His hand on the sacred relics and the hallowed things he leant.
But their sanctity nothing availed him when Hagen’s cruel eye
Fell on the priest, and doomed him to sore calamity.
With sudden violence he seized him, he hurled him over the side
Of the barge, while “Hold! hold, Hagen!” many a warrior cried,
And brake into wrath indignant the young Prince Giselher.
Yet, till he had well-nigh drowned him, would Hagen not forbear.
Thereat did the princely Gernot, the lord Burgundian, cry:
“What profit to thee is it, Hagen, that Gunther’s chaplain should die?
Had another done such outrage, it had cost him his life, I trow!