Now the tumult sank a little, and men cried on Volsung the King
    And his sons, the hedge of battle, to try the fateful thing. 
    So Volsung laughed, and answered:  “I will set me to the toil,
    Lest these my guests of the Goth-folk should deem I fear the foil. 
    Yet nought am I ill-sworded, and the oldest friend is best;
    And this, my hand’s first fellow, will I bear to the grave-mound’s
      rest,
    Nor wield meanwhile another:  Yea this shall I have in hand
    When mid the host of Odin in the Day of Doom I stand.”

    Therewith from his belt of battle he raised the golden sheath,
    And showed the peace-strings glittering about the hidden death: 
    Then he laid his hand on the Branstock, and cried:  “O tree beloved,
    I thank thee of thy good-heart that so little thou art moved: 
    Abide thou thus, green bower, when I am dead and gone
    And the best of all my kindred a better day hath won!”

    Then as a young man laughed he, and on the hilts of gold
    His hand, the battle-breaker, took fast and certain hold,
    And long he drew and strained him, but mended not the tale,
    Yet none the more thereover his mirth of heart did fail;
    But he wended to the high-seat and thence began to cry: 

    “Sons I have gotten and cherished, now stand ye forth to try;
    Lest Odin tell in God-home how from the way he strayed,
    And how to the man he would not he gave away his blade.” 
    So therewithal rose Rerir, and wasted might and main;
    Then Gunthiof, and then Hunthiof, they wearied them in vain;
    Nought was the might of Agnar; nought Helgi could avail;
    Sigi the tall and Solar no further brought the tale,
    Nor Geirmund the priest of the temple, nor Gylfi of the wood.

    At last by the side of the Branstock Sigmund the Volsung stood,
    And with right hand wise in battle the precious sword-hilt caught,
    Yet in a careless fashion, as he deemed it all for nought: 
    When lo, from floor to rafter went up a shattering shout,
    For aloft in the hand of Sigmund the naked blade shone out
    As high o’er his head he shook it:  for the sword had come away
    From the grip of the heart of the Branstock, as though all loose
      it lay. 
    A little while he stood there mid the glory of the hall,
    Like the best of the trees of the garden, when the April sunbeams fall
    On its blossomed boughs in the morning, and tell of the days to be;
    Then back unto the high-seat he wended soberly;
    For this was the thought within him; Belike the day shall come
    When I shall bide here lonely amid the Volsung home,
    Its glory and sole avenger, its after-summer seed. 
    Yea, I am the hired of Odin, his workday will to speed,
    And the harvest-tide shall be heavy.—­What then, were it come and past
    And I laid by the last of the sheaves with my wages earned at the last?