“Give it to me!” cried Schilbung.
And both tried to snatch it from Siegfried’s hand.
But the effort was too great for them. Their arms fell helpless at their sides, their feet slipped beneath them, their limbs failed: they sank fainting, each upon his pile of treasures.
“O my dear, dear gold!” murmured Niblung, trying to clasp it all in his arms,—“my dear, dear gold! Thou art mine, mine only. No one shall take thee from me. Here thou art, here thou shalt rest. O my dear, dear gold!” And then, calling up the last spark of life left in his famished body, he cried out to Siegfried, “Give me the ring!—the ring, I say!”
He hugged his cherished gold nearer to his bosom; he ran his thin fingers deep down into the shining yellow heap; he pressed his pale lips to the cold and senseless metal; he whispered faintly, “My dear, dear gold!” and then he died.
“O precious, precious gem-stones,” faltered Schilbung, “how beautiful you are! And you are mine, all mine. I will keep you safe. Come, come, my bright-eyed beauties! No one but me shall touch you. You are mine, mine, mine!” And he chattered and laughed as only madmen laugh. And he kissed the hard stones, and sought to hide them in his bosom. But his hands trembled and failed, dark mists swam before his eyes; he fancied that he heard the black dwarfs clamoring for his treasure; he sprang up quickly, he shrieked—and then fell lifeless upon his hoard of sparkling gems.
A strange, sad sight it was,—boundless wealth, and miserable death; two piles of yellow gold and sun-bright diamonds, and two thin, starved corpses stretched upon them. Some stories relate that the brothers were slain by Siegfried, because their foolish strife and greediness had angered him.[EN#19] But I like not to think so. It was the gold, and not Siegfried, that slew them.
“O gold, gold!” cried the hero sorrowfully, “truly thou art the mid-world’s curse; thou art man’s bane. But when the bright spring-time of the new world shall come, and Balder shall reign in his glory, then will the curse be taken from thee, and thy yellow brightness will be the sign of purity and enduring worth; and then thou wilt be a blessing to mankind, and the precious plaything of the gods.”
But Siegfried had little time for thought and speech. A strange sound was heard upon the mountain-side. The twelve great giants who had stood as watchmen upon the peaks above were rushing down to avenge their masters, and to drive the intruder out of Nibelungen Land. Siegfried waited not for their onset; but he mounted the noble horse Greyfell, and, with the sword Balmung in his hand, he rode forth to meet his foes, who, with fearful threats and hideous roars, came striding toward him. The sunbeams flashed from Greyfell’s mane, and dazzled the dull eyes of the giants, unused as they were to the full light of day. Doubtful, they paused, and then again came forward. But they mistook every tree in their way for an enemy, and every rock they thought a foe; and in their fear they fancied a great host to be before them. Did you ever see the dark and threatening storm-clouds on a summer’s day scattered and put to flight by the bright beams of the sun? It was thus that Siegfried’s giant foes were routed. One and all, they dropped their heavy clubs, and stood ashamed and trembling, not knowing what to do. And Siegfried made each one swear to serve him faithfully; and then he sent them back to the snow-covered mountain-peaks to stand again as watchmen at their posts.
And now another danger appeared. Alberich the dwarf, the master of the swarthy elves who guarded the Nibelungen Hoard, had come out from his cavern, and seen the two princes lying dead beside their treasures, and he thought that they had been murdered by Siegfried; and, when he beheld the giants driven back to the mountain-tops, he lifted a little silver horn to his lips, and blew a shrill bugle-call. And the little brown elves came trooping forth by thousands: from under every rock, from the nooks and crannies and crevices in the mountain-side, from the deep cavern and the narrow gorge, they came at the call of their chief. Then, at Alberich’s word, they formed in line of battle, and stood in order around the hoard and the bodies of their late masters. Their little golden shields and their sharp-pointed spears were thick as the blades of grass in a Rhine meadow. And Siegfried, when he saw them, was pleased and surprised; for never before had such a host of pygmy warriors stood before him.