they turn their faces homeward and a weary way they go,
Till they come to the hidden river, and the glimmering house they know.
There now they abide in peace, and wend abroad no more
Till the last of the nine days perished, and the spell for a space was o'er,
And they might cast their wolf-shapes: so they stood on their feet upright
Great men again as aforetime, and they came forth into the light
And looked in each other's faces, and belike a change was there
Since they did on the bodies of wolves, and lay in the wood-wolves' lair,
And they looked, and sore they wondered, and they both for speech did yearn.
First then spake out Sinfiotli: “Sure I had a craft to learn,
And thou hadst a lesson to teach, that I left the dwelling of kings,
And came to the wood-woves' dwelling; thou hast taught me many things,
But the Gods have taught me more, and at last have abased us both,
That of nought that lieth before us our hearts and our hands may be loth.
Come then, how long shall I tarry till I fashion something great?
Come, Master, and make me a master that I do the deeds of fate.”
Then loud laughed out Sinfiotli, and he said: “I wot indeed
That Signy is my mother, and her will I help at need:
Is the fox of the King-folk my father, that adder of the brake,
Who gave me never a blessing, and many a cursing spake?
Yea, have I in sooth a father, save him that cherished my life,
The Lord of the Helm of Terror, the King of the Flame of Strife?
Lo now my hand is ready to strike what stroke thou wilt,
For I am the sword of the Gods: and thine hand shall hold the hilt.”
Fierce glowed the eyes of King Sigmund, for he knew the time was come
When the curse King Siggeir fashioned at last shall seek him home:
And of what shall follow after, be it evil days, or bliss,
Or praise, or the cursing of all men,—the Gods shall see to this.

OF THE SLAYING OF SIGGEIR THE GOTH-KING.

So there are those kings abiding, and they think of nought but the day
When the time at last shall serve them, to wend on the perilous way.
And so in the first of winter, when nights grow long and mirk,
They fare unto Siggeir's dwelling and seek wherein to lurk.
And by hap 'twas the tide of twilight, ere the watch of the night was set
And the watch of the day was departed, as Sinfiotli minded yet.
So now by a passage he wotted they gat them into the bower
Where lay the biggest wine-tuns, and there they abode the hour:
Anigh to the hall it was, but no man came thereto,
But now and again the cup-lord when King Siggeir's wine he drew:
Yea and so nigh to the feast-hall, that they saw the torches shine
When the cup-lord was departed with King Siggeir's dear-bought wine,
And they heard the glee of the people, and the horns and the beakers' din,
When the feast was dight in the hall and the earls were merry therein.
Calm was the face of Sigmund, and clear were his eyes and bright;
But Sinfiotli gnawed on his shield-rim, and his face was haggard and white:
For he deemed the time full long, ere the fallow blades should leap
In the hush of the midnight feast-hall o'er King Siggeir's golden sleep.
Now it fell that two little children, Queen Signy's youngest-born,
Were about the hall that even, and amid the glee of the horn
They played with a golden toy, and trundled it here and there,
And thus to that lurking-bower they drew exceeding near,
When there fell a ring from their toy, and swiftly rolled away
And into the place of the wine-tuns, and by Sigmund's feet made stay;
Then the little ones followed after, and came to the lurking-place
Where lay those night-abiders, and met them face to face,
And fled, ere they might hold them, aback to the thronging hall.
But he cried in the front of the spear-hedge: “Nay this shall be far from me
To slay thy children sackless, though my death belike they be.
Now men will be dealing, sister, and old the night is grown,
And fair in the house of my fathers the benches are bestrown.”
So she stood aside and gazed: but Sinfiotli taketh them up
And breaketh each tender body as a drunkard breaketh a cup;
With a dreadful voice he crieth, and casteth them down the hall,
And the Goth-folk sunder before them, and at Siggeir's feet they fall.
But the fallow blades leapt naked, and on the battle came,
As the tide of the winter ocean sweeps up to the beaconing flame.
But firm in the midst of onset Sigmund the Volsung stood,
And stirred no more for the sword-strokes than the oldest oak of the wood
Shall shake to the herd-boys 'whittles: white danced his war-flame's gleam,
And oft to men's beholding his eyes of God would beam
Clear from the sword-blades' tangle, and often for a space
Amazed the garth of murder stared deedless on his face;
Nor back nor forward moved he: but fierce Sinfiotli went
Where the spears were set the thickest, and sword with sword was blent;
And great was the death before him, till he slipped in the blood and fell:
Then the shield-garth compassed Sigmund, and short is the tale to tell;
For they bore him down unwounded, and bonds about him cast:
Nor sore hurt is Sinfiotli, but is hoppled strait and fast.
Then the Goth-folk went to slumber when the hall was washed from blood:
But a long while wakened Siggeir, for fell and fierce was his mood,
And all the days of his kingship seemed nothing worth as then
While fared the son of Volsung as well as the worst of men,
While yet that son of Signy lay untormented there:
Yea the past days of his kingship seemed blossomless and bare
Since all their might had failed him to quench the Volsung kin.
So when the first grey dawning a new day did begin,
King Siggeir bade his bondsmen to dight an earthen mound
Anigh to the house of the Goth-kings amid the fruit-grown ground:
And that house of death was twofold, for 'twas sundered by a stone
Into two woeful chambers: alone and not alone
Those vanquished thralls of battle therein should bide their hour,
That each might hear the tidings of the other's baleful bower,
Yet have no might to help him. So now the twain they brought
And weary-dull was Sinfiotli, with eyes that looked at nought.
