<SPAN name="startofbook"></SPAN>
<h2><i>YOUNG FOLKS’ LIBRARY OF CHOICE
LITERATURE.</i></h2>
<h1>LEGENDS OF NORSELAND</h1>
<h3>EDITED BY<br/>
<span class="docAuthor">MARA L. PRATT,</span><br/>
</h3>
<h2 class="main">CONTENTS.</h2>
<ul>
<li> <span class="tocPageNum"><span class="sc">Page</span></span></li>
<li><SPAN href="#ch1" id="xd21e148" name="xd21e148">Valkyrie</SPAN>
(<i>Frontispiece</i>) <span class="tocPageNum">6</span></li>
<li><SPAN href="#ch1">The Beginning</SPAN>
<span class="tocPageNum">7</span></li>
<li><SPAN href="#ch2" id="xd21e163" name="xd21e163">Ygdrasil</SPAN>
<span class="tocPageNum">12</span></li>
<li><SPAN href="#ch3" id="xd21e169" name="xd21e169">Odin at the Well of
Wisdom</SPAN> <span class="tocPageNum">17</span></li>
<li><SPAN href="#ch4" id="xd21e175" name="xd21e175">Odin and the All-wise
Giant</SPAN> <span class="tocPageNum">22</span></li>
<li><SPAN href="#ch5" id="xd21e181" name="xd21e181">The Stolen Wine</SPAN>.
Part I. <span class="tocPageNum">28</span></li>
<li><SPAN href="#ch6" id="xd21e187" name="xd21e187">The Stolen Wine</SPAN>.
Part II. <span class="tocPageNum">36</span></li>
<li><SPAN href="#ch7" id="xd21e193" name="xd21e193">Loke’s Theft</SPAN>
<span class="tocPageNum">46</span></li>
<li><SPAN href="#ch8" id="xd21e199" name="xd21e199">Thor’s
Hammer</SPAN> <span class="tocPageNum">53</span></li>
<li><SPAN href="#ch11" id="xd21e205" name="xd21e205">The Theft of the
Hammer</SPAN> <span class="tocPageNum">68</span></li>
<li><SPAN href="#ch12" id="xd21e212" name="xd21e212">The Finding of the
Hammer</SPAN> <span class="tocPageNum">76</span></li>
<li><SPAN href="#ch13" id="xd21e218" name="xd21e218">The Apples of
Life</SPAN>. Part I. <span class="tocPageNum">84</span></li>
<li><SPAN href="#ch14" id="xd21e224" name="xd21e224">The Apples of
Life</SPAN>. Part II. <span class="tocPageNum">97</span></li>
<li><SPAN href="#ch15" id="xd21e230" name="xd21e230">Loke’s Wolf</SPAN>
<span class="tocPageNum">105</span></li>
<li><SPAN href="#ch16" id="xd21e236" name="xd21e236">The Fenris-wolf</SPAN>
<span class="tocPageNum">114</span></li>
<li><SPAN href="#ch17" id="xd21e242" name="xd21e242">Defeat of
Hrungner</SPAN> <span class="tocPageNum">121</span></li>
<li><SPAN href="#ch18" id="xd21e248" name="xd21e248">Thor and Skrymer</SPAN>
<span class="tocPageNum">132</span></li>
<li><SPAN href="#ch19" id="xd21e254" name="xd21e254">Thor and the
Utgard-King</SPAN> <span class="tocPageNum">143</span></li>
<li><SPAN href="#ch20" id="xd21e260" name="xd21e260">Thor and the Midgard
Serpent</SPAN> <span class="tocPageNum">155</span></li>
<li><SPAN href="#valkyries" id="xd21e266" name="xd21e266">Valkyries’
Song</SPAN> <span class="tocPageNum">165</span></li>
<li><SPAN href="#ch21" id="xd21e272" name="xd21e272">The Dying Baldur</SPAN>
<span class="tocPageNum">167</span></li>
<li><SPAN href="#ch22" id="xd21e279" name="xd21e279">The Punishment of
Loke</SPAN> <span class="tocPageNum">178</span></li>
<li><SPAN href="#ch23" id="xd21e285" name="xd21e285">The Darkness that
fell on Asgard</SPAN> <span class="tocPageNum">185</span></li>
</ul>
<div class="figure"><ANTIMG src="images/p007.jpg" alt="LEGENDS OF NORSELAND." width-obs="602" height-obs="472"></div>
<h2 class="super">LEGENDS OF NORSELAND.</h2>
<h2 class="label">I.</h2>
<h2 class="main">THE BEGINNING.</h2>
<p class="par first">In the beginning, when the beautiful and sunny
world was first made, there stood, in the very midst of all its beauty,
Mt. Ida—a mountain so high, so far away up among the snowy
clouds, that its summit was lost in the shining light of the rays of
the sun.</p>
<p>At its base, stretching away to the north, the south,
the east, and the west, as far as <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb8"
href="#pb8" name="pb8">8</SPAN>]</span>even the eyes of the gods could
reach, lay the soft, green valleys and the great, broad plain beyond.
Encircling the whole great plain, and curling lovingly around in all
the little bends and bays of the distant shore, lay the deep blue
waters; and beyond the waters, hidden in the distant mists, rose the
great mountains in which the frost giants dwelt.</p>
<p>On the top of Mt. Ida, the gods had built their shining
city, Asgard; and from its golden gateway to the valley below was
stretched the richly-colored, rainbow bridge, with its wonderful bars
of red and yellow and blue, orange and green, indigo and purple.</p>
<p>And in this shining city, where the gods dwelt, there
was no sorrow, no grief, no pain of any kind. Never was the sun’s
light shut off by heavy clouds; never did the cruel lightnings flash,
nor came their blights upon the <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb9"
href="#pb9" name="pb9">9</SPAN>]</span>harvest fields; never did the heavy
rains fall, nor did the cold winds sweep down upon this shining
city.</p>
<p>But alas, there came a time when a shadow fell upon this
city that shone so like a golden cloud resting upon the mountain peak.
For the Fates, the three cruel sisters, came and took up their abode at
the foot of the wonderful tree of Life, whose roots were in the earth,
and whose branches, reaching high above the shining city, protected it
from the sun’s fierce heat and strong white light. And from that
time even the gods themselves were no longer free from care and
sorrow.</p>
<p>Envy sprang up among the children of the great god,
Odin; sickness, and even death, fell upon them; and the frost giants
waged war with them,—a war that would never cease in all the ages
that were to come, until that day when <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb10" href="#pb10" name="pb10">10</SPAN>]</span>the sun’s light
went out forever, and the dark reign of Ragnarok fell upon the
earth.</p>
<p>It was a beautiful earth that lay stretched out at the
foot of Mt. Ida. The fields were rich with grain; the trees were loaded
with fruits; the sun shone warm and bright; but there were no
harvesters, no gatherers of the fruit, no children to run and frolic in
the sunshine.</p>
<p>“The fair earth is desolate,” said Odin to
himself, as he looked down from his golden temple. “There should
be people there, not gods and goddesses like us here upon Mt. Ida, but
beings less powerful than we, beings who can love and enjoy, and whose
children shall fill the earth with their happy voices. And the care of
all these beings shall be mine.”</p>
<p>As he spoke, he, the All Father, passed down the rainbow
bridge, out into the rich, green valley below. <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb11" href="#pb11" name="pb11">11</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p>As he passed on beneath the trees, he saw standing
together, their branches bending towards each other, a straight, strong
Ash and a gentle, graceful Elm.</p>
<p>“From these trees,” said Odin to himself,
“will I create the Earth people. The man I will name Ask, and the
woman, Embla. It is a beautiful, sunny world: they should be very happy
in it. How their children shall delight in the broad fields and the
sunny slopes! And no harm shall come to them; for I, the All Father,
will watch over them in all the age’s to come.”</p>
<p></p>
<div class="figure xd21e337width"><ANTIMG src="images/p011.png" alt="Ornament." width-obs="299" height-obs="136"></div>
<p><span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb12" href="#pb12" name="pb12">12</SPAN>]</span></p>
<div class="figure"><ANTIMG src="images/p012.jpg" alt="II." width-obs="634"
height="361"></div>
<h2 class="label">II.</h2>
<h2 class="main">YGDRASIL.</h2>
<p class="par first">At the base of Mt. Ida stood Ygdrasil, the
wonderful tree of Life. Never before nor since was there another such a
tree. It had never had a beginning; it had never been young.</p>
<p>Not even the oldest man, not even the gods themselves
could say, “I remember when this great tree was a tender sapling,
I remember <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb13" href="#pb13" name="pb13">13</SPAN>]</span>when it sent forth its first tiny leaves, and how
it rocked, and swayed, and shivered, and bent its timid head as the
cold ice king swept over it.”</p>
<p>For there had never been a time since the beginning of
the world when Ygdrasil had not stood there, tall and strong, one great
root reaching down, down through the earth to the home of the dead,
another stretching away, no one could tell how far, till it reached the
home of the terrible giants, so fierce and cruel, so strong, and withal
so wise, that even the gods themselves dreaded them and stood ever in
terror of their approach.</p>
<p>And its branches? So broad, so far reaching, so numerous
were these, that they spread themselves protectingly over the whole
earth, their top-most leaves rustling and whispering together above the
golden palace of the <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb14" href="#pb14"
name="pb14">14</SPAN>]</span>gods, far up on the summit of the
cloud-hidden Ida.</p>
<p>Nor was this all. Hidden among the dense leaves lived a
great white eagle. No one knew whence he came; no one had ever looked
upon him; but there he sat, ages upon ages, singing forever the story
of the creator of the earth and the wonderful deeds of the gods who
dwell in the shining city of Asgard. The leaves of the tree sang sunset
songs, and whispered to each other secrets, sometimes sad, sometimes
gay, which even the gods, with all their wisdom, could not
understand.</p>
<p>At the foot of the tree, away down at the end even of
the deepest, farthest root, lay the Well of Wisdom. Its waters were
black. Sometimes they were very bitter, and few there were who had the
courage and the perseverance to search out the hiding-place of this
<span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb15" href="#pb15" name="pb15">15</SPAN>]</span>wonderful spring. Then, too, it was guarded by a
grim old giant, Memory, who so loved this well, and so dreaded the
approach of man or god to its waters, that he would not allow them even
to touch their lips to it, until they had sworn to surrender to him
whatever thing was dearest in life to them.</p>
<p>This was a heavy price to pay for wisdom, and few there
were who cared to pay it. “Will you give me your children?”
“Will you give me your freedom?” “Will you give me
your health?” “Will you give me your tongue, your ears,
your eyes?” the old giant would ask of the mortals who came to
drink of the waters of the Well of Wisdom.</p>
<p>And always, when the mortals heard these questions, they
grew pale and trembled with fear. “Go back to your homes,”
the old giant would thunder, “you desire wisdom it <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb16" href="#pb16" name="pb16">16</SPAN>]</span>is true;
but you are not willing to pay the price for it.” Then the
mortals would hurry away, their hearts beating with fear, their ears
ringing with the thunderous tones of the terrible giant, who, since the
earth was made, had sat at the foot of Ygdrasil guarding the secrets
from all the world.</p>
<p></p>
<div class="figure xd21e372width"><ANTIMG src="images/p016.png" alt=""
width="318" height="146"></div>
<p><span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb17" href="#pb17" name="pb17">17</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p></p>
<div class="figure xd21e377width"><ANTIMG src="images/p017.png" alt="ODIN, THE “ALL FATHER.”" width-obs="583" height-obs="396">
<p class="figureHead">ODIN, THE “ALL FATHER.”</p>
</div>
<p></p>
<h2 class="label">III.</h2>
<h2 class="main">ODIN AT THE WELL OF WISDOM.</h2>
<p class="par first">As Odin looked down from his home in Asgard and
saw the people he had made from the ash and the elm trees, he sighed to
himself and said, “These are my children. It is I who created
them. They are innocent and pure and sweet.” <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb18" href="#pb18" name="pb18">18</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p>“But, alas, how little they know of life. By and
by there will come to them danger and sorrow. The Ice King, the cruel
tyrant, will breathe upon them, and the harvests will shrivel before
their eyes; the rivers will be frozen, the trees will be bare, and
there will be no food for them. As the years roll on, little children
will come; these children will grow into manhood and womanhood, and
other little children will follow. They are but mortals. Sickness and
death will be their share; for I could not make them like the
gods.”</p>
<p>And as Odin thought of all these things his heart grew
sad. Almost he wished he had not made these helpless beings from the
ash and the elm. He looked down into the sunny valley, where as yet no
sorrow nor suffering had come. “Poor children!” he sighed.
“What a world of wisdom Odin <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb19"
href="#pb19" name="pb19">19</SPAN>]</span>must possess to protect and
guide and teach these earth-people that he has made.”</p>
<p>Just then Ask and Embla paused and looked up towards the
shining city; for the sigh from Odin’s heart had been so deep and
long that the leaves of Ygdrasil had rustled, and a faint echo of it
had swept even across the valley below.</p>
<p>“What is it that sweeps sometimes across the
valley, and moves the trees and the leaves, and so gently fans our
cheeks?” asked Embla.</p>
<p>“I often wonder,” answered Ask. “It is
very pleasant. Perhaps it is a message from the good Odin who made us
and who gave us this sunny valley to play in.”</p>
<p>Then on they ran, hand in hand, happy children as they
were, and in a moment had forgotten all about it.</p>
<p>But Odin had not forgotten. “Frigg,”
<span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb20" href="#pb20" name="pb20">20</SPAN>]</span>said he to his goddess wife, “it is granted
to us as gods to possess great wisdom. Still there remain many things
we do not know. Below in the valley there have sprung into being a man
and a woman. They are like us, Frigg, but they are not very wise. They
need our care, even as our own dear Baldur needed our care when he was
a very little child. I shall go to the Giant Memory, who guards the
Well of Wisdom, and he shall give me a draught from the wonderful
water. Then shall I be the all-wise, all-loving All-Father these
children of the valley need.”</p>
<p>“O, but the price this cruel Giant will ask of
you!” sobbed Frigg.</p>
<p>“I would give my life for them,” answered
Odin tenderly. Then he turned from her, passed down the rainbow bridge
to the valley, entered the great black, gaping cave and <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb21" href="#pb21" name="pb21">21</SPAN>]</span>groped
his way along the cold, dark passages that led to the Well of
Wisdom.</p>
<p>Three times the sun rose, three times the sun set. Then,
just as the earth and the shining Asgard lay bathed in the rich, golden
sunset light, Odin came forth again, passed up the rainbow bridge, and
entered the great hall of the gods. “It is Odin,” cried
Frigg.</p>
<p>Yes, it is Odin, the same Odin. But with a face so
joyous, so radiant, so happy! For Odin had drank from the Well of
Wisdom. The way had been dark; the struggle with the great Giant had
been hard. But Odin had conquered; and now the joy that belongs always
to the wise was his forevermore.</p>
<p></p>
<div class="figure xd21e419width"><ANTIMG src="images/p021.png" alt="Ornament" width-obs="301" height-obs="141"></div>
<p><span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb22" href="#pb22" name="pb22">22</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p></p>
<div class="figure xd21e425width"><ANTIMG src="images/p022.png" alt=""
width="677" height="506"></div>
<p></p>
<h2 class="label">IV.</h2>
<h2 class="main">ODIN AND THE ALL-WISE GIANT.</h2>
<p class="par first">Away across the great sea of blue waters that
curled about the shores of Midgard, the dwelling place of Odin’s
earth-children, were the dark, frowning, rock-bound mountains, the
castles of the terrible giants whom even the gods feared. <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb23" href="#pb23" name="pb23">23</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p>One of these giants, Vafthrudner, was known among them
as the All-wise.</p>
<p>“He is our chief. He is wiser even than the gods
of Asgard,” the giants sometimes would thunder across the wide
blue sea. And indeed it was true; for none among the gods had yet been
able to answer his questions; nor could they; neither could they ask of
him one that he could not answer.</p>
<p>“We will bear the insolence of this giant no
longer,” said Odin to Frigg. “I will go to him, and the
race of giants shall know that at last Wisdom dwells not in Jotunheim
but in the golden city of the gods,—the glorious, shining city of
Asgard.”</p>
<p>“Who comes?” thundered Vafthrudner as Odin
approached his mountain peak.</p>
<p>“It is I—a mere traveller. But as I chanced
to be journeying through your country, <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb24" href="#pb24" name="pb24">24</SPAN>]</span>I heard of your wonderful
wisdom. In my own country, far away to the west, I too am accounted
somewhat wise. Let us test each other and learn which of us is
wiser.”</p>
<p>“Test each other! Learn which is wiser!”
bellowed the great giant, his voice echoing and re-echoing across the
sea, until the very walls of the golden hall upon Mt. Ida trembled and
the earth-children in the valley below clung to each other in fear.</p>
<p>“Whichever one fails forfeits his life. You know
that, I trust,” added Vafthrudner with a sneer.</p>
<p>“I know,” answered Odin quietly. “But
let us begin. Night will come upon us, and I must reach my home while
the Sun-god is still above us.”</p>
<p>“You will never see your home again; so it matters
little whether we begin early or late. <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb25" href="#pb25" name="pb25">25</SPAN>]</span>However, tell me,
foolish, vain earth-child that you are, what river is it that flows
between this home of the All-powerful giants and the home of the
gods?”</p>
<p>“The name of that river is Ifing,” answered
Odin. “And I can tell you more than that. Because it touches upon
the shores of the city of the gods, the Ice King, Njord, has no power
over it. His breath cannot freeze it. Year after year, Njord tries to
imprison its sparkling waters that you giants may cross upon its crust
and attack the shining city. But it will never freeze. You will never
cross it. Asgard is forever safe.”</p>
<p>The giant dropped his mighty jaw. His eyes stared like
great suns of fire. His terrible frame trembled. Down came his club
upon the floor of his great castle. <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb26"
href="#pb26" name="pb26">26</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p>Again Ask and Embla paled with fear as the valley shook
beneath their feet.</p>
<p>“Who are you?” roared the All-wise giant.
