Sleipner plunged into the waters, and the vessel, now removed beyond the power of the whirlpool, sailed back to Denmark, while Brandomann returned to Ildegarda, by whom he was received with a welcome far surpassing his hopes or expectations. He said nothing, however, of the important service he had just rendered her; and his delicate conduct, which did not pass unobserved by the princess, created for him an advocate in her bosom stronger than his own entreaties, or those of all his friends united, could have done. She saw how tenderly Brandomann loved her, but she saw also that he was resolved not to give her pain; and, to say the truth, she could not help being pleased by this circumstance; for gratitude, great as it certainly was, was yet not sufficiently powerful to make so cruel a sacrifice to his happiness. By the time he had landed, the storm had passed from the face of heaven, and all was calm upon the bosom of the waters as if the fiends of Niftheim had not been raging within it a few moments before; the party returned to sup in the palace, and all things went on pleasingly as usual. Days, weeks, passed away, but Ildegarda, no longer wretched in submitting to the sentence she had once thought so cruel, took little heed of time, except to notice the first day of the month, which presented to her anxious eyes the person and occupations of her father. Twice, successively, she had seen him in his tent, surrounded by heroes, amid preparations for war; he was cheerful, and appeared to be encouraging the spirits of a young man, whom Ildegarda knew to be prince Harold, and who, with a gentle, downcast look, was listening to his observations: this was confirmed to her by the accounts of Brandomann, whose cares to lighten her anxieties and anticipate her wishes sensibly affected the generous daughter of Haquin. She took increased delight in his conversation; and he, from whose presence she was at first so anxious to fly, was now frequently summoned to relieve solitude by his cheering conversation. She was herself surprised at the change; and could she have shut from her bosom the thought of her early and beautiful love. Brandomann, even in person, would not have been disgusting. As it was, he daily grew less odious, and daily grew the princess more contented with her lot; the happy society of the marble palace met nightly, and mirth, and song, and tale, gave wings to the cheerful hours.
PART IV.
THE RETURN.
Wilt thou begone?
Shakspeare.
One night when the conversation particularly turned upon the exploits of the ancestors of Ildegarda, Sleipner, who possessed a natural love of noble actions, inquired of the boar whether king Uffon was constant in his attendance upon the nightly festival of the hall of Odin? “He is so, frequently,” replied Serimnor; “but he takes more delight in the combat of the morning—from that he is never absent:—but what an extraordinary history is his!” continued the boar; “it is necessary that he should be in Asgard, for its inhabitants to believe it.” Ildegarda’s attention was aroused; she had never heard of her ancestor, and she entreated Brandomann to indulge her curiosity. He took up his harp immediately—for he appeared to have no occupation so delightful as to obey her slightest wish—and thus related to her the legend of Uffon the Merciful:—
LEGEND OF UFFON.
I.
There was a halo round
The golden crown which shone on Vermund’s brow,
The light of many noble deeds—
Some deathless flowers
From heaven’s immortal tree,
(The abode of changeless destiny,)
Were wreathed
Around his conquering sword:
But years rolled on, and age
Silvered his golden locks—
And darkness fell
Heavily on him,
Veiling the beauty of his latter day—
For Lok in hate,
Or envy, breathed on him a withering curse—
And he grew blind!
II.
He was a childless man,
And to the gods he prayed
That his own royal diadem might fall
Upon a kindred brow.
He asked a son—
And Odin granted to his agony
The son he craved.
Again the evil one
Blighted the bud of joy—
He laid his dark hand on the infant’s head,
And left its evil shadow on his brain,
He grew an idiot boy!
III.