“Here bide ye in peace, my companions good,
All under the grass-green hill;
Langben the Giant has smote me to day,
I doubt I shall fare but ill.”
“If thou from the Giant hast got a blow,
Thy life must be nigh its close;
We’ll ride swift back to the halls of Bern,
No man more will we lose.”
“Now wend thee, bold King Diderik,
Wend into the wood with me;
And all the gold that the giant had,
That will I show to thee.”
“If thou hast slain the giant this day,
’T will far be blaz’d in the land;
And the warrior lives not in this world,
’Gainst whom thou may’st fear to stand.”
But what befel King Diderik’s men?
When the giant they first perceiv’d,
They all stopp’d short, in the good green wood,
Of courage at once bereav’d.
They thought the giant verily would
That moment after them stride:
Not one of them all would have battled with him;
Back would they all have hied.
It was Vidrik Verlandson,
He laugh’d at their craven fear:
“How would ye have fac’d him when alive,
Ye dare not him, dead, go near?
With his lance’s haft the body he push’d,
The head came toppling down:
That the Giant was a warrior stark,
Forsooth, I am forc’d to own.
Out took they then his ruddy gold,
And shar’d it amongst the band:
To Vidrik came the largest part,
For ’t was earn’d with his good hand.
Little car’d he for the booty, I ween,
But he thought of his meed of fame;
When men should say, in the Danish land,
That the Giant he overcame.