* * * * *
Again, in the house of the Helper there dwelt a certain man
Beardless and low of stature, of visage pinched and wan:
So exceeding old was Regin, that no son of man could tell
In what year of the days passed over he came to that land to dwell:
But the youth of King Elf had he fostered, and the Helper's youth thereto,
Yea and his father's father's: the lore of all men he knew,
And was deft in every cunning, save the dealings of the sword:
So sweet was his tongue-speech fashioned, that men trowed his every word;
His hand with the harp-strings blended was the mingler of delight
With the latter days of sorrow; all tales he told aright;
The Master of the Masters in the smithying craft was he;
And he dealt with the wind and the weather and the stilling of the sea;
Nor might any learn him leech-craft, for before that race was made,
And that man-folk's generation, all their life-days had he weighed.
In this land of the Helper and Elf, his son, dwelt Hiordis, and here
her son, the last of the Volsungs, was born. The babe had eyes of
such wondrous brightness that the folk shrank from him, while they
rejoiced over his birth, but his mother spake to the babe as to one
who might understand, and she told him of Sigmund and Volsung, of
their wars and their troubles and their joys.
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