“Who are you that you know that river’s name? Who are you
that you dare tell me I shall never cross to its farther
shore?”</p>
<p>“It matters little who I am,” answered Odin,
his eyes flashing, his beautiful figure growing taller and taller.
“But listen now while I whisper into your ear my question.”
And with a mighty stride Odin crossed to Vafthrudner’s throne,
leaned forward, seized him by the shoulder, and hissed three words into
the gigantic, cave-like ear.</p>
<p>What those words were, no man ever knew. Forever they
shall remain a secret between Vafthrudner and the All-Father Odin.</p>
<p>The giant paled, staggered to his feet, <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb27" href="#pb27" name="pb27">27</SPAN>]</span>groaned
and fell. The walls of the great hall swayed to and fro. The lightning
flashed, the thunder pealed from peak to peak. Odin had conquered. The
All-Father was now the All-loving and the All-wise too. And as such,
was ever after acknowledged by all living creatures,—gods and
men, dwarfs and giants.</p>
<p></p>
<div class="figure xd21e476width"><ANTIMG src="images/p026.png" alt="Ornamental letter D." width-obs="301" height-obs="152"></div>
<p><span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb28" href="#pb28" name="pb28">28</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p></p>
<div class="figure xd21e482width"><ANTIMG src="images/p028.png" alt="Ornament." width-obs="605" height-obs="163"></div>
<p></p>
<h2 class="label">V.</h2>
<h2 class="main">THE STOLEN WINE.</h2>
<h2 class="sub">Part I.</h2>
<p class="par first">There had lain for ages upon ages, hidden away in
the great rocky cellar of one of the giant’s castles, a cask of
wine, which had been stolen from the gods.</p>
<p>Never before had the gods been able to learn what had
become of it; what giant had stolen it, nor in what castle it was
hidden.</p>
<p>But now that Odin had become All-wise, nothing could be
concealed from him.</p>
<p>“I know at last where the wine lies <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb29" href="#pb29" name="pb29">29</SPAN>]</span>hidden,” said Odin one day to his son, Thor;
“and I shall set forth to find it.”</p>
<p>Thor brought down his hammer with a thud. “Let me
go with you,” cried he, springing up. “And let me fell to
the earth with one blow of my magic hammer the giant who has stolen,
and has kept hidden all these ages our precious wine.”</p>
<p>“No;” answered Odin, “this time I must
go alone. The wine is guarded day and night, and it will not be easy to
bring it away, even when I have found it. But watch for me, dear son.
One day there will come, beating its wings against the shining gates of
our city, a great white eagle. Do not harm the eagle. Open the gates to
him; for that eagle will be Odin, returning with the stolen wine to our
city of Asgard.”</p>
<p>Then Odin put aside his sparkling crown <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb30" href="#pb30" name="pb30">30</SPAN>]</span>and laid
down his sceptre. His wonderful blue mantle, studded with stars and
fastened always with a pale crescent moon, he also threw aside, and
stepped forth in the garb of a common laborer. “It is in this
guise that I shall win my way to the giant’s castle,” said
Odin; and in a second he had passed out from the hall and was gone.</p>
<p>It was the giant, Suttung, that had stolen the wine, and
it was in his castle that it had lain hidden all these years.</p>
<p>Now, of all the strong castles of all the giants,
Suttung’s castle was the strongest. The cellar was cut into the
solid rock. Moreover, three sides of the castle rose in solid walls of
granite; while the fourth, no less firm and strong, was built of
massive blocks bound with hoops and bars and bolts of strongest iron
and steel. <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb31" href="#pb31" name="pb31">31</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p>Now, Suttung had a brother, Bauge, who was a giant
farmer. He kept nine strong slaves, half giants themselves, to do his
work for him.</p>
<p>As Odin approached the fields of Bauge’s farm, he
saw the nine men hard at work.</p>
<p>“Your scythes are dull,” said he, as he drew
near.</p>
<p>“Yes, but we have no whetstone to sharpen them
upon,” answered the workmen, the great drops standing out upon
their foreheads.</p>
<p>“I will sharpen them on mine,” said Odin,
drawing one from his pocket.</p>
<p>“It is a magic whetstone!” cried the men as
they saw it work. “Give it to us. We need it more than you. Give
it to us. Give it to us.”</p>
<p>“Take it, then,” answered Odin, throwing it
high in the air and walking off. <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb32"
href="#pb32" name="pb32">32</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p>“It is mine! It is mine! Let me have it! Give it
to me! I will have it! Out of the way! It shall be mine!”
screamed and quarreled the nine men as they pushed and crowded, each
one determined to catch the whetstone as it came down to earth.</p>
<p>At last it fell. Then a fiercer battle followed. The
angry men fell upon each other. They dragged and pulled and threw each
other to the ground. They pounded each other; they struck at each other
with their scythes. On and on they fought. Hour after hour the battle
waged; till at last the Sun-god, in sheer dismay at so unloving a
sight, hid his face behind the hills, and the nine men lay dead upon
the fields.</p>
<p>It was an hour later when Odin reached the castle of
Bauge.</p>
<p>“Can you give me shelter for the night?”
<span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb33" href="#pb33" name="pb33">33</SPAN>]</span>he asked, as the giant appeared at the door of his
castle.</p>
<p>“Yes, I can give you shelter; but you must look
elsewhere for your breakfast. A strange thing has happened. My nine
slaves, while at work in the field, have fallen in battle upon each
other, and have killed each other. Not one of them is left alive to
serve me.”</p>
<p>“They must have been idle, quarrelsome
fellows,” answered Odin.</p>
<p>“They were, indeed,” answered Bauge;
“but how shall I get my work done without them?”</p>
<p>“I will do the work for you,” answered
Odin.</p>
<p>“You! There is but one of you, even if you were
willing to try,” answered Bauge with but little interest.
<span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb34" href="#pb34" name="pb34">34</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p>“But I can do the work of any nine workmen that
ever served you.”</p>
<p>The giant laughed. “A remarkable workman. Pray, do
you ask the wages of nine men as well?”</p>
<p>“I ask no wages,” answered Odin. “I
only ask that, as my pay when the work is done, you shall give me a
draught of wine from the cask hidden in your brother’s
cellar.”</p>
<p>Bauge stared. “How did you know there is a cask in
my brother’s cellar?” he gasped.</p>
<p>“It is enough that I know it,” answered Odin
coldly.</p>
<p>Bauge looked at Odin. “He is better than no
man,” he thought to himself. “I may as well get what work
from him I can, before he finds that no being on earth can enter that
<span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb35" href="#pb35" name="pb35">35</SPAN>]</span>cellar or force my brother to give away one drop
of that wine.”</p>
<p>“Very well, you may go to work,” he said
aloud. “I cannot promise you that we can make our way into my
brother’s cellar; but I will do what I can to help
you.”</p>
<p>“That is all I ask,” answered Odin.
“Now let me sleep, for I am tired; and if I am to do nine
men’s work, I must have nine men’s sleep.”</p>
<p>“And must you have nine men’s food?”
cried Bauge.</p>
<p>“I think it very likely,” answered Odin with
a queer smile. “Now let me sleep.”</p>
<p></p>
<div class="figure xd21e578width"><ANTIMG src="images/p035.png" alt="Ornamental letter E" width-obs="295" height-obs="138"></div>
<p><span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb36" href="#pb36" name="pb36">36</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p></p>
<div class="figure xd21e584width"><ANTIMG src="images/p036.png" alt="Ornament." width-obs="611" height-obs="263"></div>
<p></p>
<h2 class="label">VI.</h2>
<h2 class="main">THE STOLEN WINE.</h2>
<h2 class="sub">Part II.</h2>
<p class="par first">“What is your name?” asked Bauge of
his new workman when they set forth the next morning to the fields.</p>
<p>“You may call me Bolverk,” answered
Odin.</p>
<p>“Will one name be enough for all nine of
you?” said Bauge with a disagreeable curling of his upper
lip.</p>
<p>“I will not burden your giant mind with
<span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb37" href="#pb37" name="pb37">37</SPAN>]</span>more than one,” Odin answered,—a funny
little twinkle in his eye.</p>
<p>The giant gave a furious grunt. He did not quite know
whether his new workman was stupid, or, whether under all his seeming
meekness, it might not be that he was making fun of him.</p>
<p>Well, Bauge set Bolverk to work, and then, lazy fellow
that he was, stretched himself out on a mountain side to watch.</p>
<p>“That new workman of mine,” he bellowed,
calling the attention of a neighbor giant to Odin at work in the field;
“do you see him down there among the corn? He says he can do nine
men’s work.”</p>
<p>“A workman usually thinks himself equal to any
nine other workingmen,” roared back the neighbor. “Of
course you have agreed to give him nine men’s wages?”
<span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb38" href="#pb38" name="pb38">38</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p>Then the two giants roared with laughter. They thought
they had said a very bright thing, and very likely they had. It is only
because you and I are mere earth-children that we do not think so
too.</p>
<p>As the days went on, Bauge began to laugh less and to
wonder more at his strange workman. He worked on quietly from sunrise
till sunset. He did not seem to hurry in his work; he did not work over
hours. But, strange to say, the work went on, as the workman had
promised. No nine men could have done more or could have done it
better.</p>
<p>It was harvest time when Odin came; the time when Frey,
the god of the fields and of all that grows, glides around among his
children and covers them over, or gathers in their wealth and beauty.
Like the kind, loving father he is, he whispers to them now
<span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb39" href="#pb39" name="pb39">39</SPAN>]</span>of Njord who so soon will come, sweeping across
the earth, breathing his cold freezing breath upon all the world, and
covering it over with the cold white sheet that kills the flowers and
the fruits. He teaches his children to curl themselves up beneath the
earth until the cruel Njord is gone. For Njord seeks to kill the tiny
leaves and buds, and shrivel the radiant flowers, that, through all the
long warm summer days, have lifted their faces so brightly to their
good friend, the Sun-god.</p>
<p>Perhaps it was because Frey and Odin worked together
that there were such rare crops, and that the harvesting went on so
smoothly. Certain it was that all the fields were cleared, the cellars
were filled, and all was ready for the long, cold months to come, when
cruel Njord was king.</p>
<p>Even Bauge was in good humor. “You <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb40" href="#pb40" name="pb40">40</SPAN>]</span>are
indeed a wonderful workman,” he said to Odin, as the last cellar
was fastened and he sat down to rest.</p>
<p>“You are kind,” answered Odin, the funny
little twinkle coming again into his eyes. “Perhaps you would be
willing to come with me now to your brother, that I may drink from the
cask of wine that he keeps so closely guarded in his cellar.”</p>
<p>Bauge began to feel uncomfortable. “He will not
allow either you or me to so much as look upon that wine. You cannot
have it.”</p>
<p>“Bauge,” said Odin, growing very tall and
godlike, his wonderful eyes flashing with a light like fire, “you
promised to do all you could to help me. Come and do as I bid
you.”</p>
<p>Bauge stared. His first thought was to kill the workman
on the spot: but there was a <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb41" href="#pb41" name="pb41">41</SPAN>]</span>something about him, he hardly knew
what, that made him, instead, rise and follow Odin to the
brother’s castle.</p>
<p>“Tell me which cellar holds the wine,” said
Odin when they had reached the brother’s mountain.</p>
<p>“This one,” answered Bauge.</p>
<p>“Now take this augur. Make a hole with it through
the solid wall.”</p>
<p>Bauge obeyed like one in a dream. It was a magic augur.
How it worked! How the powdered stone flew in a cloud about his
face!</p>
<p>“This is a very—” Bauge stopped. What
had become of his workman? Not a soul was in sight. Odin had
disappeared. And to this day the giant never knew what became of him,
nor does his brother know who stole his wine from the cellar.
<span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb42" href="#pb42" name="pb42">42</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p>The stupid Bauge stood staring, now at the augur, now at
the hole in the wall. He saw a little worm climb up the wall and
disappear through the hole. That is all he ever saw or ever knew.</p>
<p>The little worm laughed to itself as it crept in out of
sight. “You are very stupid, Bauge, not to know me.”</p>
<p>Reaching the inner side of the wall, the little worm
stopped to look about. There stood the cask; and beside it sat the
daughter of the giant. “Poor girl,” said Odin—I mean,
said the worm—to himself. “It is a bitter fate to be doomed
to sit forever in this wretched dungeon watching your father’s
stolen treasure. But be happy. Soon you will be free. There will be no
wine to watch.”</p>
<p>The young giantess must have heard his words. For she
looked up. There, just in <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb43" href="#pb43" name="pb43">43</SPAN>]</span>front of the hole, the ray of light
falling full upon his golden hair, stood a most beautiful youth. He
looked so kindly upon her, and his eyes were so full of pity!</p>
<p>Her heart went out to him at once.</p>
<p>“I am very tired,” said he gently. “So
very tired. I have come a long, long distance. My home is far from
here. I cannot tell you how far—but very, very far. If you would
give me just one draught from the cask of wine.”</p>
<p>The poor girl, grateful for the sound of a friendly
voice, and for the sight of a human face, arose and lifted the lid for
him.</p>
<p>Odin leaned over the cask. He put his lips to the wine
and drank.</p>
<p>“You are very thirsty,” said the
giantess.</p>
<p>“Very,” answered Odin, drinking on and on.
<span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb44" href="#pb44" name="pb44">44</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p>“You are very thirsty,” said the giantess
again.</p>
<p>“Very,” answered Odin, still drinking on and
on and on.</p>
<p>“You are very thirsty,” said the giantess
again; this time louder, her voice filled with fear.</p>
<p>“Very,” answered Odin, still drinking on and
on and on and on. Nor did he stop till every drop was gone and the cask
stood dry and empty.</p>
<p>The young giantess, realizing all too late that the wine
was stolen, ran to the cellar gateway, shouting as only a giant can
shout for help.</p>
<p>The gateway flew open. In rushed the giants, Bauge and
his brother.</p>
<p>“The wine! the wine!” they cried.</p>
<p>“Stolen, stolen!” sobbed the giantess, her
sobs shaking even the solid cellar walls. <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb45" href="#pb45" name="pb45">45</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p>“The thief! The thief!” cried the giants.
“Where is the thief?”</p>
<p>But there was no thief to be found. There stood the
empty cask. But the thief? There was no living creature to be seen.</p>
<p>No living creature? I should not have said quite that.
For there arose from a darkened corner of the cellar a beautiful, great
white bird. Its wings brushed against the sides of the gateway as it
passed. Then higher and higher, up, up, far, far away beyond the sea,
above the clouds it soared, nor rested till its great wings beat
against the golden bars of the shining gates of Asgard.</p>
<p></p>
<div class="figure xd21e700width"><ANTIMG src="images/p045.png" alt="Ornamental letter F." width-obs="301" height-obs="139"></div>
<p><span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb46" href="#pb46" name="pb46">46</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p></p>
<div class="figure xd21e706width"><ANTIMG src="images/p046.png" alt=""
width="635" height="256"></div>
<p></p>
<h2 class="label">VII.</h2>
<h2 class="main">LOKE’S THEFT.</h2>
<p class="par first">Thor was the son of Odin. He was a brave young
god; and when the frost giants came sweeping down upon the shining
city, none were more brave to fight for the protection of Asgard, the
beautiful home of the gods, than Thor, the son of Odin.</p>
<p>There was another son, Loke. A cruel, wicked, idle,
evil-hearted god was he, the sorrow of his father Odin, the grief of
his <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb47" href="#pb47" name="pb47">47</SPAN>]</span>mother Frigg, and the terror of all the gods and
goddesses.</p>
<p>Over this son the great Odin wept often bitter tears.
More bitter still since he had drunk from the Well of Wisdom; for since
then knowing, as he did, all things past and future, he knew that a day
was yet to come, when, because of this wicked Loke, the light would go
out from the earth; damp and cold and darkness would fall upon the
shining city; the frost giants would overcome the gods; and there would
come an end to all life. Nor was there any escape nor hope for any
help. This fate, the Norns had decreed should be; and through the
evil-hearted Loke it was to come.</p>
<p>In the golden hall of the gods dwelt Thor; and with him,
his beautiful wife, Sif. Of all the goddesses there was none like her.
<span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb48" href="#pb48" name="pb48">48</SPAN>]</span>Her eyes were of heaven’s own blue; and the
light in them was borrowed from the stars. Her hair was of yellow,
yellow gold; and as it lay massed above her pure white brow, it vied
with the golden light of harvest time in softness and rich, deep
color.</p>
<p>One happy peaceful day, when there was no danger abroad,
and rest and peace had spread themselves above the halls of the city of
Asgard, Sif lay sleeping. The Sungod’s covering of soft warm rays
fell upon her, and the leaves of Ygdrasil had spread themselves above
her in tender, loving protection.</p>
<p>Loke, the idle one, angry and revengeful, as he always
was, when happiness and rest and peace had driven out sorrow and care,
paced angrily up and down the golden streets, his deep black frowns
darkening even the clear, white light of heaven. <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb49" href="#pb49" name="pb49">49</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p>He came upon the beautiful sleeping wife of Thor.</p>
<p>“I hate my brother,” he hissed through his
cruel teeth. “And how proud he is of this golden hair of
Sif’s.”</p>
<p>The wicked light flashed from his deep black eyes.
Softly, like a thief, he crept towards the sleeping Sif. He seized the
golden hair in his hand. A cruel smile shone over his evil face.
