swords,
Or a serving-man of the Niblungs, a thrall of the Westland lords?"

So spake the voice of Gudrun; suchwise she cast the seed
O'er the gold-lust of King Atli for the day of the Niblungs' Need.

Who is this in the hall of King Gunnar, this golden-gleaming man?
Who is this, the bright and the silent as the frosty eve and wan,
Round whom the speech of wise-ones lies hid in bonds of fear?
Who this in the Niblung feast-hall as the moon-rise draweth anear?

Hark! his voice mid the glittering benches and the wine-cups of the
Earls,
As cold as the wind that bloweth where the winter river whirls,
And the winter sun forgetteth all the promise of the spring:
"Hear ye, O men of the Westlands, hear thou, O Westland King,
I have ridden the scorching highways, I have ridden the mirk-wood
blind,
I have sailed the weltering ocean your Westland house to find;
For I am the man called Knefrud with Atli's word in my mouth.
That saith: O noble Gunnar, come thou and be glad in the south,
And rejoice with Eastland warriors; for the feast for thee is dight,
And the cloths for thy coming fashioned my glorious hall make bright.
Knowst thou not how the sun of the heavens hangs there 'twixt floor
and roof.
How the light of the lamp all golden holds dusky night aloof?
How the red wine runs like a river, and the white wine springs as a
well,
And the harps are never ceasing of ancient deeds to tell?
Thou shalt come when thy heart desireth, when thou weariest thou shalt
go,
And shalt say that no such high-tide the world shall ever know.
Come bare and bald as the desert, and leave mine house again
As rich as the summer wine-burg, and the ancient wheat-sown plain!
Come, bid thy men be building thy store-house greater yet,
And make wide thy stall and thy stable for the gifts thine hand shall
get!
Yet when thou art gone from Atli he shall stand by his treasure of
gold,
He shall look through stall and stable, he shall ride by field and
fold,
And no ounce from the weight shall be lacking, of his beasts shall
lack no head,
If no thief hath stolen from Gunnar, if no beast in his land lie dead.
Yea henceforth let our lives be as one, let our wars and our
wayfarings blend,
That my name with thine may be told of when the song is sung in the
end,