the place where each is alone; But I thy thrall shall follow, I shall come where thou seemest to lie, I shall sit on the howe that hides thee, and thou so dear and nigh!  A few bones white in their war-gear that have no help or thought, Shall be Thiodolf the Mighty, so nigh, so dear—­and nought.”

His hands strayed over her shoulders and arms, caressing them, and he said softly and lovingly: 

“I am Thiodolf the Mighty:  but as wise as I may be No story of that grave-night mine eyes can ever see, But rather the tale of the Wolfings through the coming days of earth, And the young men in their triumph and the maidens in their mirth; And morn’s promise every evening, and each day the promised morn, And I amidst it ever reborn and yet reborn.  This tale I know, who have seen it, who have felt the joy and pain, Each fleeing, each pursuing, like the links of the draw-well’s chain:  But that deedless tide of the grave-mound, and the dayless nightless day, E’en as I strive to see it, its image wanes away.  What say’st thou of the grave-mound? shall I be there at all When they lift the Horn of Remembrance, and the shout goes down the hall, And they drink the Mighty War-duke and Thiodolf the old?  Nay rather; there where the youngling that longeth to be bold Sits gazing through the hall-reek and sees across the board A vision of the reaping of the harvest of the sword, There shall Thiodolf be sitting; e’en there shall the youngling be That once in the ring of the hazels gave up his life to thee.”

She laughed as he ended, and her voice was sweet, but bitter was her laugh.  Then she said: 

   “Nay thou shalt be dead, O warrior, thou shalt not see the Hall
   Nor the children of thy people ’twixt the dais and the wall. 
   And I, and I shall be living; still on thee shall waste my thought: 
   I shall long and lack thy longing; I shall pine for what is nought.”

But he smiled again, and said: 

   “Not on earth shall I learn this wisdom; and how shall I learn it then
   When I lie alone in the grave-mound, and have no speech with men? 
   But for thee,—­O doubt it nothing that my life shall live in thee,
   And so shall we twain be loving in the days that yet shall be.”

It was as if she heard him not; and she fell aback from him a little and stood silently for a while as one in deep thought; and then turned and went a few paces from him, and stooped down and came back again with something in her arms (and it was the hauberk once more), and said suddenly: 

   “O Thiodolf, now tell me for what cause thou wouldst not bear
   This grey wall of the hammer in the tempest of the spear? 
   Didst thou doubt my faith, O Folk-wolf, or the counsel of the Gods,
   That thou needs must cast thee naked midst the flashing battle-rods,
   Or is thy pride so mighty that it seemed to thee indeed
   That death was a better guerdon than the love of the Godhead’s seed?”