“Boast now of your beauty, O Sif,” he sneered. “Boast
now of your Sif’s golden hair, O Thor,” he growled. And
with one great sweep of his shining knife, he cut from the beautiful
head the whole mass of gold.</p>
<p>It was late when Sif awoke. The leaves of Ygdrasil were
moaning for the cruel deed. The Sun was sinking sorrowfully below the
distant mountain peaks. <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb50" href="#pb50" name="pb50">50</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p>“O my gold! my gold!” sobbed Sif. “O
who has stolen from me in my sleep my gold? O Thor, Thor! You were so
proud of the gold. It was for you I prized it,—my beautiful,
beautiful gold!”</p>
<p>At that second the voice of Thor was heard. His heavy
call echoed across the skies and pealed from cloud to cloud. He was
angry; for he had heard Sif’s bitter cry and felt some harm had
come to her.</p>
<p>“It is Loke that has done this,” he
thundered; and again his voice rolled from cloud to cloud. The very
mountain peaks across the sea in the country of the Frost giants rocked
and reeled. The waters foamed and tossed; the scorching lightnings
flashed from his eyes; the whole sky was as one great sheet of
fire.</p>
<p>The earth-children trembled as they had <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb51" href="#pb51" name="pb51">51</SPAN>]</span>never
trembled before. Even Loke, shivering with fear, cowered behind the
golden pillars of the great arched gateway.</p>
<p>“Forgive me, forgive me!” wailed he, as Thor
flashed his great white light upon him.</p>
<p>“Out from your hiding place, O coward! Out! Out,
or my thunderbolts shall strike you dead.”</p>
<p>“Spare me, spare me!” groaned Loke.
“Only spare me, and I will go down into the earth where the
dwarfs do dwell—”</p>
<p>“Go!” thundered Thor, not waiting for the
wretched god to finish. “Go, and bring back to me a crown of
golden threads, woven and spun in the smithies of the dwarfs, that
shall be as beautiful, and ten thousand times more beautiful, than the
golden crown you have stolen from the head of Sif. Go to <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb52" href="#pb52" name="pb52">52</SPAN>]</span>them,
tell them what you have done, and never again enter the shining gateway
of the city of our Father Odin until you bring the crown.”</p>
<p>Loke slunk away, the thunders of the wrath of Thor
slowly, slowly following him. The lightnings flashed dully across the
skies. The low rumbling of thunder, distant but threatening, warned
Loke that the wrath of Thor was not appeased, neither would it be, nor
would there be any return to Asgard for the evil doer, until the crown
of gold was won.</p>
<p></p>
<div class="figure xd21e763width"><ANTIMG src="images/p052.png" alt="Ornamental letter G." width-obs="320" height-obs="138"></div>
<p><span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb53" href="#pb53" name="pb53">53</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p></p>
<div class="figure xd21e770width"><ANTIMG src="images/p053.png" alt="DWARFS FORGING CROWN FOR LOKE." width-obs="593" height-obs="164">
<p class="figureHead">DWARFS FORGING CROWN FOR LOKE.</p>
</div>
<p></p>
<h2 class="label">VIII.</h2>
<h2 class="main">THOR’S HAMMER.</h2>
<p class="par first">It was away down in the underground caves, and
beneath the roaring waters of the rivers, and deep in the hearts of the
mountains that these dwarf workmen dwelt, and worked their smithies,
and spun their gold and brass.</p>
<p>“Make me a crown of gold for Sif the wife of
Thor,” snarled Loke, bursting in upon the workshop of the
dwarfs.</p>
<p>The dwarfs were ugly little creatures, with crooked
legs, and crooked backs. Their <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb54"
href="#pb54" name="pb54">54</SPAN>]</span>eyes were black, wicked little
beads of eyes, and their hearts were malicious and sometimes cruel. But
they were the willing and ready slaves of the gods; and so, at even
this ill-natured command from Loke, they set themselves to work.</p>
<p>The coals burned and blazed; the forges puffed and blew;
the little workmen moulded and turned and spun their gold. Hardly had
the Sun-god lifted his head above the castles of the frost giants,
hardly had his light fallen upon the rich colors of the rainbow bridge,
when Loke came forth from the underground caves, the shining crown in
his hand.</p>
<p>Quickly he rose high in the air and stood before the
gates of the city.</p>
<p>“Have you brought the crown?” thundered Thor
from within the gates.</p>
<p>“I have brought the crown,” answered
<span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb55" href="#pb55" name="pb55">55</SPAN>]</span>Loke in triumph. “And more than that,”
added he, when the gates had been opened to him, “I have brought
as gifts from the dwarfs, a ship that will sail on land or sea and a
spear that never fails. O there are no such workmen among any dwarfs as
these who made the spear, the ship and the crown.”</p>
<p>“You boast of what you do not know,” croaked
Brok, a little dwarf who stood near by.</p>
<p>“Who says I do not know?” cried Loke,
turning sharply.</p>
<p>“I say you do not know,” croaked the little
dwarf again, his beadlike eyes snapping angrily, his whole crooked
frame quivering with rage. “I have a brother, a workman in brass
and gold, who can make gifts more pleasing to the gods than any you
have brought.” <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb56" href="#pb56"
name="pb56">56</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p>Loke looked down upon the little dwarf in scorn.
“Go to your brother,” he sneered, “and bring to us
the wonderful things you think he can make. Bring us one gift more
wonderful than these I have, or more acceptable to Odin and Thor, and I
will give your brother my head to pay him for his efforts.” Then
Loke roared with laughter, believing that he had made a rare, rich
joke.</p>
<p>Hardly had the roars of laughter died away, when Brok,
gliding down the rainbow bridge with a swiftness equalled only by the
lightning, sprang into Midgard, and was making his way towards the
great mountain, beneath which worked the forges of his brother, the
master-workman—Sindre.</p>
<p>“Some one cometh,” said the dwarfs, pausing
in their work to listen, their busy hammers in mid-air. <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb57" href="#pb57" name="pb57">57</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p>“Fear not,” answered Brok, his harsh voice
echoing down the great halls. “It is I—Brok—and I
come to demand of you that now, if never again, you do your best; for
Loke boasts to the gods of Asgard that no dwarfs in all the caverns of
the under-world can make one gift more wonderful or more acceptable to
Odin than those he brings—a crown of gold, a ship that will sail
on land or sea, and a spear that never fails!”</p>
<p>A terrible roar burst forth from the hosts of angry
dwarfs. “We will see! We will see!” they thundered. And
seizing their hammers they set to work. The great forges blazed. The
sparks flew. The smoke poured forth from the mountain top. Loke,
looking out from the shining city, trembled. Well did he know the
workmanship of these dwarfs of Brok; and well did he know how rash had
<span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb58" href="#pb58" name="pb58">58</SPAN>]</span>been his scornful promise to the angry little
dwarf.</p>
<p>“We will make a hammer for Thor,” said
Sindre, the greatest among the workmen in this under world; “a
hammer, that when thrown from his mighty hand, shall ring through all
the heavens. A trail of fire shall follow it. Its aim shall never fail;
and it shall carry death and destruction wherever it falls.</p>
<p>“Blow thou the bellows, Brok; and I myself will
mould the hammer from the red hot iron.”</p>
<p>With Brok at the bellows, the very mountain rocked, and
Midgard for miles about was ablaze with the blaze of light from the
mountain top.</p>
<p>“This shall not be,” snarled Loke. And
rushing down from Asgard he crouched outside the great, black cave to
listen. <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb59" href="#pb59" name="pb59">59</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p>“A hammer for Thor!” Those were the words he
heard. The ugly face grew uglier. An instant, and there was no Loke at
the cavern mouth; but instead, a poisonous, stinging gadfly, whose
green back glistened, and whose shining wings buzzed and hummed with
cruelty and revenge. There was a hard, ringing tone of defiance in
their singing, and the tone was like that of the voice of Loke
himself.</p>
<p>“You shall drop the bellows,” buzzed the
gadfly bitterly, as it alighted upon the neck of Brok.</p>
<p>It was a cruel sting; and its poison forced, even from
the sturdy Brok, a cry of pain.</p>
<p>“I know you. It is Loke,” he cried;
“but I will not drop the bellows though you sting me through and
through and with a thousand stings!” <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb60" href="#pb60" name="pb60">60</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p>The gadfly buzzed with rage. Straight towards the hand
upon the bellows it darted. Brok groaned again. His face grew pale; he
quivered with the pain; still he held the mighty bellows and worked the
roaring forge.</p>
<p>“You will not!” hissed the gadfly; and again
it drove its poison sting, this time straight between the eyes of the
suffering dwarf. And now Brok staggered. His hands relaxed their hold.
Blinded with pain, he dropped the bellows. The blood ran down his face.
The gadfly still hummed and buzzed.</p>
<p>“You have nearly spoiled it,” cried Sindre.
“Why did you drop the bellows? See how short the handle is! And
how rough! But it cannot be helped now; nor will its terror be any less
to Loke. Ha, ha, I would have made it handsome; but there is
<span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb61" href="#pb61" name="pb61">61</SPAN>]</span>a power in it that shall make even the gods
tremble in all the ages to come. Hurry away with it, and place it in
Thor’s mighty hands. And here are other gifts. Take them all, and
bring me Loke’s head. He has promised. Surely even he must keep
his word, wicked and deceitful though he is.”</p>
<p>Brok seized the hammer, and, with the gifts, hurried up
through the dark cavern, out into the light of Midgard, up the rainbow
bridge, and, with triumph in his swarthy face, sprang into the presence
of the great god Odin.</p>
<p>Loke roared with laughter at the sight of the awkward,
clumsy hammer; but there was a proud, confident look in the
dwarf’s shining eyes that Loke did not like; and, coward that he
was, his heart began already to fail him.</p>
<p>“Let us see the gifts,” said Odin,
“that <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb62" href="#pb62" name="pb62">62</SPAN>]</span>we may judge which workman among the dwarfs has
proved himself most wonderful.”</p>
<p>“First of all,” said Loke, coming forward,
“Here is the golden crown for Sif.”</p>
<p>Eagerly Thor seized the crown, and placed it upon poor
Sif’s head.</p>
<p>“Wonderful! wonderful!” cried all the gods,
for straightway the golden hair began to grow to Sif’s head, and
in a second it was as if her golden locks had never been stolen from
her.</p>
<p>“To you, O Odin,” said the dwarf, now coming
forward, “I give this ring of gold. It is a magic ring; and each
night it will cast off from itself another ring, as pure and as heavy,
as round and as large as itself.”</p>
<p>“What is that,” sneered Loke,
“compared with this? See, O Father Odin, I bring you a magic
spear. Accept this, my second gift. It is a magic spear that never
fails.” <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb63" href="#pb63" name="pb63">63</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p>“But behold my second gift,” interrupted
Brok. “It is a boar of wonderful strength. It, too, is magic. No
horse can run, no bird can fly with such speed. It travels both on land
and sea; and in the night its bristles shine with such a light, that it
matters not how dense the blackness, the forest or the plain will be as
bright as noonday.”</p>
<p>“I, too, have a gift that will travel on land or
sea,” cried Loke, pushing himself forward again. “See, it
is a ship. And not only will it travel on land or sea, but it can lift
itself and sail like a bird above the clouds and through the
air.”</p>
<p>“It will be hard indeed to say which gift is
greatest,” said Odin kindly.</p>
<p>“Look now, O, Odin, and Frigg and Thor and Sif and
all the gods, at this the last of my three gifts. This hammer, O Thor,
I <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb64" href="#pb64" name="pb64">64</SPAN>]</span>bring to you, the god of thunder. Strike with it,
and your thunders shall echo and re-echo from cloud to cloud as never
they were heard before. Thrown into the air or at a foe, like
Loke’s spear, it shall never miss its aim; but, more than that,
it shall return always to the hand of Thor. No foe can conceal it, no
foe can destroy it. It will never fail thee, O Thor, thou god of
thunder.”</p>
<p>“But what a clumsy handle,” sneered Loke,
who already began to fear the hammer was to win the favor of the
gods.</p>
<p>“Yes,” answered Brok, “the handle is
clumsy and it is short. But none knows better than you why it is
so.”</p>
<p>Loke colored and moved uneasily. “Do not
think,” continued Brok, “that I do not know it was you who
sent the poisonous gadfly to sting and bite me as I worked at the
<span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb65" href="#pb65" name="pb65">65</SPAN>]</span>blazing forge, pounding out the brass and gold
from which this hammer is made.</p>
<p>“You thought to pain me into giving up this
contest, you coward! you evil one! you boaster!</p>
<p>“When the handle was welded just so far, you drove
the gadfly into my eye. I could not see to finish the work; but
although the handle is short and clumsy, the magic power is there, and
with it in his hand, no power in earth or among the frost giants even
can overcome our great god Thor.”</p>
<p>A ringing shout of joy arose from the gods. Thor swung
his hammer over his head and threw it far out against the clouds. The
thunder rolled, the clouds filled with blackness, and the lightnings
flashed, as the magic hammer, humming through the air, came back to the
hands of Thor. <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb66" href="#pb66" name="pb66">66</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p>“Now give me my wager,” cried Brok. “I
was promised the head of Loke.”</p>
<p>“Take it,” laughed Loke. “Take
it.”</p>
<p>Brok drew near. “I will take it,”
<span class="corr" id="xd21e897" title="Source: is">he</span> hissed
through his set teeth; “and a rich day will it be both in Midgard
and in Asgard when your miserable head is bound down in the home of the
dwarfs of the underground world.”</p>
<p>“But halt,” commanded Loke. “My head
you may have; but you must not touch my neck. One drop of blood from
that, and you forfeit your life.”</p>
<p>Brok stood for a moment white with anger. He knew that
he was foiled. Then springing forward, he thundered, “I may not
touch your neck; but see, I have my revenge.” And so, falling
upon Loke, who struggled, but struggled in vain, he whipped
<span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb67" href="#pb67" name="pb67">67</SPAN>]</span>from his mantle a thong and thread of brass; and
before even Loke knew what had been done, he had sewed, firm together,
the lying boasting lips of the evil god, Loke, the wicked-hearted son
of Odin.</p>
<p></p>
<div class="figure xd21e907width"><ANTIMG src="images/p067.png" alt="THOR." width-obs="581" height-obs="444">
<p class="figureHead">THOR.</p>
</div>
<p><span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb68" href="#pb68" name="pb68">68</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p></p>
<div class="figure xd21e913width"><ANTIMG src="images/p068.png" alt=""
width="640" height="214"></div>
<p></p>
<h2 class="label">XI.</h2>
<h2 class="main">THE THEFT OF THE HAMMER.</h2>
<p class="par first">It was to the sweet and loving god Baldur that the
earth owed its warmth and beauty, its rich fruit and its rare harvests.
How the frost giants hated Baldur, and how they struggled year after
year to wrest the earth from him!</p>
<p>They hated the warmth Baldur brought with him, for it
destroyed their power. They hated the sweet flowers and the soft grass
and the tiny leaves that everywhere peeped out <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb69" href="#pb69" name="pb69">69</SPAN>]</span>when the
winds whispered, “Baldur is coming, Baldur is coming.”</p>
<p>But no sooner had Baldur turned away and said,
“Good-bye, dear Earth, for a little time, remember Baldur loves
you and will come back again to you,” than the frost giants would
creep out from their mountain gorges, and burst forth upon the fields
and forests.</p>
<p>The tiny bubbling brooks they would seal with their
cruel chains of ice; even the great rivers could not hold their freedom
against the giant power.</p>
<p>Like angry fiends they would seize upon the leaves and
tear them from the trees. The tiny flowers hung their heads and
shriveled with fear when they approached; nor were the frost giants
content until the whole earth lay brown and cold and barren beneath
their hand. Then, all beauty swept away, they <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb70" href="#pb70" name="pb70">70</SPAN>]</span>covered
over all, their silent sheet of snow, and stood, grim sentinels, cold
and hard, guarding their work of destruction and desolation.</p>
<p>There was deep silence when the frost giants reigned; no
sound was heard save the sad moaning among the branches of the forest,
as the firs and pine trees bent towards each other and whispered of the
days when Baldur shone upon them.</p>
<p>But the frost giants never yet had conquered; never yet
had Baldur failed to return to the trees and flowers and rivers and
streams that he loved so well.</p>
<p>At his first step upon the ice, a crackling sound was
heard—a sound which awoke the sleeping earth and warned the frost
giants to flee to their mountains.</p>
<p>“Baldur has come! Baldur has come!”
<span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb71" href="#pb71" name="pb71">71</SPAN>]</span>the birds and every living thing would cry; and a
rustle and sound of music would thrill the waiting earth.</p>
<p>Then came always a mighty battle. The frost giants
lashed the waters and rocked the trees. The winds shrieked, the sky
grew cold and black. The snows fell and the driving rain beat against
the earth. But Baldur, the quiet, firm, loving Baldur always conquered.
How, he himself could hardly tell. He did not fight; he did not storm.
