wonderful witness to the heroism and spirit of the scholar,
and justifies Sir George Dasent's characterization of Cleasby as "one of
the most indefatigable students that ever lived." The work thus begun
was not completed until many years afterward (it is dated 1874), and, by
untoward circumstances, very little of it is Richard Cleasby's. But
generous scholarship acknowledged its debt to the man who gave his
strength and his wealth to the work, by placing his name on the
title-page. No less shall we fail to honor his memory by mentioning his
labors here. Although the dictionary was not completed in the decade of
its inception, the study that it was designed to promote took hold on a
number of men and the results were remarkable for both literature and
scholarship.

THOMAS CARLYLE (1795-1881).

First in order of time was the work of Thomas Carlyle. It will not seem
strange to the student of English literature to find that this writer
came under the influence of the old skalds and sagaman and spoke
appreciative words concerning them. His German studies had to take
cognizance of the Old Norse treasuries of poetry, and he became a
diligent reader of Icelandic literature in what translations he could
get at, German and English. The strongest utterance on the subject that
he left behind him is in "Lecture I" of the series "On Heroes,
Hero-Worship, and the Heroic in History," dated May, 1840. This is a
treatment of Scandinavian mythology, rugged and thorough, like all of
this man's work. Carlyle evinces a scholar's instinct in more than one
place, as, for instance, when he doubts the _grandmother_ etymology of
_Edda_, an etymology repeated until a much later day by scholars of a
less sure sense.[17] But this lecture "On Heroes" is also a
glorification of the literature with which we are dealing, and in this
regard it is worthy of special note here.

In the first place, Carlyle with true critical instinct caught the
essence of it; to him it seemed to have "a rude childlike way of
recognizing the divineness of Nature, the divineness of Man." For him
Scandinavian mythology was superior in sincerity to the Grecian, though
it lacked the grace of the latter. "Sincerity, I think, is better than
grace. I feel that these old Northmen were looking into Nature with open
eye and soul: most earnest, honest; childlike, and yet manlike; with a
great-hearted simplicity and depth and freshness, in a true, loving,
admiring, unfearing way.