Now Sigurd backeth Greyfell on the first of the morrow morn,And he rideth fair and softly through the acres of the corn;The Wrath to his side is girded, but hid are the edges blue,As he wendeth his ways to the mountains, and rideth the horse-mead through.His wide grey eyes are happy, and his voice is sweet and soft,As amid the mead-lark's singing he casteth song aloft:Lo, lo, the horse and the rider! So once maybe it was,When over the Earth unpeopled the youngest God would pass;But never again meseemeth shall such a sight betide,Till over a world unwrongful new-born shall Baldur ride.So he comes to that ness of the mountains, and Gripir's garden steep,That bravely Greyfell breasteth, and adown by the door doth he leapAnd his war-gear rattleth upon him; there is none to ask or forbidAs he wendeth the house clear-lighted, where no mote of the dust is hid,Though the sunlight hath not entered: the walls are clear and bright,For they cast back each to other the golden Sigurd's light;Through the echoing ways of the house bright-eyed he wendeth along,And the mountain-wind is with him, and the hovering eagles' song;But no sound of the children of men may the ears of the Volsung hear,And no sign of their ways in the world, or their will, or their hope or their fear.So he comes to the hall of Gripir, and gleaming-green is it builtAs the house of under-ocean where the wealth of the greedy is spilt;Gleaming and green as the sea, and rich as its rock-strewn floor,And fresh as the autumn morning when the burning of summer is o'er.There he looks and beholdeth the high-seat, and he sees it strangely wrought,Of the tooth of the sea-beast fashioned ere the Dwarf-kind came to nought;And he looks, and thereon is Gripir, the King exceeding old,With the sword of his fathers girded, and his raiment wrought of gold;With the ivory rod in his right-hand, with his left on the crystal laid,That is round as the world of men-folk, and after its image made,And clear is it wrought to the eyen that may read therein of FateThough little indeed be its sea, and its earth not wondrous great.There Sigurd stands in the hall, on the sheathed Wrath doth he lean,All his golden light is mirrored in the gleaming floor and green;But the smile in his face upriseth as he looks on the ancient King,And their glad eyes meet and their laughter, and sweet is the welcoming:And Gripir saith: "Hail Sigurd! for my bidding hast thou done,And here in the mountain-dwelling are two Kings of men alone."But Sigurd spake: "Hail father! I am girt with the fateful swordAnd my face is set to the highway, and I come for thy latest word."Said Gripir: "What wouldst thou hearken ere we sit and drink the wine?""Thy word and the Norns'," said Sigurd, "but never a word of mine.""What sights wouldst thou see," said Gripir, "ere mine hand shall take thine hand?""As the Gods would I see," said Sigurd, "though Death light up the land.""What hope wouldst thou hope, O Sigurd, ere we kiss, we twain, and depart?""Thy hope and the Gods'," said Sigurd, "though the grief lie hard on my heart."Nought answered the ancient wise-one, and not a whit had he stirredSince the clash of Sigurd's raiment in his mountain-hall he heard;But the ball that imaged the earth was set in his hand grown old;And belike it was to his vision, as the wide-world's ocean rolled,And the forests waved with the wind, and the corn was gay with the lark,And the gold in its nether places grew up in the dusk and the dark,And its children built and departed, and its King-folk conquered and went,As over the crystal image his all-wise face was bent:For all his desire was dead, and he lived as a God shall live,Who the prayers of the world hath forgotten, and to whom no hand may give.But there stood the mighty Volsung, and leaned on the hidden Wrath;As the earliest sun's uprising o'er the sea-plain draws a pathWhereby men sail to the Eastward and the dawn of another day,So the image of King Sigurd on the gleaming pavement lay.Then great in the hall fair-pillared the voice of Gripir arose,And it ran through the glimmering house-ways, and forth to the sunny close;There mid the birds' rejoicing went the voice of an o'er-wise KingLike a wind of midmost winter come back to talk with spring.But the voice cried: "Sigurd, Sigurd! O great, O early born!O hope of the Kings first fashioned! O blossom of the morn!Short day and long remembrance, fair summer of the North!One day shall the worn world wonder how first thou wentest forth!"Arise, O Sigurd, Sigurd! in the night arise and go,Thou shalt smite when the day-dawn glimmers through the folds of God-home's foe:"There the child in the noon-tide smiteth; the young King rendeth apart,The old guile by the guile encompassed, the heart made wise by the heart."Bind the red rings, O Sigurd; bind up to cast abroad!That the earth may laugh before thee rejoiced by the Waters' Hoard."Ride on, O Sigurd, Sigurd! for God's word goes forth on the wind,And he speaketh not twice over; nor shall they loose that bind:But the Day and the Day shall loosen, and the Day shall awake and arise,And the Day shall rejoice with the Dawning, and the wise heart learn of the wise."O fair, O fearless, O mighty, how green are the garths of Kings,How soft are the ways before thee to the heart of their war-farings!"How green are the garths of King-folk, how fair is the lily and roseIn the house of the Cloudy People, 'neath the towers of kings and foes!"Smite now, smite now in the noontide! ride on through the hosts of men!Lest the dear remembrance perish, and today come not again."Is it day?—But the house is darkling—But the hand would gather and hold,And the lips have kissed the cloud-wreath, and a cloud the arms enfold."In the dusk hath the Sower arisen; in the dark hath he cast the seed,And the ear is the sorrow of Odin and the wrong, and the nameless need!"Ah the hand hath gathered and garnered, and empty is the hand,Though the day be full and fruitful mid the drift of the Cloudy Land!"Look, look on the drift of the clouds, how the day and the even doth growAs the long-forgotten dawning that was a while ago!"Dawn, dawn, O mighty of men! and why wilt thou never awake,When the holy field of the Goth-folk cries out for thy love and thy sake?"Dawn, now; but the house is silent, and dark is the purple bloodOn the breast of the Queen fair-fashioned; and it riseth up as a floodRound the posts of the door belovèd; and a deed there lieth therein:The last of the deeds of Sigurd; the worst of the Cloudy Kin—The slayer slain by the slain within the door and without.—O dawn as the eve of the birth-day! O dark world cumbered with doubt!"Shall it never be day any more, nor the sun's uprising and growth?Shall the kings of earth lie sleeping and the war-dukes wander in slothThrough the last of the winter twilight? is the word of the wise-ones saidTill the five-fold winter be ended and the trumpet waken the dead?"Short day and long remembrance! great glory for the earth!O deeds of the Day triumphant! O word of Sigurd's worth!It is done, and who shall undo it of all who were ever alive?May the Gods or the high Gods' masters 'gainst the tale of the righteous strive,And the deeds to follow after, and all their deeds increase,Till the uttermost field is foughten, and Baldur riseth in peace!"Cry out, O waste, before him! O rocks of the wilderness, cry!For to-morn shalt thou see the glory, and the man not made to die!Cry out, O upper heavens! O clouds beneath the liftFor the golden King shall be riding high-headed midst the drift:The mountain waits and the fire; there waiteth the heart of the wiseTill the earthly toil is accomplished, and again shall the fire arise;And none shall be nigh in the ending and none by his heart shall be laid,Save the world that he cherished and quickened, and the Day that he wakened and made."So died the voice of Gripir from amidst the sunny close,And the sound of hastening eagles from the mountain's feet arose,But the hall was silent a little, for still stood Sigmund's son,And he heard the words and remembered, and knew them one by one.Then he turned on the ancient Gripir with eyes that knew no guileAnd smiled on the wise of King-folk as the first of men might smileOn the God that hath fashioned him happy; and he spake:"Hast thou spoken and knownHow there standeth a child before thee and a stripling scarcely grown?Or hast thou told of the Volsungs, and the gathered heart of these,And their still unquenched desire for garnering fame's increase?E'en so do I hearken thy words: for I wot how they deem it longTill a man from their seed be arisen to deal with the cumber and wrong.Bid me therefore to sit by thy side, for behold I wend on my way,And the gates swing to behind me, and each day of mine is a dayWith deeds in the eve and the morning, nor deeds shall the noontide lack;To the right and the left none calleth, and no voice crieth aback.""Come, kin of the Gods," said Gripir, "come up and sit by my sideThat we twain may be glad as the fearless, and they that have nothing to hide:I have wrought out my will and abide it, and I sit ungrieved and alone,I look upon men and I help not; to me are the deeds long doneAs those of to-day and to-morrow: for these and for those am I glad;But the Gods and men are the framers, and the days of my life I have had."Then Sigurd came unto Gripir, and he kissed the wise-one's face,And they sat in the high-seat together, the child and the elder of days;And they drank of the wine of King-folk, and were joyful each of each,And spake for a while of matters that are meet for King-folk's speech;The deeds of men that have been and Kin of the Kings of the earth;And Gripir told of the outlands, and the mid-world's billowy girth,And tales of the upper heaven were mingled with his talk,And the halls where the Sea-Queen's kindred o'er the gem-strewn pavement walk,And the innermost parts of the earth, where they lie, the green and the blue,And the red and the glittering gem-stones that of old the Dwarf-kind knew.Long Sigurd sat and marvelled at the mouth that might not lie,And the eyes no God had blinded, and the lone heart raised on high,Then he rose from the gleaming high-seat, and the rings of battle rangAnd the sheathèd Wrath was hearkening and a song of war it sang,But Sigurd spake unto Gripir:"Long and lovely are thy days,And thy years fulfilled of wisdom, and thy feet on the unhid ways,And the guileless heart of the great that knoweth not anger nor pain:So once hath a man been fashioned and shall not be again.But for me hath been foaled the war-horse, the grey steed swift as the cloud,And for me were the edges smithied, and the Wrath cries out aloud;And a voice hath called from the darkness, and I ride to the Glittering Heath;To smite on the door of Destruction, and waken the warder of Death."So they kissed, the wise and the wise, and the child from the elder turned;And again in the glimmering house-ways the golden Sigurd burned;He stood outside in the sunlight, and tarried never a deal,But leapt on the cloudy Greyfell with the clank of gold and steel,And he rode through the sinking day to the walls of the kingly stead,And came to Regin's dwelling when the wind was fallen dead,And the great sun just departing: then blood-red grew the west,And the fowl flew home from the sea-mead, and all things sank to rest.
