Siggeir's roof-tree bowed earthward, and the mighty walls crashed
down, and so that dark murder-hall lay wasted, and its glory was
swept away.


_How Sigmund cometh to the Land of the Volsungs again, and of the
death of Sinfiotli his Son._

Now Sigmund the king bestirs him, and Sinfiotli, Sigmund's son,
And they gather a host together, and many a mighty one;
Then they set the ships in the sea-flood and sail from the stranger's shore,
And the beaks of the golden dragons see the Volsungs' land once more;
And men's hearts are fulfilled of joyance; and they cry, The sun shines now
With never a curse to hide it, and they shall reap that sow!
Then for many a day sits Sigmund 'neath the boughs of the Branstock green,
With his earls and lords about him as the Volsung wont hath been.
And oft he thinketh on Signy and oft he nameth her name,
And tells how she spent her joyance and her life-days and her fame
That the Volsung kin might blossom and bear the fruit of worth
For the hope of unborn people and the harvest of the earth.
And again he thinks of the word that he spake that other day,
How he should abide there lonely when his kin was passed away,
Their glory and sole avenger, their after-summer seed.

But far and wide went Sinfiotli through the earth, mowing the war
swathe and wasting the land, and passing but little time in song and
laughter in his father's hall. So went his days in warfare and valour,
and yet his end was not glorious, for he drank of the poisoned cup
given him by the sister of a warrior he had rightly slain.