HISTORIA VICESIMA PRIMA.
Quomodo Loco procreavit equum Sleipnerum cum Svadilfaro.
“Faber quidam Asas adveniens, ad urbem illis ædificandam per tres annos sese obtulit, eamque adeo munitam, ut tuta esset ab incursionibus Gigantum. Mercedem vero laboris Frejam postulavit, ut et lunam solemque. Dii vero, inito consilio, paciscuntur; si vero quid laboris prima die æstatis superesset, præmium amitteret; nullius vero opera ei uti liceret. Hic de auxilio equi sui Svadelfari tantum pactus fuit. Omnia vero hæc fiebant, dirigente et instigante Locone. Hic urbam ædificaturus, noctu per equum lapides attraxit. Asis mirum videbatur, eam tam magnos adferre montes; nec non equum plus, quam fabrum, conficere. Pacto autem multi interfuere testes: quippe cum gigas videretur non satis tutus inter Asas, si hic esset, Toro domum reverso. Qui jam mari Baltico trajecto, hinc per amnes et fluvios ad Asiam progressus, (quod priscis Austerveg audit) bellum cum gigantibus gessit. Urbs fuit munita et tam alta, ut perspicere non valeres. Tribus vero reliquis fabro diebus, Dii congregati solia sua ascendentes quæsiverunt, quisnam auctor esset, ut Freya in Jotunheimiam elocaretur? ut et aer perderetur, inducta cœlo calligine, sublatum solem et lunam dando gigantibus. Illos vero inter conventum fuit, Loconem hoc dedisse consilium. Dicebant, eum misera morte afficiendum esse, nisi rationem, qua faber mercedem amitteret, inveniret, adjicientes fore ut statim illum comprehenderent. Examinatus vero jurejurando promisit se effecturum, ut faber mercede frustraretur, quicquid tandem huic negotio impenderet. Fabro autem lapidis advehendi causa, cum Svadilfaro, egressuro, ex sylva prosiliit equa quædam solitaria, equo adhinniens. Quam conspicatus equus, in furorem actus, rupto fune, eam adcurrit, jam in sylvam accelerantem, insequente fabro, equum assecuturo. Equa vero totam per noctem discurrente, faber impeditus fuit, quominus, hac nocte, una cum die sequente, opus, uti antea, fuerit continuatum. Quo cognito, animo percellitur giganteo. Quo viso, juramentis non parcentes Torum invocarunt: qui statim adveniens, vibrato in aera malleo, dataque mercede, occisum fabrum in Niflheimium detrusit. Loconi vero cum Svadilfaro res fuit, ut equuleum genuerit nomine Sleipnerum, octo habentem pedes.
EDDA, FAB. XXI, OPERA ET STUDIO JO. GORANSON.”
NOTE II, P. 63.
The Goblin Groom now screamed a scream;
For Goblins hate a running stream;
And, if the truth my records say,
The Elfin Poney neighed a neigh.
The terror of the inhabitants of Alfheim, or Fairy land, for running water, has been too often asserted to require much comment. Unlicensed spirits, that wander on the face of the earth, with intentions injurious to mankind, are always represented as tortured with hydrophobia. The author cannot hope that he has painted the Goblin’s terror in all the glowing colours of a Burns,[19] or with the finer tints of a Scott; yet he flatters himself some beauty may be found, by the admirers of pleonastic redundancy, in the passage expressive of the horror of the horse and rider; and he feels that, in this judgment, he will be supported by the most classical authorities in the English language; e.g.
GILES SCROGGINS.
Giles Scroggins courted Molly Brown,
Fol deriddle lol, fol deriddle lido;
The fairest wench in all the town,
Fol deriddle lol, fol deriddle lido;
He bought a ring with posie true,
“If you loves I as I loves you,
“No knife can cut our love in two.”
Fol deriddle lol, fol deriddle lido.
But scissars cut as well as knives,
Fol deriddle lol, fol deriddle lido;
And quite unsartin’s all our lives,
Fol deriddle lol, fol deriddle lido;
The day they were to have been wed,
Fate’s scissars cut poor Giles’s thread,
So they could not be mar-ri-ed.
Fol deriddle lol, fol deriddle lido.