heart, and he fell dead in the Hall of the
Branstock.

Oh, woeful was Sigmund for the death of his kinsman and his comrade. He
would let no one touch his body. He himself lifted Sinfiotli in his arms
and carried him out of the Hall, and through the wood, and down to the
seashore. And when he came to the shore he saw a boat drawn up with a
man therein. Sigmund came near to him and saw that the man was old and
strangely tall. "I will take thy burthen from thee," the man said.

Sigmund left the body of Sinfiotli in the boat, thinking to take a place
beside it. But as soon as the body was placed in it the boat went from
the land without sail or oars. Sigmund, looking on the old man who stood
at the stern, knew that he was not of mortal men, but was Odin
All-Father, the giver of the sword Gram.

Then Sigmund went back to his Hall. His Queen died, and in time he wed
with Hiordis, who became the mother of Sigurd. And now Sigurd the
Volsung, the son of Sigmund and Hiordis, rode the ways of the forest,
the sword Gram by his side, and the Golden Helmet of the Dragon's Hoard
above his golden hair.

[Illustration]

BRYNHILD IN THE HOUSE OF FLAME

The forest ways led him on and up a mountain-side. He came to a
mountain-summit at last: Hindfell, where the trees fell away, leaving a
place open to the sky and the winds. On Hindfell was the House of Flame.
Sigurd saw the walls black, and high, and all around them was a ring of
fire.

As he rode nearer he heard the roar of the mounting and the circling
fire. He sat on Grani, his proud horse, and for long he looked on the
black walls and the flame that went circling around them.

Then he rode Grani to the fire. Another horse would have been
affrighted, but Grani remained steady under Sigurd. To the wall of fire
they came, and Sigurd, who knew no fear, rode through it.

Now he was in the courtyard of the Hall. No stir was there of man or
hound or horse. Sigurd dismounted and bade Grani be still. He opened a
door and he saw a chamber with hangings on which was wrought the pattern
of a great tree, a tree with three roots, and the pattern was carried
across from one wall to the other. On a couch in the center of the
chamber one lay in slumber. Upon the head was a helmet and across the
breast was a breastplate. Sigurd took the helmet off the head. Then over
the couch fell a heap of woman's hair--wondrous, bright-gleaming hair.
This was the maiden that the birds had told him