THE FIRST LAY OF GUDRUN
7. My father and my mother, my brothers four, on the sea the wind deluded; the waves struck on the ship's timbers.
8. Their last honours 'twas mine to pay, 'twas mine to see them tombed, their funeral rites to prepare was mine. All this I underwent in one half-year, and to me no one consolation offered.
9. Then I became a captive, taken in war, at the close of the same half-year. Then had I to adorn, and tie the shoes, of the hersir's wife, each morn.
10. From jealousy she threatened me, and with hard blows drove me: nowhere master found I a better, but mistress no where a worse."
11. Gudrun could not shed a tear, such was her affliction for her dead consort, and her soul's anguish for the king's fall.
12. Then said Gullrond, Giuki's daughter: "Little canst thou, my fosterer, wise as thou art, with a young wife fittingly talk." The king's body she forbade to be longer hidden.
13. She snatched the sheet from Sigurd's corse, and turned his cheek towards his wife's knees: "Behold thy loved one, lay thy mouth to his lip, as if thou wouldst embrace the living prince."
14. Gudrun upon him cast one look: she saw the prince's locks dripping with blood, the chief's sparkling eyes closed in death, his kingly breast cleft by the sword.
15. Then sank down Gudrun back on her pillow, her head-gear was loosed, her cheeks grew red, and a flood of tears fell to her knees.
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