youngest son, great in fame, but
still greater in deeds; the skjalds (bards) and foster-brothers sit
nearest to him. They defended the coasts of their countrymen, and the
pious women; they fetched wheat and honey from England, they went to
the White Sea for sables and furs--their adventures are related in
song. We see the old man ride in rich clothing, with gloves sewn with
golden thread, and with a hat brought from Garderige; we see the youth
with a golden fillet around his brow; we see him at the _Thing_; we
see him in battle and in play, where the best is he that can cut off
the other's eyebrows without scratching the skin, or causing a wink
with the eyes, on pain of losing his station. The woman sits in the
log-house at her loom, and in the late moonlight nights the spirits of
the fallen come and sit down around the fire, where they shake the
wet, dripping clothes; but the serf sleeps in the ashes, and on the
kitchen bench, and dreams that he dips his bread in the fat soup, and
licks his fingers.

Thou future poet, thou wilt call forth the vanished forms from the
Sagas, thou wilt people these islands, and let us glide past these
reminiscences of the olden time with the mind full of them; clearly
and truly wilt thou let us glide, as we now with the power of steam
fly past that firmly standing scenery, the swelling sea, rocks and
reefs, the main land, and wood-grown islands.

We are already past Braavigen, where numberless ships from the
northern kingdoms lay, when Upsala's King, Sigurd Ring, came,
challenged by Harald Hildetand, who, old and grey, feared to die on a
sick bed, and would fall in battle; and the mainland thundered like
the plains of Marathon beneath the tramp of horses' hoofs during the
battle:[F] bards and female warriors surrounded the Danish King. The
blind old man raised himself high in his chariot, gave his horse free
rein, and hewed his way. Odin himself had due reverence paid to
Hildetand's bones; and the pile was kindled, and the King laid on it,
and Sigurd conjured all to cast gold and weapons, the most valuable
they possessed, into the fire; and the bards sang to it, and the
female warriors struck the spears on the bright shields. Upsala's
Lord, Sigurd Ring, became King of Sweden and Denmark: so says the
Saga, which sounded over the land and water from these coasts.

[Footnote F: The battle of Braavalla.]

The memorials of olden times pass swiftly through our thoughts; we fly
past the sce