increasing part of the mental equipment of the
northern peoples in proportion as the native literature and tradition
have been neglected.

Undoubtedly Northern mythology has exercised a deep influence upon
our customs, laws, and language, and there has been, therefore,
a great unconscious inspiration flowing from these into English
literature. The most distinctive traits of this mythology are a
peculiar grim humour, to be found in the religion of no other race,
and a dark thread of tragedy which runs throughout the whole woof,
and these characteristics, touching both extremes, are writ large
over English literature.

But of conscious influence, compared with the rich draught of Hellenic
inspiration, there is little to be found, and if we turn to modern
art the difference is even more apparent.

This indifference may be attributed to many causes, but it was due
first to the fact that the religious beliefs of our pagan ancestors
were not held with any real tenacity. Hence the success of the
more or less considered policy of the early Christian missionaries
to confuse the heathen beliefs, and merge them in the new faith,
an interesting example of which is to be seen in the transference
to the Christian festival of Easter of the attributes of the pagan
goddess Eastre, from whom it took even the name. Northern mythology
was in this way arrested ere it had attained its full development,
and the progress of Christianity eventually relegated it to the limbo
of forgotten things. Its comprehensive and intelligent scheme, however,
in strong contrast with the disconnected mythology of Greece and Rome,
formed the basis of a more or less rational faith which prepared the
Norseman to receive the teaching of Christianity, and so helped to
bring about its own undoing.

The religious beliefs of the North are not mirrored with any
exactitude in the Elder Edda. Indeed only a travesty of the faith of
our ancestors has been preserved in Norse literature. The early poet
loved allegory, and his imagination rioted among the conceptions of
his fertile muse. "His eye was fixed on the mountains till the snowy
peaks assumed human features and the giant of the rock or the ice
descended with heavy tread; or he would gaze at the splendour of the
spring, or of the summer fields, till Freya with the gleaming necklace
stepped forth, or Sif with the flowing locks of gold." [4]

We are told nothing as to sacrificial and religious rites, and
all else