He only bent his shining face over the struggling earth and waited.</p>
<p>Little by little, when their fury was spent, the frost
giants, defiant but conquered, retreated. The great sheets of ice broke
up, and the rivers rushed forth singing their mad songs of joy and
freedom. The snows faded away, and one by one the little flowers peeped
forth again. <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb72" href="#pb72" name="pb72">72</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p>All now was happiness and warmth and fragrance; the
flowers bloomed; the fruits turned mellow; the sky grew warm; and the
pines and fir trees breathed deep sighs of rest and contentment that
once again sweet Baldur was among them.</p>
<p>And not only did the frost giants hate Baldur, but they
hated Frey, who often robbed them of the fruits and flowers they loved
to breathe their bitter breath upon and kill. Thor, too, they hated;
for with his magic hammer, he now, more than ever, loved to bring forth
the lightnings and the thunder, and to send down upon the earth
refreshing showers of soft, warm rain.</p>
<p>As the frost giants scowled down from their icy castles,
and saw the little flowers turn up their happy faces to drink in the
sparkling drops, and heard the birds trill their happy <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb73" href="#pb73" name="pb73">73</SPAN>]</span>songs,
and smelled the rich fragrance of the damp firs and pines, they roared
with anger and vexation.</p>
<p>“Let us revenge ourselves upon this insolent Thor
who robs us of our rights,” they bellowed to each other across
the great valleys that separated their giant peaks.</p>
<p>“We can do nothing so long as he holds the magic
hammer,” growled one.</p>
<p>“We must steal the hammer from him,” shouted
another.</p>
<p>“Steal the hammer! Steal the hammer!”
shouted all the giants until the very skies echoed with the words.</p>
<p>“And I will be the one to steal it,”
bellowed Thrym, the strongest and greatest giant of them all.</p>
<p>“And, moreover, I will go at once to the city of
Asgard. The gods are asleep. With <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb74"
href="#pb74" name="pb74">74</SPAN>]</span>my great eye, I can see even now
the hammer lying beside the sleeping Thor. Guard my castle. I am
gone.”</p>
<p></p>
<div class="figure xd21e974width"><ANTIMG src="images/p074.png" alt="THE THEFT OF THE HAMMER." width-obs="621" height-obs="363">
<p class="figureHead">THE THEFT OF THE HAMMER.</p>
</div>
<p></p>
<p>And putting on the guise of a great bird, Thrym spread
his wings and flew across the black night to Asgard. The gods shivered
in their sleep as he entered and breathed his breath upon the summer
air of heaven, but knew not what had chilled them. <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb75" href="#pb75" name="pb75">75</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p>In the morning there was a heavy frost upon the
gateways. There was a chill in the air. For Thrym, the frost giant, had
crept in upon them. He had crept even to the hall in which the mighty
Thor was sleeping. He had crept close beside the mighty god—and
the magic hammer was gone.</p>
<p></p>
<div class="figure xd21e984width"><ANTIMG src="images/p075.jpg" alt=""
width="596" height="463"></div>
<p><span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb76" href="#pb76" name="pb76">76</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p></p>
<div class="figure xd21e988width"><ANTIMG src="images/p076.png" alt="THOR AND LOKE ON THE JOURNEY AFTER THE HAMMER." width-obs="609" height-obs=
"404">
<p class="figureHead">THOR AND LOKE ON THE JOURNEY AFTER THE
HAMMER.</p>
</div>
<p></p>
<h2 class="label">XII.</h2>
<h2 class="main">THE FINDING OF THE HAMMER.</h2>
<p class="par first">“My hammer! My hammer!” thundered
Thor, awaking and finding it gone.</p>
<p>The gods in all Asgard awoke with a start.</p>
<p>“What a crash of thunder! So quick, <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb77" href="#pb77" name="pb77">77</SPAN>]</span>so
sharp!” cried the earth-people; for they did not know it was a
cry of rage from Thor.</p>
<p>“Loke,” thundered Thor again. “Put you
on wings. Go you to the home of the Frost giants and bring back my
hammer. Some one of them has stolen it. Go! Go! I say.”</p>
<p>And Loke, who had been a very obedient servant to Thor
since his theft of the golden hair of Sif, put on the magic wings and
fled away.</p>
<p>“What brings you here in the land of the Frost
giants?” growled Thrym, as Loke alighted before him.</p>
<p>“I have come for the hammer you have stolen from
Thor,” answered Loke boldly, seeing at once, from the jeering
look in Thrym’s eye, that he was the thief.</p>
<p></p>
<div class="figure xd21e1014width"><ANTIMG src="images/p078.png" alt="FREYJA IN HER CHARIOT." width-obs="621" height-obs="717">
<p class="figureHead">FREYJA IN HER CHARIOT.</p>
</div>
<p></p>
<p>“You will never find it,” sneered Thrym.
<span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb79" href="#pb79" name="pb79">79</SPAN>]</span>“It is well hidden; but I will send it back
to you if Odin will send me Freyja for my wife.”</p>
<p>Loke begged and coaxed and threatened; but it was all of
no avail. “Never,” bellowed Thrym, “until you send
Freyja to me.”</p>
<p>“She shall go,” thundered Thor, when Loke
came back to Asgard. “Whatever the price, the hammer must be
brought back. Asgard is not safe without it.”</p>
<p>But Freyja was as fierce as had been Thrym himself.
“I will not go,” she insisted. “Never! Never! Never
will I go!”</p>
<p>“I say you must,” thundered Thor. But
although Thor’s thunders were terrible and his frown was deep and
inky black, Freyja was not to be moved either by pleading or
threatening.</p>
<p>“Go yourself,” said she. “Dress
yourself as a goddess and go.” Nor would she listen <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb80" href="#pb80" name="pb80">80</SPAN>]</span>even to
another word. Thor thundered and rumbled and rolled. It was all of no
avail. Freyja was a goddess and would not be driven.</p>
<p>“I will go,” said Thor at last. “Bring
me a bridal dress. Hang a necklace around my neck. Bind a bridal veil
about my head. The giants are as stupid as they are large; and I will
set forth in the name of Freyja to meet the giant Thrym.”</p>
<p>Thor was quickly dressed, and the bridal party set forth
across the sky in the chariot of the Sungod. How the thunder rolled!
How the lightnings flashed from the angry eyes of Thor! How he grumbled
and rumbled!</p>
<p>Jotunheim was reached. The Sungod lowered his chariot
behind the hills; and a soft, red light spread over the earth and sky
as the bridal party entered the castle of the giant Thrym. <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb81" href="#pb81" name="pb81">81</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p>“Freyja has come! Freyja has come!” bellowed
Thrym. “Come, come, everyone to the bridal feast! Come, come to
the feast of Thrym and Freyja!”</p>
<p>The giants in all the mountains round about answered to
the call of Thrym. An hour, and the huge castle was filled with the
huge guests. A great feast was held. But through it all Thor sat silent
and motionless. Indeed, he dared not move; he dared not speak lest the
thunder burst forth from his lips, or the lightning shoot forth from
his eyes.</p>
<p>“Now lift the veil from Freyja’s
face,” bellowed Thrym, when all save the bride herself had eaten
and drank their fill. “Let me see the eyes of my bride. Let us
all look upon the face of my goddess bride.”</p>
<p>“Not yet,” whispered Loke coming forward;
“it was the command of Thor that the <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb82" href="#pb82" name="pb82">82</SPAN>]</span>veil
should not be lifted, nor should you claim Freyja for your own, until
the hammer was placed in her hand, to be returned to the
gods.”</p>
<p>“Bring in the hammer! Bring in the hammer!”
roared Thrym, full of loud, good humor.</p>
<p>The hammer was brought. Hardly could Thor wait to have
it placed in his hand.</p>
<p>His thunder began to rumble. There was a dangerous light
in his eyes; but Thrym and the guests saw none of this. But hardly was
the hammer within his reach when forth Thor sprang, seized it in his
clutched fingers, tore aside the bridal veil, and with a rumble and a
roar that shook the mountains of Jotunheim and razed the great stone
castles to the ground, he poured out his lightnings upon the giants,
one and all. Right and left he swung the mighty weapon; the giants
quaked and trembled with terror; Thrym ran and hid <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb83" href="#pb83" name="pb83">83</SPAN>]</span>himself
behind a mountain; the air was white with lightning; the hills rang
with the crashings of the thunder; the seas lashed and foamed and
answered back the echoes; the walls of Jotunheim shook and
trembled.</p>
<p>And now the chariot of the Sungod was near at hand. Into
it Thor and Loke leaped, and were borne back to the city of the gods.
The hammer was restored. Again Thor held it in his mighty grasp. He
held it, and Asgard once more was safe.</p>
<p></p>
<div class="figure xd21e1064width"><ANTIMG src="images/p083.png" alt="Thor’s hammer." width-obs="586" height-obs="351"></div>
<p><span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb84" href="#pb84" name="pb84">84</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p></p>
<div class="figure xd21e1070width"><ANTIMG src="images/p084.png" alt=""
width="583" height="475"></div>
<p></p>
<h2 class="label">XIII.</h2>
<h2 class="main">THE APPLES OF LIFE.</h2>
<h2 class="sub">Part I.</h2>
<p class="par first">Among the gods in Asgard, dwelt the beautiful
Idun, the goddess whose care it was to guard the apples of life.</p>
<p>“Idun,” Odin<SPAN name="xd21e1083" name="xd21e1083"></SPAN> had said as he gave into her hands the rosy apples,
“to guard these <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb85" href="#pb85"
name="pb85">85</SPAN>]</span>apples and keep them forever from all harm,
is to do a greater service for Asgard than even Thor, with his mighty
thunders, or Baldur, with his warm light, can do; for these are the
apples of everlasting youth. Without them, what would Asgard be more
than the cities of Midgard or of Jotunheim? What would the gods be more
than the mortals of Midgard or the giants of Jotunheim? So guard them
well, beautiful Idun, for to them you owe your beauty, even as we owe
to them our never fading youth.”</p>
<p>One day, when all was quiet and peaceful and happy in
the city of Asgard, Loke, feeling within him the stirring of his own
evil heart, betook himself to Midgard in search of mischief. The peace
and quiet of Asgard he could no longer endure. Then, too, it was to him
a cruel delight to shoot his arrows into <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb86" href="#pb86" name="pb86">86</SPAN>]</span>the lives of the helpless
children of Midgard and make them sad.</p>
<p>O, Loke was a cruel god! “Surely,” Odin
would sometimes say, as he looked upon him and thought of the
wretchedness that yet would fall on Asgard through Loke’s wicked
deeds, “surely, Loke has the spirit of a Frost giant; and the
Frost giants are bitter, bitter foes to Asgard.”</p>
<p>This day Loke longed for mischief. “I will go down
to Midgard and find some happy heart to sadden,” said he, his
eyes shining with their wicked light.</p>
<p>Down the rainbow bridge he hastened, and, with a light
bound, sprang upon a bright tree in the beautiful land of Midgard.</p>
<p>“Who are you?” cried he, seeing in the tree
beside him a great, white bird.</p>
<p>But the bird made no reply; he only <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb87" href="#pb87" name="pb87">87</SPAN>]</span>winked,
and blinked, and stared at Loke, and crooned, and pruned his
feathers.</p>
<p>“Do you not know a god speaks to you?”
stormed Loke, growing angry even with a bird.</p>
<p>Still no answer.</p>
<p>“Was ever there such a stupid bird? Indeed, like
the people of Midgard, you seem to have no wisdom,” sneered Loke.
And determined to vent his evil mood, he seized a branch and began to
beat the bird.</p>
<p>Then a strange thing happened. The bird, who all this
time had seemed so stupid—too stupid even to fly away—now
seized upon the bough and held it fast. Loke pulled and pulled with all
his godlike strength. He could not move it; it was as if held in the
grasp of a giant.</p>
<p>“Stupid bird!” sneered Loke, when he found
he could do the bird no harm. “I will <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb88" href="#pb88" name="pb88">88</SPAN>]</span>not stay
in the tree with such a stupid creature.”</p>
<p>A strange sound—almost like a laugh of
triumph—squeezed itself out from the beak of the big bird.</p>
<p>“Go, Loke, go at once. Go back to Asgard; or
perhaps you would like to go with me to Jotunheim,” spoke the
bird at last. And as he spoke, he spread his wings, and arose high in
the air. Alas, alas for Loke, as the bird rose, he rose too; nor could
he free himself. He screamed, he fought, he begged, he strove with all
his godlike arts to free himself, but all in vain.</p>
<p>On, on they flew, the bird and Loke, across the sky,
over and under and between the clouds, across the great wide sea, at
last across the snow-white peaks, down, down to a castle in Jotunheim,
in the land of the mighty <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb89" href="#pb89" name="pb89">89</SPAN>]</span>Frost giants, the terrible, the
dreaded enemies of the gods.</p>
<p>“Let me free! Let me free!” foamed Loke,
struggling against the bird, whose magic held him fast.</p>
<p>“I will never let you free,” answered the
bird, throwing off his disguise and standing forth a giant foe;
“I will never let you free except on one condition.”</p>
<p>“I grant it! I grant it! Whatever it is, I grant
it,” cried the coward, caring for nothing but to free
himself.</p>
<p>“The condition is this,” continued the giant
coolly: “I will let you free if you will bring me, without delay,
the apples of everlasting youth—the apples that Idun guards and
watches over, locked so closely in the golden casket in the city of
Asgard.<span class="corr" id="xd21e1133" title=
"Not in source">”</span></p>
<p>Loke stared. He caught his breath. To <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb90" href="#pb90" name="pb90">90</SPAN>]</span>give up
the apples of life—the fruit by which the gods were kept forever
young and strong and beautiful,—that was too great a thing to ask
even of Loke, evil as he was.</p>
<p>“There are no such apples,” answered he,
trying, as cowards always do, to hide himself behind a lie.
“There are no such apples.”</p>
<p>“Very well,” answered the giant, opening a
great dungeon door, and thrusting Loke in. “When you are ready to
do what I say, you may come out; never until then.” The great
dungeon door creaked upon its terrible hinges and Loke was alone, a
prisoner, at the mercy of the Frost giant.</p>
<p>Loke howled and beat against the walls of the
dungeon.</p>
<p>“Are you ready to do what I asked of you?”
asked the Frost giant, opening the great door the next morning.
<span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb91" href="#pb91" name="pb91">91</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p>“There are no such apples,” cried Loke.
“On my honor as a god, I swear it!”</p>
<p>The giant made no reply. The heavy door creaked again,
and Loke was alone.</p>
<p></p>
<div class="figure xd21e1154width"><ANTIMG src="images/p091.png" alt=""
width="587" height="369"></div>
<p></p>
<p>“Are you ready to do what I asked of you?”
asked the Frost giant, opening the great door the second morning.</p>
<p>“Anything in all Asgard, O Giant, I promise
you—anything but the apples,” cried Loke. <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb92" href="#pb92" name="pb92">92</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p>The giant made no reply. The heavy door creaked again,
and Loke was alone.</p>
<p>“Are you willing to do what I asked of you?”
asked the Frost giant, opening the great door the third morning.</p>
<p>“One of the apples, O Giant, I might steal from
Idun and escape with before the fruit was missed,” Loke
began.</p>
<p>The giant made no reply. The heavy door creaked again
and Loke was alone.</p>
<p>“Are you ready to do what I asked of you?”
asked the Frost giant, opening the great door the fourth morning.</p>
<p>“Yes, two of the three apples will I promise to
bring you. With even one left, the gods might be content; for even then
their lives would be far longer than the life of mortals.”
<span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb93" href="#pb93" name="pb93">93</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p>The giant made no reply. The heavy door creaked again
and Loke was alone.</p>
<p>“Are you ready to do what I asked of you?”
asked the Frost giant, opening the great door the fifth morning.</p>
<p>“Yes,” answered Loke, meekly.</p>
<p>“You are willing to bring the apples of
life?”</p>
<p>“Yes.”</p>
<p>“And you will bring all three of them?”</p>
<p>“Yes.”</p>
<p>“And you will bring them at once?”</p>
<p>“Yes.”</p>
<p>“Go, then. I will go with you. Outside the walls
of the shining city I will wait for you to bring the apples to
me.”</p>
<p>Then putting on the guise of birds, the two set forth,
reaching the gateway of the city just as the Sungod was pouring down
his <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb94" href="#pb94" name="pb94">94</SPAN>]</span>flood of red and golden light upon the shining
spires. The whole city lay bathed in the sunset splendor.</p>
<p>“Idun,” said Loke, going directly to her,
“it is well you guard so closely these golden apples of life.
Without them we should grow old and die, even as wretched mortals grow
old and die.”</p>
<p>“Indeed, it would fare ill with us if harm came to
these precious apples,” answered Idun. “See the rich bloom
upon them. If that were lost, then would our bloom be lost as well, and
we should grow old and wrinkled.”</p>
<p>“Yes,” answered Loke; “and
still—it seems very strange—but outside the gate of our
city, just on the outer walls, are growing apples, looking so like
these I cannot tell them one from the other. Bring your apples with you
and let us see if they are alike. If they <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb95" href="#pb95" name="pb95">95</SPAN>]</span>should prove to be, then
I will gather them for you, and we will put them all together in the
golden casket.”</p>
<p>“How strange!” thought Idun innocently.</p>
<p><SPAN name="xd21e1211" name="xd21e1211"></SPAN>The Frost giant,
in his great bird guise, wheeled round and round, impatiently awaiting
the coming of Idun and the apples. Hardly had the gates closed upon
her, when down he swooped, seized her in his great strong beak, and
flew with her across the sea to his home among the mountains.</p>
<p>The days rolled on and on. The Sungod rose, and drove
his chariot across the sky, and sank behind the distant purple hills a
thousand times.</p>
<p>There was a gloom, a shadow over Asgard; for the gods
were growing old. The life had gone out of their eyes; their smooth
round faces had grown thin and peaked; their <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb96" href="#pb96" name="pb96">96</SPAN>]</span>step was
halting, and the feebleness of age was falling upon them.</p>
<p>“It is Loke who has done this,” thundered
Thor one day, when, from old age and weakness, he had been defeated in
a battle with the now ever youthful giants. “It is Loke who has
done this, and we will bear it no longer. Look at Odin; even he grows
weak and bent and trembling. He is like the old men in Midgard. He,
Odin, the All-father.”</p>
<p>Thor’s indignation waxed stronger and stronger. He
set forth in search of Loke. “I will not even wait for him to
come,” he thundered, seizing his hammer and setting forth.
