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“That would I do right gladly,” young Giselher replied:

“But these my high-born kinsmen who still are here inside,

If they at your hands perish, the friendship firmly knit

With you and eke your daughter by me must be acquit.”

“Then God have mercy on us!” the gallant warrior spake.

Thereon they raised their bucklers, as though a way to make,

By force, unto the strangers within Kriemhilda’s hall.

Then loudly from the stairway was Hagen heard to call:

“Now for a while yet tarry, most noble Rüdeger;”

Such were the words of Hagen: “we would again confer,—

Myself and eke my masters,— forced by necessity:

How will it profit Etzel if we poor exiles die?

“I am in grievous trouble,” yet Hagen said, “the shield

That Lady Gotelinda gave me as mine to wield,

The Huns for me have batter’d and hack’d it out of hand:

In friendliness I brought it unto King Etzel’s land.

“If so be God in heaven would grant me of His grace

To hold as good a buckler once more before my face,

As that which thou dost handle, right noble Rüdeger,

No longer in the combat need I a hauberk wear.”

“Right gladly would I serve thee as touching this my shield,

Durst I make thee the offer in spite of Dame Kriemhild.

But do thou take it, Hagen, and bear it on thine hand;

Ay! what if thou shouldst bring it to thy Burgundian land!”