And her face is a rose of the morning by the night-tide
framed about.
and how perfect in imagination this of the Volsung King's sword--
Therewith from the belt of battle he raised the golden sheath,
And showed the peace-strings glittering around the hidden death.
and there is surely no more lovely description in poetry than this--
So the hall dusk deepens upon them till the candles come arow,
And they drink the wine of departing and gird themselves to go;
And they dight the dark-blue raiment and climb to the wains aloft
While the horned moon hangs in the heaven and the
summer wind blows soft.
Then the yoke-beasts strained at the collar, and the dust
in the moon arose,
And they brushed the side of the acre and the blooming dewy close;
Till at last, when the moon was sinking and the night was
waxen late,
The warders of the earl-folk looked forth from the Niblung gate
And saw the gold pale-gleaming, and heard the wain-wheels crush
The weary dust of the summer amidst the midnight hush.
In _Sigurd_, too, Morris's power of investing his language with the
utmost dramatic compression at exactly the right moment is developed
to its highest point. One example may be given. Regin means to use
Sigurd for his own ends--to make him secure the treasure of Fafnir.
But Sigurd as yet has no will for action--
the wary foot is surest, and the hasty oft turns back.