When he them all in safety / o'er the flood had brought,
Of that strange story / the valiant warrior thought,
Which erstwhile had told him / those women of the sea.
Lost thereby the chaplain's / life well-nigh was doomed to be.
Beside his priestly baggage / he saw the chaplain stand,
Upon the holy vestments / resting with his hand.
No whit was that his safety; / when Hagen him did see,
Must the priest full wretched / suffer sorest injury.
From out the boat he flung him / ere might the thing be told,
Whereat they cried together: / "Hold, O Master, hold!"
Soon had the youthful Giselher / to rage thereat begun,
And mickle was his sorrow / that Hagen yet the thing had done.
Then outspake Sir Gernot, / knight of Burgundy:
"What boots it thee, Sir Hagen, / that thus the chaplain die?
Dared any else to do it, / thy wrath 'twould sorely stir.
Wherein the priest's offending, / thus thy malice to incur?"
To swim the chaplain struggled. / He thought him yet to free,
If any but would help him. / Yet such might never be,
For that the doughty Hagen / full wrathful was of mood,
He sunk him to the bottom, / whereat aghast each warrior stood.