"I have done many deeds," said Hogni, "I have worn the smooth and the rough,
While the Gods looked on from heaven, and belike I have done enough,
And no deed for me abideth, but rather the sleep and the rest
But thou, O Son of King Giuki, art our eldest and our best,
And fair lie the fields before thee wherein thine hand shall work:
By the wayside of the greedy doth many a peril lurk;
Full wise is the great one meseemeth who bideth his ending at home
When the winds and the waves may be dealing with hate that hath far to come."
"I hearken thy word," said Gunnar, "and I know in very deed
That long-lived and happy are most men that hearken Hogni's rede.
Hear thou, O Eastland War-god, and bear this answer aback,
That nought may the earth of my people King Giuki's children lack,
And that here in the land am I biding till the Norns my life shall change;
Howbeit, if here were Atli, his face were scarce more strange
Than that daughter of my father whom sore I long to see:
Let him come, and sit with the Niblungs, and be called their king with me."
Then spake the guileful Knefrud, and his word was exceeding proud:
"It is little the wont of Atli to sit at meat with a crowd;
Yet know, O Westland Warrior, that thy message shall be done.
Since the Cloudy Folk make ready new lodging for the sun."
He laughed, and the wise kept silence, and Gunnar heeded him nought:
On the daughter of his people was set the Niblung's thought,
So sore he longed to behold her; for his life seemed wearing away,
And the wealth and the fame he had gathered seemed nought by the earlier day,
The day of love departed, and of hope forgotten long.
But Hogni laughs with the stranger, and cries out for harp and song,
And the glee rises up as a river when the mountain-tops grow clear,
When seaward drift the rain-clouds, and the end of day is near;
As of birds in the green groves singing is the Niblung manhood's voice,
And the Earls without foreboding in their mighty life rejoice.
Glad then grows the King of the people, and the sweetness filleth his heart,
And he turneth about a little, and speaketh to Knefrud apart:
"What sayest thou, lord of the Eastland, how with Gudrun's heart it fares?
Is she sunk in the day of dominion and the burden that it bears,
Or remembereth she her brethren and her father and her folk?"
Then Knefrud looked upon Gunnar, and forth from the teeth he spoke:
"It is e'en as I said, King Gunnar: all eves she stands by the gate
The coming of her kindred through the dusky tide to wait:
Each day in the dawn she ariseth, and saith the time is at hand
When the feet of the Niblung War-Kings shall tread King Atli's land:
Then she praiseth the wings of the dove, and the wings of the wayfaring crane
'Gainst whom the wind prevails not, and the tempest driveth in vain;
And she praiseth the waves of the ocean, how they toil and toil and blend,
Till they break on the strand belovèd, and the Niblung earth in the end."
He spake, and the song rose upward and the wine of Kings was poured,
And Gunnar heard in the wall-nook how the wind went forth abroad,
And he dreamed, and beheld the ocean, and all kingdoms of the earth,
And the world lay fair before him and his worship and his worth.
Then again spake the Eastland liar: "O King, I may not hide
That great things in the land of Atli thy mighty soul abide;
For the King is spent and war-weak, nor rejoiceth more in strife;
And his sons, the children of Gudrun, now look their first on life:
For this end meseems is his bidding, that no worser men than ye
May sit in the throne of Atli and the place where he wont to be."
In the tuneful hall of the Niblungs that Eastland liar spake,
And he heard the song of the mighty o'er Gunnar's musing break,
And his cold heart gladdened within him as man cried out to man,
And fair 'twixt horn and beaker the red wine bubbled and ran.
At last spake Gunnar the Niblung as his hand on the cup he laid:
"A great king craveth our coming, and no more shall he be gainsayed:
We will go to look on Atli, though the Gods and the Goths forbid;
Nought worse than death meseemeth on the Niblungs' path is hid,
And this shall the high Gods see to, but I to the Niblung name,
And the day of deeds to accomplish, and the gathering-in of fame."