But Sigmund fresh and clear-eyed went to the deadly hall,
And the song arose within him as he sat within its wall;
Nor aught durst Siggeir mock him, as he had good will to do,
But went his ways when the bondmen brought the roofing turfs thereto.
And that was at eve of the day; and lo now, Signy the white
Wan-faced and eager-eyed stole through the beginning of night
To the place where the builders built, and the thralls with lingering hands
Had roofed in the grave of Sigmund and hidden the glory of lands,
But over the head of Sinfiotli for a space were the rafters bare.
Gold then to the thralls she gave, and promised them days full fair
If they held their peace for ever of the deed that then she did:
And nothing they gainsayed it; so she drew forth something hid,
In wrappings of wheat-straw winded, and into Sinfiotli's place
She cast it all down swiftly; then she covereth up her face,
And beneath the winter starlight she wended swift away.
But her gift do the thralls deem victual, and the thatch on the hall they lay,
And depart, they too, to their slumber, now dight was the dwelling of death.
Then Sigmund hears Sinfiotli, how he cries through the stone and saith:
“Best unto babe is mother, well sayeth the elder's saw;
Here hath Signy sent me swine's-flesh in windings of wheaten straw.”
And again he held him silent of bitter words or of sweet;
And quoth Sigmund, “What hath betided? is an adder in the meat!”
Then loud his fosterling laughed: “Yea, a worm of bitter tooth,
The serpent of the Branstock, the sword of thy days of youth!
I have felt the hilts aforetime; I have felt how the letters run
On each side of the trench of blood and the point of that glorious one.
O mother, O mother of kings! we shall live and our days shall be sweet!
I have loved thee well aforetime, I shall love thee more when we meet.”
Then Sigmund heard the sword-point smite on the stone wall's side,
And slowly mid the darkness therethrough he heard it gride
As against it bore Sinfiotli: but he cried out at the last:
“It biteth, O my fosterer! it cleaves the earth-bone fast!
Now learn we the craft of the masons that another day may come
When we build a house for King Siggeir, a strait unlovely home.”
Then in the grave-mound's darkness did Sigmund the King upstand,
And unto that saw of battle he set his naked hand;
And hard the gift of Odin home to their breasts they drew;
Sawed Sigmund, sawed Sinfiotli, till the stone was cleft atwo,
And they met and kissed together: then they hewed and heaved full hard
Till lo, through the bursten rafters the winter heavens bestarred!
And they leap out merry-hearted; nor is there need to say
A many words between them of whither was the way.
For they took the night-watch sleeping, and slew them one and all,
And then on the winter fagots they made them haste to fall,
They pile the oak-trees cloven, and when the oak-beams fail
They bear the ash and the rowan, and build a mighty bale
About the dwelling of Siggeir, and lay the torch therein.
Then they drew their swords and watched it till the flames began to win
Hard on to the mid-hall's rafters, and those feasters of the folk,
As the fire-flakes fell among them, to their last of days awoke.
By the gable-door stood Sigmund, and fierce Sinfiotli stood
Red-lit by the door of the women in the lane of blazing wood:
To death each doorway opened, and death was in the hall.
Then amid the gathered Goth-folk 'gan Siggeir the King to call:
“Who lit the fire I burn in, and what shall buy me peace?
Will ye take my heaped up treasure, or ten years of my fields' increase,
Or half of my father's kingdom? O toilers at the oar,
O wasters of the sea-plain, now labour ye no more!
But take the gifts I bid you, and lie upon the gold,
And clothe your limbs in purple and the silken women hold!”
But a great voice cried o'er the fire: “Nay, no such men are we,
No tuggers at the hawser, no wasters of the sea:
We will have the gold and the purple when we list such things to win;
But now we think on our fathers, and avenging of our kin.
Not all King Siggeir's kingdom, and not all the world's increase
For ever and for ever, shall buy thee life and peace.
For now is the tree-bough blossomed that sprang from murder's seed;
And the death-doomed and the buried are they that do the deed;
Now when the dead shall ask thee by whom thy days were done,
Thou shalt say by Sigmund the Volsung, and Sinfiotli, Signy's son.”
Then stark fear fell on the earl-folk, and silent they abide
Amid the flaming penfold; and again the great voice cried,
As the Goth-king's golden pillars grew red amidst the blaze:
“Ye women of the Goth-folk, come forth upon your ways;
And thou, Signy, O my sister, come forth from death and hell,
That beneath the boughs of the Branstock once more we twain may dwell.”
Forth came the white-faced women and passed Sinfiotli's sword,
Free by the glaive of Odin the trembling pale ones poured,
But amid their hurrying terror came never Signy's feet;
And the pearls of the throne of Siggeir shrunk in the fervent heat.
Then the men of war surged outward to the twofold doors of bane,
But there played the sword of Sigmund amidst the fiery lane
Before the gable door-way, and by the woman's door
Sinfiotli sang to the sword-edge amid the bale-fire's roar,
And back again to the burning the earls of the Goth-folk shrank:
And the light low licked the tables, and the wine of Siggeir drank.
Lo now to the woman's doorway, the steel-watched bower of flame,
Clad in her queenly raiment King Volsung's daughter came
Before Sinfiotli's sword-point; and she said: “O mightiest son,
Best now is our departing in the day my grief hath won,
And the many days of toiling, and the travail of my womb,
And the hate, and the fire of longing: thou, son, and this day of the doom
Have long been as one to my heart; and now shall I leave you both,
And well ye may wot of the slumber my heart is nothing loth;
And all the more, as, meseemeth, thy day shall not be long
To weary thee with labour and mingle wrong with wrong.
Yea, and I wot that the daylight thine eyes had never seen
Save for a great king's murder and the shame of a mighty queen.
