slain brothers and is bound to avenge them. He tells the Volsung
that in the morning, weapons or no weapons, he must fight for his
life. Then he orders the woman to bed, and follows her himself,
taking his spear with him.

The unlucky stranger, left brooding by the hearth, has nothing to
console himself with but an old promise of his father's that he
shall find a weapon to his hand when he most needs one. The last
flicker of the dying fire strikes on the golden hilt of the sword
that sticks in the tree; but he does not see it; and the embers
sink into blackness. Then the woman returns. Hunding is safely
asleep: she has drugged him. She tells the story of the one-eyed
man who appeared at her forced marriage, and of the sword. She
has always felt, she says, that her miseries will end in the arms
of the hero who shall succeed in drawing it forth. The stranger,
diffident as he is about his luck, has no misgivings as to his
strength and destiny. He gives her his affection at once, and
abandons himself to the charm of the night and the season;
for it is the beginning of Spring. They soon learn from their
confidences that she is his stolen twin-sister. He is transported
to find that the heroic race of the Volsungs need neither perish
nor be corrupted by a lower strain. Hailing the sword by the name
of Nothung (or Needed), he plucks it from the tree as her
bride-gift, and then, crying "Both bride and sister be of thy
brother; and blossom the blood of the Volsungs!" clasps her as
the mate the Spring has brought him.

The Second Act

So far, Wotan's plan seems prospering. In the mountains he calls