Now Sigurd backeth Greyfell on the first of the morrow morn,And he rideth fair and softly through the acres of the corn;The Wrath to his side is girded, but hid are the edges blue,As he wendeth his ways to the mountains, and rideth the horse-mead through.His wide grey eyes are happy, and his voice is sweet and soft,As amid the mead-lark's singing he casteth song aloft:Lo, lo, the horse and the rider! So once maybe it was,When over the Earth unpeopled the youngest God would pass;But never again meseemeth shall such a sight betide,Till over a world unwrongful new-born shall Baldur ride.So he comes to that ness of the mountains, and Gripir's garden steep,That bravely Greyfell breasteth, and adown by the door doth he leapAnd his war-gear rattleth upon him; there is none to ask or forbidAs he wendeth the house clear-lighted, where no mote of the dust is hid,Though the sunlight hath not entered: the walls are clear and bright,For they cast back each to other the golden Sigurd's light;Through the echoing ways of the house bright-eyed he wendeth along,And the mountain-wind is with him, and the hovering eagles' song;But no sound of the children of men may the ears of the Volsung hear,And no sign of their ways in the world, or their will, or their hope or their fear.So he comes to the hall of Gripir, and gleaming-green is it builtAs the house of under-ocean where the wealth of the greedy is spilt;Gleaming and green as the sea, and rich as its rock-strewn floor,And fresh as the autumn morning when the burning of summer is o'er.There he looks and beholdeth the high-seat, and he sees it strangely wrought,Of the tooth of the sea-beast fashioned ere the Dwarf-kind came to nought;And he looks, and thereon is Gripir, the King exceeding old,With the sword of his fathers girded, and his raiment wrought of gold;With the ivory rod in his right-hand, with his left on the crystal laid,That is round as the world of men-folk, and after its image made,And clear is it wrought to the eyen that may read therein of FateThough little indeed be its sea, and its earth not wondrous great.There Sigurd stands in the hall, on the sheathed Wrath doth he lean,All his golden light is mirrored in the gleaming floor and green;But the smile in his face upriseth as he looks on the ancient King,And their glad eyes meet and their laughter, and sweet is the welcoming:And Gripir saith: "Hail Sigurd! for my bidding hast thou done,And here in the mountain-dwelling are two Kings of men alone."But Sigurd spake: "Hail father! I am girt with the fateful swordAnd my face is set to the highway, and I come for thy latest word."Said Gripir: "What wouldst thou hearken ere we sit and drink the wine?""Thy word and the Norns'," said Sigurd, "but never a word of mine.""What sights wouldst thou see," said Gripir, "ere mine hand shall take thine hand?""As the Gods would I see," said Sigurd, "though Death light up the land.""What hope wouldst thou hope, O Sigurd, ere we kiss, we twain, and depart?""Thy hope and the Gods'," said Sigurd, "though the grief lie hard on my heart."Nought answered the ancient wise-one, and not a whit had he stirredSince the clash of Sigurd's raiment in his mountain-hall he heard;But the ball that imaged the earth was set in his hand grown old;And belike it was to his vision, as the wide-world's ocean rolled,And the forests waved with the wind, and the corn was gay with the lark,And the gold in its nether places grew up in the dusk and the dark,And its children built and departed, and its King-folk conquered and went,As over the crystal image his all-wise face was bent:For all his desire was dead, and he lived as a God shall live,Who the prayers of the world hath forgotten, and to whom no hand may give.But there stood the mighty Volsung, and leaned on the hidden Wrath;As the earliest sun's uprising o'er the sea-plain draws a pathWhereby men sail to the Eastward and the dawn of another day,So the image of King Sigurd on the gleaming pavement lay.Then great in the hall fair-pillared the voice of Gripir arose,And it ran through the glimmering house-ways, and forth to the sunny close;There mid the birds' rejoicing went the voice of an o'er-wise KingLike a wind of midmost winter come back to talk with spring.But the voice cried: "Sigurd, Sigurd! O great, O early born!O hope of the Kings first fashioned! O blossom of the morn!Short day and long remembrance, fair summer of the North!One day shall the worn world wonder how first thou wentest forth!"Arise, O Sigurd, Sigurd! in the night arise and go,Thou shalt smite when the day-dawn glimmers through the folds of God-home's foe:"There the child in the noon-tide smiteth; the young King rendeth apart,The old guile by the guile encompassed, the heart made wise by the heart."Bind the red rings, O Sigurd; bind up to cast abroad!That the earth may laugh before thee rejoiced by the Waters' Hoard."Ride on, O Sigurd, Sigurd! for God's word goes forth on the wind,And he speaketh not twice over; nor shall they loose that bind:But the Day and the Day shall loosen, and the Day shall awake and arise,And the Day shall rejoice with the Dawning, and the wise heart learn of the wise."O fair, O fearless, O mighty, how green are the garths of Kings,How soft are the ways before thee to the heart of their war-farings!"How green are the garths of King-folk, how fair is the lily and roseIn the house of the Cloudy People, 'neath the towers of kings and foes!"Smite now, smite now in the noontide! ride on through the hosts of men!Lest the dear remembrance perish, and today come not again."Is it day?—But the house is darkling—But the hand would gather and hold,And the lips have kissed the cloud-wreath, and a cloud the arms enfold."In the dusk hath the Sower arisen; in the dark hath he cast the seed,And the ear is the sorrow of Odin and the wrong, and the nameless need!"Ah the hand hath gathered and garnered, and empty is the hand,Though the day be full and fruitful mid the drift of the Cloudy Land!"Look, look on the drift of the clouds, how the day and the even doth growAs the long-forgotten dawning that was a while ago!"Dawn, dawn, O mighty of men! and why wilt thou never awake,When the holy field of the Goth-folk cries out for thy love and thy sake?"Dawn, now; but the house is silent, and dark is the purple bloodOn the breast of the Queen fair-fashioned; and it riseth up as a floodRound the posts of the door belovèd; and a deed there lieth therein:The last of the deeds of Sigurd; the worst of the Cloudy Kin—The slayer slain by the slain within the door and without.—O dawn as the eve of the birth-day! O dark world cumbered with doubt!"Shall it never be day any more, nor the sun's uprising and growth?Shall the kings of earth lie sleeping and the war-dukes wander in slothThrough the last of the winter twilight? is the word of the wise-ones saidTill the five-fold winter be ended and the trumpet waken the dead?"Short day and long remembrance! great glory for the earth!O deeds of the Day triumphant! O word of Sigurd's worth!It is done, and who shall undo it of all who were ever alive?May the Gods or the high Gods' masters 'gainst the tale of the righteous strive,And the deeds to follow after, and all their deeds increase,Till the uttermost field is foughten, and Baldur riseth in peace!"Cry out, O waste, before him! O rocks of the wilderness, cry!For to-morn shalt thou see the glory, and the man not made to die!Cry out, O upper heavens! O clouds beneath the liftFor the golden King shall be riding high-headed midst the drift:The mountain waits and the fire; there waiteth the heart of the wiseTill the earthly toil is accomplished, and again shall the fire arise;And none shall be nigh in the ending and none by his heart shall be laid,Save the world that he cherished and quickened, and the Day that he wakened and made."So died the voice of Gripir from amidst the sunny close,And the sound of hastening eagles from the mountain's feet arose,But the hall was silent a little, for still stood Sigmund's son,And he heard the words and remembered, and knew them one by one.Then he turned on the ancient Gripir with eyes that knew no guileAnd smiled on the wise of King-folk as the first of men might smileOn the God that hath fashioned him happy; and he spake:"Hast thou spoken and knownHow there standeth a child before thee and a stripling scarcely grown?Or hast thou told of the Volsungs, and the gathered heart of these,And their still unquenched desire for garnering fame's increase?E'en so do I hearken thy words: for I wot how they deem it longTill a man from their seed be arisen to deal with the cumber and wrong.Bid me therefore to sit by thy side, for behold I wend on my way,And the gates swing to behind me, and each day of mine is a dayWith deeds in the eve and the morning, nor deeds shall the noontide lack;To the right and the left none calleth, and no voice crieth aback.""Come, kin of the Gods," said Gripir, "come up and sit by my sideThat we twain may be glad as the fearless, and they that have nothing to hide:I have wrought out my will and abide it, and I sit ungrieved and alone,I look upon men and I help not; to me are the deeds long doneAs those of to-day and to-morrow: for these and for those am I glad;But the Gods and men are the framers, and the days of my life I have had."Then Sigurd came unto Gripir, and he kissed the wise-one's face,And they sat in the high-seat together, the child and the elder of days;And they drank of the wine of King-folk, and were joyful each of each,And spake for a while of matters that are meet for King-folk's speech;The deeds of men that have been and Kin of the Kings of the earth;And Gripir told of the outlands, and the mid-world's billowy girth,And tales of the upper heaven were mingled with his talk,And the halls where the Sea-Queen's kindred o'er the gem-strewn pavement walk,And the innermost parts of the earth, where they lie, the green and the blue,And the red and the glittering gem-stones that of old the Dwarf-kind knew.Long Sigurd sat and marvelled at the mouth that might not lie,And the eyes no God had blinded, and the lone heart raised on high,Then he rose from the gleaming high-seat, and the rings of battle rangAnd the sheathèd Wrath was hearkening and a song of war it sang,But Sigurd spake unto Gripir:"Long and lovely are thy days,And thy years fulfilled of wisdom, and thy feet on the unhid ways,And the guileless heart of the great that knoweth not anger nor pain:So once hath a man been fashioned and shall not be again.But for me hath been foaled the war-horse, the grey steed swift as the cloud,And for me were the edges smithied, and the Wrath cries out aloud;And a voice hath called from the darkness, and I ride to the Glittering Heath;To smite on the door of Destruction, and waken the warder of Death."So they kissed, the wise and the wise, and the child from the elder turned;And again in the glimmering house-ways the golden Sigurd burned;He stood outside in the sunlight, and tarried never a deal,But leapt on the cloudy Greyfell with the clank of gold and steel,And he rode through the sinking day to the walls of the kingly stead,And came to Regin's dwelling when the wind was fallen dead,And the great sun just departing: then blood-red grew the west,And the fowl flew home from the sea-mead, and all things sank to rest.