But let thy soul, I charge thee, o'er all these things prevail
To make thy short day glorious and leave a goodly tale.”
She kissed him and departed, and unto Sigmund went
As now against the dawning grey grew the winter bent:
As the night and the morning mingled he saw her face once more,
And he deemed it fair and ruddy as in the days of yore;
Yet fast the tears fell from her, and the sobs upheaved her breast:
And she said: “My youth was happy; but this hour belike is best
Of all the days of my life-tide, that soon shall have an end.
I have come to greet thee, Sigmund, then back again must I wend,
For his bed the Goth-king dighteth: I have lain therein, time was,
And loathed the sleep I won there: but lo, how all things pass,
And hearts are changed and softened, for lovely now it seems.
Yet fear not my forgetting: I shall see thee in my dreams
A mighty king of the world 'neath the boughs of the Branstock green,
With thine earls and thy lords about thee as the Volsung fashion hath been.
And there shall all ye remember how I loved the Volsung name,
Nor spared to spend for its blooming my joy, and my life, and my fame.
For hear thou: that Sinfiotli, who hath wrought out our desire,
Who hath compassed about King Siggeir with this sea of a deadly fire,
Who brake thy grave asunder—my child and thine he is,
Begot in that house of the Dwarf-kind for no other end than this;
The son of Volsung's daughter, the son of Volsung's son.
Look, look! might another helper this deed with thee have done?”
And indeed as the word she uttereth, high up the red flames flare
To the nether floor of the heavens: and yet men see them there,
The golden roofs of Siggeir, the hall of the silver door
That the Goths and the Gods had builded to last for evermore.
She said: “Farewell, my brother, for the earls my candles light,
And I must wend me bedward lest I lose the flower of night.”
And soft and sweet she kissed him, ere she turned about again,
And a little while was Signy beheld of the eyes of men;
And as she crossed the threshold day brightened at her back,
Nor once did she turn her earthward from the reek and the whirling wrack,
But fair in the fashion of Queens passed on to the heart of the hall.
And then King Siggeir's roof-tree upheaved for its utmost fall,
And its huge walls clashed together, and its mean and lowly things
The fire of death confounded with the tokens of the kings.
A sign for many people on the land of the Goths it lay,
A lamp of the earth none needed, for the bright sun brought the day.

HOW SIGMUND COMETH TO THE LAND OF THE VOLSUNGS AGAIN, AND OF THE DEATH OF SINFIOTLI HIS SON.

Now Sigmund the King bestirs him, and Sinfiotli, Sigmund's son,
And they gather a host together, and many a mighty one;
Then they set the ships in the sea-flood and sail from the stranger's shore
And the beaks of the golden dragons see the Volsungs' land once more:
And men's hearts are fulfilled of joyance; and they cry, The sun shines now
With never a curse to hide it, and they shall reap that sow!
Then for many a day sits Sigmund 'neath the boughs of the Branstock green
With his earls and lords about him as the Volsung wont hath been.
And oft he thinketh on Signy and oft he nameth her name,
And tells how she spent her joyance and her lifedays and her fame
That the Volsung kin might blossom and bear the fruit of worth
For the hope of unborn people and the harvest of the earth.
And again he thinks of the word that he spake that other day,
How he should abide there lonely when his kin was passed away,
Their glory and sole avenger, their after-summer seed.
And now for their fame's advancement, and the latter days to speed,
He weddeth a wife of the King-folk; Borghild she had to name;
And the woman was fair and lovely and bore him sons of fame;
Men called them Hamond and Helgi, and when Helgi first saw light,
There came the Norns to his cradle and gave him life full bright,
And called him Sunlit Hill, Sharp Sword, and Land of Rings,
And bade him be lovely and great, and a joy in the tale of kings.
And he waxed up fair and mighty, and no worser than their word,
And sweet are the tales of his life-days, and the wonders of his sword,
And the Maid of the Shield that he wedded, and how he changed his life,
And of marvels wrought in the grave-mound where he rested from the strife.
But the tale of Sinfiotli telleth, that wide in the world he went,
And many a wall of ravens the edge of his warflame rent;
And oft he drave the war-prey and wasted many a land:
Amidst King Hunding's battle he strengthened Helgi's hand;
And he went before the banners amidst the steel-grown wood,
When the sons of Hunding gathered and Helgi's hope withstood:
Nor less he mowed the war-swathe in Helgi's glorious day
When the kings of the hosts at the Wolf-crag set the battle in array.
Then at home by his father's high-seat he wore the winter through;
And the marvel of all men he was for the deeds whereof they knew,
And the deeds whereof none wotted, and the deeds to follow after.
And yet but a little while he loved the song and the laughter,
And the wine that was drunk in peace, and the swordless lying down,
And the deedless day's uprising and the ungirt golden gown.
And he thought of the word of his mother, that his day should not be long
To weary his soul with labour or mingle wrong with wrong;
And his heart was exceeding hungry o'er all men to prevail,
And make his short day glorious and leave a goodly tale.
So when green leaves were lengthening and the spring was come again
He set his ships in the sea-flood and sailed across the main;
And the brother of Queen Borghild was his fellow in the war,
A king of hosts hight Gudrod; and each to each they swore,
And plighted troth for the helping, and the parting of the prey.
Now Sinfiotli's men beheld it and grew exceeding wroth,
But Sinfiotli laughed and answered: “The day's work hath been meet:
Thou hast done well, war-brother, to sift the chaff from the wheat;
Nought have kings' sons to meddle with the refuse of the earth,
Nor shall warriors burden their long-ships with things of nothing worth.”
