These flow by Hela’s throne, and near their spring.
And from the dark flock’d up the shadowy tribes:
And as the swallows crowd the bulrush-beds
Of some clear river, issuing from a lake,
On autumn days, before they cross the sea;
And to each bulrush-crest a swallow hangs
Swinging, and others skim the river streams,
And their quick twittering fills the banks and shores—
So around Hermod swarm’d the twittering ghosts.
Women, and infants, and young men who died
Too soon for fame, with white ungraven shields;
And old men, known to Glory, but their star
Betray’d them, and of wasting age they died,
Not wounds: yet, dying, they their armour wore,
And now have chief regard in Hela’s realm.
Behind flock’d wrangling up a piteous crew,
Greeted of none, disfeatur’d and forlorn—
Cowards, who were in sloughs interr’d alive;
And round them still the wattled hurdles hung
Wherewith they stamp’d them down, and trod them deep,
To hide their shameful memory from men.
But all he pass’d unhail’d, and reach’d the throne
Of Hela, and saw, near it, Balder crown’d,
And Hela set thereon, with countenance stern;
And thus bespake him first the solemn Queen:—
“Unhappy, how hast thou endur’d to leave
The light, and journey to the cheerless land
Where idly flit about the feeble shades?
How didst thou cross the bridge o’er Giall’s stream,
Being alive, and come to Ocean’s shore?
Or how o’erleap the grate that bars the wall?”
She spake: but down off Sleipner Hermod sprang,
And fell before her feet, and clasp’d her knees;
And spake, and mild entreated her, and said:—
“O Hela, wherefore should the Gods declare
Their errands to each other, or the ways
They go? the errand and the way is known.
Thou know’st, thou know’st, what grief we have in Heaven
For Balder, whom thou hold’st by right below:
Restore him, for what part fulfils he here?
Shall he shed cheer over the cheerless seats,
And touch the apathetic ghosts with joy?
Not for such end, O Queen, thou hold’st thy realm.
For Heaven was Balder born, the City of Gods
And Heroes, where they live in light and joy:
Thither restore him, for his place is there.”
He spoke; and grave replied the solemn Queen:—
“Hermod, for he thou art, thou Son of Heaven!
A strange unlikely errand, sure, is thine.
Do the Gods send to me to make them blest?
Small bliss my race hath of the Gods obtain’d.
Three mighty children to my Father Lok
Did Angerbode, the Giantess, bring forth—
Fenris the Wolf, the Serpent huge, and Me.
Of these the Serpent in the sea ye cast,
Who since in your despite hath wax’d amain,
And now with gleaming ring enfolds the world:
Me on this cheerless nether world ye threw
And gave me nine unlighted realms to rule:
While on his island in the lake, afar,
Made fast to the bor’d crag, by wile not strength
Subdu’d, with limber chains lives Fenris bound.
Lok still subsists in Heaven, our Father wise,
Your mate, though loath’d, and feasts in Odin’s hall;
But him too foes await, and netted snares,
And in a cave a bed of needle rocks,
And o’er his visage serpents dropping gall.
Yet he shall one day rise, and burst his bonds,
And with himself set us his offspring free,
When he guides Muspel’s children to their bourne.
Till then in peril or in pain we live,
Wrought by the Gods: and ask the Gods our aid?
Howbeit we abide our day: till then,
We do not as some feebler haters do,
Seek to afflict our foes with petty pangs,
Helpless to better us, or ruin them.
Come then; if Balder was so dear belov’d,
And this is true, and such a loss is Heaven’s—
Hear, how to Heaven may Balder be restor’d.
Show me through all the world the signs of grief:
Fails but one thing to grieve, here Balder stops:
Let all that lives and moves upon the earth
Weep him, and all that is without life weep:
Let Gods, men, brutes, beweep him; plants and stones.
So shall I know the lost was dear indeed,
And bend my heart, and give him back to Heaven.”
She spake; and Hermod answer’d her, and said:—
“Hela, such as thou say’st, the terms shall be.
But come, declare me this, and truly tell:
May I, ere I depart, bid Balder hail?
Or is it here withheld to greet the dead?”
He spake, and straightway Hela answered him:—
“Hermod, greet Balder if thou wilt, and hold
Converse: his speech remains, though he be dead.”
And straight to Balder Hermod turn’d, and spake:—
“Even in the abode of death, O Balder, hail!
Thou hear’st, if hearing, like as speech, is thine,
The terms of thy releasement hence to Heaven:
Fear nothing but that all shall be fulfill’d.
For not unmindful of thee are the Gods
Who see the light, and blest in Asgard dwell;
Even here they seek thee out, in Hela’s realm.
And sure of all the happiest far art thou
Who ever have been known in Earth or Heaven:
Alive, thou wert of Gods the most belov’d:
And now thou sittest crown’d by Hela’s side,
Here, and hast honour among all the dead.”
He spake; and Balder utter’d him reply,
But feebly, as a voice far off; he said:—
“Hermod the nimble, gild me not my death.
Better to live a slave, a captur’d man,
Who scatters rushes in a master’s hall,
Than be a crown’d king here, and rule the dead.
And now I count not of these terms as safe
To be fulfill’d, nor my return as sure,
Though I be lov’d, and many mourn my death:
For double-minded ever was the seed
Of Lok, and double are the gifts they give.
Howbeit, report thy message; and therewith,
To Odin, to my Father, take this ring,
Memorial of me, whether sav’d or no;
And tell the Heaven-born Gods how thou hast seen
Me sitting here below by Hela’s side,
Crown’d, having honour among all the dead.”
He spake, and raised his hand, and gave the ring.
And with inscrutable regard the Queen
Of Hell beheld them, and the ghosts stood dumb.
But Hermod took the ring, and yet once more
Kneel’d and did homage to the solemn Queen;
Then mounted Sleipner, and set forth to ride
Back, through the astonish’d tribes of dead, to Heaven.
And to the wall he came, and found the grate
Lifted, and issued on the fields of ice;
And o’er the ice he fared to Ocean’s strand,
And up from thence, a wet and misty road,
To the arm’d Damsel’s bridge, and Giall’s stream.
Worse was that way to go than