Again on the morrow morning doth Sigurd the Volsung ride,And Regin, the Master of Masters, is faring by his side,And they leave the dwelling of kings and ride the summer land,Until at the eve of the day the hills are on either hand:Then they wend up higher and higher, and over the heaths they fareTill the moon shines broad on the midnight, and they sleep 'neath the heavens bare;And they waken and look behind them, and lo, the dawning of dayAnd the little land of the Helper and its valley far away;But the mountains rise before them, a wall exceeding great.Then spake the Master of Masters: "We have come to the garth and the gate:There is youth and rest behind thee and many a thing to do,There is many a fond desire, and each day born anew;And the land of the Volsungs to conquer, and many a people's praise:And for me there is rest it maybe, and the peaceful end of days.We have come to the garth and the gate; to the hall-door now shall we win,Shall we go to look on the high-seat and see what sitteth therein?""Yea and what else?" said Sigurd, "was thy tale but mockeriesAnd have I been drifted hither on a wind of empty lies?""It was sooth, it was sooth," said Regin, "and more might I have toldHad I heart and space to remember the deeds of the days of old."And he hung down his head as he spake it, and was silent a little space;And when it was lifted again there was fear in the Dwarf-king's face.And he said: "Thou knowest my thought, and wise-hearted art thou grown:It were well if thine eyes were blinder, and we each were faring alone,And I with my eld and my wisdom, and thou with thy youth and thy might;Yet whiles I dream I have wrought thee, a beam of the morning bright,A fatherless motherless glory, to work out my desire;Then high my hope ariseth, and my heart is all afireFor the world I behold from afar, and the day that yet shall be;Then I wake and all things I remember and a youth of the Kings I see——The child of the Wood-abider, the seed of a conquered King,The sword that the Gods have fashioned, the fate that men shall sing:—Ah might the world run backward to the days of the Dwarfs of old,When I hewed out the pillars of crystal, and smoothed the walls of gold!"Nought answered the Son of Sigmund; nay he heard him nought at all,Save as though the wind were speaking in the bights of the mountain-hall:But he leapt aback of Greyfell, and the glorious sun rose up,And the heavens glowed above him like the bowl of Baldur's cup,And a golden man was he waxen; as the heart of the sun he seemed,While over the feet of the mountains like blood the new light streamed;Then Sigurd cried to Greyfell and swift for the pass he rodeAnd Regin followed after as a man bowed down by a load.Day-long they fared through the mountains, and that highway's fashionerForsooth was a fearful craftsman, and his hands the waters were,And the heaped-up ice was his mattock, and the fire-blast was his man,And never a whit he heeded though his walls were waste and wan,And the guest-halls of that wayside great heaps of the ashes spent.But, each as a man alone, through the sun-bright day they went,And they rode till the moon rose upward, and the stars were small and fair,Then they slept on the long-slaked ashes beneath the heavens bare;And the cold dawn came and they wakened, and the King of the Dwarf-kind seemedAs a thing of that wan land fashioned; but Sigurd glowed and gleamedAmid the shadowless twilight by Greyfell's cloudy flank,As a little space they abided while the latest star-world shrank;On the backward road looked Regin and heard how Sigurd drewThe girths of Greyfell's saddle, and the voice of his sword he knewAnd he feared to look on the Volsung, as thus he fell to speak:"I have seen the Dwarf-folk mighty, I have seen the God-folk weak;And now, though our might be minished, yet have we gifts to give.When men desire and conquer, most sweet is their life to live;When men are young and lovely there is many a thing to do,And sweet is their fond desire and the dawn that springs anew.""This gift," said the Son of Sigmund, "the Norns shall give me yet,And no blossom slain by the sunshine while the leaves with dew are wet."Then Regin turned and beheld him: "Thou shalt deem it hard and strange,When the hand hath encompassed it all, and yet thy life must change.Ah, long were the lives of men-folk, if betwixt the Gods and themWere mighty warders watching mid the earth's and the heaven's hem!Is there any man so mighty he would cast this gift away,—The heart's desire accomplished, and life so long a day,That the dawn should be forgotten ere the even was begun?"Then Sigurd laughed and answered: "Fare forth, O glorious sun;Bright end from bright beginning, and the mid-way good to tell,And death, and deeds accomplished, and all remembered well!Shall the day go past and leave us, and we be left with night,To tread the endless circle, and strive in vain to smite?But thou—wilt thou still look backward? thou sayst I know thy thought:Thou hast whetted the sword for the slaying, it shall turn aside for nought.Fear not! with the Gold and the wisdom thou shalt deem thee God alone,And mayst do and undo at pleasure, nor be bound by right nor wrong:And then, if no God I be waxen, I shall be the weak with the strong."And his war-gear clanged and tinkled as he leapt to the saddle-stead:And the sun rose up at their backs and the grey world changed to red.And away to the west went Sigurd by the glory wreathed about,But little and black was Regin as a fire that dieth out.Day-long they rode the mountains by the crags exceeding old,And the ash that the first of the Dwarf-kind found dull and quenched and cold.Then the moon in the mid-sky swam, and the stars were fair and pale,And beneath the naked heaven they slept in an ash-grey dale;And again at the dawn-dusk's ending they stood upon their feet,And Sigurd donned his war-gear nor his eyes would Regin meet.A clear streak widened in heaven low down above the earth;And above it lay the cloud-flecks, and the sun, anigh its birth,Unseen, their hosts was staining with the very hue of blood,And ruddy by Greyfell's shoulder the Son of Sigmund stood.Then spake the Master of Masters: "What is thine hope this mornThat thou dightest thee, O Sigurd, to ride this world forlorn?""What needeth hope," said Sigurd, "when the heart of the Volsungs turnsTo the light of the Glittering Heath, and the house where the Waster burns?I shall slay the Foe of the Gods, as thou badst me a while agone,And then with the Gold and its wisdom shalt thou be left alone.""O Child," said the King of the Dwarf-kind, "when the day at last comes roundFor the dread and the Dusk of the Gods, and the kin of the Wolf is unbound,When thy sword shall hew the fire, and the wildfire beateth thy shield,Shalt thou praise the wages of hope and the Gods that pitched the field?""O Foe of the Gods," said Sigurd, "wouldst thou hide the evil thing,And the curse that is greater than thou, lest death end thy labouring,Lest the night should come upon thee amidst thy toil for nought?It is me, it is me that thou fearest, if indeed I know thy thought;Yea me, who would utterly light the face of all good and ill,If not with the fruitful beams that the summer shall fulfill,Then at least with the world a-blazing, and the glare of the grinded sword."And he sprang aloft to the saddle as he spake the latest word,And the Wrath sang loud in the sheath as it ne'er had sung before,And the cloudy flecks were scattered like flames on the heaven's floor,And all was kindled at once, and that trench of the mountains greyWas filled with the living light as the low sun lit the way:But Regin turned from the glory with blinded eyes and dazed,And lo, on the cloudy war-steed how another light there blazed,And a great voice came from amidst it:"O Regin, in good sooth,I have hearkened not nor heeded the words of thy fear and thy ruth:Thou hast told thy tale and thy longing, and thereto I hearkened well:—Let it lead thee up to heaven, let it lead thee down to hell,The deed shall be done to-morrow: thou shalt have that measureless Gold,And devour the garnered wisdom that blessed thy realm of old,That hath lain unspent and begrudged in the very heart of hate:With the blood and the might of thy brother thine hunger shalt thou sate;And this deed shall be mine and thine; but take heed for what followeth then!Let each do after his kind! I shall do the deeds of men;I shall harvest the field of their sowing, in the bed of their strewing shall sleep;To them shall I give my life-days, to the Gods my glory to keep.But thou with the wealth and the wisdom that the best of the Gods might praise,If thou shalt indeed excel them and become the hope of the days,Then me in turn hast thou conquered, and I shall be in turnThy fashioned brand of the battle through good and evil to burn,Or the flame that sleeps in thy stithy for the gathered winds to blow,When thou listest to do and undo and thine uttermost cunning to show.But indeed I wot full surely that thou shalt follow thy kind;And for all that cometh after, the Norns shall loose and bind."Then his bridle-reins rang sweetly, and the warding-walls of death,And Regin drew up to him, and the Wrath sang loud in the sheath,And forth from that trench in the mountains by the westward way they ride;And little and black goes Regin by the golden Volsung's side;But no more his head is drooping, for he seeth the Elf-king's Gold;The garnered might and the wisdom e'en now his eyes behold.So up and up they journeyed, and ever as they wentAbout the cold-slaked forges, o'er many a cloud-swept bent,Betwixt the walls of blackness, by shores of the fishless meres,And the fathomless desert waters, did Regin cast his fears,And wrap him in desire; and all alone he seemedAs a God to his heirship wending, and forgotten and undreamedWas all the tale of Sigurd, and the folk he had toiled among,And the Volsungs, Odin's children, and the men-folk fair and young.