Then he cried across the sea-strand in a voice exceeding great:
“Depart, ye thralls of the battle; ye have nought to do to wait!
Old, young, and good, and evil, depart and share the spoil,
That burden of the battle, that spring and seed of toil.
—But thou king of the greedy heart, thou king of the thievish grip,
What now wilt thou bear to the sea-strand and set within my ship
To buy thy life from the slaying? Unmeet for kings to hear
Of a king the breaker of troth, of a king the stealer of gear.”
Then mad-wroth waxed King Gudrod, and he cried: “Stand up, my men!
And slay this wood-abider lest he slay his brothers again!”
But no sword leapt from its sheath, and his men shrank back in dread:
Then Sinfiotli's brow grew smoother, and at last he spake and said:
“Indeed thou art very brother of my father Sigmund's wife:
Wilt thou do so much for thine honour, wilt thou do so much for thy life,
As to bide my sword on the island in the pale of the hazel wands?
For I know thee no battle-blencher, but a valiant man of thine hands.”
Now nought King Gudrod gainsayeth, and men dight the hazelled field,
And there on the morrow morning they clash the sword and shield,
And the fallow blades are leaping: short is the tale to tell,
For with the third stroke stricken to field King Gudrod fell.
So there in the holm they lay him; and plenteous store of gold
Sinfiotli lays beside him amid that hall of mould;
“For he gripped,” saith the son of Sigmund, “and gathered for such a day.”
Then Sinfiotli and his fellows o'er the sea-flood sail away,
And come to the land of the Volsungs: but Borghild heareth the tale,
And into the hall she cometh with eager face and pale
As the kings were feasting together, and glad was Sigmund grown
Of the words of Sinfiotli's battle, and the tale of his great renown:
And there sat the sons of Borghild, and they hearkened and were glad
Of their brother born in the wild-wood, and the crown of fame he had.
So she stood before King Sigmund, and spread her hands abroad:
“I charge thee now, King Sigmund, as thou art the Volsungs' lord,
To tell me of my brother, why cometh he not from the sea?”
Quoth Sinfiotli: “Well thou wottest and the tale hath come to thee:
The white swords met in the island; bright there did the war-shields shine,
And there thy brother abideth, for his hand was worser than mine.”
But she heeded him never a whit, but cried on Sigmund and said:
“I charge thee now, King Sigmund, as thou art the lord of my bed,
To drive this wolf of the King-folk from out thy guarded land;
Lest all we of thine house and kindred should fall beneath his hand.”
Then spake King Sigmund the Volsung: “When thou hast heard the tale,
Thou shalt know that somewhat thy brother of his oath to my son did fail;
Nor fell the man all sackless: nor yet need Sigmund's son
For any slain in sword-field to any soul atone.
Yet for the love I bear thee, and because thy love I know,
And because the man was mighty, and far afield would go,
I will lay down a mighty weregild, a heap of the ruddy gold.”
But no word answered Borghild, for her heart was grim and cold;
And she went from the hall of the feasting, and lay in her bower a while;
Nor speech she took, nor gave it, but brooded deadly guile.
And now again on the morrow to Sigmund the king she went,
And she saith that her wrath hath failed her, and that well is she content
To take the king's atonement; and she kissed him soft and sweet,
And she kissed Sinfiotli his son, and sat down in the golden seat
All merry and glad by seeming, and blithe to most and least.
And again she biddeth King Sigmund that he hold a funeral feast
For her brother slain on the island; and nought he gainsayeth her will.
And so on an eve of the autumn do men the beakers fill,
And the earls are gathered together 'neath the boughs of the Branstock green;
There gold-clad mid the feasting went Borghild, Sigmund's Queen,
And she poured the wine for Sinfiotli, and smiled in his face and said:
“Drink now of this cup from mine hand, and bury we hate that is dead.”
So he took the cup from her fingers, nor drank but pondered long
O'er the gathering days of his labour, and the intermingled wrong.
Now he sat by the side of his father; and Sigmund spake a word:
“O son, why sittest thou silent mid the glee of earl and lord?”
“I look in the cup,” quoth Sinfiotli, “and hate therein I see.”
“Well looked it is,” said Sigmund; “give thou the cup to me,”
And he drained it dry to the bottom; for ye mind how it was writ
That this king might drink of venom, and have no hurt of it.
But the song sprang up in the hall, and merry was Sigmund's heart,
And he drank of the wine of King-folk and thrust all care apart.
Then the second time came Borghild and stood before the twain,
And she said: “O valiant step-son, how oft shall I say it in vain,
That my hate for thee hath perished, and the love hath sprouted green?
Wilt thou thrust my gift away, and shame the hand of a queen?”
So he took the cup from her fingers, and pondered over it long,
And thought on the labour that should be, and the wrong that amendeth wrong.
Then spake Sigmund the King: “O son, what aileth thine heart,
When the earls of men are merry, and thrust all care apart?”
But he said: “I have looked in the cup, and I see the deadly snare.”
“Well seen it is,” quoth Sigmund, “but thy burden I may bear.”
And he took the beaker and drained it, and the song rose up in the hall;
And fair bethought King Sigmund his latter days befall.
But Sigmund turned him about, and he said: “What aileth thee, son?
Shall our life-days never be merry, and our labour never be done?”
But Sinfiotli said: “I have looked, and lo there is death in the cup.”
And the song, and the tinkling of harp-strings to the roof-tree winded up:
And Sigmund was dreamy with wine and the wearing of many a year;
And the noise and the glee of the people as the sound of the wild woods were,
And the blossoming boughs of the Branstock were the wild trees waving about;
So he said: “Well seen, my fosterling; let the lip then strain it out.”
