“Lie thou and rest, my noble Lord,
And from thy thought the vision fling;
It means no doubt our vassals stout
Their rent and tribute soon will bring.”
“Not so, not so, it means, I trow,
Although thou tell’st me that, my love,
It means the King at our country’s Ting,
Too much for me and my cause will prove.”
Marsk Stig he arms seven hundred men,
Each one in iron panoply;
And away he scowers to Viborg’s towers
The traitor monarch to defy.
And at their head young Marsk Stig sped,
And in his heart he felt so bold;
Behind him rode his courtiers proud,
Their breast-plates beaming bright with gold.
It was the young Sir Marshal Stig
Stepp’d proudly in at the lofty door;
And bold knights then, and bold knights’ men,
Stood up the Marshal Stig before.
So up to the Ting of the land he goes,
And straight to make his plaint began;
Then murmured loud the assembled crowd,
And clench’d his fist each honest man.
“Ye good men hear a tale of fear,
A tale of horror, a tale of hell;
A rape upon my wife’s been done,
With frantic grief the tale I tell.”
Then up did spring the Danish King,
And proffer’d to Stig his fair white hand:
“I joy thou art come, Sir Marsk Stig, home
Safe from the fray in the foreign land.”
Then answer’d him the Marshal Stig,
His heart was fill’d with grief and rage:
“And trouble and cost I more than lost
When forth I went the fight to wage.
“To the field of war I went afar,
And for thy realm I risk’d my life;
But thou didst stay and, welladay,
Didst foully force my virtuous wife.”