The Story of Sigurd the Volsung and the Fall of the Niblungs - William Morris

Скачать книгу

of all who were once afraid.

       There as thou drawest thy sword, thou shalt think of the days that were,

       And the foul shall still seem foul, and the fair shall still seem fair;

       But thy wit shall then be awakened, and thou shalt know indeed

       Why the brave man's spear is broken, and his war-shield fails at need;

       Why the loving is unbelovèd; why the just man falls from his state;

       Why the liar gains in a day what the soothfast strives for late.

       Yea, and thy deeds shalt thou know, and great shall thy gladness be;

       As a picture all of gold thy life-days shalt thou see,

       And know that thou too wert a God to abide through the hurry and haste;

       A God in the golden hall, a God on the rain-swept waste,

       A God in the battle triumphant, a God on the heap of the slain:

      Then she kissed him and departed, for the day was nigh at hand,

       And by then she had left the woodways green lay the horse-fed land

       Beneath the new-born daylight, and as she brushed the dew

       Betwixt the yellowing acres, all heaven o'erhead was blue.

       And at last on that dwelling of Kings the golden sunlight lay,

       And the morn and the noon and the even built up another day.

      Of the birth and fostering of Sinfiotli, Signy's Son.

      So wrought is the will of King Siggeir, and he weareth Odin's sword

       And it lies on his knees in the council and hath no other lord:

       And he sendeth earls o'er the sea-flood to take King Volsung's land,

       And those scattered and shepherdless sheep must come beneath his hand.

       And he holdeth the milk-white Signy as his handmaid and his wife.

       And nought but his will she doeth, nor raiseth a word of strife;

       So his heart is praising his wisdom, and he deems him of most avail

       Of all the lords of the cunning that teacheth how to prevail.

      Now again in a half-month's wearing goes Signy into the wild,

       And findeth her way by her wisdom to the dwelling of Volsung's child.

       It was e'en as a house of the Dwarfs, a rock, and a stony cave.

       In the heart of the midmost thicket by the hidden river's wave.

       There Signy found him watching how the white-head waters ran,

       And she said in her heart as she saw him that once more she had seen a man.

       His words were few and heavy, for seldom his sorrow slept,

       Yet ever his love went with them; and men say that Signy wept

       When she left that last of her kindred: yet wept she never more

       Amid the earls of Siggeir, and as lovely as before

       Was her face to all men's deeming: nor aught it changed for ruth,

       Nor for fear nor any longing; and no man said for sooth

       That she ever laughed thereafter till the day of her death was come.

      So is Volsung's seed abiding in a rough and narrow home;

       And wargear he gat him enough from the slaying of earls of men,

       And gold as much as he would; though indeed but now and again

       He fell on the men of the merchants, lest, wax he overbold,

       The tale of the wood-abider too oft to the king should be told.

       Alone in the woods he abided, and a master of masters was he

       In the craft of the smithying folk; and whiles would the hunter see,

       Belated amid the thicket, his forge's glimmering light,

       And the boldest of all the fishers would hear his hammer benight.

       Then dim waxed the tale of the Volsungs, and the word mid the wood-folk rose

       That a King of the Giants had wakened from amidst the stone-hedged close,

       Where they slept in the heart of the mountains, and had come adown to dwell

       In the cave whence the Dwarfs were departed, and they said: It is aught but well

       To come anigh to his house-door, or wander wide in his woods?

       For a tyrannous lord he is, and a lover of gold and of goods.

      So win the long years over, and still sitteth Signy there

       Beside the King of the Goth-folk, and is waxen no less fair,

       And men and maids hath she gotten who are ready to work her will,

       For the worship of her fairness, and remembrance of her ill.

      So it fell on a morn of springtide, as Sigmund sat on the sward

       By that ancient house of the Dwarf-kind and fashioned a golden sword?

       By the side of the hidden river he saw a damsel stand,

       And a manchild of ten summers was holding by her hand.

       And she cried:

       "O Forest-dweller! harm not the child nor me,

       For I bear a word of Signy's, and thus she saith to thee:

       'I send thee a man to foster; if his heart be good at need

       Then may he help thy workday; but hearken my words and heed;

       If thou deem that his heart shall avail not, thy work is over-great

       That thou weary thy heart with such-like: let him wend the ways of his fate.'"

      And no more word spake the maiden, but turned and gat her gone,

       And there by the side of the river the child abode alone:

       But Sigmund stood on his feet, and across the river he went.

       For he knew how the child was Siggeir's, and of Signy's fell intent.

       So he took the lad on his shoulder, and bade him hold his sword,

       And waded back to his dwelling across the rushing ford:

       But the youngling fell a prattling, and asked of this and that,

       As above the rattle of waters on Sigmund's shoulder he sat!

       And Sigmund deemed in his heart that the boy would be bold enough.

       So he fostered him there in the woodland in life full hard and rough

      

Скачать книгу