Then Sinfiotli laughed and answered: “I drink unto Odin then,
And the Dwellers up in God-home, the lords of the lives of men.”
He drank as he spake the word, and forthwith the venom ran
In a chill flood over his heart, and down fell the mighty man
With never an uttered death-word and never a death-changed look,
And the floor of the hall of the Volsungs beneath his falling shook.
Then up rose the elder of days with a great and bitter cry
And lifted the head of the fallen, and none durst come anigh
To hearken the words of his sorrow, if any words he said,
But such as the Father of all men might speak over Baldur dead.
And again, as before the death-stroke, waxed the hall of the Volsungs dim,
And once more he seemed in the forest, where he spake with nought but him.
Then he lifted him up from the hall-floor and bore him on his breast,
And men who saw Sinfiotli deemed his heart had gotten rest,
And his eyes were no more dreadful. Forth fared the Volsung child
With Signy's son through the doorway; and the wind was great and wild,
And the moon rode high in the heavens, and whiles it shone out bright,
And whiles the clouds drew over. So went he through the night,
Until the dwellings of man-folk were a long while left behind.
Then came he unto the thicket and the houses of the wind,
And the feet of the hoary mountains, and the dwellings of the deer,
And the heaths without a shepherd, and the houseless dales and drear.
Then lo, a mighty water, a rushing flood and wide,
And no ferry for the shipless; so he went along its side,
As a man that seeketh somewhat: but it widened toward the sea,
And the moon sank down in the west, and he went o'er a desert lea.
But lo, in that dusk ere the dawning a glimmering over the flood,
And the sound of the cleaving of waters, and Sigmund the Volsung stood
By the edge of the swirling eddy, and a white-sailed boat he saw,
And its keel ran light on the strand with the last of the dying flaw.
But therein was a man most mighty, grey-clad like the mountain-cloud,
One-eyed and seeming ancient, and he spake and hailed him aloud:
“Now whither away, King Sigmund, for thou farest far tonight?”
Spake the King: “I would cross this water, for my life hath lost its light,
And mayhap there be deeds for a king to be found on the further shore.”
“My senders,” quoth the shipman, “bade me waft a great king o'er,
So set thy burden a-shipboard, for the night's face looks toward day.”
So betwixt the earth and the water his son did Sigmund lay;
But lo, when he fain would follow, there was neither ship nor man,
Nor aught but his empty bosom beside that water wan,
That whitened by little and little as the night's face looked to the day.
So he stood a long while gazing and then turned and gat him away;
And ere the sun of the noon-tide across the meadows shone
Sigmund the King of the Volsungs was set in his father's throne,
And he hearkened and doomed and portioned, and did all the deeds of a king.
So the autumn waned and perished, and the winter brought the spring.

OF THE LAST BATTLE OF KING SIGMUND, AND THE DEATH OF HIM.

Now is Queen Borghild driven from the Volsung's bed and board,
And unwedded sitteth Sigmund an exceeding mighty lord,
And fareth oft to the war-field, and addeth fame to fame:
And where'er are the great ones told of his sons shall the people name;
But short was their day of harvest and their reaping of renown,
And while men stood by to marvel they gained their latest crown.
So Sigmund alone abideth of all the Volsung seed,
And the folk that the Gods had fashioned lest the earth should lack a deed.
And he said: “The tree was stalwart, but its boughs are old and worn.
Where now are the children departed, that amidst my life were born?
I know not the men about me, and they know not of my ways:
I am nought but a picture of battle, and a song for the people to praise.
I must strive with the deeds of my kingship, and yet when mine hour is come
It shall meet me as glad as the goodman when he bringeth the last load home.”
Now there was a king of the Islands, whom the tale doth Eylimi call,
And saith he was wise and valiant, though his kingdom were but small:
He had one only daughter that Hiordis had to name,
A woman wise and shapely beyond the praise of fame.
And now saith the son of King Volsung that his time is short enow
To labour the Volsung garden, and the hand must be set to the plough:
So he sendeth an earl of the people to King Eylimi's high-built hall,
Bearing the gifts and the tokens, and this word in his mouth withal:
“King Sigmund the son of Volsung hath sent me here with a word
That plenteous good of thy daughter among all folk he hath heard,
And he wooeth that wisest of women that she may sit on his throne,
And lie in the bed of the Volsungs, and be his wife alone.
And he saith that he thinketh surely she shall bear the kings of the earth,
And maybe the best and the greatest of all who are deemed of worth.
Now hereof would he have an answer within a half-month's space,
And these gifts mean while he giveth for the increase of thy grace.”
So King Eylimi hearkened the message, and hath no word to say,
For an earl of King Lyngi the mighty is come that very day,
He too for the wooing of Hiordis: and Lyngi's realm is at hand,
But afar King Sigmund abideth o'er many a sea and land:
And the man is young and eager, and grim and guileful of mood.
He spake: “The first is Lyngi, a valiant man and a fair,
A neighbour ill for thy father, if a foe's name he must bear:
And the next is King Sigmund the Volsung of a land far over sea,
And well thou knowest his kindred, and his might and his valiancy,
And the tales of his heart of a God; and though old he be waxen now,
Yet men deem that the wide world's blossom from Sigmund's loins shall grow.”
Said Hiordis: “I wot, my father, that hereof may strife arise;
Yet soon spoken is mine answer; for I, who am called the wise,
Shall I thrust by the praise of the people, and the tale that no ending hath,
And the love and the heart of the godlike, and the heaven ward-leading path,
For the rose and the stem of the lily, and the smooth-lipped youngling's kiss,
And the eyes' desire that passeth, and the frail unstable bliss?
