And the bellows they blew till the furnace ’gan roar,

And the fire flamed on high for the wind.

And they struck with their sledge-hammers stroke on stroke,

That the sparks from the skin flew on high,

But never a word good or bad spake Loke,

Though foul malice lurked in his eye.

The thunderer far distant, with sorrow he thought

On all he’d engaged to obtain,

And, as summer-breeze fickle, now anxiously sought

To render the dwarfs’ labor vain.