<span class="corr" id="xd21e1224" title="Not in source">“</span>I
shall find him, the evil-hearted, somewhere making mischief among the
innocent people of Midgard,” said he. <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb97" href="#pb97" name="pb97">97</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p></p>
<div class="figure xd21e1229width"><ANTIMG src="images/p097.png" alt=""
width="587" height="167"></div>
<p></p>
<h2 class="label">XIV.</h2>
<h2 class="main">THE APPLES OF LIFE.</h2>
<h2 class="sub">Part II.</h2>
<p class="par first">“Henceforth, O evil-hearted, cruel
Loke,” burst forth the angry Thor, “henceforth Thor guards
the walls of Asgard. Midgard, the skies, he shall forsake; no more will
he brew storms; never shall the thunder roll nor the lightnings flash;
for Thor will watch forever upon the battlements of Asgard the approach
of the evil god who has brought such grief upon us. Never shall he
enter the gates of the city again. Let him dare approach even
<span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb98" href="#pb98" name="pb98">98</SPAN>]</span>to the golden gates, and Thor will smite him with
his mighty hammer.”</p>
<p>Loke quailed before the fury of the great god Thor. To
be an outcast from Asgard, even he could not bear. “Spare me,
spare me!” whined the cowardly Loke. “Spare me once more,
and I will go again to Jotunheim. I will bring back Idun and the three
apples of life.”</p>
<p>Thor stood looking at the cowardly Loke. He longed to
strike him with the hammer; to kill him with his thunder bolt; to
scorch him with his lightning arrows. But, evil as he was, Loke was
immortal; he was the son of Odin.</p>
<p>“Go, then, you mischief-making, evil-hearted son
of unhappy Odin! Go; and whether success is yours or not, remember Thor
guards the walls of Asgard and watches <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb99" href="#pb99" name="pb99">99</SPAN>]</span>with his thunders for
your return. Never, never, as long as Thor wields the mighty hammer,
and holds the powers of thunder and lightning, shall Loke enter the
golden city without the golden apples of immortal life.”</p>
<p></p>
<div class="figure xd21e1252width"><ANTIMG src="images/p099.png" alt=""
width="575" height="450"></div>
<p></p>
<p>Without another word, Loke put on his guise of a great
white bird and sped across <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb100" href="#pb100" name="pb100">100</SPAN>]</span>the sea and sky, again to the land
of Jotunheim.</p>
<p>Straight down he swooped upon the castle of the giant
who, all this time, had kept Idun imprisoned in a strong walled tower
of solid rock.</p>
<p>The giant was out upon the sea. “And it is well
for me,” thought Loke, “that he is. No power in Midgard or
in Asgard could wrest these precious apples from the giant’s
grasp.”</p>
<p>One quick look out over the mountains and down upon the
sea, and Loke seized Idun in his talons, changed her at once into a
nut, the apples safe within the shell, and swept away towards
Asgard.</p>
<p>But alas for Loke! The giant had heard the whirr of the
great white wings. Leaping to his feet in his boat, he scanned the sky
<span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb101" href="#pb101" name="pb101">101</SPAN>]</span>with his sharp giant eye. “It is Loke! It
is Loke!” bellowed he, catching sight of the great white bird
among the clouds. “It is Loke! It is Loke! No bird of Midgard
flies so high nor sweeps the air with such mighty wings.”</p>
<p>With one great giant pull, he shot his boat upon the
shore; with one great giant bound he struck the mountain top.</p>
<p>“The apples of life! the apples of life!” he
thundered. “Gone! gone! The apples of life are gone!”</p>
<p>One second, and putting on the guise of a great grey
eagle he shot up into the sky in swift pursuit of Loke. The Sungod hid
his chariot behind a cloud that the shadows might protect and cover
Loke. Thor sent forth his thunder. The skies blackened; the wind beat
back the great grey eagle; the lightnings <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb102" href="#pb102" name="pb102">102</SPAN>]</span>staggered and blinded
him. Still on and on he flew, gaining in spite of all upon the track of
Loke.</p>
<p>Every eye in Asgard was strained; every giant in
Jotunheim stood breathless upon his mountain. The great round faces of
the giants grew tense; the wrinkled aged faces of the gods grew pale.
It was a terrible race. It was a race for life and health and
everlasting youth.</p>
<p>“Build fires upon the walls! Heap up the brush!
Stand ready with the tapers!” cried Odin, who foresaw the
end.</p>
<p>The brush is heaped. Each god stands ready, his haggard
face growing whiter and thinner with fright and dread and
eagerness.</p>
<p>Already the rush of Loke’s wings are heard. The
eagle follows close. Nearer and nearer they come, closer and closer is
the race. <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb103" href="#pb103" name="pb103">103</SPAN>]</span>One moment more!—One second!—The
frightened eyes of Loke can be seen, so near he is. Thor sends his
blinding fire once more across the eagle’s track. It reels, for
an instant it falls back. In that one second, with one last mighty
stroke, Loke clears the walls and falls, exhausted, breathless, almost
dead upon the golden pavement of the city.</p>
<p>“The fires! the fires! the fires!” cried
Odin. An instant, and there rises from the walls great sheets of blaze.
The brush crackles and snaps and sends up great tongues of fire. The
eagle, angry, desperate, and blinded by the lightning sweeps on,
straight towards them. Like a foolish moth, he bears down upon the
city, into the very heart of the blaze. A sudden crackling, a cry of
pain, a cloud of black, black smoke, and the great grey <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb104" href="#pb104" name="pb104">104</SPAN>]</span>eagle falls a helpless mass upon the pavement
beside the breathless Loke.</p>
<p>The haggard faces flush with hope and joy. The apples
are safe. Idun has come back, the apples again are theirs, and life and
joy and eternal youth once more are with them.</p>
<p>Now the goddess of music bursts forth again in song; the
god of poetry pours forth his melody; a feast is spread, and the gods
and goddesses once more eat of the wonderful apples of life. The color
comes back into their faded cheeks; light again flashes from their
eyes. Youth and health and strength are theirs again. Peace reigns once
more in Asgard. <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb105" href="#pb105"
name="pb105">105</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p></p>
<div class="figure xd21e1298width"><ANTIMG src="images/p105.png" alt=""
width="574" height="167"></div>
<p></p>
<h2 class="label">XV.</h2>
<h2 class="main">LOKE’S WOLF.</h2>
<p class="par first">Although the Apples of Life had been brought back,
and although Loke appeared for some time very penitent and willing to
obey the laws of the kind Odin, the gods had little faith in him. More
than that, so much had they suffered, that now they were in constant
fear of him. “We never know,” plead Freyja and Sif and
Idun, all of whom had good reason to fear him, “what mischief he
may be planning.”</p>
<p>And so it came about that Loke was driven forth from
Asgard, as indeed he deserved to be. <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb106" href="#pb106" name="pb106">106</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p>Straight to the home of the giants Loke went—he
always had been a giant at heart, the evil creature!—and was much
more in harmony with them in their thoughts and acts, than ever he had
been with the gods whom he claimed as his people.</p>
<p>But now that he was cast out from Asgard, and could no
longer share its beauties and its joys, he had but one wish—that
was, to be revenged upon the gods, to destroy them, and to ruin their
golden city.</p>
<p>To do this he raised two dreadful creatures. Terrible
monsters! Even the gods shuddered as they looked upon them.</p>
<p>“Loke! Loke!” thundered Odin, looking down
upon him in wrath that he should dare such vengeance.</p>
<p>But Loke stood defiant. There was but one thing to be
done, so the gods thought; <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb107" href="#pb107" name="pb107">107</SPAN>]</span>and that was to take these
terrible creatures from Loke’s power.</p>
<p>“The serpent we will cast into the sea,”
said Thor. “But the wolf—what shall we do with the wolf?
Certainly he cannot be left to wander up and down in Midgard. The sea
would not hold him. Loke must not have him in Jotunheim. What shall be
done with him?”</p>
<p>“Kill him,” said some.</p>
<p>“No,” answered Odin. “To him Loke has
given the gift of everlasting life. He will not die as long as we the
gods have life. There is but one way left open to us; and that is to
bring the wolf into Asgard. Here we can watch him and keep him from
much, if not all the evil he would do.”</p>
<p>And so the wolf—the Fenris-wolf he was
called—was brought into the home of the gods. <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb108" href="#pb108" name="pb108">108</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p>He was a dreadful creature to look upon. His eyes were
like balls of fire; and his fangs were white, and sharp, and cruel.</p>
<p>Every day he grew more terrible. Fiercer and fiercer he
grew, and larger and stronger and more dreadful to look upon.</p>
<p>“What is to be done with him?” asked Odin
one day, his face white with despair, as he looked upon the wolf, and
realized what sorrow by and by he would bring among them.</p>
<p>“Kill him!” cried one.</p>
<p>“Send him to Jotunheim,” cried another.</p>
<p>“Chain him,” thundered Thor. And indeed to
chain him seemed really the only thing that could be done with him.</p>
<p>“We will make the chains this night,” said
Thor. And at once the great forge was set in motion. All night long
Thor worked <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb109" href="#pb109" name="pb109">109</SPAN>]</span>the forge, hammering with his mighty hammer the
links that should make a chain to hold the Fenris-wolf.</p>
<p>Morning came. The gods were filled with hope as they saw
the great heap of iron. “Now we shall be safe. Now we shall be
free,” they said; <span class="corr" id="xd21e1350" title=
"Not in source">“</span>for no creature living can break the
irons that the god of Thunder forges.”</p>
<p>The wolf growled and showed his wicked teeth as Thor
approached and threw the chain about him. He knew the gods hated him
and feared him. He knew, too, that, with his wondrous strength, even
the chains of Thor were not too strong for him to break.</p>
<p>So, snarling and showing his fangs and lashing his tail,
he allowed himself to be bound. “They are afraid of me,”
the cruel wolf grinned. “And well they may be; <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb110" href="#pb110" name="pb110">110</SPAN>]</span>there is a power in me that even they do not yet
dream of.”</p>
<p>The chains were tightly fastened, and the gods waited
eagerly for the wolf to test his strength with them.</p>
<p>Now, the wolf knew well enough that there were no chains
that could hold him. “I will amuse myself,” said he to
himself, “by tormenting the gods.” So he glared at the
chains with his fiery eyes, sniffed here and there at them, lifted one
paw and then the other, bit at them with his sharp teeth, and clawed at
them with his strong claws; setting up now and then a howl that echoed,
like the thunders of Thor, from cloud to cloud across the skies.</p>
<p>The faces of the gods grew brighter and brighter. They
looked at each other and hope rose high in their hearts. “We are
saved!” <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb111" href="#pb111" name="pb111">111</SPAN>]</span>they whispered to each other. “Hear how he
howls! He knows he cannot break chains forged in the smithy of the
mighty Thor.”</p>
<p>But Odin did not smile. He knew only too well that the
wolf was amusing himself; and that when the gods were least expecting
it, he would spring forth and shatter the links of the mighty chain,
even as a mortal might shatter a chain of straw.</p>
<p>“Conquered at last, you cruel Fenris-wolf!”
thundered Thor, lifting his hammer in scorn, to throw at the helpless
wolf.</p>
<p>“The Fenris-wolf is never conquered,” hissed
the wolf; and with one bound he leaped across the walls of Asgard,
down, down across the skies to Midgard, the links of the chains
scattering like sparks of fire as he flew through the air.</p>
<p>“See! See!” cried the people of Midgard,
<span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb112" href="#pb112" name="pb112">112</SPAN>]</span>as they saw the fiery eyes of Fenris gleam
across the sky. “See! A star has fallen! A star has fallen into
the sea!” For the people of Midgard cannot understand the wonders
of the heavens and the mysteries of the gods.</p>
<p></p>
<div class="figure xd21e1379width"><ANTIMG src="images/p112.png" alt=""
width="398" height="235"></div>
<p></p>
<p>The gods stood, wonder-struck. Their faces were pale
with fright. The brow of Thor grew black and stern. Odin looked
pityingly upon them all. “Lose not your courage,” said he
kindly. “The Fenris-wolf shall yet be bound; and there shall yet
remain <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb113" href="#pb113" name="pb113">113</SPAN>]</span>to us ages upon ages of happiness and freedom
from his wicked power. Go now to the dwarfs who work their forges in
the great mines beneath the mountains of Midgard. They shall make for
you a magic chain that even Fenris cannot break.”</p>
<p>Hardly were the words out of Odin’s mouth when
Thor set forth upon the wings of his own lightning, to the home of the
dwarfs, to do the bidding of Odin the All-wise.</p>
<p></p>
<div class="figure xd21e1389width"><ANTIMG src="images/p113.png" alt="Ornamental letter K." width-obs="288" height-obs="137"></div>
<p><span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb114" href="#pb114" name="pb114">114</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p></p>
<div class="figure xd21e1395width"><ANTIMG src="images/p114.png" alt=""
width="589" height="150"></div>
<p></p>
<h2 class="label">XVI<span class="corr" id="xd21e1400" title= "Not in source">.</span></h2>
<h2 class="main">THE FENRIS WOLF.</h2>
<p class="par first">With wonderful speed the chain was forged; and
when the Sun-god lifted his head above the hills, to send forth his
light again across the fields of Midgard, the first sight that greeted
his return was Thor, a great mass of golden coil within his hand,
speeding up the rainbow bridge to Asgard.</p>
<p>It was a tiny chain—hardly larger than a thread;
but in it lay a magic strength.</p>
<p>Entering the great golden gate, Thor saw the Fenris
wolf, again creeping stealthily up and down the streets. <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb115" href="#pb115" name="pb115">115</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p>Thor’s hand shut tight upon the handle of his
hammer. It was hard to believe that a blow from the hammer would not
slay the wicked creature. For an instant Thor’s face grew black.
Then forcing a smile, and showing to the wolf the mass of gold, he
said, “Come Fenris; come with me into the hall. There the gods
are to meet and test our strength upon this magic coil. Whoever breaks
it, and so proves himself the strongest, is to win a prize from the
great All-father Odin.”</p>
<p>The wolf stretched back his cruel lips, and showed his
sharp fangs of teeth. He did not speak; but his wicked grin said,
“You do not deceive the Fenris-wolf.”</p>
<p>Together Thor and the Fenris-wolf entered the presence
of Odin and the gods and goddesses. <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb116" href="#pb116" name="pb116">116</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p>“I have,” said Thor, “a magic coil. It
is very strong. The dwarfs made it for me; and Odin has promised a
great prize to the one who shall be strong enough to break its links.
Come, let us try.”</p>
<p>Then the gods—for they all understood what Thor
was about to do—sprang forward, seizing the coil, pulling and
twisting it in every way and in every direction, coiling it about the
pillars of the hall, and hanging by it from the arches; until at last,
tired out and breathless, they sank exhausted upon the golden
floors.</p>
<p>“Fenris,” called Thor. “Now is your
time to prove to us what you have so often said—that you are
stronger than we. Try if you can break this golden thread which, small
as it is, has proved too strong for the strength of the gods.”
<span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb117" href="#pb117" name="pb117">117</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p>The wolf growled. He did not care to risk even his
strength in a magic coil. He growled and slunk away.</p>
<p>“What! Fenris, are you a coward? After all your
boasted strength, why is it that you shrink from a contest in which the
gods have willingly taken part? Do you mean to say that, because the
gods have been defeated, you fear that you, too, may be
defeated?”</p>
<p>The wolf halted. He looked back at the gods and growled
a long, low growl. The words of Thor had stung his pride.</p>
<p>Thor laughed. “O Fenris, Fenris! this is your
boasted strength! your boasted courage! To slink away in a contest with
the gods—the gods at whose strength you have always sneered and
scoffed.”</p>
<p>“Fenris is a coward!” cried all the gods;
and the heavens echoed with their laughter. <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb118" href="#pb118" name="pb118">118</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p>This was more than the wolf could bear. Back he sprang
into the hall.</p>
<p>“I hear your sneers,” he snarled. “I
hear you call me coward. Give me the cord; bind me with it round and
round; fasten me to the strongest pillar of this great hall. If the
coil is an honest coil, Fenris can break it. There is no chain he
cannot break. But if you are blinding me—if you have here a cord
woven with magic such as no power can break—how am I to know? I
put this test to you. Some one of you shall place your hand between my
jaws. As long as that hand is there, you may coil and coil the thread
about me. Then, if I find the cord a magic cord, Fenris shall set his
teeth upon the hand and crush it.”</p>
<p>The gods stared at one another. Surely, Thor must not
lose his hand. Thor needed his hand with which to wield the magic
hammer. <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb119" href="#pb119" name="pb119">119</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p>Then Tyre, the brave god Tyre, the god of courage and
bravery and unselfishness stepped forth.</p>
<p>“Here is my hand, O Fenris-wolf. It shall be yours
to destroy if you can not loose yourself when bound in the golden
coil.”</p>
<p>Again the Fenris-wolf showed his shining teeth. He
seized the hand between his heavy jaws; Thor bound the cord about him.
