Therewith he laughed out amid the wild-wood, and his speech became song, and he said:

  “We wrought in the ring of the hazels, and the wine of war we drank:

From the tide when the sun stood highest to the hour wherein she sank:

And three kings came against me, the mightiest of the Huns,

The evil-eyed in battle, the swift-foot wily ones;

And they gnashed their teeth against me, and they gnawed on the shield-rims there,

On that afternoon of summer, in the high-tide of the year.

Keen-eyed I gazed about me, and I saw the clouds draw up

Till the heavens were dark as the hollow of a wine-stained iron cup,

And the wild-deer lay unfeeding on the grass of the forest glades,

And all earth was scared with the thunder above our clashing blades.

  “Then sank a King before me, and on fell the other twain,

And I tossed up the reddened sword-blade in the gathered rush of the rain

And the blood and the water blended, and fragrant grew the earth.

  “There long I turned and twisted within the battle-girth

Before those bears of onset: while out from the grey world streamed

The broad red lash of the lightening and in our byrnies gleamed.

And long I leapt and laboured in that garland of the fight

’Mid the blue blades and the lightening; but ere the sky grew light

The second of the Hun-kings on the rain-drenched daisies lay;

And we twain with the battle blinded a little while made stay,

And leaning on our sword-hilts each on the other gazed.

  “Then the rain grew less, and one corner of the veil of clouds was raised,

And as from the broidered covering gleams out the shoulder white

Of the bed-mate of the warrior when on his wedding night

He layeth his hand to the linen; so, down there in the west

Gleamed out the naked heaven: but the wrath rose up in my breast,

And the sword in my hand rose with it, and I leaped and hewed at the Hun;

And from him too flared the war-flame, and the blades danced bright in the sun

Come back to the earth for a little before the ending of day.

  “There then with all that was in him did the Hun play out the play,

Till he fell, and left me tottering, and I turned my feet to wend

To the place of the mound of the mighty, the gate of the way without end.

And there thou wert.  How was it, thou Chooser of the Slain,

Did I die in thine arms, and thereafter did thy mouth-kiss wake me again?”

  Ere the last sound of his voice was done she turned and kissed him; and then she said; “Never hadst thou a fear and thine heart is full of hardihood.”

  Then he said:

  “’Tis the hardy heart, beloved, that keepeth me alive,

As the king-leek in the garden by the rain and the sun doth thrive,

So I thrive by the praise of the people; it is blent with my drink and my meat;

As I slumber in the night-tide it laps me soft and sweet;

And through the chamber window when I waken in the morn

With the wind of the sun’s arising from the meadow is it borne

And biddeth me remember that yet I live on earth:

Then I rise and my might is with me, and fills my heart with mirth,

As I think of the praise of the people; and all this joy I win

By the deeds that my heart commandeth and the hope that lieth therein.”

  “Yea,” she said, “but day runneth ever on the heels of day, and there are many and many days; and betwixt them do they carry eld.”

  “Yet art thou no older than in days bygone,” said he.  “Is it so, O Daughter of the Gods, that thou wert never born, but wert from before the framing of the mountains, from the beginning of all things?”

  But she said:

  “Nay, nay; I began, I was born; although it may be indeed

That not on the hills of the earth I sprang from the godhead’s seed.

And e’en as my birth and my waxing shall be my waning and end.

But thou on many an errand, to many a field dost wend

Where the bow at adventure bended, or the fleeing dastard’s spear

Oft lulleth the mirth of the mighty.  Now me thou dost not fear,

Yet fear with me, beloved, for the mighty Maid I fear;

And Doom is her name, and full often she maketh me afraid

And even now meseemeth on my life her hand is laid.”

  But he laughed and said:

  “In what land is she abiding?  Is she near or far away?

Will she draw up close beside me in the press of the battle play?

And if then I may not smite her ’midst the warriors of the field

With the pale blade of my fathers, will she bide the shove of my shield?”

  But sadly she sang in answer:

  “In many a stead Doom dwelleth, nor sleepeth day nor night:

The rim of the bowl she kisseth, and beareth the chambering light

When the kings of men wend happy to the bride-bed from the board.

It is little to say that she wendeth the edge of the grinded sword,

When about the house half builded she hangeth many a day;

The ship from the strand she shoveth, and on his wonted way

By the mountain-hunter fareth where his foot ne’er failed before:

She is where the high bank crumbles at last on the river’s shore:

The mower’s scythe she whetteth; and lulleth the shepherd to sleep

Where the deadly ling-worm wakeneth in the desert of the sheep.

Now we that come of the God-kin of her redes for ourselves we wot,

But her will with the lives of men-folk and their ending know we not.

So therefore I bid thee not fear for thyself of Doom and her deed,

But for me: and I bid thee hearken to the helping of my need.

Or else—Art thou happy in life, or lusteth thou to die