That the knight who yonder beareth so princely a port, is he.

Great tales shall be told, if it be so, of his coming to this our land.

The lion-hearted Niblungs were slain by the hero’s hand,

Schilbung and Nibelung, scions of the King of the Golden Hoard;—

Marvels he wrought against them when his strong arm swung the sword!

For it chanced, when the hero was riding alone with no helpers near,

That he found by a misty mountain, as the tale hath been told in mine ear,

Enringing the Hoard of King Niblung a throng of fierce-eyed men:

He had seen not those strange faces till he lighted on them then.

There lay King Niblung’s Gold-hoard, haled forth from the dark abyss