“Now free yourself,” he thundered. “Free yourself,
and prove to the gods the mighty power of the Fenris-wolf.”</p>
<p>The wolf, his eyes blazing with wrath, and with fear as
well, struggled with the coil. But alas for the wolf! And joy for the
gods! The harder he struggled, the fiercer he battled, the tighter drew
the cord. With a howl of rage that shook the city and echoed even to
the base of the great Mt. Ida, he seized upon <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb120" href="#pb120" name="pb120">120</SPAN>]</span>the
hand of Tyre and tore it from his wrist. With another angry howl he
sprang towards Thor; but with a quick turn Thor seized one end of the
coil, fastened it to a great rock, and before the wolf could set his
fangs he hurled him, rock and all, over the walls of the city, down
down into the mighty sea.</p>
<p>“And there, chained to his rocky island, he shall
abide forever,” cried the gods; “and now peace once more
shall rest upon our city.”</p>
<p>But Odin sighed, and to himself he said, “O happy
children, there shall yet come a day when darkness shall fall upon us;
the Fenris-wolf shall again be loosed; and even the gods shall be no
more.”</p>
<p></p>
<div class="figure xd21e1460width"><ANTIMG src="images/p120.png" alt=""
width="588" height="157"></div>
<p><span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb121" href="#pb121" name="pb121">121</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p></p>
<div class="figure xd21e1464width"><ANTIMG src="images/p121.jpg" alt=""
width="578" height="321"></div>
<p></p>
<h2 class="label">XVII.</h2>
<h2 class="main">DEFEAT OF HRUNGNER.</h2>
<p class="par first">Greatest among the giants of Jotunheim, was
Hrungner. Even the gods stood in fear of him; for when Thor’s
deep thunder rolled out across the skies, and the winds rose and the
clouds grew black, it was Hrungner who, bold and defiant, shouted back
with roars of scornful laughter—roars that rivalled in their
thunder those of the great and mighty Thor. <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb122" href="#pb122" name="pb122">122</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p>“This giant,” said the gods, standing in
council together,—“this giant must be overcome. Too long
have we suffered him to defy our power; too long have we borne his
insolence; too long have his threats passed unnoticed by Odin the
All-Father and by Thor the god of Thunder.”</p>
<p>“I will go forth,” said Odin, “upon my
winged horse, my fleet-footed Sleipner, to meet this giant who dares
defy the gods of Asgard.”</p>
<p>Accordingly across the skies, over the sea to Jotunheim,
rode Odin.</p>
<p>“It is a fine steed you ride, good
stranger,” bellowed Hrungner as Odin drew near; “almost as
fine a steed as my own Goldfax, who can fly through the air and swim
through the seas with the same ease that another steed might travel
upon the plains of Midgard.” <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb123"
href="#pb123" name="pb123">123</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p>“But his speed cannot equal that of
Sleipner,” answered Odin quietly, his deep eyes burning with the
light no giant could quite comprehend, and beneath which even Hrungner
quailed at heart.</p>
<p>“Sleipner! Odin!” thundered Hrungner.
“Are you Odin? And is this your Sleipner—the winged steed
of which the gods of Asgard boast? Away with him! And I upon my Goldfax
will prove to you that in Jotunheim lives one giant who dares challenge
even Odin and his mighty war-horse to contest. Away! Away Odin! Away
Sleipner! Away Hrungner! Away Goldfax!”</p>
<p>And with a shout that echoed even to the halls of
Asgard, the great giant mounted his steed and soon brought him, neck to
neck with Odin and his immortal Sleipner.</p>
<p>On, on, across the skies they flew. <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb124" href="#pb124" name="pb124">124</SPAN>]</span>Before their mighty force, the clouds scattered
hither and thither, striking against each other with a crashing sound
that to the earth-people was like the voice of Thor.</p>
<p>From the eyes of the steeds the lightnings flashed; and
from their reeking sides the foam fell in showers upon the earth below.
The people, terror-stricken, ran to their caves and prayed the gods to
protect them from the fury of the blast.</p>
<p>“It is like no storm we ever knew,” they
whispered, one to the other. “The thunder! the lightnings! the
scurrying clouds! and with it all, the roaring winds and the falling of
great white flakes, now like hail, now like snow! Has Odin forgotten
his children? Have the Frost giants fallen upon Asgard?” But now
the storm was over. Odin and Hrungner both had reached the walls of
<span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb125" href="#pb125" name="pb125">125</SPAN>]</span>Asgard. Through the great rolling gateway both
had burst together; for the steed of the bold Hrungner had indeed
proved himself equal to the snow-white Sleipner, whose magic powers no
one but Odin fully knew.</p>
<p>Hrungner, elated with his success, and never once
dreaming that, had Odin so willed it, he, with his brave steed Goldfax,
might have been left far behind in the race, strode into the halls of
Asgard and called loudly for food and drink and rest.</p>
<p>All these were granted him, and the giant threw himself
down upon a golden couch and stared insolently upon the gods. All were
there save Thor. “And where,” bellowed Hrungner, “is
the great god Thor, the mighty thunderer who dares defy the Frost
giants; and whose strength is boasted greater than that of Hrungner,
the chief of the mighty Frost giants? <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb126" href="#pb126" name="pb126">126</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p>“Bring him into my presence<span class="corr" id="xd21e1507" title="Source: .">,</span>” roared the giant.
“Let me prove to you that one giant at least dares defy even the
greatest and most warlike of you all.”</p>
<p>Away upon the sea, Thor heard this boast. “Who
challenges me and defies my power?” he thundered; and with the
swiftness of the wind, hastening upward toward the shining city, he
burst in upon the giant stretched out upon the golden couch.</p>
<p>“I challenge you!” bellowed the giant,
springing from his couch and facing the god of thunder.</p>
<p>Thor raised his hammer. The lightnings flashed from his
eye. “Halt!” roared the giant. “Little credit will it
be to the god of Thunder to fall in battle upon a Frost giant unarmed
and unprotected. You are a coward! Fight me as becomes a great god on
equal <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb127" href="#pb127" name="pb127">127</SPAN>]</span>grounds and under fair conditions. Come to me in
the land of Jotunheim, and there will I challenge you to battle. Then
will your victory, if you win, lend lustre to your greatness; and the
fear of you throughout the land of the Frost giants be greater than
ever before.”</p>
<p>“As you say,” answered Thor with a sneer.
“Go now, and make ready for the holmgang,<SPAN class="noteref" id="xd21e1520src" href="#xd21e1520" name="xd21e1520src">1</SPAN> in which the
insolent, boastful Hrungner shall learn the power of the gods whom, in
his ignorance, he dares defy.”</p>
<p>Then Hrungner departed from the city of Asgard, and
assembled the giants together to prepare for the coming battle.
“Let us make a giant of clay,” and at once every giant in
Jotunheim fell to work. Whole mountains were leveled to the earth, and
the great masses <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb128" href="#pb128"
name="pb128">128</SPAN>]</span>of stone and earth heaped high; until, on
the third day, there stood a giant nine miles high and three miles
broad, ready to defy the power of the Thunder-god when he should come.
But alas for the heart of this warrior of clay! None could be found,
either in Midgard or in Jotunheim, of size proportionate to the body of
the mighty creation; and so, in despair, the heart of a sheep was
chosen, and around it the clay warrior was built.</p>
<p>At the first sound of rolling thunder—by which the
coming of Thor was announced afar off—alas! this heart,
fluttering and trembling, so shook the mighty form that its spear fell
from its hand, its knees shook, and Hrungner was left to fight his
battle alone with the angry son of Odin.</p>
<p>Onward, nearer and nearer, came Thor the Terrible. The
lightnings flashed and the <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb129" href="#pb129" name="pb129">129</SPAN>]</span>earth rumbled. Seizing a great
mountain of flint in his hands, Hrungner waited. His eyes burned and
his face was set.</p>
<p>Suddenly, forth from the ground beneath his feet, the
god of Thunder burst. Hrungner sprang forward. With a mighty force he
hurled the mountain of flint. Thor, with a roar, flung his mighty
hammer. The two crashed together in midair. The flint broke, and one
half of it was driven into the heavy skull of Thor. The hammer,
cleaving the flint, sped onward, and Hrungner fell dead beneath its
never-failing blow; but in falling his great body lay across the neck
of Thor, who, stunned by the blow from the flint, had fallen, his
hammer still clenched firmly in his powerful hand.</p>
<p>For a moment, there was a hush. The very sun stood
still. Not a sound was heard <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb130" href="#pb130" name="pb130">130</SPAN>]</span>through Jotunheim. The thunder of
battle had died away; all the earth was still.</p>
<p>Then came Magne, a son of Thor. “Why this sudden
quiet?” he called. “Why has my father’s voice been
stilled? Certainly the great god Thor has not fallen in
battle!”</p>
<p>“In the name of Odin,” he thundered, as he
saw the Frost giant’s body lying across his father’s
massive frame,—“in the name of Odin and of Thor, what does
this mean?” And, seizing the giant by a foot, he hurled him out
over the seas. For miles and miles the giant’s body cut the air,
and then, falling, sank and was buried beneath the waves.</p>
<p>Thor staggered to his feet again, and with a roar that
made the leaves of Ygdrasil tremble and shook even the halls of
Valhalla, set forth across the seas, never once looking back towards
the land of Jotunheim, whose <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb131" href="#pb131" name="pb131">131</SPAN>]</span>people for the time, at least,
were again subdued by the power of Thor, the god of Thunder,—by
Thor, the son of Odin the All-wise.</p>
<p></p>
<div class="figure xd21e1549width"><ANTIMG src="images/p131.jpg" alt=""
width="601" height="352"></div>
<p><span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb132" href="#pb132" name="pb132">132</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p></p>
<div class="figure xd21e1553width"><ANTIMG src="images/p132.jpg" alt=""
width="580" height="236"></div>
<p></p>
</div>
<div class="footnotes">
<hr class="fnsep">
<p class="par footnote"><span class="label"><SPAN class="noteref" id="xd21e1520" href="#xd21e1520src" name="xd21e1520">1</SPAN></span>
duel. <SPAN class="fnarrow" href="#xd21e1520src">↑</SPAN></p>
<h2 class="label">XVIII.</h2>
<h2 class="main">THOR AND SKRYMER.</h2>
<p class="par first">There was peace in all the lands; stilled were the
Frost giants, and in Midgard all was happiness.</p>
<p>“Come with me, that I may see that you do no
mischief,” said Thor to Loke, as he sprang into his golden
chariot, drawn by his snow-white goats.</p>
<p>All day the chariot wheeled on and on across the skies.
Night fell, and the gods, <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb133" href="#pb133" name="pb133">133</SPAN>]</span>entering a peasant’s
cottage, asked for shelter. “Our supper we have with us,”
Thor said. And taking the goats from the chariot, he killed them and
placed them before the fire.</p>
<p>Never had the peasants taken part in such a feast.
“It is a feast for the gods,” they said; “but pray,
how will you finish your journey without your goats?”</p>
<p>“We will attend to that,” said Thor.
“Eat what you will, and all you can. I only ask that, when the
feast is finished, you promise to place all the bones together there
before the door upon the goat skins. See to it that no bone is
forgotten; and that not one—even the smallest—be lost or
broken.”</p>
<p>The peasants promised; the meat was eaten, and in due
time the household went to bed and to sleep.</p>
<p>Morning came; and with the first flush <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb134" href="#pb134" name="pb134">134</SPAN>]</span>of
light Thor arose, and, with his magic hammer, sat down beside the heap
of bones, that lay upon the goat skins before the door.</p>
<p>“Kling! Kling! Kling!” sounded the hammer,
striking in turn each little bone; then the two goats leaped forth, as
white and plump and round as ever, and as ready to spin across the
waters with the golden chariot of their master.</p>
<p>But alas, one goat was lame. He held up one tiny foot
and moaned. “Some one of you,” roared Thor, “has
broken a bone. Did I not command that you be careful, and see that
every bone should be placed, uninjured, upon the goat skins?”</p>
<p>The peasants shook with fear. They knew now who this
strange guest might be. “It is Thor!” they whispered to
each other. “And that is the mighty hammer whose aim <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb135" href="#pb135" name="pb135">135</SPAN>]</span>never fails, and whose force is death to all
upon whom it falls!”</p>
<p>“O thou great god Thor,” cried the peasants,
“spare us! Indeed had we known, not one bone would we have taken
in our unhappy fingers; and all night long would we have watched beside
the goat skins that no harm should come to them. Spare us, O spare us,
great Thor! Take all we have—our house, our cattle, our children,
everything—only spare our lives to us!”</p>
<p>Thor seized his hammer in his hand. His great knuckles
grew white, so strong was his giant hold upon the handle. The peasants
sank upon their knees. Their faces dropped and their eyes closed.
Shaking with terror, they awaited the falling of the hammer.</p>
<p>“Up, up, ye peasants,” thundered Thor.
“This offense I forgive. Your lives too, shall <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb136" href="#pb136" name="pb136">136</SPAN>]</span>be
spared you; but I will carry away with me these children of
yours,—Thjalfe and Roskva; and they shall serve me in my journeys
across the lands and over the seas.”</p>
<p>“The goats I leave with you; and I charge you, by
your lives see that no harm comes to them in any way. Come Thjalfe,
come Roskva, place yourselves before the chariot, and bear me quickly
across the seas.”</p>
<p>All day long the chariot wheeled on and on, the children
never tiring, until, at nightfall, they found themselves upon the
shores of the country of the Frost giants.</p>
<p>Plunging into a deep forest, they hurried through and
came out into a great plain beyond. Here they found a house, the very
doors of which were as high as the mountains and as broad as the
broadest river.</p>
<p>“We will rest here,” said Thor, and,
<span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb137" href="#pb137" name="pb137">137</SPAN>]</span>spreading the great skins which they found near
the doorway, they made for themselves beds, and soon were fast
asleep.</p>
<p>At midnight they were awakened by a terrible roar. The
whole house shook with its vibrations. Thor, seizing his hammer in his
strong right hand, strode to the door. The whole earth trembled, but in
the darkness even Thor could not see beyond the doorway.</p>
<p>Hour after hour he stood there, listening. Slowly, at
last, the dawn began to come; the sun rose, and there, just at the edge
of the forest, Thor saw the outstretched body of a giant, whose head
was in itself a small mountain, and whose feet stretched away into the
valley below.</p>
<p>“And it is you, then, that have rocked the very
earth with your giant snores, and have taken from me my night of
rest,” thought <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb138" href="#pb138"
name="pb138">138</SPAN>]</span>Thor, when he saw the giant form stretched
out before him.</p>
<p>With one angry stride Thor reached the side of the
sleeping giant. Raising his hammer a full mile into the air, he smote
the giant full upon the skull, with a crash that sounded like the fall
of a mighty oak.</p>
<p>“What is that?” asked the giant, opening his
sleepy eyes. “Indeed, Thor, are you here? Something awoke me. I
think an acorn must have dropped upon my head,” said the giant,
gathering himself to rise.</p>
<p>“Go to sleep again,” growled Thor; “it
isn’t morning yet. I am going to sleep myself.”</p>
<p>A few minutes and the snores of the giant rang through
the air again.</p>
<p>“Now we will see,” thought Thor. Again he
crept to the giant’s side. Lifting his <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb139" href="#pb139" name="pb139">139</SPAN>]</span>hammer, this time two miles in the air, he
brought it down upon the giant’s skull with a crash that sounded
like the breaking of the ice and the roaring of the torrent in a mighty
river.</p>
<p>“What is that?” muttered the giant, only
half awake. “A leaf must have fallen upon my forehead. I will
take myself out into the plain where I can sleep in peace.”</p>
<p>“Go to sleep,” answered Thor; “it is
nearly morning, and will be time to wake up for the day before you
reach the plain.”</p>
<p>Again the giant fell asleep; and again the snoring rang
out upon the air. “He shall not escape me this time,”
whispered Thor, creeping again to the giant’s side. Raising his
hammer, this time three miles in the air, he crashed it down upon the
forehead of the giant with such force and fury that the very heavens
reverberated; and the earth people, <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb140" href="#pb140" name="pb140">140</SPAN>]</span>springing frightened
from their deep sleep, called to each other, “The dwarfs are at
their forges! Did you not feel the earth shake and the mountains
tremble?”</p>
<p>“Well, well,” droned the sleepy giant;
“the moss from the trees falls upon my face and wakes me. It is
nearly sunrise, and I may as well arise and go on to Utgard. And you,
Thor,—I am told you, too, are journeying towards the land of
Utgard. But I must hurry on. I will meet you there; but let me give you
warning that we are a race of giants of no mean size. And great though
you are, it would be as well for you that you boast not of your power
among us. Even your mighty hammer might fail to do its work among
giants of such strength and stature as those of Skrymer’s
race.”</p>
<p>There was a sneer on Skrymer’s face as
<span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb141" href="#pb141" name="pb141">141</SPAN>]</span>he said this; but before Thor could raise his
hammer to punish him for his insolence, he had crossed the great plain,
and was already miles away. Thor sat down beside the forest. He was
mortified, and vexed, and puzzled. What did it mean? Had his hammer
lost its magic power? Was the giant Skrymer immortal? He could not
tell. There was a heavy cloud upon his face as he set forth again upon
his journey. The little servants shook with fear; even Loke kept
silent, and said not one word the live-long day.</p>
<p></p>
<div class="figure xd21e1641width"><ANTIMG src="images/p141.png" alt=""
width="309" height="143"></div>
<p><span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb142" href="#pb142" name="pb142">142</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p></p>
<div class="figure xd21e1646width"><ANTIMG src="images/p142.jpg" alt="A GIANT’S HOME." width-obs="509" height-obs="720">
<p class="figureHead">A GIANT’S HOME.</p>
</div>
<p><span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb143" href="#pb143" name="pb143">143</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p></p>
<div class="figure xd21e1652width"><ANTIMG src="images/p143.jpg" alt=""
width="582" height="387"></div>
<p></p>
<h2 class="label">XIX.</h2>
<h2 class="main">THOR AND THE UTGARD-KING.</h2>
<p class="par first">Travelling on and on, through many days and many
nights, Thor and his companions came to a great castle. Its pinnacles
reached far up among the clouds, and its great gateways were broad even
like the horizon itself.</p>
<p>In between the bars crept Thor and Loke and the children
Thjalfe and <span class="corr" id="xd21e1663" title=
"Source: Roska">Roskva</span>.</p>
<p>“Let us enter the castle,” said Thor grimly.
“It must be the palace of the king—<span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb144" href="#pb144" name="pb144">144</SPAN>]</span>the
Utgard-Loke—whose threats have defied even the All-wisdom and the
All-power of the mighty Odin.<span class="corr" id="xd21e1670" title=
"Not in source">”</span></p>
<p>At these words the walls of the castle trembled. The
pillars of frost and the great arches of ice glittered and glistened.
