"And if my loving kinsmen would sorrow o'er my clay,
This to the best and nearest, dear uncle, of me say,
That I need no lamenting, that tears were better dried,
That 'twas a king that slew me, and gloriously I died.
LXX
"Besides, in this wild slaughter I've sold my life so dear,
That many a knight's pale lady 'twill cost full many a tear.
If any ask the question, straight let the truth be shown.
Here lie at least a hundred slain by this hand alone."
LXXI
Just then redoubted Hagan upon the gleeman thought,
Whom the good knight Sir Hildebrand so late to death had brought.
Thus he bespake the conqueror, "You for my grief shall pay;
Of many a valiant champion you've robb'd us here to-day."
LXXII
So struck he then at Hildebrand, that all at once might hear
'Twas Balmung there was sounding, the sword that he whilere
Had ta'en from noble Siegfried when he the hero slew.
Well was his onset warded by the graybeard stout and true.
LXXIII
Sir Dietrich's aged liegeman the fearful stroke repaid
With one that show'd, that he, too, wielded a griding blade;
Still from the man of Gunther no drop of blood he drew.
Sir Hagan with a second cut his good hauberk through.