disappointment, went to the fields to watch their sheep; but their
father sat down to guard his new-gotten treasure. He took in his hand
the glittering serpent ring, and gazed into its cold ruby eyes; and, as
he gazed, all his thoughts were fixed upon his gold; and there was no
room in his heart for love toward his fellows, nor for deeds of
kindness, nor for the worship of the All-Father. And behold, as he
continued to look at the snaky ring, a dreadful change came over him.
The warm red blood, which until that time had leaped through his veins,
and given him life and strength and human feelings, became purple and
cold and sluggish; and selfishness, like serpent's poison, took hold of
his heart. Then, as he kept on gazing at the hoard which lay before
him, he began to lose his human shape; his body lengthened into many
scaly folds, and he coiled himself around his loved treasures,--the
very likeness of the ring upon which he had looked so long.

When the day drew near its close, Fafnir came back from the fields with
his herd of sheep, and thought to find his father guarding the
treasure, as he had left him in the morning; but instead he saw a
glittering snake, fast asleep, encircling the hoard like a huge scaly
ring of gold. His first thought was that the monster had devoured his
father; and, hastily drawing his sword, with one blow he severed the
serpent's head from its body. And, while yet the creature writhed in
the death agony, he gathered up the hoard, and fled with it beyond the
hills of Hunaland, until on the seventh day he came to a barren heath
far from the homes or men. There he placed the treasures in one
glittering heap; and he clothed himself in a wondrous mail-coat of gold
that was found among them, and he put on the Helmet of Dread, which had
once been the terror of the mid-world, and the like of which no man had
ever seen; and then he gazed with greedy eyes upon the fateful ring,
until he, too, was changed into a cold and slimy reptile,--a monster