And she turned to the King beneath her and raised her hands on high,
    And fell on the body of Sigurd with a great and bitter cry;
    All else in the house kept silence, and she as one alone
    Spared not in that kingly dwelling to wail aloud and moan;
    And the sound of her lamentation the peace of the Niblungs rent,
    While the restless birds in the wall-nook their song to the green
      leaves sent;
    And the geese in the home-mead wandering clanged out beneath the sun;
    For now was the day’s best hour, and its loveliest tide begun.

    Long Gudrun lay on Sigurd, and her tears fell fast on the floor
    As the rain in midmost April when the winter-tide is o’er,
    Till she heard a wail anigh her and how Gullrond wept beside,
    Then she knew the voice of her pity, and rose upright and cried: 

    “O ye, e’en such was my Sigurd among these Giuki’s sons,
    As the hart with the horns day-brightened mid the forest-creeping ones;
    As the spear-leek fraught with wisdom mid the lowly garden grass;
    As the gem on the gold band’s midmost when the council cometh to pass,
    And the King is lit with its glory, and the people wonder and praise. 
    —­O people, Ah thy craving for the least of my Sigurd’s days! 
    O wisdom of my Sigurd! how oft I sat with thee
    Thou striver, thou deliverer, thou hope of things to be! 
    O might of my love, my Sigurd! how oft I sat by thy side,
    And was praised for the loftiest woman and the best of Odin’s pride! 
    But now am I as little as the leaf on the lone tree left,
    When the winter wood is shaken and the sky by the North is cleft.”

    Then her speech grew wordless wailing, and no man her meaning knew;
    Till she hushed her swift and turned her; for a laugh her wail pierced
      through,
    As a whistling shaft the night-wind in some foe-encompassed wood;
    And lo, by the nearest pillar the wife of Gunnar stood;
    There stood the allwise Brynhild ’gainst the golden carving pressed,
    As she stared at the wound of Sigurd and that rending of his breast: 
    But she felt the place fallen silent, and the speechless anger set
    On her own chill, bitter sorrow; and the eyes of the women met,
    And they stood in the hall together, as they stood that while ago,
    When they twain in Brynhild’s dwelling of days to come would know: 
    But every soul kept silence, and all hearts were chill as stone
    As Brynhild spake: 
                      “Thou woman, shall thine eyes be wet alone? 
    Shalt thou weep and speak in thy glory, when I may weep no more,
    When I speak, and my speech is as silence to the man that loved me
      sore?”

Then folk heard the woe of Gudrun, and the bitterness of hate: 
“Day cursed o’er every other! when they opened wide the gate,
And Kings in gold arrayed them, and all men the joy might hear,
As Greyfell neighed in the forecourt the world’s delight to bear,
And my brethren shook the world-ways as they rode to Brynhild’s bower,
—­An ill day—­an evil woman—­a most untimely hour!”