afterwards by their being kept and named as dogs; they come to their
own and avenge their wrongs.

The "Journey to Hell" story is told of Eric, who goes to a far land to
fetch a princess back, and is successful. It is apparently an adventure
of Swipdag, if everyone had their rights. It is also told of Thorkill,
whose adventures are rather of the "True Thomas" type.

The "Test of Endurance" by sitting between fires, and the relief of the
tortured and patient hero by a kindly trick, is a variant of the famous
Eddic Lays concerning Agnar.

The "Robbers of the Island", evidently comes from an Icelandic source
(cf. The historic "Holmveria Saga" and Icelandic folk-tales of later
date), the incident of the hero slaying his slave, that the body might
be mistaken for his, is archaic in tone; the powerful horse recalls
Grani, Bayard, and even Sleipner; the dog which had once belonged to
Unfoot (Ofote), the giant shepherd (cf. its analogues in old Welsh
tales), is not quite assimilated or properly used in this story.
It seems (as Dr. Rydberg suspects) a mythical story coloured by the
Icelandic relater with memory full of the robber-hands of his own land.

The stratagem of "Starcad", who tried even in death to slay his slayer,
seems an integral part of the Starcad story; as much as the doom of
three crimes which are to be the price for the threefold life that a
triple man or giant should enjoy. The noose story in Starcad (cf. that
told of Bicce in the Eormenric story), is also integral.

SAXO'S MYTHOLOGY.

No one has commented upon Saxo's mythology with such brilliancy, such
minute consideration, and such success as the Swedish scholar, Victor
Rydberg. More than occasionally he is over-ingenious and over-anxious to
reduce chaos to order; sometimes he almost loses his faithful reader in
the maze he treads so easily and confidently, and sometimes he stumbles
badly. But he has placed the whole subject on a fresh footing, and much
that is to follow will be drawn from his "Teutonic Mythology" (cited
here from the English version by Rasmus B. Anderson, London, 1889, as
"T.M.").

Let us take first some of the incontestable results of his
investigations that affect Saxo.

SCIOLD is the father of Gram in Saxo, and the son of Sceaf in other
older authorities. Dr. Rydberg (97-101) forms the following equations
for the Sciolding patriarchs:--

a. Scef--Heimdal--Rig.
b. Sciold--Borgar--Jarl.
c. Gram--Halfdan--Ko