Thjalfe and <span class="corr" id="xd21e1675" title=
"Source: Roska">Roskva</span> grew white with fear. “We hear your
voice,” thundered Thor; “but we have no fear of you even
though you shake the castle walls until they fall. And behold, we dare
come into your very presence, thou terrible king of Utgard!”</p>
<p>The great king showed his glittering teeth. His brow
grew black with rage.</p>
<p>“This is Thor, the god of Thunder,” he
sneered: “and so small are you that you can creep through the
bars of our gateway, pass unnoticed by our sentinels, even into the
very presence of the king!” <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb145"
href="#pb145" name="pb145">145</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p>Then Utgard-Loke—for this was the king’s
name—threw back his head and laughed until the whole earth shook;
trees were uprooted, and avalanches of ice and snow, pouring down into
valleys, buried hundreds of the little people of Midgard.</p>
<p>Thor clenched his hammer. He dared not thunder; even his
lightnings were as nothing in this great palace hall and before the
terrible voice of the Utgard-king.</p>
<p>“But perhaps you are greater than you look,”
continued the king, roaring again at his own wit. “Tell me what
great feats you can accomplish; for no one is allowed entrance to this
castle who cannot perform great deeds.”</p>
<p>“I can perform great deeds—many of
them,” boasted Loke, nowise abashed, even in the presence of the
terrible king. “I can eat faster than any creature in Midgard, in
<span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb146" href="#pb146" name="pb146">146</SPAN>]</span>Utgard, or even in Asgard, the home of the
gods.”</p>
<p>Again the king roared; and, placing before him a great
wooden trough heaped high with food, he commanded his servant Loge to
challenge Loke to the contest.</p>
<p>But alas for Loke, although the food disappeared before
him like fields of grain beneath the scythe of steel, yet before the
task was half begun, Loge had swallowed food, and trough, and all!</p>
<p>The king roared louder still; and Loke, never before
beaten by giant power, shrank away, angry and threatening.</p>
<p>“But I,” said Thjalfe, “can run. I can
outrun any creature that lives on land or sea.”</p>
<p>Then Thjalfe was placed beside a tiny little
pigmy—Huge he was called; but hardly had they run a pace before
Huge had shot so <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb147" href="#pb147"
name="pb147">147</SPAN>]</span>far ahead that Thjalfe, crestfallen, went
and hid himself behind the great ice pillar that stood outside the
castle gate.</p>
<p>And now Thor rose to his feet and drew himself up to his
greatest height; but even that seemed as nothing compared with the
enormous stature of the Utgard-king. He clenched the hammer tightly and
thundered as never he had thundered before. The tiny fringe of icicles
trembled. Then Utgard-Loke laughed; and with his thunder the whole
castle rocked and reeled.</p>
<p>“And will Thor contest with the power of
Utgard?” asked the king. “I will,” roared Thor, and
there was a fire in his eye that even Utgard shrank before.</p>
<p>But Utgard only roared in turn and brought to Thor a
great horn, filled to its brim with sparkling water. <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb148" href="#pb148" name="pb148">148</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p>“Drink,” said he; “and if one half the
power is yours that Odin claims, you will empty the horn at a single
draught.”</p>
<p>Thor seized the horn. One long, deep draught, such as no
mortal, no giant, nor even another god could have drawn—and the
horn was hardly one drop less full.</p>
<p>The king roared till the icicles and the fringes of
frost, swaying and rocking beneath the thunder, fell with a crash upon
the palace floor.</p>
<p>“Can the great god Thor boast no greater power
than that? Once more, thou greatest of all the sons of Odin—once
more lift the horn in thy mighty hands and show us the greatness of the
gods of Asgard.”</p>
<p>Thor, stung by the sneer of the Utgard-king, raised the
horn again to his lips; and calling upon the name of Odin and all the
<span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb149" href="#pb149" name="pb149">149</SPAN>]</span>gods of the shining city, drank again. Higher
and higher he raised the horn, deeper and deeper drew he the draught.
But alas, again, when the horn was lowered, the waters were no lower
than before.</p>
<p>“You seem not so great as we the frost giants have
believed,” said the king with a cold sneer.</p>
<p>Thor’s anger rose. His blood boiled with rage and
fury. With a burst of thunder and a flash of lightning that shattered
the pillars of the great hall, he seized the horn again. Three long
hours passed. Utgard-Loke trembled with fear and dread; for never for
one second had the angry god taken the horn from his lips. “The
ruin of the Utgard kingdom is come,” he groaned. “There is
no hope for victory over such a god. The horn—even the magic
horn—will fail before the <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb150"
href="#pb150" name="pb150">150</SPAN>]</span>might of this fierce and
awful Thor, the god of Thunder.”</p>
<p>Then Thor lifted the horn from his lips. Defiance
flashed from his eye. The king of the Frost giants trembled. Both
looked into the horn. Alas for Thor! Even now hardly could it be
counted one quarter emptied. Darkness gathered over the strong
god’s face. Courage sprang into the eyes of the king. “Let
not your valor fail you,” said the king, taking the horn from the
hand of Thor. “You are great—you have proved it, in that
you have, even in so small a degree as this, emptied the horn from
which none but a god could have quaffed one drop. It is only that your
greatness is less than you have boasted, and less than we have believed
it to be.”</p>
<p>“I will not stand defeated,” thundered Thor.
“Bring before me another challenge. <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb151" href="#pb151" name="pb151">151</SPAN>]</span>I will not go forth
until the giants of Utgard have indeed known and felt the power of
Thor, the god whose lightnings rend the skies, and whose thunders rock
the very mountains of the earth.”</p>
<p>“Once more, then, shall you contend for
power,” said the Utgard-king. “And this time with Elle, the
toothless giant of endless years, before whose power bend all the
strongest sons of Midgard, and before whom, in some far off day, even
the gods of Asgard shall bow as powerless as the children of
Midgard.”</p>
<p>Thor sprang upon the giant Elle. Like a demon of the
under world he fought, and for a time even this All-conquering giant
swayed before the wild madness of his bursts of thunder, and his
crashing, hissing bolts of fire. But alas for Thor! Even his godlike
strength was doomed to fail him. He trembled; his <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb152" href="#pb152" name="pb152">152</SPAN>]</span>sight vanished; a strange chill settled over
him, and he sank, conquered, before the power of the giant Elle.</p>
<p>And now the night had fallen upon the land. The light
had faded from the mountain tops; and the chill of night was in the
frosty air. Exhausted, the great god wrapped himself about and sank
into heavy sleep. And his dreams were of great battles, of terrible
foes, and of the last great day which, sometime in the ages to come,
should fall upon the city of the gods, and in which even the power of
Odin should fail, and the light go out from all the earth. All night
long these dreams haunted the great heart of Thor; and in the morning
the people in Midgard said, “It was a strange night. Through all
the hours of darkness, the thunders rolled in the distance, and the
pale lightnings flashed <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb153" href="#pb153" name="pb153">153</SPAN>]</span>among the mountain peaks beyond
the seas.”</p>
<p>In the morning, even with the first rays of light, Thor,
with Loke and Thjalfe and Roskva, set forth upon their journey
homeward. There was a terrible blackness upon the face of Thor, and the
thunders rumbled deeply. Never before had Thor known the bitterness of
defeat, and he returned to Asgard and to Odin sick at heart.</p>
<p>“Lose not thy courage, Thor,” said the
All-wise. “Know that thou art not even now defeated in any test
of true strength. Utgard-Loke has triumphed to be sure; but even he
trembles now, and has closed the doors of his castle, and has set
thousands upon thousands of sentinels to watch against thy return.</p>
<p><span class="corr" id="xd21e1754" title=
"Not in source">“</span>The horn from which thou didst drink
reached far down into the depths of the sea; <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb154" href="#pb154" name="pb154">154</SPAN>]</span>and
the people of Midgard even now throng the shores and wonder what power
in heaven or in earth can so have shrunken the great waters of the
sea.</p>
<p><span class="corr" id="xd21e1760" title=
"Not in source">“</span>Loge, with whom Loke contended, was none
less than Wild Fire; and Huge was Thought itself. Even the gods, even
Odin himself, with these would but contend in vain. And Elle—it
is indeed as Utgard-Loke said—no power in heaven itself can equal
hers. She is the all-powerful, the never-failing, the ever-present Old
Age. All the people of the earth, all the gods of Asgard—aye,
even the Earth and Asgard must one day fall before her mighty will.
That you contended even as you did, has driven terror deep into the
hearts of the cruel Frost giants; nor do they doubt that you are the
terrible god of Thunder, the greatest of all the sons of Odin.”
<span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb155" href="#pb155" name="pb155">155</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p></p>
<div class="figure xd21e1765width"><ANTIMG src="images/p155.jpg" alt=""
width="557" height="291"></div>
<p></p>
<h2 class="label">XX.</h2>
<h2 class="main">THOR AND THE MIDGARD SERPENT.</h2>
<p class="par first">With these words of Odin, Thor’s courage
rose. “Bring me my hammer,” he called to Sif, “and
again will I go forth into the realms of the Frost giants.”</p>
<p>The great Odin smiled. “Fear not, my son. Remember
there can be no defeat to Thor, the son of Odin, whose mighty hand
holds firm the terrible hammer forged by the dwarfs of the under
world.” <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb156" href="#pb156" name="pb156">156</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p>Then Thor sprang into his chariot. “Away,
away,” he thundered, “to the home of Hymer—the
hateful, boastful Hymer! Away to the land of the Frost giants! Once,
and for all, Thor will prove to them the power and the terror of the
gods of Asgard.”</p>
<p>The wheels of the chariot rumbled and rolled. From their
spokes the lightnings flashed. With the speed of Thought itself, it
hissed and whistled through the air. The clouds, scattering, raised a
mighty wind.</p>
<p>In Midgard the leaves ran like fire before the gale; the
trees rocked; and ever and anon the moaning wind rose and fell like the
voice of a mighty tempest.</p>
<p>“It is the Valkyries!” the people of Midgard
said. “Always does the wind rise; always do the clouds hurry
across the skies when the Valkyries set forth to battle. Somewhere
<span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb157" href="#pb157" name="pb157">157</SPAN>]</span>there is war in our fair earth; somewhere heroes
are falling on the bloody battlefield.”</p>
<p>For, in all this time, there had come to be many people
in Midgard. The children of Ask and Embla had become men and women, had
grown old, and their children, too, had become men and women.</p>
<p>And there were wars in the land. Warriors in the east
fought those in the west; those in the north fought those in the
south.</p>
<p>But the warriors were brave men; and over every battle
Odin watched, grinding the spears, now shielding and protecting, now
forcing the warriors into the very hottest of the battle. And when the
battle was over, and all was quiet, when the great sun had sunk behind
the hills of Jotunheim, and the soft moon shone down upon the
battlefield, then Odin would call to the Valkyries, <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb158" href="#pb158" name="pb158">158</SPAN>]</span>and
bid them go down into Midgard and bring with them to Valhalla all who
had fallen bravely fighting. For this was the hero’s reward. With
this hope he entered battle; with this hope he fought; with this hope
he turned his dying eyes towards Mt. Ida and thanked the All-father
that now he, too, might enter into the joys of Asgard and know the
glory of immortal life in the golden halls of Valhalla.</p>
<p>And now the winds had died away; the clouds were at
rest; there was peace over Midgard. For the chariot had reached the
home of the Frost giants, and Thor had entered the great rock-bound
castle of the giant Hymer.</p>
<p>“Let us go out upon the sea to fish,” said
Thor to the dread giant, with whom he longed to measure power.
<span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb159" href="#pb159" name="pb159">159</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p>Seizing the oars, Thor himself rowed the great boat out
into the sea. “Give me the oars,” bellowed Hymer;
“you have already rowed a long way and must be
wearied.”</p>
<p>“I wearied!” thundered Thor. “Indeed I
have not rowed one half the distance. I shall row even into the realm
of the Midgard Serpent, whose length lies coiled round about Midgard,
and whose home is deep down beneath the raging waters. There only shall
we find fish worthy of the bait of a god.”</p>
<p>Hymer trembled. He feared the Midgard Serpent, whose
great coils so lashed the waters of the ocean that they rose, white
with foam, even to the very mountain tops. “The fishing just here
has never failed. There is no need to row farther into the
ocean,” said Hymer, hoping to dissuade the god from rowing
farther from the shores of Jotunheim. <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb160" href="#pb160" name="pb160">160</SPAN>]</span>“But I must
fish in mid-ocean, and in the deepest of the waters,” was
Thor’s reply.</p>
<p>For hours and hours they rowed. The mountain tops grew
dimmer and dimmer in the blue distance; no land could be seen; the
waters sparkled and shone on every side as far as the eye could
reach.</p>
<p>“We will make this our fishing place,” said
Thor, at last, throwing down his oars and preparing the great cable
that should serve him for a line. This he gave into the hands of the
trembling giant, and prepared for himself another. The hours passed,
but no fish had been drawn into the boat.</p>
<p>“Had you listened to me,” thundered Hymer,
“our boat might long before this have been filled with the fish I
have never failed to catch in waters nearer the shores of the land of
the Frost giants.” <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb161" href="#pb161" name="pb161">161</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p>“Do you think a god would be content with less
than the greatest fish in all the sea?” thundered Thor. “Do
you not know I shall bring to this boat’s edge the terrible
Midgard Serpent itself?”</p>
<p>And even as he spoke he gathered in his line, and dashed
upon the boat floor a whale of such enormous size that even the giant
looked with amazement upon so terrible a display of the
fisherman’s strength and power. Surely this must be Thor
himself!</p>
<p>“The whale is yours,” muttered Thor,
unfastening his line and throwing it overboard again. “I have no
care for fish as small as this.”</p>
<p>Suddenly there was a rush of waters. It was as if a
terrible tempest had burst upon the sea. The waters seethed and foamed.
The great waves rose mountain high. The <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb162" href="#pb162" name="pb162">162</SPAN>]</span>boat rocked and
reeled, and the green waters, pouring over its sides, filled it so that
the great whale floated out upon the sea.</p>
<p>“It is the Midgard Serpent!” roared Thor;
and his mighty voice, rising even above the rush of the great sea,
mingled with the thunder of the breaking waves and echoed out to the
shores of the farthest lands.</p>
<p>Thor sprang from the boat and planted himself firmly
upon the great rocks beneath the sea. The giant, dumb with terror,
clung to the sides of the rocking boat. On, on came the serpent, nearer
and nearer, the roaring waves and the heaping foam bursting closer and
closer upon the mountain-like boat that tossed now like seaweed upon
the angry waters.</p>
<p>One burst like thunder, and the terrible serpent’s
head rose above the foam and <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb163" href="#pb163" name="pb163">163</SPAN>]</span>glistened in the light. Thor
sprang forward; and, with his mighty arm, threw the cable about the
slimy neck of the Midgard Serpent and dragged him to the boat’s
edge. The giant sprang to his feet.</p>
<p>“Give me my hammer!” thundered the god.</p>
<p>“I will not!” thundered the giant; and with
one quick bound he sprang forward, raised his shining sword, and with a
sweep miles high, cut the great cable which held the writhing
serpent.</p>
<p>Another roar, and the great serpent arched his back even
to the blue dome of the sky above. Then, with a hiss that sounded
through Midgard and even up to the shining city of the fair Mt. Ida, he
shot down beneath the waters, and over him closed the angry waves.
