“Why went ye forth, O Wolfings, from the garth your fathers built,
   And the House where sorrow dieth, and all unloosed is guilt? 
   Turn back, turn back, and behold it! lest your feet be over slow
   When your shields are heavy-burdened with the arrows of the foe;
   How ye totter, how ye stumble on the rough and corpse-strewn way! 
   And lo, how the eve is eating the afternoon of day! 
   O why are ye abiding till the sun is sunk in night
   And the forest trees are ruddy with the battle-kindled light? 
   O rest not yet, ye Wolfings, lest void be your resting-place,
   And into lands that ye know not the Wolf must turn his face,
   And ye wander and ye wander till the land in the ocean cease,
   And your battle bring no safety and your labour no increase.”

Then was she silent for a while, and her tears ceased to flow; but presently her eyes opened once more, and she lifted up her voice and cried aloud—­

   “I see, I see!  O Godfolk behold it from aloof,
   How the little flames steal flickering along the ridge of the Roof! 
   They are small and red ’gainst the heavens in the summer afternoon;
   But when the day is dusking, white, high shall they wave to the moon. 
   Lo, the fire plays now on the windows like strips of scarlet cloth
   Wind-waved! but look in the night-tide on the onset of its wrath,
   How it wraps round the ancient timbers and hides the mighty roof
   But lighteth little crannies, so lost and far aloof,
   That no man yet of the kindred hath seen them ere to-night,
   Since first the builder builded in loving and delight!”

Then again she stayed her speech with weeping and sobbing, but after a while was still again, and then she spoke pointing toward the roof with her right hand.

“I see the fire-raisers and iron-helmed they are, Brown-faced about the banners that their hands have borne afar.  And who in the garth of the kindred shall bear adown their shield Since the onrush of the Wolfings they caught in the open field, As the might of the mountain lion falls dead in the hempen net?  O Wolfings, long have ye tarried, but the hour abideth yet.  What life for the life of the people shall be given once for all, What sorrow shall stay sorrow in the half-burnt Wolfing Hall?  There is nought shall quench the fire save the tears of the Godfolk’s kin, And the heart of the life-delighter, and the life-blood cast therein.”

Then once again she fell silent, and her eyes closed again, and the slow tears gushed out from them, and she sank down sobbing on the grass, and little by little the storm of grief sank and her head fell back, and she was as one quietly asleep.  Then the carline hung over her and kissed her and embraced her; and then through her closed eyes and her slumber did the Hall-Sun see a marvel; for she who was kissing her was young in semblance and unwrinkled, and lovely to look on, with plenteous long hair of the hue of ripe barley, and clad in glistening raiment such as has been woven in no loom on earth.