478.
“While thus in power and numbers they throng throughout the land,
What is the queen’s intention we cannot understand:
What if she be against us so wroth that we be lost?
The noble maiden surely was born to our great cost!”
479.
Then spake the sturdy Siegfried: “All this will I forestall;
The danger you are dreading I will not let befall.
I must go hence, and succour bring quickly to this shore,—
A band of chosen warriors ne’er known to you before.
480.
“Ye must not seek to find me, I go across the sea;
May God meanwhile preserve you from all indignity!
I’ll come hack quickly, bringing a thousand men with me,
The very best of warriors that ever one could see.”
481.
“Be not too long gone from us,” the king in answer said:
“In this our need we shall be right glad to have your aid.”
Said he: “I'll come back to you, ere many days be spent;
And you must tell the queen that by you I have been sent.”
ADVENTURE VIII.—HOW SIEGFRIED WENT TO FETCH THE NIBELUNGS.
482.
So thence went Siegfried unto the haven on the strand,
Clad in his hood of darkness, to where a boat did stand.
Therein he stood, all hidden, this son of Siegmund brave;—
He steered it quickly seaward, as ’twere the wind that drave.
