escribed as being
of foreign origin. Moreover this is the only version in which the
goddess Freyja is made responsible for the Unending Battle. Indeed
the supernatural element, and especially the influence of charms and
spells, is more prominent in this version than in any of the others.
It is only here, too, that we find the story of Goendul and the "potion
of forgetfulness." On the other hand our version contains no reference
to the statement made in _Skaldskaparmal_ and Saxo that it was Hild
who by her magic spells restored the dead to life each night.

In our version of the story the character of Hild is left wholly
undeveloped. Indeed the writers of the Romantic Sagas are always
so much more interested in incident than in character that highly
individualised personality is rare. Even when as in the case of
Hervoer[7], the very nature of the story presents an interesting and
somewhat unusual personality, we are sometimes left with a feeling of
dissatisfaction and a conviction that the writer did not realise the
full merits and possibilities of his material. Hoegni is the usual type
of hot-headed implacable sea-rover. The character of Hethin, however,
presents some interesting features and strikes us as more modern in
conception. Naturally gentle of disposition, he had been forced
by malignant powers into a situation foreign to his nature. Hardly
characteristic of a viking chief are his genuine regret for the harm
he had done and his anxiety that the men of Hoegni and himself
should not be called upon to forfeit their lives for his "crimes and
misdeeds." The conventional viking, clear-eyed and purely material
in his view of life, would have stayed to brave out the consequences.
Hethin only wished "to go away somewhere a long way off, where he
would not each day have his wicked deeds cast in his teeth." His
remorse had broken him down.--"You will find it an easy matter to slay
me when I am left alive last of all!"

The motif of the Everlasting Battle is not confined the story of
Hethin and Hoegni. Parallels can be found in many literatures, both
ancient and modern[8].

This _thattr_ has been translated into English under the title of
_The Tale of Hogni and Hedinn_ in _Three Northern Love Stories_ by W.
Morris and Eirikr Magnusson, London, 1875.

For a full bibliography of MSS., translations, and the general
literature dealing with this saga, cf. _Islandica_, Vol. v, pp. 41,
42.

[Footnote 1: _Oldnorske og O