ould have worked in to such supreme advantage. To be sure
his method clashes with the simplicity of the Old Norse manner, but from
him we should have had men and women superb in stature and virility, and
perhaps the Arctic influence would have killed the troublesome
tropicality of his language.

This drama by Gosse is not strictly Icelandic in motive. Jealousy was
not the passion to loosen the tongue of the sagaman, and in so far as
that is the theme of "King Erik," the play is not Old Norse in origin.
Christian material, too, has been introduced that gives a modern tinge
to the drama, but there is enough of the genuine saga spirit to warrant
attention to it here. Something more than the names is Icelandic. Here
is a woman, Botilda, with strength of character enough to recall a
Brynhild or a Bergthora. Gisli is the foster-brother that takes up the
blood-feud for Grimur. Adalbjoerg and Svanhilda are the whisperers of
slander and the workers of ill. Marcus is the skald who is making a poem
about the king. Here are customs and beliefs distinctly Norse:

I loved him from the first,
And so the second midnight to the cliff
We went. I mind me how the round moon rose,
And how a great whale in the offing plunged,
Dark on the golden circle. There we cut
A space of turf, and lifted it, and ran
Our knife-points sharp into our arms, and drew
Blood that dripped into the warm mould and mixed.
So there under the turf our plighted faith
Starts in the dew of grasses.

(Act. IV, Sc. II.)

But all day long I hear amid the crowds,

. . . . . . . . .

A voice that murmurs in a monotone,
Strange, warning words that scarcely miss the ear,
Yet miss it altogether.

_Botilda_.

Oh! God grant,
You be not fey, nor truly near your end!

(Act. IV, Sc. III.)

Although this work is dramatic in form, it is not so in spirit. The true
dramatist would have put such an incident as the swearing of brotherhood
into a scene, instead of into a speech. This effort is, however, the
nearest approach to a drama in English founded on saga material. It is
curious that our poets have inclined to every form but the drama in
reproducing Old Norse literature. It is not that saga-stuff is not
dramatic in possibilities. Ewald and Oehlenschlaeger have used this
material to excellent effect in Danish dramas. Had the