Now shalt thou tell King Sigmund, that I deem it the crown of my life
To dwell in the house of his fathers amidst all peace and strife,
And to bear the sons of his body: and indeed full well I know
That fair from the loins of Sigmund shall such a stem outgrow
That all folk of the earth shall be praising the womb where once he lay
And the paps that his lips have cherished, and shall bless my happy day.”
Now the king's heart sore misgave him, but herewith must he be content,
And great gifts to the earl of Lyngi and a word withal he sent,
That the woman's troth was plighted to another people's king.
But King Sigmund's earl on the morrow hath joyful yea-saying,
And ere two moons be perished he shall fetch his bride away.
“And bid him,” King Eylimi sayeth, “to come with no small array,
But with sword and shield and war-shaft, lest aught of ill betide.”
So forth goes the earl of Sigmund across the sea-flood wide,
And comes to the land of the Volsungs, and meeteth Sigmund the King,
And tells how he sped on his errand, and the joyful yea-saying.
So King Sigmund maketh him ready, and they ride adown to the sea
All glorious of gear and raiment, and a goodly company.
Yet hath Sigmund thought of his father, and the deed he wrought before,
And hath scorn to gather his people and all his hosts of war
To wend to the feast and the wedding: yet are their long-ships ten,
And the shielded folk aboard them are the mightiest men of men.
So Sigmund goeth a-shipboard, and they hoist their sails to the wind,
And the beaks of the golden dragons leave the Volsungs' land behind.
Then come they to Eylimi's kingdom, and good welcome have they there,
And when Sigmund looked on Hiordis, he deemed her wise and fair.
But her heart was exceeding fain when she saw the glorious king,
And it told her of times that should be full many a noble thing.
So there is Sigmund wedded at a great and goodly feast,
And day by day on Hiordis the joy of her heart increased;
And her father joyed in Sigmund and his might and majesty,
And dead in the heart of the Isle-king his ancient fear did lie.
Yet, forsooth, had men looked seaward, they had seen the gathering cloud,
And the little wind arising, that should one day pipe so loud.
For well may ye wot indeed that King Lyngi the Mighty is wroth,
When he getteth the gifts and the answer, and that tale of the woman's troth:
And he saith he will have the gifts and the woman herself withal,
Either for loving or hating, and that both those heads shall fall.
So now when Sigmund and Hiordis are wedded a month or more,
And the Volsung bids men dight them to cross the sea-flood o'er,
Lo, how there cometh the tidings of measureless mighty hosts
Who are gotten ashore from their long-ships on the skirts of King Eylimi's coasts.
Sore boded the heart of the Isle-king of what the end should be.
But Sigmund long beheld him, and he said: “Thou deem'st of me
That my coming hath brought thee evil; but put aside such things;
For long have I lived, and I know it, that the lives of mighty kings
Are not cast away, nor drifted like the down before the wind;
And surely I know, who say it, that never would Hiordis' mind
Have been turned to wed King Lyngi or aught but the Volsung seed.
Come, go we forth to the battle, that shall be the latest deed
Of thee and me meseemeth: yea, whether thou live or die,
No more shall the brand of Odin at peace in his scabbard lie.”
And therewith he brake the peace-strings and drew the blade of bale,
And Death on the point abided, Fear sat on the edges pale.
So men ride adown to the sea-strand, and the kings their hosts array
When the high noon flooded heaven; and the men of the Volsungs lay,
With King Eylimi's shielded champions mid Lyngi's hosts of war,
As the brown pips lie in the apple when ye cut it through the core.
But now when the kings were departed, from the King's house Hiordis went,
And before men joined the battle she came to a woody bent,
Where she lay with one of her maidens the death and the deeds to behold.
In the noon sun shone King Sigmund as an image all of gold,
And he stood before the foremost and the banner of his fame,
And many a thing he remembered, and he called on each earl by his name
To do well for the house of the Volsungs, and the ages yet unborn.
Then he tossed up the sword of the Branstock, and blew on his father's horn,
Dread of so many a battle, doom-song of so many a man.
Then all the earth seemed moving as the hosts of Lyngi ran
On the Volsung men and the Isle-folk like wolves upon the prey;
But sore was their labour and toil ere the end of their harvesting day.
On went the Volsung banners, and on went Sigmund before,
And his sword was the flail of the tiller on the wheat of the wheat-thrashing floor,
And his shield was rent from his arm, and his helm was sheared from his head:
But who may draw nigh him to smite for the heap and the rampart of dead?
White went his hair on the wind like the ragged drift of the cloud,
And his dust-driven, blood-beaten harness was the death-storm's angry shroud,
When the summer sun is departing in the first of the night of wrack;
And his sword was the cleaving lightning, that smites and is hurried aback
Ere the hand may rise against it; and his voice was the following thunder.
Then cold grew the battle before him, dead-chilled with the fear and the wonder:
For again in his ancient eyes the light of victory gleamed;
From his mouth grown tuneful and sweet the song of his kindred streamed;
And no more was he worn and weary, and no more his life seemed spent:
And with all the hope of his childhood was his wrath of battle blent;
And he thought: A little further, and the river of strife is passed,
And I shall sit triumphant the king of the world at last.
But lo, through the hedge of the war-shafts a mighty man there came,
One-eyed and seeming ancient, but his visage shone like flame:
Gleaming-grey was his kirtle, and his hood was cloudy blue;
And he bore a mighty twi-bill, as he waded the fight-sheaves through,
And stood face to face with Sigmund, and upheaved the bill to smite.
