It was Siegfried’s last blow.  His countenance was already that of a dead man.  He could not stand upright.  Down he crashed among the flowers; fast flowed his blood; in his agony he began to upbraid those who had contrived his death.

“Cowards and caitiffs,” he cried, “is this the price you pay me for my fealty to you?  Ill have you done by your friends, for sons of yours as yet unborn will feel the weight of this deed.  You have vented your spite on my body; but for this dastard crime all good knights shall shun you.”

Now all surrounded him, and those that were true among them mourned for him.  Gunther also wept.  But the dying man, turning to him, said:  “Does he weep for the evil from whom the evil cometh?  Better for him that it had remained undone, for mighty is his blame.”

Then said false Hagen:  “What rue ye?  Surely our care is past.  Who will now withstand us?  Right glad am I that Siegfried is no more.”

Loud was Siegfried’s dole for Kriemhild.  “Never was so foul a murder done as thou hast done on me, O king,” he said to Gunther.  “I saved thy life and honour.  But if thou canst show truth to any on earth, show it to my dear wife, I beg of thee, for never had woman such woe for one she loved.”

Painfully he writhed as they watched him, and as he became weaker he spake prophetically.

“Greatly shall ye rue this deed in the days to come,” he groaned, “for know, all of ye, that in slaying me ye have slain yourselves.”

Wet were the flowers with his blood.  He struggled grimly with death, but too deep had been the blow, and at last he spake no more.

They laid his body on a shield of ruddy gold and took counsel with one another how they should hide that the deed had been done by Hagen.

“Sure have we fallen on evil days,” said many; “but let us all hide this thing, and hold to one tale:  that is, that as Siegfried rode alone in the forest he was slain by robbers.”

“But,” said Hagen of Trony, “I will myself bear him back to Burgundy.  It is little concern of mine if Kriemhild weep.”

Kriemhild’s Grief

Great was the grief of Kriemhild when she learned of the murder of her husband, whose body had been placed at her very door by the remorseless Hagen.  He and the rest of the Burgundians pretended that Siegfried had been slain by bandits, but on their approach the wounds of Siegfried commenced to bleed afresh in mute witness of treachery.  Kriemhild secretly vowed a terrible revenge and would not quit the land where her beloved spouse was buried.  For four years she spake never a word to Gunther or Hagen, but sat silent and sad in a chamber near the minster where Siegfried was buried.  Gunther sent for the Nibelungen treasure for the purpose of propitiating her, but she distributed it so freely among Gunther’s dependents that Hagen conceived the suspicion that her intention was to suborn them to her cause and foment rebellion within the Burgundian dominions; therefore he seized it and sank it in the Rhine, forcing Kriemhild’s brethren never to divulge its whereabouts.