THE SECOND LAY OF HELGI HUNDINGCIDE
Helgi.
43. Thou art alone the cause,[1] Sigrun of Sefafioll! that Helgi is with sorrow's dew suffused. Thou weepest, gold-adorned! cruel tears, sun-bright daughter of the south! ere to sleep thou goest; each one falls bloody on the prince's breast, wet, cold, and piercing, with sorrow big.
44. We shall surely drink delicious draughts, though we have lost life and lands. No one shall a song of mourning sing, though on my breast he wounds behold. Now are women in the mound enclosed, daughters of kings, with us the dead.
Sigrun prepares a bed in the mound.
35. Here, Helgi! have I for thee a peaceful couch prepared, for the Ylfings' son. On thy breast I will, chieftain! repose, as in my hero's lifetime I was wont.
Helgi.
46. Nothing I now declare unlooked for, at Sefafioll, late or early, since in a corpse's arms thou sleepest, Hogni's fair daughter! in a mound, and thou art living, daughter of kings!
47. Time 'tis for me to ride on the reddening ways: let the pale horse tread the aerial path. I towards the
- ↑ The superstition commemorated in this strophe is, no doubt, the origin of some very beautiful ballads in the later literature of Scandinavia and Germany referring to this superstition:
"When thou, my dear, art cheerful,
"And easy in thy mind,
"The coffin where I slumber
"Is all with roses lined.
"But oft as thou 'rt in sorrow,
"And bow'd with grief so sore,
"Is all the while my coffin
"Brim full of blood and gore."
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