d the courage of
my brothers, or the fierce spirit of the Hunnish kings."

4. Then said Hamdir, the great of heart: "Little didst thou care
Hogni's deed to praise, when Sigurd he from sleep awaked. Thy
blue-white bed-clothes were red with thy husband's gore, with
death-blood covered.

5. "For thy brothers thou didst o'er-hasty vengeance take, dire and
bitter, when thou thy sons didst murder. We young ones[117] could on
Jormunrek, acting all together, have avenged our sister.

6. "Bring forth the arms of the Hunnish kings: thou hast us
stimulated to a sword-mote."

7. Laughing Gudrun to the storehouse turned, the kings' crested
helms from the coffers drew, their ample corslets, and to her sons
them bore. The young heroes loaded their horses' shoulders.

8. Then said Hamdir, the great of heart: "So will no more come his
mother to see, the warrior felled in the Gothic land, so that thou the
funeral-beer after us all may drink, after Svanhild and thy sons."

9. Weeping Gudrun, Giuki's daughter, sorrowing went, to sit in the
fore-court, and to recount, with tear-worn cheeks, sad of soul, her
calamities, in many ways.

10. "Three fires I have known, three hearths I have known, of three
consorts I have been borne to the house. Sigurd alone to me was better
than all, of whom my brothers were the murderers.

11. "Of my painful wounds I might not complain; yet they even more
seemed to afflict me, when those chieftains to Atli gave me.

12. "My bright boys I called to speak with me; for my injuries I
could not get revenge, ere I had severed the Hniflungs' heads.

13. "To the sea-shore I went, against the Norns I was embittered; I
would cast off their persecution; bore, and submerged me not the
towering billows; up on land I rose, because I was to live.

14. "To the nuptial couch I went--as I thought better for me,--for
the third time, with a mighty king. I brought forth offspring,
guardians of the heritage, guardians of the heritage, Jonakr's sons.

15. "But around Svanhild bond-maidens sat; of all my children her I
loved the best. Svanhild was, in my hall, as was the sun-beam, fair to
behold.

16. "I with gold adorned her, and with fine raiment, before I gave
her to the Gothic people. That is to me the hardest of all my woes,
that Svanhild's beauteous locks should in the mire be trodden under
horses' feet.

17. "But that was yet more painful, when my Sigurd they ingloriously
slew in his bed; though of all most c