aside your woes. And ye seek friends, I will be one of them and
trow well to deport myself with honor until mine end."

"Now God reward you, Sir Siegfried, your speech thinketh me good,
and though your prowess help me not, yet do I rejoice to hear
that ye are friend to me, and live I yet a while, I shall repay
you well. I will let you hear why I stand thus sad; from the
messengers of my foes I have heard that they would visit me with
war, a thing which knights have never done to us in all these
lands."

"Regard this lightly," spake then Siegfried, "and calm your mood.
Do as I pray you. Let me gain for you both worship and advantage
and do ye command your knights, that they gather to your aid.
Should your mighty foes be helped by thirty thousand (3) men, yet
could I withstand them, had I but a thousand; for that rely on
me."

Then spake King Gunther: "For this I'll serve you ever."

"So bid me call a thousand of your men, since of mine own I have
but twelve, and I will guard your land. Faithfully shall the
hand of Siegfried serve you. Hagen shall help us and also
Ortwin, Dankwart, and Sindolt, your trusty men. Folker, the
valiant man, shall also ride along; he shall bear the banner, for
to none would I liefer grant it. Let now the envoys ride home to
their masters' lands. Give them to understand they soon shall
see us, that our castles may rest in peace."

Then the king bade summon both his kinsmen and his men. The