Page:The Nibelungenlied - tr. Shumway - 1909.pdf/354

296 now with strife, how right unkindly do ye let it appear, that: I trust you well above all other men and therefore won me your daughter to wife.”

“Think on your fealty, most noble and high-born king. And God let you escape,” so spake Rüdeger, “let the maiden suffer not for me. For your own virtue’s sake, vouchsafe her mercy.”

“That I should do by right,” spake the youthful Giselher, “but if my noble kinsmen here within must die through you, then my steadfast friendship for you and for your daughter must he parted.”

“Now may God have mercy on us,” answered the valiant man. Then they raised their shields, as though they would hence to fight the guests in Kriemhild’s hall, but Hagen cried full loud adown the steps. “Pray tarry awhile, most noble Rüdeger,” so spake Hagen; “I and my lords would fain have further parley, as doth befit our need. What can the death of us wanderers avail King Etzel? I stand here in a fearful plight; the shield that Lady Gotelind gave me to bear hath been cut to pieces by the Huns. I brought it with friendly purpose into Etzel’s land. O that God in heaven would grant, that I might bear so good a shield as that thou hast in thy hand, most noble Rüdeger! Then I should no longer need a hauberk in the fray.”

“Gladly would I serve thee with my shield, durst I offer it before Kriemhild. Yet take it, Hagen, and bear it on thine arm. Ho, if thou couldst only wield it in the Burgundian land!”

When he so willingly offered to give the shield, enow of eyes grew red with scalding tears. ’T was the