<span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb164" href="#pb164" name="pb164">164</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p>The foam dashed mountains high; the caves howled and
boomed; the skies echoed crash on crash; and the whole earth trembled
with the upheaval of the troubled waters. A rushing back, a heaping up,
a breaking of great waves—and never again, by man or giant or
god, was the loathsome serpent seen above the waters, until on that
last sad, fateful day when the light had gone out from the sun, and the
dread chill of Ragnarok had fallen even upon Valhalla and the beautiful
shining city of Asgard.</p>
<p></p>
<div class="figure xd21e1845width"><ANTIMG src="images/p164.png" alt=""
width="583" height="168"></div>
<p></p>
<p></p>
<div class="figure xd21e1849width"><ANTIMG src="images/p_valkyrie.jpg" alt="" width-obs="454" height-obs="720"></div>
<p><span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb165" href="#pb165" name="pb165">165</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p></p>
<div class="figure xd21e1853width"><ANTIMG src="images/p165.png" alt="A NORSE GALLEY." width-obs="411" height-obs="339">
<p class="figureHead">A NORSE GALLEY.</p>
</div>
<p></p>
<h2 class="main">VALKYRIES’ SONG.</h2>
<div class="lg">
<p class="line">The Sea-king looked o’er the brooding wave;</p>
<p class="line xd21e1864">He turned to the dusky shore,</p>
<p class="line">And there seemed, through the arch of a tide-worn
cave</p>
<p class="line xd21e1864">A gleam, as of snow, to pour;</p>
<p class="line xd21e1870">And forth, in watery light,</p>
<p class="line xd21e1870">Moved phantoms, dimly white,</p>
<p class="line xd21e1864">Which the garb of woman bore.</p>
</div>
<div class="lg">
<p class="line">Slowly they moved to the billow side;</p>
<p class="line xd21e1864">And the forms, as they grew more clear,</p>
<p class="line">Seemed each on a tall, pale steed to ride,</p>
<p class="line xd21e1864">And a shadowy crest to rear,<span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb166" href="#pb166" name="pb166">166</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p class="line xd21e1870">And to beckon with faint hand,</p>
<p class="line xd21e1870">From the dark and rocky strand,</p>
<p class="line xd21e1864">And to point a gleaming spear.</p>
</div>
<div class="lg">
<p class="line">Then a stillness on his spirit fell,</p>
<p class="line xd21e1864">Before th’ unearthly train,</p>
<p class="line">For he knew Valhalla’s daughters well,</p>
<p class="line xd21e1864">The Choosers of the slain!</p>
<p class="line xd21e1870">And a sudden rising breeze</p>
<p class="line xd21e1870">Bore, across the moaning seas,</p>
<p class="line xd21e1864">To his ear their thrilling strain.</p>
</div>
<p class="tb">* * *</p>
<div class="lg">
<p class="line">“Regner! tell thy fair-haired bride</p>
<p class="line">She must slumber at thy side!</p>
<p class="line">Tell the brother of thy breast,</p>
<p class="line">Even for him thy grave hath rest!</p>
<p class="line">Tell the raven steed which bore thee,</p>
<p class="line">When the wild wolf fled before thee,</p>
<p class="line">He too with his lord must fall,—</p>
<p class="line">There is room in Odin’s Hall!”</p>
</div>
<p class="tb">* * *</p>
<div class="lg">
<p class="line">There was arming heard on land and wave,</p>
<p class="line xd21e1864">When afar the sunlight spread,</p>
<p class="line">And the phantom forms of the tide-worn cave</p>
<p class="line xd21e1864">With the mists of morning fled;</p>
<p class="line xd21e1870">But at eve, the kingly hand</p>
<p class="line xd21e1870">Of the battle-axe and brand,</p>
<p class="line xd21e1864">Lay cold on a pile of
dead!—<i>Hemans.</i></p>
<p><span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb167" href="#pb167" name="pb167">167</SPAN>]</span></p>
</div>
<p></p>
<div class="figure xd21e1946width"><ANTIMG src="images/p167.png" alt=""
width="626" height="233"></div>
<p></p>
<h2 class="label">XXI.</h2>
<h2 class="main">THE DYING BALDUR.</h2>
<p class="par first">Ages upon ages had rolled away. And now the day of
sorrow, which always Odin had known must come, drew near.</p>
<p>Already the god of song had gone with his beautiful wife
Idun down into the dark valley of death; and there was a new strange
rustle among the leaves of Ygdrasil, like the rustling of leaves that
were dead.</p>
<p>Odin’s face grew sad; and, try as he would, he
could not join with the happy gods about him in their joys and festal
games. <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb168" href="#pb168" name="pb168">168</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p>“Odin,” said Frigg one day, “tell me
what grieves thee; what weighs thee down and puts such sadness into
thine eyes and heart.”</p>
<p>“Baldur himself shall tell you all,”
answered Odin sadly.</p>
<p>Then Baldur seated himself in the midst of the gods and
said: “Always, since Odin drank at the Well of Wisdom, and
learned the secrets of the past and of the future, has he known that a
time would come when the light must go out from Baldur’s eyes;
and he, although a god, must go down into the dark valley. Now that
time draws near. Already have Brage and Idun gone from us; and with
them have gone song and youth. Soon will Baldur go, and with him must
go the light and warmth he has always been so glad to bring to Asgard
and to Midgard both.” <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb169" href="#pb169" name="pb169">169</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p>“O Baldur! Baldur! Baldur! My Child! my child! my
child!” cried Frigg. “This cannot be! this shall not be! I
will go down from Asgard. I will go up and down the earth, and every
rock and tree and plant shall pledge themselves to do no harm to
thee.”</p>
<p>“Dear mother Frigg,” sighed Baldur,
“you cannot change what is foretold. From the beginning of time
this was decreed, that one day the light should go out from heaven and
the twilight of the gods should fall.”</p>
<p>There was a long silence in the hall of Asgard. No god
had courage to speak. Their hearts were heavy, and they had no wish to
speak.</p>
<p>The sun sank behind the western hills. Its rich sunset
glow spread over the golden city and over the beautiful earth below.
Then darkness followed slowly, slowly creeping, <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb170" href="#pb170" name="pb170">170</SPAN>]</span>creeping on, up the mountain side, across the
summit, until even the shining city stood dark and shadowy beneath the
gathering twilight.</p>
<p>“Like this, some day, the twilight will fall upon
our city,” said Odin; “and it will never, never rise
again.”</p>
<p>The mother heart of Frigg would not accept even
Odin’s word. And when the sun’s first rays shot up above
the far-off hills, Frigg stole forth from Asgard down the rainbow
bridge to Midgard.</p>
<p>To every lake, and river, and sea, she hurried, and
said: “Promise me, O waters, that Baldur’s light shall
never go out because of you.”</p>
<p>“We promise,” the waters answered. And Frigg
hurried on to the metals. “Promise me, O metals, that
Baldur’s light shall never go out because of you.”
<span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb171" href="#pb171" name="pb171">171</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p>“We promise,” answered the metals. And Frigg
hurried on to the minerals. “Promise me, O minerals,” she
said, “that Baldur’s light shall never go out because of
you.”</p>
<p></p>
<div class="figure xd21e1990width"><ANTIMG src="images/p171.png" alt=""
width="598" height="419"></div>
<p></p>
<p>“We promise,” answered the minerals. And
Frigg hurried on to the fire, the earth, the stones, the trees, the
shrubs, the grasses, the birds, the beasts, the reptiles; and even to
<span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb172" href="#pb172" name="pb172">172</SPAN>]</span>the abode of pale disease she went. Of each she
asked the same earnest, anxious question; and from each she received
the same kind, honest answer.</p>
<p>As the sun sank behind the high peaks of the Frost
giants’ homes, Frigg, radiant and happy, her eyes bright and her
heart alive with hope, sped up the rainbow bridge. Triumphant, she
hurried into the great hall to Odin and Baldur.</p>
<p>“Be happy again, O Odin! Be happy again, O Baldur!
There is no danger, no sorrow to come to us from anything in the earth
or under the earth. For every tree has promised me; and every rock and
every metal; every animal and every bird. Even the waters and the fire
have promised that never harm through them shall come to
Baldur.”</p>
<p>But, alas, for poor Frigg. One little <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb173" href="#pb173" name="pb173">173</SPAN>]</span>weed, a wee little weed, hidden beneath a rock,
she had overlooked. Loke, who had followed closely upon her in all her
wanderings through the day, had not failed to notice this oversight of
Frigg’s. His wicked face shone with glee. His eyes gleamed; and
as the radiant Frigg sped up the rainbow bridge, he hurried away to his
home among the Frost giants to tell them of the little weed which, by
and by, should work such harm to Baldur, in shutting out his life and
light from Asgard and the earth.</p>
<p>The ages rolled on. Every one in Asgard, save Odin, had
long ago thrown off the shadow of fear. “No harm can come to
Baldur,” they would say; and all save Odin believed it.</p>
<p>But a day came when Odin, looking down into the home of
the dead, saw there the <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb174" href="#pb174" name="pb174">174</SPAN>]</span>spirits moving about, hastening
hither and thither.</p>
<p>“Something is happening there in the pale
valley,” said Odin. “They are preparing for the coming of
another shade. And it must be some great one who is to come. See how
great the preparation is they make.”</p>
<p>“We prepare for the coming of Baldur,”
answered the shades as Odin came upon them, busy in their work.
“We prepare a throne for Baldur. We prepare a throne for
Baldur.”</p>
<p>“For Baldur?” asked Odin, his heart sinking.
“For Baldur!” chanted the shades. “For Baldur! Baldur
cometh! Baldur cometh!”</p>
<p>And Odin, his godlike heart faint and sick at the
thought, turned away and went slowly up the rainbow bridge.</p>
<p>There, in the great garden of the gods, he found Thor
and Baldur and their brother <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb175" href="#pb175" name="pb175">175</SPAN>]</span>Hodor playing at tests of
strength. Behind Hodor, invisible, stood Loke. In his hand he held a
spear.</p>
<p>“Shame upon you, Hodor,” whispered Loke,
“that you, the strong and mighty Hodor, cannot overcome Baldur in
a test of strength. Baldur may be beautiful and sunny, and he is a
great joy to the world; that we know. But what is he compared with
Hodor for strength?”</p>
<p>“But the spears will not touch him. See how they
glance away. Indeed it is true: Light cannot be pierced.”
answered Hodor, good-naturedly.</p>
<p>“Take this spear,” said Loke, quietly.
“It is less clumsy than those you throw.”</p>
<p></p>
<div class="figure xd21e2030width"><ANTIMG src="images/p176.png" alt="BALDUR, THE BEAUTIFUL, IS DEAD." width-obs="489" height-obs="720">
<p class="figureHead">BALDUR, THE BEAUTIFUL, IS DEAD.</p>
</div>
<p></p>
<p>Hodor took it, never thinking of any harm. Alas for
Baldur and Asgard and all the happy smiling Earth! It was a spear
tipped with the mistletoe—the one plant that <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb177" href="#pb177" name="pb177">177</SPAN>]</span>Frigg had failed to find. The one plant that had
not promised to do no harm to Baldur.</p>
<p>Quickly the spear flew through the air. One second, and
Baldur the Summer Spirit, Baldur the Light of the Earth
fell—dead.</p>
<p>“O, Asgard! Baldur is dead!” groaned Odin.
“O Asgard, Asgard! Baldur is dead!”</p>
<p>Hodor, Thor, the gods, one and all, stood pale and
white. A terrible fear settled over their faces. They shook with
terror.</p>
<p>And even as they stood there, speechless in their grief,
a twilight dimness began to fall lightly, lightly over all. The shining
pavements grew less bright; the blue of the great arch overhead
deepened; and in the valleys of Midgard there were long black shadows.
Baldur was dead. The light had failed. The golden age was at an end.
Now, even the gods must die. <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb178" href="#pb178" name="pb178">178</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p></p>
<div class="figure xd21e2049width"><ANTIMG src="images/p178.png" alt=""
width="598" height="343"></div>
<p></p>
<h2 class="label">XXII.</h2>
<h2 class="main">THE PUNISHMENT OF LOKE.</h2>
<p class="par first">“It is Loke that has done this!”
thundered Thor, seizing the great hammer in his clenched fists.
“Nor will the gods of Asgard forgive this crime. No promise of
his, no begging, no pleading shall save him from the punishment that
belongs to him.</p>
<p>“O Baldur, Baldur! That I had slain the evil Loke
ages upon ages ago—when he stole the hair from the glorious Sif;
when he <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb179" href="#pb179" name="pb179">179</SPAN>]</span>stole the necklace from the beautiful Freyja;
when he carried Idun and the Apples of Life away into the home of the
Frost giants; when he stung the dwarf and broke short the handle of my
mighty hammer. Had I slain him then, this sorrow need not have come to
us. O Baldur, Baldur!”</p>
<p>And the whole earth shook with the grief of Thor. The
skies grew black. The wind shrieked. The lightnings flashed across the
sky. His tears fell in torrents down the mountain sides; trees were
swept away, and the swollen rivers rushed and roared along their
course.</p>
<p>Never, even in the memory of the gaunt old giant at the
Well of Wisdom, had such a storm of wind and rain and thunder and
lightning been known. The earth-people fled to the mountain caves in
terror. <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb180" href="#pb180" name="pb180">180</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p>“It is the wrath of Thor!” cried Loke,
gasping with dread. “Let me hide myself till it is over.”
And changing himself into a fish, he dived deep into the great seething
mass of angry waters.</p>
<p>But Thor and Odin were close upon him. The fiery eye of
Thor had caught the sparkle of its shiny coat as the great fish shot
down from the mountain side into the sea. Then, too, of what use was it
to hide from the great, all-seeing eye of Odin? Did he not see and hear
all sights and sounds? And, more than that, did he not know all things
even from the beginning?</p>
<p>“We will take a great net, and we will drag the
sea,” said Odin quietly.</p>
<p>Loke heard these words and trembled. He hid himself
beneath the sea-weed; but so muddy were the waters that he was driven
out <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb181" href="#pb181" name="pb181">181</SPAN>]</span>to breathe. The great net was spread. Held by
the hands of Odin and of Thor, there was no escape for Loke. Sullenly
he allowed the net to close over him. There was no other way; for it
stretched from shore to shore and from above the waters even to the
ocean bed.</p>
<p>And so, at last, because it was to be, the fish held;
and Loke was in the power of the angry Thor.</p>
<p>“Come back,” commanded Odin, “to your
own shape and size.” Loke obeyed; and in his own form was borne
to Asgard. The angry gods fell, one and all, upon him. Not one showed
pity for him. They hated him. And well they might; for had he not slain
Baldur, and so loosed the power of the Frost giants upon their shining
city.</p>
<p>“Let him be bound! Let him be bound!” they
cried. <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb182" href="#pb182" name="pb182">182</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p></p>
<div class="figure xd21e2086width"><ANTIMG src="images/p182.png" alt="LOKE IN CHAINS." width-obs="356" height-obs="620">
<p class="figureHead">LOKE IN CHAINS.</p>
<p class="par first">From an Ancient Scandinavian Stone.</p>
</div>
<p></p>
<p>“Let him be bound even as the Fenris-wolf is
bound!”</p>
<p>“Let him be bound with iron fetters!”
<span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb183" href="#pb183" name="pb183">183</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p>“Let him be nailed to the great rocks in the
sea!”</p>
<p>“Let a poisonous serpent hang over him; and let
the serpent drop, moment by moment, through all the time to come, his
burning poison upon him! Let him lie there, chained and suffering till
the last great day!”</p>
<p>“All this shall be,” thundered Thor. And
thus it was that the cruel, evil-hearted, peace-destroyer Loke,
suffered ages upon ages of punishment for his malice and his crime.</p>
<p></p>
<div class="figure xd21e2104width"><ANTIMG src="images/p183.png" alt=""
width="291" height="135"></div>
<p><span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb184" href="#pb184" name="pb184">184</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p></p>
<div class="figure xd21e2108width"><ANTIMG src="images/p184.jpg" alt="THE NORNS." width-obs="545" height-obs="720">
<p class="figureHead">THE NORNS.</p>
</div>
<p><span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb185" href="#pb185" name="pb185">185</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p></p>
<div class="figure xd21e2114width"><ANTIMG src="images/p185.png" alt=""
width="593" height="335"></div>
<p></p>
<h2 class="label">XXIII.</h2>
<h2 class="main">THE DARKNESS THAT FELL ON ASGARD.</h2>
<p class="par first">The gods had avenged themselves upon the cruel
Peace-destroyer, and he lay suffering the tortures they had put upon
him.</p>
<p>But even this could not bring back the sunny god, the
happy, cheerful, life-giving Baldur. Brage had gone, and there was no
sound of music in Asgard; Idun had gone, and signs of age were again
creeping over the <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb186" href="#pb186"
name="pb186">186</SPAN>]</span>faces of the gods; now Baldur was gone, and
with him the long light and warm softness of the summer time.</p>
<p>“He may come back,” Frigg would say; and
every morning she strained her eyes to see if he had risen from behind
the far-off hills with the soft light she had learned to know so well.
“Baldur is late,” she would say, as the days rolled on.</p>
<p>But all this time, from the cold north land, the Frost
giants, triumphant, were drawing near. Their chill breath was in the
air. The days grew short; the nights grew long. The rivers were locked
in ice. Great drifts of snow were everywhere. The sky was gray; and
there were no stars. The sun shone pale and white through the dull
clouds and the blinding drifts of snow. It grew bitter, bitter cold.
<span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb187" href="#pb187" name="pb187">187</SPAN>]</span></p>
<p>“The Fimbul-winter!” whispered the
earth-people. “Has the Fimbul-winter come?” And Odin
answered, “Yes; it is true. The Fimbul-winter, foretold by the
Norns, even from the beginning of time, has come. Soon the great wolf
will spring forth from the under world, and he will seize upon the sun
and devour it. Then dense darkness will fall upon us; and
Ragnarok—the end of all things—will be upon us.”</p>
<p>And it came to pass as Odin said. One day there was
heard a mighty rumbling. This time it was not the thunder from the
mighty hammer of great Thor. His hands were frozen; nor had he heart to
try to wield his hammer.</p>
<p>The thunder and the rumble came this time from within
the earth. The great earth trembled and shook. Great gaping mouths
<span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb188" href="#pb188" name="pb188">188</SPAN>]</span>opened and swallowed up the children; the
mountains crumbled and fell; the great serpent lashed the sea; the
great rocks rocked and swayed and tore themselves apart. Loke and the
Fenris-wolf, freed from their fetters, sprang forth, burning with hate
and wild for vengeance. The Frost giants already were upon the rainbow
bridge. A terrible battle followed.</p>
<p>The gods fell, one by one: Thor by the deadly flood of
poison from the Midgard serpent; Tyre in the great jaws of the
Fenris-wolf, who, ages before, had torn from him his strong right
hand.</p>
<p>And now the battle was over. The gods lay
dead—even Odin. The shining city of Asgard was a blackened,
smoking ruin; the rainbow bridge was gone. The giants sent forth their
cold winds, howling with cruel glee. <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb189" href="#pb189" name="pb189">189</SPAN>]</span>Loke’s evil
heart was glad; the great serpent lashed the waters mountain high; and
the earth-people perished in the flood. The Fenris-wolf stretched its
great jaw from heaven to earth and shook the skies.</p>
<p>There was a strange hush! A great ball of fire had
fallen upon the battle field. There was a sudden rush of air! A great
wave of heat spread out across all space! A burst of thunder! A
crackling as of fire! Then one hiss, and the whole earth was one great
scorching blaze.</p>
<p>One second—a fierce red tongue of flame had shot
up the trunk of Ygdrasil, and it fell, a mass of blackened ashes. The
sea hissed and steamed. The earth melted. The Frost giants, Loke, the
serpent, the Fenris-wolf, all, all were wrapped in flame. A second
more, and there was no living thing in all the earth. <span class="pagenum">[<SPAN name="pb190" href="#pb190" name="pb190">190</SPAN>]</span>For
Ragnarok, the Reign of Fire, had come; and with it came an end to
Life—and end alike to gods and giants; an end to all creatures of
the land and sea; an end even to the great earth itself.</p>
<p></p>
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