But the mind is unsubdued—
Fearless is the warrior's mood,
While his eyes are keeping
This last vigil strange and lone,
That his spirit may be known.
As a ship cuts through the froth
Shining comes the morning forth,
From his own ancestral north,
While each rosy vapour
Kindles beautiful and bright,
With an evanescent light:
But the human taper
Hath an even briefer ray:
Strange, oh life, is thy decay!
Haughtily his castle stands
On a rock amid the sands,
Where the waves in gather'd bands
Day by day are dashing.
Never is the sounding shore
Still with their eternal roar,
And their strife is flashing
To the noontide's azure light,
And the stars that watch at night.
Sigurd's look is on the foam
Where his childhood wont to roam—
For the sea has been his home
From his earliest hours—
Gathering the echoing shells,
Where the future tempest dwells,
As some gather flowers;
Trembling when a rosy boy
With a fierce and eager joy.
Many things long since forgot
In a hard and hurried lot
Now arise—they trouble not
He, the stately hearted:
But he saw a blue-eyed maid,
Long since 'mid the long grass laid,
And true friends departed.
Tears that stand in that dark eye
Only may the sea-breeze dry.
Longer do the shadows fall
Of his castle's armed wall,
Yet the old man sits, while all
Stand behind him weeping:
But behind they stand, for he
Would not brook man's tears to see.
One fair child is sleeping—
To his grandsire's feet he crept,
Weeping silent till he slept.
Heavily beneath his mail
Seems Earl Sigurd's breath to fail,
And his pale cheek is more pale,
And his hand less steady.
Crimson are the sky and surge,
Stars are on th' horizon's verge,
Night and Death are ready!
Down in ocean goes the sun,
And Earl Sigurd's life is done!