Again on the morrow morning doth Sigurd the Volsung ride,And Regin, the Master of Masters, is faring by his side,And they leave the dwelling of kings and ride the summer land,Until at the eve of the day the hills are on either hand:Then they wend up higher and higher, and over the heaths they fareTill the moon shines broad on the midnight, and they sleep 'neath the heavens bare;And they waken and look behind them, and lo, the dawning of dayAnd the little land of the Helper and its valley far away;But the mountains rise before them, a wall exceeding great.Then spake the Master of Masters: "We have come to the garth and the gate:There is youth and rest behind thee and many a thing to do,There is many a fond desire, and each day born anew;And the land of the Volsungs to conquer, and many a people's praise:And for me there is rest it maybe, and the peaceful end of days.We have come to the garth and the gate; to the hall-door now shall we win,Shall we go to look on the high-seat and see what sitteth therein?""Yea and what else?" said Sigurd, "was thy tale but mockeriesAnd have I been drifted hither on a wind of empty lies?""It was sooth, it was sooth," said Regin, "and more might I have toldHad I heart and space to remember the deeds of the days of old."And he hung down his head as he spake it, and was silent a little space;And when it was lifted again there was fear in the Dwarf-king's face.And he said: "Thou knowest my thought, and wise-hearted art thou grown:It were well if thine eyes were blinder, and we each were faring alone,And I with my eld and my wisdom, and thou with thy youth and thy might;Yet whiles I dream I have wrought thee, a beam of the morning bright,A fatherless motherless glory, to work out my desire;Then high my hope ariseth, and my heart is all afireFor the world I behold from afar, and the day that yet shall be;Then I wake and all things I remember and a youth of the Kings I see——The child of the Wood-abider, the seed of a conquered King,The sword that the Gods have fashioned, the fate that men shall sing:—Ah might the world run backward to the days of the Dwarfs of old,When I hewed out the pillars of crystal, and smoothed the walls of gold!"Nought answered the Son of Sigmund; nay he heard him nought at all,Save as though the wind were speaking in the bights of the mountain-hall:But he leapt aback of Greyfell, and the glorious sun rose up,And the heavens glowed above him like the bowl of Baldur's cup,And a golden man was he waxen; as the heart of the sun he seemed,While over the feet of the mountains like blood the new light streamed;Then Sigurd cried to Greyfell and swift for the pass he rodeAnd Regin followed after as a man bowed down by a load.Day-long they fared through the mountains, and that highway's fashionerForsooth was a fearful craftsman, and his hands the waters were,And the heaped-up ice was his mattock, and the fire-blast was his man,And never a whit he heeded though his walls were waste and wan,And the guest-halls of that wayside great heaps of the ashes spent.But, each as a man alone, through the sun-bright day they went,And they rode till the moon rose upward, and the stars were small and fair,Then they slept on the long-slaked ashes beneath the heavens bare;And the cold dawn came and they wakened, and the King of the Dwarf-kind seemedAs a thing of that wan land fashioned; but Sigurd glowed and gleamedAmid the shadowless twilight by Greyfell's cloudy flank,As a little space they abided while the latest star-world shrank;On the backward road looked Regin and heard how Sigurd drewThe girths of Greyfell's saddle, and the voice of his sword he knewAnd he feared to look on the Volsung, as thus he fell to speak:"I have seen the Dwarf-folk mighty, I have seen the God-folk weak;And now, though our might be minished, yet have we gifts to give.When men desire and conquer, most sweet is their life to live;When men are young and lovely there is many a thing to do,And sweet is their fond desire and the dawn that springs anew.""This gift," said the Son of Sigmund, "the Norns shall give me yet,And no blossom slain by the sunshine while the leaves with dew are wet."Then Regin turned and beheld him: "Thou shalt deem it hard and strange,When the hand hath encompassed it all, and yet thy life must change.Ah, long were the lives of men-folk, if betwixt the Gods and themWere mighty warders watching mid the earth's and the heaven's hem!Is there any man so mighty he would cast this gift away,—The heart's desire accomplished, and life so long a day,That the dawn should be forgotten ere the even was begun?"Then Sigurd laughed and answered: "Fare forth, O glorious sun;Bright end from bright beginning, and the mid-way good to tell,And death, and deeds accomplished, and all remembered well!Shall the day go past and leave us, and we be left with night,To tread the endless circle, and strive in vain to smite?But thou—wilt thou still look backward? thou sayst I know thy thought:Thou hast whetted the sword for the slaying, it shall turn aside for nought.Fear not! with the Gold and the wisdom thou shalt deem thee God alone,And mayst do and undo at pleasure, nor be bound by right nor wrong:And then, if no God I be waxen, I shall be the weak with the strong."And his war-gear clanged and tinkled as he leapt to the saddle-stead:And the sun rose up at their backs and the grey world changed to red.And away to the west went Sigurd by the glory wreathed about,But little and black was Regin as a fire that dieth out.Day-long they rode the mountains by the crags exceeding old,And the ash that the first of the Dwarf-kind found dull and quenched and cold.Then the moon in the mid-sky swam, and the stars were fair and pale,And beneath the naked heaven they slept in an ash-grey dale;And again at the dawn-dusk's ending they stood upon their feet,And Sigurd donned his war-gear nor his eyes would Regin meet.A clear streak widened in heaven low down above the earth;And above it lay the cloud-flecks, and the sun, anigh its birth,Unseen, their hosts was staining with the very hue of blood,And ruddy by Greyfell's shoulder the Son of Sigmund stood.Then spake the Master of Masters: "What is thine hope this mornThat thou dightest thee, O Sigurd, to ride this world forlorn?""What needeth hope," said Sigurd, "when the heart of the Volsungs turnsTo the light of the Glittering Heath, and the house where the Waster burns?I shall slay the Foe of the Gods, as thou badst me a while agone,And then with the Gold and its wisdom shalt thou be left alone.""O Child," said the King of the Dwarf-kind, "when the day at last comes roundFor the dread and the Dusk of the Gods, and the kin of the Wolf is unbound,When thy sword shall hew the fire, and the wildfire beateth thy shield,Shalt thou praise the wages of hope and the Gods that pitched the field?""O Foe of the Gods," said Sigurd, "wouldst thou hide the evil thing,And the curse that is greater than thou, lest death end thy labouring,Lest the night should come upon thee amidst thy toil for nought?It is me, it is me that thou fearest, if indeed I know thy thought;Yea me, who would utterly light the face of all good and ill,If not with the fruitful beams that the summer shall fulfill,Then at least with the world a-blazing, and the glare of the grinded sword."And he sprang aloft to the saddle as he spake the latest word,And the Wrath sang loud in the sheath as it ne'er had sung before,And the cloudy flecks were scattered like flames on the heaven's floor,And all was kindled at once, and that trench of the mountains greyWas filled with the living light as the low sun lit the way:But Regin turned from the glory with blinded eyes and dazed,And lo, on the cloudy war-steed how another light there blazed,And a great voice came from amidst it:"O Regin, in good sooth,I have hearkened not nor heeded the words of thy fear and thy ruth:Thou hast told thy tale and thy longing, and thereto I hearkened well:—Let it lead thee up to heaven, let it lead thee down to hell,The deed shall be done to-morrow: thou shalt have that measureless Gold,And devour the garnered wisdom that blessed thy realm of old,That hath lain unspent and begrudged in the very heart of hate:With the blood and the might of thy brother thine hunger shalt thou sate;And this deed shall be mine and thine; but take heed for what followeth then!Let each do after his kind! I shall do the deeds of men;I shall harvest the field of their sowing, in the bed of their strewing shall sleep;To them shall I give my life-days, to the Gods my glory to keep.But thou with the wealth and the wisdom that the best of the Gods might praise,If thou shalt indeed excel them and become the hope of the days,Then me in turn hast thou conquered, and I shall be in turnThy fashioned brand of the battle through good and evil to burn,Or the flame that sleeps in thy stithy for the gathered winds to blow,When thou listest to do and undo and thine uttermost cunning to show.But indeed I wot full surely that thou shalt follow thy kind;And for all that cometh after, the Norns shall loose and bind."Then his bridle-reins rang sweetly, and the warding-walls of death,And Regin drew up to him, and the Wrath sang loud in the sheath,And forth from that trench in the mountains by the westward way they ride;And little and black goes Regin by the golden Volsung's side;But no more his head is drooping, for he seeth the Elf-king's Gold;The garnered might and the wisdom e'en now his eyes behold.So up and up they journeyed, and ever as they wentAbout the cold-slaked forges, o'er many a cloud-swept bent,Betwixt the walls of blackness, by shores of the fishless meres,And the fathomless desert waters, did Regin cast his fears,And wrap him in desire; and all alone he seemedAs a God to his heirship wending, and forgotten and undreamedWas all the tale of Sigurd, and the folk he had toiled among,And the Volsungs, Odin's children, and the men-folk fair and young.
