“I’ve driven a pin the floor within,
And plac’d a balk against the door;
By Mary bright no mortal wight
To move that mighty balk has power.
“Marsk Stig is hot, I deny it not,
And wondrous words he thunders out;
But be of good cheer my master dear,
He o’er his table sits no doubt.
“The lapwing bird each spot can guard
Upon the face of the verdant field,
Except alone the knoll whereon
Its nest the bird is wont to build.”
No pin or stake did Ranild take,
He was I wean a lying cheat;
I tell to ye, for a verity,
He only took two straws of wheat.
And for all his talk ’twas no thick balk
He plac’d for the door’s security,
But a wheat-sheaf light which the gust of night
From the door removed instantly.
Scarce on the groun’ had they laid them down,
On the groun’ of the barn so cold and hard,
When of Ingeborg Dame the avengers came,
Spurring amain to the peasant’s gard.
Into the yard came riding hard
The fatal monks of orders grey;
No pause they made, to the place they sped
Where well they knew that the Monarch lay.
Upon the door their blows they shower,
With faulchion struck they and with spear;
“Come out, come out, Sir King,” they shout,
“The Dame has sent to greet thee here.”
To them in reply did Ranild cry,
And thus the Ranild youth began:
“No King is here, no King is near,
No King nor any such a man.”
Then swift and fast Sir Ranild cast
Over his Lord both straw and hay,
But points with his hand to the in-rushing band
The spot where the hapless Monarch lay.