th great wealth, and he
himself was a man exceeding goodly to look on. But when he had been but
a little while at home, the queen, his mother, asked him why the fairest
of the two women had the fewer rings and the less worthy attire.

"I deem," she said, "that she whom ye have held of least account is the
noblest of the twain."

He answered: "I too have misdoubted me, that she is little like a
bondwoman, and when we first met, in seemly wise she greeted noble men.
Lo now, we will make a trial of the thing."

So on a time as men sat at the drink, the king sat down to talk with the
women, and said:--

"In what wise do ye note the wearing of the hours, whenas night grows
old, if ye may not see the lights of heaven?"

Then says the bondwoman, "This sign have I, that whenas in my youth I
was wont to drink much in the dawn, so now when I no longer use that
manner, I am yet wont to wake up at that very same tide, and by that
token do I know thereof."

Then the king laughed and said, "Ill manners for a king's daughter!" And
therewith he turned to Hjordis, and asked her even the same question;
but she answered--

"My father erst gave me a little gold ring of such nature, that it
groweth cold on my finger in the day-dawning; and that is the sign that
I have to know thereof."

The king answered: "Enow of gold there, where a very bondmaid bore it!
But come now, thou hast been long enow hid from me; yet if thou hadst
told me all from the beginning, I would have done to thee as though we
had both been one king's children: but better than thy deeds will I deal
with thee, for thou shalt be my wife, and due jointure will I pay thee
whenas thou hast borne me a child."

She spake therewith and told out the whole truth about herself: so there
was she held in great honour, and deemed the worthiest of women.

CHAPTER XIII. Of the Birth and Waxing of Sigurd Fafnir's-bane.

The tale tells that Hjordis brought forth a man-child, who was
straightly borne before King Hjalprek, and then was the king glad
thereof, when he saw the keen eyes in the head of him, and he said that
few men would be equal to him or like unto him in any wise. So he was
sprinkled with water, and had to name Sigurd, of whom all men speak
with one speech and say that none was ever his like for growth and
goodliness. He was brought up in the house of King Hjalprek in great
love and honour; and so it is, that whenso all the noblest men and
greatest kings are n