En Havfrue op af Vandet steg,
Og spaade Herr Sinklar ilde.
Sinclar's Visa.
A mermaid from the water rose,
And spaed Sir Sinclar ill.
Fortune-telling has been in all countries a gift of the sea-people. We need hardly mention the prophecies of Nereus and Proteus.
A girl one time fell into the power of a Havfrue and passed fifteen years in her submarine abode without ever seeing the sun. At length her brother went down in quest of her, and succeeded in bringing her back to the upper world. The Havfrue waited for seven years expecting her return, but when she did not come back, she struck the water with her staff and made it boil up and cried—
Hade jag trott att du varit så falsk,
Så skulle jag kreckt dig din tiufvehals!
Had I but known thee so false to be,
Thy thieving neck I'd have cracked for thee.[216]
Duke Magnus and the Mermaid.
Duke Magnus looked out through the castle windów,
How the stream ran so rapidly;
And there he saw how upon the stream sat
A woman most fair and lovelie,
Duke Magnus, Duke Magnus, plight thee to me,
I pray you still so freely;
Say me not nay, but yes, yes!
"O, to you I will give a travelling ship,
The best that a knight would guide;
It goeth as well on water as on firm land,
And through the fields all so wide.
Duke Magnus, &c.