Round her peerless body his clasping arms he threw;
Lovingly he kiss'd her, that faithful wife and true;
Then took his leave, and parted;—in a moment all was o'er—
Living, alas poor lady! she saw him never more.
In the chase Siegfried prefers to hunt with a single limehound.
But he achieves most marvelous feats of skill and strength.
Stanzas 962-971.
All, that the limehound started, anon with mighty hand
Were slain by noble Siegfried the chief of Netherland.
No beast could there outrun him, so swift is steed could race;
He won from all high praises for mastery in the chace.
Whatever he attempted, he went the best before.
The first beast he encounter'd was a fierce half-bred boar.
Him with a mighty death-stroke he stretch'd upon the ground;
Just after in a thicket a lion huge he found.
Him the limehound started; his bow Sir Siegfried drew;
With a keen-headed arrow he shot the lion through.
But three faint bounds thereafter the dying monster made.
His wond'ring fellow-huntsmen thanks to Sir Siegfried paid.
Then one upon another a buffalo, an elk
He slew, four strong ureoxen, and last a savage shelk.
No beast, how swift soever, could leave his steed behind;
Scarcely their speed could profit the flying hart or hind
. . . . . . .
They heard then all about them, throughout those forest grounds,
Such shouting and such baying of huntsmen and of hounds,
That hill and wood re-echoed with the wild uproar.
Th' attendants had uncoupled four and twenty dogs or more.
Then full many a monster was doom'd his last to groan.
They thought with glad expectance to challenge for their own
The praise for the best hunting; but lower sunk their pride,
When to the tryst-fire shortly they saw Sir Siegfried ride.
The hunting now was over for the most part at least;
Game was brought in plenty and skins of many a beast
To the place of meeting, and laid the hearth before.
Ah! to the busy kitchen what full supplies they bore!
. . . . . . . . . . . . .
The chase being done, the hunters are summoned to a feast in a neighboring glade. Here, though they are served with a profusion of sumptuous viands, there is, according to Hagen's plot, no wine to drink. When, toward the end of the meal Siegfried is tormented with thirst, Hagen tells him of a cool runnel near by under a linden, and proposes that he and Gunther and Siegfried shall try a race to this brook. Siegfried gaily consents, and boasts that he will run with all his clothing and his weapons upon him.
Stanzas 1005-1029.
King Gunther and Sir Hagan to strip were nothing slow;
Both for the race stood ready in shirts as white as snow.
Long bounds, like two wild panthers o'er the grass they took,
But seen was noble Siegfried before them at the brook.