Once more round the head of the Volsung fierce glittered the Branstock's light,
The sword that came from Odin; and Sigmund's cry once more
Rang out to the very heavens above the din of war.
Then clashed the meeting edges with Sigmund's latest stroke,
And in shivering shards fell earth ward that fear of worldly folk.
But changed were the eyes of Sigmund, and the war-wrath left his face;
For that grey-clad mighty helper was gone, and in his place
Drave on the unbroken spear-wood 'gainst the Volsung's empty hands:
And there they smote down Sigmund, the wonder of all lands,
On the foemen, on the death-heap his deeds had piled that day.
Ill hour for Sigmund's fellows! they fall like the seeded hay
Before the brown scythes' sweeping, and there the Isle-king fell
In the fore-front of his battle, wherein he wrought right well,
And soon they were nought but foemen who stand upon their feet
On the isle-strand of the ocean where the grass and the sea-sand meet.
And now hath the conquering War-king another deed to do,
And he saith: “Who now gainsayeth King Lyngi come to woo,
The lord and the overcomer and the bane of the Volsung kin?”
So he fares to the Isle-king's dwelling a wife of the kings to win;
And the host is gathered together, and they leave the field of the dead;
And round as a targe of the Goth-folk the moon ariseth red.
She said: “Thou livest, thou livest! the leeches shall heal thee still.”
“Nay,” said he, “my heart hath hearkened to Odin's bidding and will;
For today have mine eyes beheld him: nay, he needed not to speak:
Forsooth I knew of his message and the thing he came to seek.
And now do I live but to tell thee of the days that are yet to come:
And perchance to solace thy sorrow; and then will I get me home
To my kin that are gone before me. Lo, yonder where I stood
The shards of a glaive of battle that was once the best of the good:
Take them and keep them surely. I have lived no empty days;
The Norns were my nursing-mothers; I have won the people's praise.
When the Gods for one deed asked me I ever gave them twain;
Spendthrift of glory I was, and great was my life-days' gain;
Now these shards have been my fellow in the work the Gods would have,
But today hath Odin taken the gift that once he gave.
I have wrought for the Volsungs truly, and yet have I known full well
That a better one than I am shall bear the tale to tell:
And for him shall these shards be smithied; and he shall be my son
To remember what I have forgotten and to do what I left undone.
Under thy girdle he lieth, and how shall I say unto thee,
Unto thee, the wise of women, to cherish him heedfully.
Now, wife, put by thy sorrow for the little day we have had;
For in sooth I deem thou weepest: The days have been fair and glad:
And our valour and wisdom have met, and thou knowest they shall not die:
Sweet and good were the days, nor yet to the Fates did we cry
For a little longer yet, and a little longer to live:
But we took, we twain in our meeting, all gifts that they had to give:
Our wisdom and valour have kissed, and thine eyes shall see the fruit,
And the joy of his days that shall be hath pierced mine heart to the root.
Grieve not for me; for thou weepest that thou canst not see my face
How its beauty is not departed, nor the hope of mine eyes grown base.
Indeed I am waxen weary; but who heedeth weariness
That hath been day-long on the mountain in the winter weather's stress,
And now stands in the lighted doorway and seeth the king draw nigh,
And heareth men dighting the banquet, and the bed wherein he shall lie?”
Then failed the voice of Sigmund; but so mighty was the man,
That a long while yet he lingered till the dusky night grew wan,
And she sat and sorrowed o'er him, but no more a word he spake.
Then a long way over the sea-flood the day began to break;
And when the sun was arisen a little he turned his head
Till the low beams bathed his eyen, and there lay Sigmund dead.
And the sun rose up on the earth; but where was the Volsung kin
And the folk that the Gods had begotten the praise of all people to win?

HOW KING SIGMUND THE VOLSUNG WAS LAID IN MOUND ON THE SEA-SIDE OF THE ISLE-REALM.

Now Hiordis looked from the dead, and her eyes strayed down to the sea,
And a shielded ship she saw, and a war-dight company,
Who beached the ship for the landing: so swift she fled away,
And once more to the depth of the thicket, wherein her handmaid lay:
And she said: “I have left my lord, and my lord is dead and gone,
And he gave me a charge full heavy, and here are we twain alone,
And earls from the sea are landing: give me thy blue attire,
And take my purple and gold and my crown of the sea-flood's fire,
And be thou the wife of King Volsung when men of our names shall ask,
And I will be the handmaid: now I bid thee to this task,
And I pray thee not to fail me, because of thy faith and truth,
And because I have ever loved thee, and thy mother fostered my youth.
Yea, because my womb is wealthy with a gift for the days to be.
Now do this deed for mine asking and the tale shall be told of thee.”
So the other nought gainsaith it and they shift their raiment there:
But well-spoken was the maiden, and a woman tall and fair.
Now the lord of those new-coming men was a king and the son of a king,
King Elf the son of the Helper, and he sailed from war-faring
And drew anigh to the Isle-realm and sailed along the strand;
For the shipmen needed water and fain would go a-land;
And King Elf stood hard by the tiller while the world was yet a-cold:
Then the red sun lit the dawning, and they looked, and lo, behold!
The wrack of a mighty battle, and heaps of the shielded dead,
And a woman alive amidst them, a queen with crownèd head,
And her eyes strayed down to the sea-strand, and she saw that weaponed folk,
And turned and fled to the thicket: then the lord of the shipmen spoke:
“Lo, here shall we lack for water, for the brooks with blood shall run,
Yet wend we ashore to behold it and to wot of the deeds late done.”
So they turned their faces to Sigmund, and waded the swathes of the sword.
