lying on the other side of the great square. And then the carnage went on with redoubled fury.

The ruthless Hagen and his companions, standing upon the dead bodies of the slain, took their helmets, and dipping them in the red gore that filled the hall, quenched their fiery thirst in these horrible draughts.

And on and on the dreadful warfare continued, and the living were become but as a handful to the hundreds and thousands that were lying choking up the chamber.

CHAPTER IX.

REVENGE, AND ITS FRUITS.

"Revenge, that thirsty dropsy of our souls,

Which makes us covet that which hurts us most."

MASSINGER.

UT at last the Burgundians became weary of the sickening conflict, and they sought to have a parley with Etzel, to the intent that they might have his permission to depart out of his land.

But the heart of the kind old man had become embittered within him by the cruel slaughter of his child, and his answer

was

"My child and peace with me now?

my

friends ye have killed, and would ye have

While my heart beats I will make no peace

with you, dastardly slayers of babes as ye are.”

And yet once again the Burgundians offered to lay down. their arms, so that they might escape with their lives; and then Criemhild, hearing of the conference that was going on between her husband and brothers, rushed wildly into the hall, where

they were holding parley. Her golden hair hung dishevelled upon her shoulders, and a fire as of madness glittered in her eye.

"Would ye have peace? Would ye have peace?" cried she, in a voice of such shrill and piercing agony that it vibrated through every corner of the vaulted hall. "Ye shall have peace, ye shall have leave to depart, but it shall be only upon one condition. We are children of one mother, therefore get you gone; but leave Hagen, the foul murderer, a hostage in my hands.”

Then the three princes looked darkly one at another, and Gernot made answer :

66

'Royal sister, that cannot be. Never shall it be said that a Burgundian, to purchase his own safety, gave up one of his friends into the hands of a foeman."

"Your blood then be upon your own heads,” cried the queen; and she and Etzel left the chamber, while the three princes returned back to their comrades, and the red slaughter began again.

But a frenzy, as of madness, possessed Criemhild; her enemy should not escape, even though her own life should be the penalty; so she called her husband's liegemen, and bade them set fire to the great hall in which the Huns and Burgundians were fighting.

Horrible and more horrible became the scene; and, before the morning dawned, many a mother's son, who had managed to escape the sword of the enemy, fell to earth, a prey to the devouring flames.

K

Now the margrave, Rudiger, having had Gunther's permission to do so, had left the hall immediately after Ortleben's slaughter, at the same time that Dietrich of Berne had led out the king and queen, for his soul revolted from the cruel carnage, and he thought foul scorn that a brave man should take revenge upon an innocent babe; but when he heard how the queen had taken vengeance upon her foes, he felt heavy and sad at heart, and it was no shame to his manhood that the