The American children were especially delighted with the gingerbread booth where they bought quantities of the Julbocken (Yule-goats) and Julgrisen (Yule-pig). It was true that these gingerbread animals sometimes resembled each other in such a surprising way that it was hard to distinguish the pigs from the goats, but, in spite of that, Dorothy wanted to buy some to send to America. John told her that they would probably dry up and break into pieces, long before they reached there, so she had to content herself with buying some for the New Year’s Christmas tree, as she called it.
“You can hang them on the branches, you know, and then give them to Freda’s little brothers and sisters to eat afterwards,” said Hedwig. “That is the way we always do.”
“But why do they have goats and pigs at Jul-tide?” asked John. “Why, don’t you know?” replied Helmer, in surprise. “It is to remind us of Thor’s goats and Frey’s pig, which were sacred to our forefathers.”
“Why were they sacred?” asked Dorothy. “Why, the goats drew the giant chariot of Thor, the Thunderer, through the skies,” said Hedwig.
“The Yule-pig makes us think of Frey’s hog,” said Helmer. “It was a magical hog whose golden bristles illuminated the darkest night and it could run more swiftly than any horse on land or sea.”
The American children looked rather bewildered and Dorothy asked why these animals should be especially remembered at Christmas-time.
Helmer and Hedwig laughed outright at this question, for it seemed really funny to them that any one could be so ignorant of the old stories which they had known from their nursery days, but Fru Bjerkander said kindly, “You must ask your father to tell you something about the ancient gods and their stories, for he is reading about them, every day, in the Edda.”
So that evening, the children drew their chairs in front of the great white stove which seemed to be the very heart of their home these cold winter evenings and clamored for the stories.
“Do you remember,” said their father, “what I told you before we left America, that the favorite festival among the heathen people in this part of the world, before Christ was born, came at just this time of the year?”