“O, look ye long,” said the Sea-king, “for here lieth a mighty lord:
And all these are the deeds of his war-flame, yet hardy hearts, be sure,
That they once durst look in his face or the wrath of his eyen endure;
Though his lips be glad and smiling as a God that dreameth of mirth.
Would God I were one of his kindred, for none such are left upon earth.
Now fare we into the thicket, for thereto is the woman fled,
And belike she shall tell us the story of this field of the mighty dead.”
So they wend and find the women, and bespeak them kind and fair:
Then spake the gold-crowned handmaid: “Of the Isle-king's house we were,
And I am the Queen called Hiordis; and the man that lies on the field
Was mine own lord Sigmund the Volsung, the mightiest under shield.”
Then all amazed were the sea-folk when they hearkened to that word,
And great and heavy tidings they deem their ears have heard:
But again spake out the Sea-king: “And this blue-clad one beside,
So pale, and as tall as a Goddess, and white and lovely eyed?”
“In sooth and in troth,” said the woman, “my serving-maid is this;
She hath wept long over the battle, and sore afraid she is.”
So there lies Sigmund the Volsung, and far away, forlorn
Are the blossomed boughs of the Branstock, and the house where he was born.
To what end was wrought that roof-ridge, and the rings of the silver door,
And the fair-carved golden high-seat, and the many-pictured floor
Worn down by the feet of the Volsungs? or the hangings of delight,
Or the marvel of its harp-strings, or the Dwarf-wrought beakers bright?
Then the Gods have fashioned a folk who have fashioned a house in vain:
It is nought, and for nought they battled, and nought was their joy and their pain.
Lo, the noble oak of the forest with his feet in the flowers and grass,
How the winds that bear the summer o'er its topmost branches pass,
And the wood-deer dwell beneath it, and the fowl in its fair twigs sing,
And there it stands in the forest, an exceeding glorious thing:
Then come the axes of men, and low it lies on the ground,
And the crane comes out of the southland, and its nest is nowhere found,
And bare and shorn of its blossoms is the house of the deer of the wood.
But the tree is a golden dragon; and fair it floats on the flood,
And beareth the kings and the earl-folk, and is shield-hung all without:
And it seeth the blaze of the beacons, and heareth the war-God's shout.
There are tidings wherever it cometh, and the tale of its time shall be told.
A dear name it hath got like a king, and a fame that groweth not old.
Lo, such is the Volsung dwelling; lo, such is the deed he hath wrought
Who laboured all his life-days, and had rest but little or nought,
Who died in the broken battle; who lies with swordless hand
In the realm that the foe hath conquered on the edge of a stranger-land.

HOW QUEEN HIORDIS IS KNOWN; AND HOW SHE ABIDETH IN THE HOUSE OF ELF THE SON OF THE HELPER.

Now asketh the king of those women where now in the world they will go,
And Hiordis speaks for the twain: “This is now but a land of the foe,
And our lady and Queen beseecheth that unto thine house we wend
And that there thou serve her kingly that her woes may have an end.”
Fain then was the heart of the folk-king, and he bade aboard forth-right,
And they hoist the sails to the wind and sail by day and by night
Till they come to a land of the people, and a goodly land it is,
Where folk may dwell unharried and win abundant bliss,
The land of King Elf and the Helper; and there he bids them abide
In his house that is goodly shapen, and wrought full high and wide:
And he biddeth the Queen be merry, and set aside her woe,
And he doth by them better and better, as day on day doth go.
Now there was the mother of Elf, and a woman wise was she,
And she spake to her son of a morning: “I have noted them heedfully,
Those women thou brought'st from the outlands, and fain now would I wot
Why the worser of the women the goodlier gear hath got.”
He said: “She hath named her Hiordis, the wife of the mightiest king,
E'en Sigmund the son of Volsung with whose name the world doth ring.”
Then the old queen laughed and answered: “Is it not so, my son,
That the handmaid still gave counsel when aught of deeds was done?”
He said: “Yea, she spake mostly; and her words were exceeding wise,
And measureless sweet I deem her, and dear she is to mine eyes.”
But she said: “Do after my counsel, and win thee a goodly queen:
Speak ye to the twain unwary, and the truth shall soon be seen,
And again shall they shift their raiment, if I am aught but a fool.”
Then laughed King Elf and answered: “Thy father's house was fine;
There was gold enough meseemeth—But come now, say the word
And tell me the speech thou spakest awrong mine ears have heard,
And that thou wert the wife of Sigmund, the wife of the mightiest King.”
No whit she smiled, but answered. “Indeed thou sayst the thing:
Such a wealth I had in my storehouse that I feared the Kings of men.”
He said: “Yet for nought didst thou hide thee; had I known of the matter then,
As the daughter of my father had I held thee in good sooth,
For dear to mine eyes wert thou waxen, and my heart of thy woe was ruth.
But now shall I deal with thee better than thy dealings to me have been:
For my wife I will bid thee to be, and the people's very queen.”
She said: “When the son of King Sigmund is brought forth to the light of day
And the world a man hath gotten, thy will shall I nought gainsay.
And I thank thee for thy goodness, and I know the love of thine heart;
And I see thy goodly kingdom, thy country set apart,
With the day of peace begirdled from the change and the battle's wrack:
'Tis enough, and more than enough since none prayeth the past aback.”
Then the King is fain and merry, and he deems his errand sped,
And that night she sits on the high-seat with the crown on her shapely head:
And amidst the song and the joyance, and the sound of the people's praise,
She thinks of the days that have been, and she dreams of the coming days.
So passeth the summer season, and the harvest of the year,
And the latter days of the winter on toward the springtide wear.