Page:The lay of the Nibelungs; (IA nibelungslay00hortrich).pdf/256

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“It never need have happen’d if real your sorrow were;

Me must ye have forgotten,— that may I well aver,—

When I was there bereft of my own belovéd one.

I would to God,” said Kriemhild, “it had to me been done!”

They clave unto their lying. Kriemhild began again:

“Whoso of you is guiltless, now let him make it plain;—

Let each before the people walk up unto the bier;

Thereby the truth that’s in him shall presently appear.”

It is a wondrous marvel that oft hath happenéd:

That when one sees the slayer beside the murder’d dead,

The wounds afresh start bleeding; as here, too, came to pass.

Whereby men saw that Hagen the malefactor was.

Again the wounds bled freely, as they had done afore;

They who had mourn’d him sorely bewail’d him now the more.

Then spake aloud King Gunther: “I tell you everyone

’Twas vagabonds that slew him: ’twas not by Hagen done.”

“These vagabonds, too surely are known to me,” she spake,

“By friendly hands, God willing, we’ll vengeance on them take!

Thou Gunther and thou Hagen have surely done this thing.”

By this time Siegfried’s warriors for strife were hankering.

Kriemhilda spake yet further: “Now share with me my need.”

Then came those twain unto her who found him lying dead,—

They were her brother Gernot and Giselher the youth.

As many a man did later, these mourn’d for him in sooth.