So on they ride to the westward, and huge were the mountains grownAnd the floor of heaven was mingled with that tossing world of stone:And they rode till the noon was forgotten and the sun was waxen low,And they tarried not, though he perished, and the world grew dark below.Then they rode a mighty desert, a glimmering place and wide,And into a narrow pass high-walled on either sideBy the blackness of the mountains, and barred aback and in faceBy the empty night of the shadow; a windless silent place:But the white moon shone o'erhead mid the small sharp stars and pale,And each as a man alone they rode on the highway of bale.
So on they ride to the westward, and huge were the mountains grownAnd the floor of heaven was mingled with that tossing world of stone:And they rode till the noon was forgotten and the sun was waxen low,And they tarried not, though he perished, and the world grew dark below.Then they rode a mighty desert, a glimmering place and wide,And into a narrow pass high-walled on either sideBy the blackness of the mountains, and barred aback and in faceBy the empty night of the shadow; a windless silent place:But the white moon shone o'erhead mid the small sharp stars and pale,And each as a man alone they rode on the highway of bale.
So ever they wended upward, and the midnight hour was o'er,And the stars grew pale and paler, and failed from the heaven's floor,And the moon was a long while dead, but there was the promise of day,No change came over the darkness, no streak of the dawning grey;No sound of the wind's uprising adown the night there ran:It was blind as the Gaping Gulf ere the first of the worlds began.Then athwart and athwart rode Sigurd and sought the walls of the pass,But found no wall before him; and the road rang hard as brassBeneath the hoofs of Greyfell, as up and up he trod:—Was it the daylight of Hell, or the night of the doorways of God?But lo, at the last a glimmer, and a light from the west there came,And another and another, like points of far-off flame;And they grew and brightened and gathered; and whiles together they ranLike the moonwake over the waters; and whiles they were scant and wan,Some greater and some lesser, like the boats of fishers laidAbout the sea of midnight; and a dusky dawn they made,A faint and glimmering twilight: So Sigurd strains his eyes,And he sees how a land deserted all round about him liesMore changeless than mid-ocean, as fruitless as its floor:Then the heart leaps up within him, for he knows that his journey is o'er,And there he draweth bridle on the first of the Glittering Heath:And the Wrath is waxen merry and sings in the golden sheathAs he leaps adown from Greyfell, and stands upon his feet,And wends his ways through the twilight the Foe of the Gods to meet.
So ever they wended upward, and the midnight hour was o'er,And the stars grew pale and paler, and failed from the heaven's floor,And the moon was a long while dead, but there was the promise of day,No change came over the darkness, no streak of the dawning grey;No sound of the wind's uprising adown the night there ran:It was blind as the Gaping Gulf ere the first of the worlds began.Then athwart and athwart rode Sigurd and sought the walls of the pass,But found no wall before him; and the road rang hard as brassBeneath the hoofs of Greyfell, as up and up he trod:—Was it the daylight of Hell, or the night of the doorways of God?But lo, at the last a glimmer, and a light from the west there came,And another and another, like points of far-off flame;And they grew and brightened and gathered; and whiles together they ranLike the moonwake over the waters; and whiles they were scant and wan,Some greater and some lesser, like the boats of fishers laidAbout the sea of midnight; and a dusky dawn they made,A faint and glimmering twilight: So Sigurd strains his eyes,And he sees how a land deserted all round about him liesMore changeless than mid-ocean, as fruitless as its floor:Then the heart leaps up within him, for he knows that his journey is o'er,And there he draweth bridle on the first of the Glittering Heath:And the Wrath is waxen merry and sings in the golden sheathAs he leaps adown from Greyfell, and stands upon his feet,And wends his ways through the twilight the Foe of the Gods to meet.
Nought Sigurd seeth of Regin, and nought he heeds of him,As in watchful might and glory he strides the desert dim,And behind him paceth Greyfell; but he deems the time o'erlongTill he meet the great gold-warden, the over-lord of wrong.So he wendeth midst the silence through the measureless desert place,And beholds the countless glitter with wise and steadfast face,Till him-seems in a little season that the flames grow somewhat wan,And a grey thing glimmers before him, and becomes a mighty man,One-eyed and ancient-seeming, in cloud-grey raiment clad;A friendly man and glorious, and of visage smiling-glad:Then content in Sigurd groweth because of his majesty,And he heareth him speak in the desert as the wind of the winter sea:"Hail Sigurd! Give me thy greeting ere thy ways alone thou wend!"Said Sigurd: "Hail! I greet thee, my friend and my fathers' friend.""Now whither away," said the elder, "with the Steed and the ancient Sword?""To the greedy house," said Sigurd, "and the King of the Heavy Hoard.""Wilt thou smite, O Sigurd, Sigurd?" said the ancient mighty-one."Yea, yea, I shall smite," said the Volsung, "save the Gods have slain the sun.""What wise wilt thou smite," said the elder, "lest the dark devour thy day?""Thou hast praised the sword," said the child, "and the sword shall find a way.""Be learned of me," said the Wise-one, "for I was the first of thy folk."Said the child: "I shall do thy bidding, and for thee shall I strike the stroke."Spake the Wise-one: "Thus shalt thou do when thou wendest hence alone:Thou shalt find a path in the desert, and a road in the world of stone;It is smooth and deep and hollow, but the rain hath riven it not,And the wild wind hath not worn it, for it is but Fafnir's slot,Whereby he wends to the water and the fathomless pool of old,When his heart in the dawn is weary, and he loathes the Ancient Gold:There think of the great and the fathers, and bare the whetted Wrath,And dig a pit in the highway, and a grave in the Serpent's path:Lie thou therein, O Sigurd, and thine hope from the glooming hide,And be as the dead for a season, and the living light abide!And so shall thine heart avail thee, and thy mighty fateful hand,And the Light that lay in the Branstock, the well belovèd brand."Said the child: "I shall do thy bidding, and for thee shall I strike the stroke;For I love thee, friend of my fathers, Wise Heart of the holy folk."So spake the Son of Sigmund, and beheld no man anear,And again was the night the midnight, and the twinkling flames shone clearIn the hush of the Glittering Heath; and alone went Sigmund's sonTill he came to the road of Fafnir, and the highway worn by one,By the drift of the rain unfurrowed, by the windy years unrent,And forth from the dark it came, and into the dark it went.Great then was the heart of Sigurd, for there in the midmost he stayed,And thought of the ancient fathers, and bared the bright blue blade,That shone as a fleck of the day-light, and the night was all around.Fair then was the Son of Sigmund as he toiled and laboured the ground;Great, mighty he was in his working, and the Glittering Heath he clave,And the sword shone blue before him as he dug the pit and the grave:There he hid his hope from the night-tide and lay like one of the dead,And wise and wary he bided; and the heavens hung over his head.Now the night wanes over Sigurd, and the ruddy rings he sees,And his war-gear's fair adornment, and the God-folk's images;But a voice in the desert ariseth, a sound in the waste has birth,A changing tinkle and clatter, as of gold dragged over the earth:O'er Sigurd widens the day-light, and the sound is drawing close,And speedier than the trample of speedy feet it goes;But ever deemeth Sigurd that the sun brings back the day,For the grave grows lighter and lighter and heaven o'erhead is grey.But now, how the rattling waxeth till he may not heed nor hark!And the day and the heavens are hidden, and o'er Sigurd rolls the dark,As the flood of a pitchy river, and heavy-thick is the airWith the venom of hate long hoarded, and lies once fashioned fair:Then a wan face comes from the darkness, and is wrought in manlike wise,And the lips are writhed with laughter and bleared are the blinded eyes;And it wandereth hither and thither, and searcheth through the graveAnd departeth, leaving nothing, save the dark, rolled wave on waveO'er the golden head of Sigurd and the edges of the sword,And the world weighs heavy on Sigurd, and the weary curse of the Hoard:Him-seemed the grave grew straiter, and his hope of life grew chill,And his heart by the Worm was enfolded, and the bonds of the Ancient Ill.Then was Sigurd stirred by his glory, and he strove with the swaddling of Death;He turned in the pit on the highway, and the grave of the Glittering Heath;He laughed and smote with the laughter and thrust up over his head,And smote the venom asunder, and clave the heart of Dread;Then he leapt from the pit and the grave, and the rushing river of blood,And fulfilled with the joy of the War-God on the face of earth he stoodWith red sword high uplifted, with wrathful glittering eyes;And he laughed at the heavens above him for he saw the sun arise,And Sigurd gleamed on the desert, and shone in the new-born light,And the wind in his raiment wavered, and all the world was bright.But there was the ancient Fafnir, and the Face of Terror layOn the huddled folds of the Serpent, that were black and ashen-greyIn the desert lit by the sun; and those twain looked each on each,And forth from the Face of Terror went a sound of dreadful speech:"Child, child, who art thou that hast smitten? bright child, of whence is thy birth?""I am called the Wild-thing Glorious, and alone I wend on the earth.""Fierce child, and who was thy father?—Thou hast cleft the heart of the Foe!""Am I like to the sons of men-folk, that my father I should know?""Wert thou born of a nameless wonder? shall the lies to my death-day cling?""How lieth Sigurd the Volsung, and the Son of Sigmund the King?""O bitter father of Sigurd!—thou hast cleft mine heart atwain!""I arose, and I wondered and wended, and I smote, and I smote not in vain.""What master hath taught thee of murder?