“Are you not called Gilitrutt?” said the woman timorously.
This answer came like a thunderbolt on the old hag, who fell down with a great noise on the floor, and lay there for sometime. She then got up, and, without speaking a word, went her way out of the house, and was never more seen in the country-side.
As for the peasant’s wife, she was full of joy at her deliverance, and, ever after, was a changed woman. She became a pattern of industry and good management, and henceforth always worked her own wool herself.
HILDUR THE FAIRY QUEEN.
Once on a time a farmer settled in a mountainous part of the country, but the particular spot is not mentioned, nor has his name come to us; but we do know that he was a bachelor, and had a housekeeper named Hildur.
Who Hildur was, neither the farmer nor any of the neighbouring gossips could find out: but as she took good care of the household and discharged her duties faithfully, she was allowed to keep her own secret. All the servants liked her, and the farmer thought himself very fortunate in having fallen in with such a housekeeper. She was of a quiet disposition, but always kind and obliging.
The farmer’s affairs were in a flourishing state: his sheep throve and multiplied, and he had nothing to annoy him except this, that he had great difficulty in getting shepherds to enter his service. The cause of this was not that the farmer treated his shepherds badly, but that, one after another, they were found dead in bed, on Christmas morning.
In olden times, it was the custom for the Icelanders, on Christmas Eve, to meet together at midnight for public worship; and any one who absented himself from church, on that occasion, was considered as much to blame as if he were keeping away on Christmas day itself. Those living up among the mountains, and who had long weary roads to go, had often great difficulty in getting to church in time; especially those who were not able to leave home before the Pleiades could be seen in the south-eastern heavens.
In this farm, the shepherds did not usually get home from work before that time, so that they generally missed the opportunity of attending the Christmas Eve service. Hildur never went on those occasions, as she preferred staying at home to watch the house—as is customary for some one to do on Christmas Eve—and attend to the preparations for the Christmas feast. She was always busily occupied in this way till the night was far advanced, so that the church-goers were back from the services and asleep in bed, before she retired for the night.
As often as Christmas morn came round, the farmer’s shepherd, whoever he might be, was found dead in bed. This strange fatality was well known over all the country side. No wonder, then, that shepherds were afraid of entering the farmer’s service, even though offered better wages than they could get elsewhere. No mark of violence was ever seen on the body of the unfortunate shepherd, so that no blame could be attached either to the farmer, or to any one in the house. At last the farmer declared that he could not find it in his heart to engage shepherds, with the prospect of certain death before them, and that he would, for the future, leave his sheep to take care of themselves.