Odin smiled; the artist was pleased with his work.
But were animals, impelled by natural instincts only and exclusively occupied with the desire to satisfy their coarse wants, were such animals worthy to be the sole owners of such a charming abode?
It occurred to him to invent a being which, without participating in the divine essence, might still rise high above all other creatures. This time the divine artist wanted a spectator, to witness his work, to appreciate it intelligently, and afterwards to profit by it for some good purpose.
He was meditating on it during a walk on the sea-shore, when a piece of wood, a fragment of a huge branch of a tree which the wind had broken off, attracted his attention. It had evidently fallen into a river, which had carried it out into the high sea, and there it had been beaten and bruised by ebb and tide. He drew this poor shapeless stick of wood towards him, split it in two and made out of it a man and a woman.
“Do you hear? Do you understand?” Asks the Edda, at this point.
Now, what is this intended to convey to us? That man, exposed to the caprices of the elements, is nothing but a poor plaything in the hands of Fate? Very well, let us admit this explanation. But can the sacred book of the Scandinavians really presume to teach us that the origin of mankind must be looked for in two sticks of wood? We cannot but think that that would be a sorry jest, alike unworthy of the general solemnity of the Edda and of the mysterious majesty of ancient cosmogonies.
Besides, we ought not to forget that all the Northern nations attributed a divine character to trees; if in Germany the oak was held sacred, the hyperboreans held the ash tree in great respect, and the question is only whether our first father was made of the wood of an ash tree, an oak, or a willow.
This leads us naturally to the consideration of the ash Ygdrasil and its curious population of gods, birds, and quadrupeds.
The branches of this marvelous tree spread over the whole surface of the earth; its top supported the Walhalla and rose is to the uppermost heavens, while its roots penetrated to the very bottom of hell. Under its shadow dwell Odin and his Ases, when the government of the world requires his presence, or some important question has to be decided.