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 earthward 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 by 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.

    And so when the last is departed, and she deems they will come not
      aback,
    Fares Hiordis forth from the thicket to the field of the fateful wrack,
    And half-dead was her heart for sorrow as she waded the swathes of
      the sword. 
    Not far did she search the death-field ere she found her king and lord
    On the heap that his glaive had fashioned:  not yet was his spirit past,
    Though his hurts were many and grievous, and his life-blood ebbing
      fast;
    And glad were his eyes and open as her wan face over him hung,
    And he spake: 
            “Thou art sick with sorrow, and I would thou wert not so young;
    Yet as my days passed shall thine pass; and a short while now it seems
    Since my hand first gripped the sword-hilt, and my glory was but in
      dreams.”

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