"Hear me, ancient earth, welling water, ethereal air, flickering flame! Listen to me well and preserve my words. Here stand five men of the race of Graut, Teja and Totila, Hildebad and Hildebrand, and Witichis, Waltari's son.
"We stand here in a quiet hour To bind a bond between blood-brethren, For ever and ever and every day. In closest communion as kindred companions. In friendship and feud, in revenge and right. One hope, one hate, one love, one lament, As we drop to one drop Our blood as blood-brethren."
At these words he bared his left arm, the others did the same; close together they stretched their five arms over the cauldron, the old man lifted the sharp flint-knife, and with one stroke scratched the skin of his own and the others' forearms, so that the blood of all flowed in red drops into the brazen cauldron. Then they retook their former positions, and the old man continued murmuring:
"And we swear the solemn oath, To sacrifice all that is ours, House, horse, and armour, Court, kindred, and cattle, Wife, weapons, and wares, Son, and servants, and body, and life, To the glance and glory of the race of Gaut, To the good Goths. And who of us would withdraw From honouring the oath with all sacrifices--"
here he, and at a sign, the others also, stepped out of the ditch from under the strip of turf--
"His red blood shall run unrevenged Like this water under the wood-sod--"
he lifted the cauldron, poured its bloody contents into the ditch, and then took it out, together with the other implements--
"Upon his head shall the halls of Heaven Crash cumbrous down and crush him, Solid as this sod."
At one stroke he struck down the three supporting lance-shafts, and dully fell the heavy turf-roof back into the ditch. The five men now placed themselves again on the spot thus covered by the turf, with their hands entwined, and the old man said in more rapid tones:
"Whosoever does not keep this oath; whosoever does not protect his blood-brother like his own brother during his life, and revenge his death; whosoever refuses to sacrifice everything that he possesses to the people of the Goths, when called upon to do so by a brother in case of necessity, shall be for ever subject to the eternal and infernal powers which reign under the green grass of the earth; good men shall tread with their feet over the perjurer's head, and his name shall be without honour wherever Christian folk ring bells and heathen folk offer sacrifices, wherever mothers caress their children and the wind blows over the wide world. Say, companions, shall it be thus with the vile perjurer?"