THE HEROES OF ASGARD.

INTRODUCTION.

If we would understand the religion of the ancient Scandinavians, we ought to study at the same time the myths of all Teutonic nations. A drawing together of these, and a comparison of one with another, has been most beautifully effected by Simrock, in his Handbuch der Deutschen Mythologie, where he tells us that whilst the Scandinavian records are richer and more definite, they are also younger than those of Germany, which latter may be compared to ancient half choked-up streams from which the fuller river flows, but which, it is to be remarked, that

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river has mingled in its flowing. Grimm says that both religions-the German and the Northernwere in the main identical, though in details they varied; and as heathenism lingered longer in Scandinavia than in any other part of Europe, it is not surprising that there, rather than anywhere else, we should find the old world wants and hopes and fears, dark guesses, crude imaginings, childlike poetic expressions, crystalised into a pretty definite system of belief and worship. Yes, we can walk through the glittering ice halls of the old frozen faith, and count its gems and wonder at its fearful images; but the warm heart-reachings from which they alike once flowed, we can only darkly feel, at best but narrowly pry into here and there. Ah! if we could but break up the poem again into the syllables of the far off years.

The little tales which follow, drawn from the most striking and picturesque of the Northern myths, are put together in the simplest possible form, and were written only with a design to make the subject interesting to children. By-and

bye, however, as we through their means become in a slight degree acquainted with the characters belonging to, and the parts played by, the various deities of this mythology, it will not be uninteresting to consider what their meaning may be, and to try if we can trace the connection of one with another. At present it seems best, as an introduction to them-and without it they would be scarcely intelligible-to give a very slight sketch of the Northern mythology, as it is gathered from the earliest Scandinavian sources, as well as a short account of the sources from which it is gathered.

Laing, in the introduction to his Translation of the Heimskringla Saga, says,-"A nation's literature is its breath of life, without which a nation has no existence, is but a congregation of individuals. During the five centuries in which the Northmen were riding over the seas, and conquering wheresoever they landed, the literature of the people they overcame was locked up in a dead language, and within the walls of monasteries. But the Northmen had a literature of their own, rude

as it was." Songs and sagas, mythical and heroic, were the staple of this literature of the north; and these appear to have been handed down by word of mouth from skald to skald until about the beginning of the twelfth century. Then Sæmund the Learned, and others, began to commit them to writing. Sæmund the Learned was born in Iceland about the year 1057, fifty years after Christianity had been positively established in that island. He passed his youth in Germany, France, and Italy, studying at one time with a famous master, "by whom he was instructed in every kind of lore." So full, indeed, did Sæmund's head become of all that he had learnt, that he frequently "forgot the commonest things," even his Own name and identity, so that when asked who he was, he would give the name of any one he had been reading about. He was also said to be an astrologer, and a charming little anecdote is related of him in this capacity, which, however, would be out of place here. When he went back to Iceland, he became priest of Oddi, instructed the people about him, studied the old religion, and, besides writing

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a history of Norway and Iceland, which has been lost, transcribed several of the mythic and heroic songs of the North, which together form a collection known by the name of the Poetic, Elder, or Sæmund's Edda. The songs themselves are supposed to date from about the eighth century; Sæmund wrote them down in the twelfth. oldest copy of his original MS. is of the fourteenth century, and this copy is now in the Royal Library of Copenhagen. A few years ago they were translated into English by B. Thorpe. much for the history of the Elder Edda-greatgrandmother the name is said to mean, but after all she scarcely seems old enough to be called a great-grandmother. We have traced her growing up, and seen how she has dressed herself, and we begin to think of her almost as a modern young lady. When we listen to the odd jumble of tales she tells us, too, we are more than half inclined to quarrel with her, though without exactly knowing whether it is with her youth or her age that we find fault. You are too young to know what you are talking about, great-grandmother, we com