—Thou hast wasted Fafnir's day.""I, Sigurd, knew and desired, and the bright sword learned the way.""Thee, thee shall the rattling Gold and the red rings bring to the bane.""Yet mine hand shall cast them abroad, and the earth shall gather again.""I see thee great in thine anger, and the Norns thou heedest not.""O Fafnir, speak of the Norns and the wisdom unforgot!""Let the death-doomed flee from the ocean, him the wind and the weather shall drown.""O Fafnir, tell of the Norns ere thy life thou layest adown!""O manifold is their kindred, and who shall tell them all?There are they that rule o'er men-folk and the stars that rise and fall:—I knew of the folk of the Dwarfs, and I knew their Norns of old;And I fought, and I fell in the morning, and I die afar from the gold:—I have seen the Gods of heaven, and their Norns withal I know:They love and withhold their helping, they hate and refrain the blow;They curse and they may not sunder, they bless and they shall not blend;They have fashioned the good and the evil; they abide the change and the end.""O Fafnir, what of the Isle, and what hast thou known of its name,Where the Gods shall mingle edges with Surt and the Sons of Flame?""O child, O Strong Compeller? Unshapen is its hight;There the fallow blades shall be shaken and the Dark and the Day shall smite,When the Bridge of the Gods is broken, and their white steeds swim the sea,And the uttermost field is stricken, last strife of thee and me.""What then shall endure, O Fafnir, the tale of the battle to tell?""I am blind, O Strong Compeller, in the bonds of Death and Hell.But thee shall the rattling Gold and the red rings bring unto bane.""Yet the rings mine hand shall scatter, and the earth shall gather again.""Woe, woe! in the days passed over I bore the Helm of Dread,I reared the Face of Terror, and the hoarded hate of the Dead:I overcame and was mighty; I was wise and cherished my heartIn the waste where no man wandered, and the high house builded apart:Till I met thine hand, O Sigurd, and thy might ordained from of old;And I fought and fell in the morning, and I die far off from the Gold."Then Sigurd leaned on his sword, and a dreadful voice went byLike the wail of a God departing and the War-God's misery;And strong words of ancient wisdom went by on the desert wind,The words that mar and fashion, the words that loose and bind;And sounds of a strange lamenting, and such strange things bewailed,That words to tell their meaning the tongue of man hath failed.Then all sank into silence, and the Son of Sigmund stoodOn the torn and furrowed desert by the pool of Fafnir's blood,And the Serpent lay before him, dead, chilly, dull, and grey;And over the Glittering Heath fair shone the sun and the day,And a light wind followed the sun and breathed o'er the fateful place,As fresh as it furrows the sea-plain or bows the acres' face.
Nought Sigurd seeth of Regin, and nought he heeds of him,As in watchful might and glory he strides the desert dim,And behind him paceth Greyfell; but he deems the time o'erlongTill he meet the great gold-warden, the over-lord of wrong.So he wendeth midst the silence through the measureless desert place,And beholds the countless glitter with wise and steadfast face,Till him-seems in a little season that the flames grow somewhat wan,And a grey thing glimmers before him, and becomes a mighty man,One-eyed and ancient-seeming, in cloud-grey raiment clad;A friendly man and glorious, and of visage smiling-glad:Then content in Sigurd groweth because of his majesty,And he heareth him speak in the desert as the wind of the winter sea:"Hail Sigurd! Give me thy greeting ere thy ways alone thou wend!"Said Sigurd: "Hail! I greet thee, my friend and my fathers' friend.""Now whither away," said the elder, "with the Steed and the ancient Sword?""To the greedy house," said Sigurd, "and the King of the Heavy Hoard.""Wilt thou smite, O Sigurd, Sigurd?" said the ancient mighty-one."Yea, yea, I shall smite," said the Volsung, "save the Gods have slain the sun.""What wise wilt thou smite," said the elder, "lest the dark devour thy day?""Thou hast praised the sword," said the child, "and the sword shall find a way.""Be learned of me," said the Wise-one, "for I was the first of thy folk."Said the child: "I shall do thy bidding, and for thee shall I strike the stroke."Spake the Wise-one: "Thus shalt thou do when thou wendest hence alone:Thou shalt find a path in the desert, and a road in the world of stone;It is smooth and deep and hollow, but the rain hath riven it not,And the wild wind hath not worn it, for it is but Fafnir's slot,Whereby he wends to the water and the fathomless pool of old,When his heart in the dawn is weary, and he loathes the Ancient Gold:There think of the great and the fathers, and bare the whetted Wrath,And dig a pit in the highway, and a grave in the Serpent's path:Lie thou therein, O Sigurd, and thine hope from the glooming hide,And be as the dead for a season, and the living light abide!And so shall thine heart avail thee, and thy mighty fateful hand,And the Light that lay in the Branstock, the well belovèd brand."Said the child: "I shall do thy bidding, and for thee shall I strike the stroke;For I love thee, friend of my fathers, Wise Heart of the holy folk."So spake the Son of Sigmund, and beheld no man anear,And again was the night the midnight, and the twinkling flames shone clearIn the hush of the Glittering Heath; and alone went Sigmund's sonTill he came to the road of Fafnir, and the highway worn by one,By the drift of the rain unfurrowed, by the windy years unrent,And forth from the dark it came, and into the dark it went.Great then was the heart of Sigurd, for there in the midmost he stayed,And thought of the ancient fathers, and bared the bright blue blade,That shone as a fleck of the day-light, and the night was all around.Fair then was the Son of Sigmund as he toiled and laboured the ground;Great, mighty he was in his working, and the Glittering Heath he clave,And the sword shone blue before him as he dug the pit and the grave:There he hid his hope from the night-tide and lay like one of the dead,And wise and wary he bided; and the heavens hung over his head.Now the night wanes over Sigurd, and the ruddy rings he sees,And his war-gear's fair adornment, and the God-folk's images;But a voice in the desert ariseth, a sound in the waste has birth,A changing tinkle and clatter, as of gold dragged over the earth:O'er Sigurd widens the day-light, and the sound is drawing close,And speedier than the trample of speedy feet it goes;But ever deemeth Sigurd that the sun brings back the day,For the grave grows lighter and lighter and heaven o'erhead is grey.But now, how the rattling waxeth till he may not heed nor hark!And the day and the heavens are hidden, and o'er Sigurd rolls the dark,As the flood of a pitchy river, and heavy-thick is the airWith the venom of hate long hoarded, and lies once fashioned fair:Then a wan face comes from the darkness, and is wrought in manlike wise,And the lips are writhed with laughter and bleared are the blinded eyes;And it wandereth hither and thither, and searcheth through the graveAnd departeth, leaving nothing, save the dark, rolled wave on waveO'er the golden head of Sigurd and the edges of the sword,And the world weighs heavy on Sigurd, and the weary curse of the Hoard:Him-seemed the grave grew straiter, and his hope of life grew chill,And his heart by the Worm was enfolded, and the bonds of the Ancient Ill.Then was Sigurd stirred by his glory, and he strove with the swaddling of Death;He turned in the pit on the highway, and the grave of the Glittering Heath;He laughed and smote with the laughter and thrust up over his head,And smote the venom asunder, and clave the heart of Dread;Then he leapt from the pit and the grave, and the rushing river of blood,And fulfilled with the joy of the War-God on the face of earth he stoodWith red sword high uplifted, with wrathful glittering eyes;And he laughed at the heavens above him for he saw the sun arise,And Sigurd gleamed on the desert, and shone in the new-born light,And the wind in his raiment wavered, and all the world was bright.But there was the ancient Fafnir, and the Face of Terror layOn the huddled folds of the Serpent, that were black and ashen-greyIn the desert lit by the sun; and those twain looked each on each,And forth from the Face of Terror went a sound of dreadful speech:"Child, child, who art thou that hast smitten? bright child, of whence is thy birth?""I am called the Wild-thing Glorious, and alone I wend on the earth.""Fierce child, and who was thy father?—Thou hast cleft the heart of the Foe!""Am I like to the sons of men-folk, that my father I should know?""Wert thou born of a nameless wonder? shall the lies to my death-day cling?""How lieth Sigurd the Volsung, and the Son of Sigmund the King?""O bitter father of Sigurd!—thou hast cleft mine heart atwain!""I arose, and I wondered and wended, and I smote, and I smote not in vain.""What master hath taught thee of murder?—Thou hast wasted Fafnir's day.""I, Sigurd, knew and desired, and the bright sword learned the way.""Thee, thee shall the rattling Gold and the red rings bring to the bane.""Yet mine hand shall cast them abroad, and the earth shall gather again.""I see thee great in thine anger, and the Norns thou heedest not.""O Fafnir, speak of the Norns and the wisdom unforgot!""Let the death-doomed flee from the ocean, him the wind and the weather shall drown.""O Fafnir, tell of the Norns ere thy life thou layest adown!""O manifold is their kindred, and who shall tell them all?There are they that rule o'er men-folk and the stars that rise and fall:—I knew of the folk of the Dwarfs, and I knew their Norns of old;And I fought, and I fell in the morning, and I die afar from the gold:—I have seen the Gods of heaven, and their Norns withal I know:They love and withhold their helping, they hate and refrain the blow;They curse and they may not sunder, they bless and they shall not blend;They have fashioned the good and the evil; they abide the change and the end.""O Fafnir, what of the Isle, and what hast thou known of its name,Where the Gods shall mingle edges with Surt and the Sons of Flame?""O child, O Strong Compeller? Unshapen is its hight;There the fallow blades shall be shaken and the Dark and the Day shall smite,When the Bridge of the Gods is broken, and their white steeds swim the sea,And the uttermost field is stricken, last strife of thee and me.""What then shall endure, O Fafnir, the tale of the battle to tell?""I am blind, O Strong Compeller, in the bonds of Death and Hell.But thee shall the rattling Gold and the red rings bring unto bane.""Yet the rings mine hand shall scatter, and the earth shall gather again.""Woe, woe! in the days passed over I bore the Helm of Dread,I reared the Face of Terror, and the hoarded hate of the Dead:I overcame and was mighty; I was wise and cherished my heartIn the waste where no man wandered, and the high house builded apart:Till I met thine hand, O Sigurd, and thy might ordained from of old;And I fought and fell in the morning, and I die far off from the Gold."Then Sigurd leaned on his sword, and a dreadful voice went byLike the wail of a God departing and the War-God's misery;And strong words of ancient wisdom went by on the desert wind,The words that mar and fashion, the words that loose and bind;And sounds of a strange lamenting, and such strange things bewailed,That words to tell their meaning the tongue of man hath failed.Then all sank into silence, and the Son of Sigmund stoodOn the torn and furrowed desert by the pool of Fafnir's blood,And the Serpent lay before him, dead, chilly, dull, and grey;And over the Glittering Heath fair shone the sun and the day,And a light wind followed the sun and breathed o'er the fateful place,As fresh as it furrows the sea-plain or bows the acres' face.
