ions of man's obligations
to man, but in their ignorance they were no worse off than their
continental brethren, for these forgot their greatest Teacher's
teaching, and modern social science must point them back to it.

This Sigurd that we love becomes the Sigurd that we pity in the drinking
of a draught. Sorrow takes the place of joy in his life, and "the soul
is changed in him," so that men may say that on this day they saw him
die the first time, who was to die a second time by Guttorm's sword.
Gloom spreads over all the earth with the quenching of Sigurd's joy:

In the deedless dark he rideth, and all things he remembers save one,
And nought else hath he care to remember of all the deeds he hath done.

Here is illustrated the essential difference between the sagaman's art
and the modern story-teller's. The Icelander must tell his story in
haste; the deeds of men are his care, not their divagations nor their
psychologizings. The modern writer must linger on every step in the
story until the motive and the meaning are laid bare. In the present-day
version Sigurd's mental sufferings are described at length, and our
hearts are wrung at his unmerited woes. The saga knows no such woes, and
to all appearance Sigurd's life is not unhappy to its very end. Indeed,
it appears in more than one place in Morris's poem that Sigurd has
become godlike through the hard experiences of his life. Take this
passage as an illustration:

So is Sigurd yet with the Niblungs, and he loveth Gudrun his wife,
And wendeth afield with the brethren to the days of the dooming of
life;
And nought his glory waneth, nor falleth the flood of praise:
To every man he hearkeneth, nor gainsayeth any grace,
And, glad is the poor in the Doom-ring when he seeth his face mid
the Kings,
For the tangle straighteneth before him, and the maze of crooked
things.
But the smile is departed from him, and the laugh of Sigurd the
young,
And of few words now is he waxen, and his songs are seldom sung.
Howbeit of all the sad-faced was Sigurd loved the best;
And men say: Is the king's heart mighty beyond all hope of rest?
Lo, how he beareth the people! how heavy their woes are grown!
So oft were a God mid the Goth-folk, if he dwelt in the world alone.

(P. 205.)

Set this by the side of the saga: "This is truer," says Sigurd, "that I
loved thee better than myself