gloom of antiquity, we ought not to be surprised that ancient legends,
being often shattered fragments and dim shadowings-forth of mystic and
hierophantic philosophy, should be found, with many of their principal
features unaltered, in the popular traditions of different ages and
countries.

The tale embodied in the "Lay of Oleg the Wise," is identical in all its
essentials with the legend still extant upon the tomb of an ancient
Kentish family, in the church of (we believe) Minster, in the Isle of
Sheppey. The inimitable Ingoldsby has made the adventure the subject of
one of his charming "Legends," and has shown how the Knight came by his
death in consequence of wounding his foot in the act of contemptuously
kicking the fatal horse's skull, thus accomplishing the prophecy many
years after the death of the faithful steed. The reader will perceive,
that in the Russian form of the legend the hero dies by the bite of a
serpent, and not by the less imposing consequences of mortification in
the toe; but the identity of the leading idea in the two versions of the
old tale, is too striking not to be remarked. It is only necessary to
observe that Oleg is still one of the popular heroes of Russian
legendary lore, and that the feast, to which allusion is made at the end
of the poem, is the funeral banquet customary among the ancient Slavons
at the burial of their heroes; and resembling the funeral games of the
heroic age in Greece. The Slavonians, however, had the habit, on such
occasions, of sacrificing a horse over the tumulus or barrow of the
departed brave. The _Perun_ mentioned in the stanzas was the War-God of
this ancient people.

THE LAY OF THE WISE OLEG.

Wise Oleg to the war he hath bouned him again,
The Khozars have awaken'd his ire;
For rapine and raid, hamlet, city, and plain
Are devoted to falchion and fire.
In mail of Byzance, girt with many a good spear,
The Prince pricks along on his faithful destrere.

From the darksome fir-forest, to meet that array,
Forth paces a gray-haired magician:
To none but Perun did that sorcerer pray,
Fulfilling the prophet's dread mission:
His life he had wasted in penance and pain:--
And beside that enchanter Oleg drew his rein.

"Now rede me, enchanter, beloved of Perun,
The good and the ill that's before me;
Shall I soon give my neighbour-foes triumph, and soon
Shall the earth of the grave be piled o'e