There standeth Sigurd the Volsung, and leaneth on his sword,And beside him now is Greyfell and looks on his golden lord,And the world is awake and living; and whither now shall they wend,Who have come to the Glittering Heath, and wrought that deed to its end?For hither comes Regin the Master from the skirts of the field of death,And he shadeth his eyes from the sunlight as afoot he goeth and saith:"Ah, let me live for a while! for a while and all shall be well,When passed is the house of murder and I creep from the prison of hell."Afoot he went o'er the desert, and he came unto Sigurd and staredAt the golden gear of the man, and the Wrath yet bloody and bared,And the light locks raised by the wind, and the eyes beginning to smile,And the lovely lips of the Volsung, and the brow that knew no guile;And he murmured under his breath while his eyes grew white with wrath:"O who art thou, and wherefore, and why art thou in the path?"Then he turned to the ash-grey Serpent, and grovelled low on the ground,And he drank of that pool of the blood where the stones of the wild were drowned,And long he lapped as a dog; but when he arose again,Lo, a flock of the mountain-eagles that drew to the feastful plain;And he turned and looked on Sigurd, as bright in the sun he stood,A stripling fair and slender, and wiped the Wrath of the blood.But Regin cried: "O Dwarf-kind, O many-shifting folk,O shapes of might and wonder, am I too freed from the yoke,That binds my soul to my body a withered thing forlorn,While the short-lived fools of man-folk so fair and oft are born?Now swift in the air shall I be, and young in the concourse of kings,If my heart shall come to desire the gain of earthly things."And he looked and saw how Sigurd was sheathing the Flame of War,And the eagles screamed in the wind, but their voice came faint from afar:Then he scowled, and crouched and darkened, and came to Sigurd and spake:"O child, thou hast slain my brother, and the Wrath is alive and awake.""Thou sayest sooth," said Sigurd, "thy deed and mine is done:But now our ways shall sunder, for here, meseemeth, the sunHath but little of deeds to do, and no love to win aback."Then Regin crouched before him, and he spake: "Fare on to the wrack!Fare on to the murder of men, and the deeds of thy kindred of old!And surely of thee as of them shall the tale be speedily told.Thou hast slain thy Master's brother, and what wouldst thou say thereto,Were the judges met for the judging and the doom-ring hallowed due?"Then Sigurd spake as aforetime: "Thy deed and mine it was,And now our ways shall sunder, and into the world will I pass."But Regin darkened before him, and exceeding grim was he grown,And he spake: "Thou hast slain my brother, and wherewith wilt thou atone?""Stand up, O Master," said Sigurd, "O Singer of ancient days,And take the wealth I have won thee, ere we wend on the sundering ways.I have toiled and thou hast desired, and the Treasure is surely anear,And thou hast wisdom to find it, and I have slain thy fear."But Regin crouched and darkened: "Thou hast slain my brother," he said."Take thou the Gold," quoth Sigurd, "for the ransom of my head!"Then Regin crouched and darkened, and over the earth he hung;And he said: "Thou hast slain my brother, and the Gods are yet but young."Bright Sigurd towered above him, and the Wrath cried out in the sheath,And Regin writhed against it as the adder turns on death;And he spake: "Thou hast slain my brother, and to-day shalt thou be my thrall:Yea a King shall be my cook-boy and this heath my cooking-hall."Then he crept to the ash-grey coils where the life of his brother had lain,And he drew a glaive from his side and smote the smitten and slain,And tore the heart from Fafnir, while the eagles cried o'erhead,And sharp and shrill was their voice o'er the entrails of the dead.Then Regin spake to Sigurd: "Of this slaying wilt thou be free?Then gather thou fire together and roast the heart for me,That I may eat it and live, and be thy master and more;For therein was might and wisdom, and the grudged and hoarded lore:——Or else, depart on thy ways afraid from the Glittering Heath."Then he fell abackward and slept, nor set his sword in the sheath,But his hand was red on the hilts and blue were the edges bared,Ash-grey was his visage waxen, and with open eyes he staredOn the height of heaven above him, and a fearful thing he seemed,As his soul went wide in the world, and of rule and kingship he dreamed.But Sigurd took the Heart, and wood on the waste he found,The wood that grew and died, as it crept on the niggard ground,And grew and died again, and lay like whitened bones;And the ernes cried over his head, as he builded his hearth of stones,And kindled the fire for cooking, and sat and sang o'er the roastThe song of his fathers of old, and the Wolflings' gathering host:So there on the Glittering Heath rose up the little flame,And the dry sticks crackled amidst it, and alow the eagles came,And seven they were by tale, and they pitched all round aboutThe cooking-fire of Sigurd, and sent their song-speech out:But nought he knoweth its wisdom, or the word that they would speak:And hot grew the Heart of Fafnir and sang amid the reek.Then Sigurd looketh on Regin, and he deemeth it overlongThat he dighteth the dear-bought morsel, and the might for the Master of wrong,So he reacheth his hand to the roast to see if the cooking be o'er;But the blood and the fat seethed from it and scalded his finger sore,And he set his hand to his mouth to quench the fleshly smart,And he tasted the flesh of the Serpent and the blood of Fafnir's Heart:Then there came a change upon him, for the speech of fowl he knew,And wise in the ways of the beast-kind as the Dwarfs of old he grew;And he knitted his brows and hearkened, and wrath in his heart arose;For he felt beset of evil in a world of many foes.But the hilt of the Wrath he handled, and Regin's heart he saw,And how that the Foe of the Gods the net of death would draw;And his bright eyes flashed and sparkled, and his mouth grew set and sternAs he hearkened the voice of the eagles, and their song began to learn.For the first cried out in the desert: "O mighty Sigmund's son,How long wilt thou sit and tarry now the dear-bought roast is done?"And the second: "Volsung, arise! for the horns blow up to the hall,And dight are the purple hangings, and the King to the feasting should fall."And the third: "How great is the feast if the eater eat arightThe Heart of the wisdom of old and the after-world's delight!"And the fourth: "Yea what of Regin? shall he scatter wrack o'er the world?Shall the father be slain by the son, and the brother 'gainst brother be hurled?"And the fifth: "He hath taught a stripling the gifts of a God to give:He hath reared up a King for the slaying, that he alone might live."And the sixth: "He shall waken mighty as a God that scorneth a truth;He hath drunk of the blood of the Serpent, and drowned all hope and ruth."And the seventh: "Arise, O Sigurd, lest the hour be overlate!For the sun in the mid-noon shineth, and swift is the hand of Fate:Arise! lest the world run backward and the blind heart have its will,And once again be tangled the sundered good and ill;Lest love and hatred perish, lest the world forget its tale,And the Gods sit deedless, dreaming, in the high-walled heavenly vale."Then swift ariseth Sigurd, and the Wrath in his hand is bare,And he looketh, and Regin sleepeth, and his eyes wide-open glare;But his lips smile false in his dreaming, and his hand is on the sword;For he dreams himself the Master and the new world's fashioning-lord.And his dream hath forgotten Sigurd, and the King's life lies in the pit;He is nought; Death gnaweth upon him, while the Dwarfs in mastery sit.But lo, how the eyes of Sigurd the heart of the guileful behold,And great is Allfather Odin, and upriseth the Curse of the Gold,And the Branstock bloometh to heaven from the ancient wondrous root;The summer hath shone on its blossoms, and Sigurd's Wrath is the fruit:Dread then he cried in the desert: "Guile-master, lo thy deed!Hast thou nurst my life for destruction, and my death to serve thy need?Hast thou kept me here for the net and the death that tame things die?Hast thou feared me overmuch, thou Foe of the Gods on high?Lest the sword thine hand was wielding should turn about and cleaveThe tangled web of nothing thou hadst wearied thyself to weave.Lo here the sword and the stroke! judge the Norns betwixt us twain!But for me, I will live and die not, nor shall all my hope be vain."Then his second stroke struck Sigurd, for the Wrath flashed thin and white,And 'twixt head and trunk of Regin fierce ran the fateful light;And there lay brother by brother a faded thing and wan.But Sigurd cried in the desert: "So far have I wended on!Dead are the foes of God-home that would blend the good and the ill;And the World shall yet be famous, and the Gods shall have their will.Nor shall I be dead and forgotten, while the earth grows worse and worse,With the blind heart king o'er the people, and binding curse with curse."
There standeth Sigurd the Volsung, and leaneth on his sword,And beside him now is Greyfell and looks on his golden lord,And the world is awake and living; and whither now shall they wend,Who have come to the Glittering Heath, and wrought that deed to its end?For hither comes Regin the Master from the skirts of the field of death,And he shadeth his eyes from the sunlight as afoot he goeth and saith:"Ah, let me live for a while! for a while and all shall be well,When passed is the house of murder and I creep from the prison of hell."Afoot he went o'er the desert, and he came unto Sigurd and staredAt the golden gear of the man, and the Wrath yet bloody and bared,And the light locks raised by the wind, and the eyes beginning to smile,And the lovely lips of the Volsung, and the brow that knew no guile;And he murmured under his breath while his eyes grew white with wrath:"O who art thou, and wherefore, and why art thou in the path?"Then he turned to the ash-grey Serpent, and grovelled low on the ground,And he drank of that pool of the blood where the stones of the wild were drowned,And long he lapped as a dog; but when he arose again,Lo, a flock of the mountain-eagles that drew to the feastful plain;And he turned and looked on Sigurd, as bright in the sun he stood,A stripling fair and slender, and wiped the Wrath of the blood.But Regin cried: "O Dwarf-kind, O many-shifting folk,O shapes of might and wonder, am I too freed from the yoke,That binds my soul to my body a withered thing forlorn,While the short-lived fools of man-folk so fair and oft are born?Now swift in the air shall I be, and young in the concourse of kings,If my heart shall come to desire the gain of earthly things."And he looked and saw how Sigurd was sheathing the Flame of War,And the eagles screamed in the wind, but their voice came faint from afar:Then he scowled, and crouched and darkened, and came to Sigurd and spake:"O child, thou hast slain my brother, and the Wrath is alive and awake.""Thou sayest sooth," said Sigurd, "thy deed and mine is done:But now our ways shall sunder, for here, meseemeth, the sunHath but little of deeds to do, and no love to win aback."Then Regin crouched before him, and he spake: "Fare on to the wrack!Fare on to the murder of men, and the deeds of thy kindred of old!And surely of thee as of them shall the tale be speedily told.Thou hast slain thy Master's brother, and what wouldst thou say thereto,Were the judges met for the judging and the doom-ring hallowed due?"Then Sigurd spake as aforetime: "Thy deed and mine it was,And now our ways shall sunder, and into the world will I pass."But Regin darkened before him, and exceeding grim was he grown,And he spake: "Thou hast slain my brother, and wherewith wilt thou atone?""Stand up, O Master," said Sigurd, "O Singer of ancient days,And take the wealth I have won thee, ere we wend on the sundering ways.I have toiled and thou hast desired, and the Treasure is surely anear,And thou hast wisdom to find it, and I have slain thy fear."But Regin crouched and darkened: "Thou hast slain my brother," he said."Take thou the Gold," quoth Sigurd, "for the ransom of my head!"Then Regin crouched and darkened, and over the earth he hung;And he said: "Thou hast slain my brother, and the Gods are yet but young."Bright Sigurd towered above him, and the Wrath cried out in the sheath,And Regin writhed against it as the adder turns on death;And he spake: "Thou hast slain my brother, and to-day shalt thou be my thrall:Yea a King shall be my cook-boy and this heath my cooking-hall."Then he crept to the ash-grey coils where the life of his brother had lain,And he drew a glaive from his side and smote the smitten and slain,And tore the heart from Fafnir, while the eagles cried o'erhead,And sharp and shrill was their voice o'er the entrails of the dead.Then Regin spake to Sigurd: "Of this slaying wilt thou be free?Then gather thou fire together and roast the heart for me,That I may eat it and live, and be thy master and more;For therein was might and wisdom, and the grudged and hoarded lore:——Or else, depart on thy ways afraid from the Glittering Heath."Then he fell abackward and slept, nor set his sword in the sheath,But his hand was red on the hilts and blue were the edges bared,Ash-grey was his visage waxen, and with open eyes he staredOn the height of heaven above him, and a fearful thing he seemed,As his soul went wide in the world, and of rule and kingship he dreamed.But Sigurd took the Heart, and wood on the waste he found,The wood that grew and died, as it crept on the niggard ground,And grew and died again, and lay like whitened bones;And the ernes cried over his head, as he builded his hearth of stones,And kindled the fire for cooking, and sat and sang o'er the roastThe song of his fathers of old, and the Wolflings' gathering host:So there on the Glittering Heath rose up the little flame,And the dry sticks crackled amidst it, and alow the eagles came,And seven they were by tale, and they pitched all round aboutThe cooking-fire of Sigurd, and sent their song-speech out:But nought he knoweth its wisdom, or the word that they would speak:And hot grew the Heart of Fafnir and sang amid the reek.Then Sigurd looketh on Regin, and he deemeth it overlongThat he dighteth the dear-bought morsel, and the might for the Master of wrong,So he reacheth his hand to the roast to see if the cooking be o'er;But the blood and the fat seethed from it and scalded his finger sore,And he set his hand to his mouth to quench the fleshly smart,And he tasted the flesh of the Serpent and the blood of Fafnir's Heart:Then there came a change upon him, for the speech of fowl he knew,And wise in the ways of the beast-kind as the Dwarfs of old he grew;And he knitted his brows and hearkened, and wrath in his heart arose;For he felt beset of evil in a world of many foes.But the hilt of the Wrath he handled, and Regin's heart he saw,And how that the Foe of the Gods the net of death would draw;And his bright eyes flashed and sparkled, and his mouth grew set and sternAs he hearkened the voice of the eagles, and their song began to learn.For the first cried out in the desert: "O mighty Sigmund's son,How long wilt thou sit and tarry now the dear-bought roast is done?"And the second: "Volsung, arise! for the horns blow up to the hall,And dight are the purple hangings, and the King to the feasting should fall."And the third: "How great is the feast if the eater eat arightThe Heart of the wisdom of old and the after-world's delight!"And the fourth: "Yea what of Regin? shall he scatter wrack o'er the world?Shall the father be slain by the son, and the brother 'gainst brother be hurled?"And the fifth: "He hath taught a stripling the gifts of a God to give:He hath reared up a King for the slaying, that he alone might live."And the sixth: "He shall waken mighty as a God that scorneth a truth;He hath drunk of the blood of the Serpent, and drowned all hope and ruth."And the seventh: "Arise, O Sigurd, lest the hour be overlate!For the sun in the mid-noon shineth, and swift is the hand of Fate:Arise! lest the world run backward and the blind heart have its will,And once again be tangled the sundered good and ill;Lest love and hatred perish, lest the world forget its tale,And the Gods sit deedless, dreaming, in the high-walled heavenly vale."Then swift ariseth Sigurd, and the Wrath in his hand is bare,And he looketh, and Regin sleepeth, and his eyes wide-open glare;But his lips smile false in his dreaming, and his hand is on the sword;For he dreams himself the Master and the new world's fashioning-lord.And his dream hath forgotten Sigurd, and the King's life lies in the pit;He is nought; Death gnaweth upon him, while the Dwarfs in mastery sit.But lo, how the eyes of Sigurd the heart of the guileful behold,And great is Allfather Odin, and upriseth the Curse of the Gold,And the Branstock bloometh to heaven from the ancient wondrous root;The summer hath shone on its blossoms, and Sigurd's Wrath is the fruit:Dread then he cried in the desert: "Guile-master, lo thy deed!Hast thou nurst my life for destruction, and my death to serve thy need?Hast thou kept me here for the net and the death that tame things die?Hast thou feared me overmuch, thou Foe of the Gods on high?Lest the sword thine hand was wielding should turn about and cleaveThe tangled web of nothing thou hadst wearied thyself to weave.Lo here the sword and the stroke! judge the Norns betwixt us twain!But for me, I will live and die not, nor shall all my hope be vain."Then his second stroke struck Sigurd, for the Wrath flashed thin and white,And 'twixt head and trunk of Regin fierce ran the fateful light;And there lay brother by brother a faded thing and wan.But Sigurd cried in the desert: "So far have I wended on!Dead are the foes of God-home that would blend the good and the ill;And the World shall yet be famous, and the Gods shall have their will.Nor shall I be dead and forgotten, while the earth grows worse and worse,With the blind heart king o'er the people, and binding curse with curse."