eir passion
in glowing terms, the ordinary Icelandic marriage of the tenth century
was much more a matter of business, in the first place, than of love.
Though strong affection may have sprung up afterwards between husband
and wife, the love was rather a consequence of the marriage than the
marriage a result of the love.

When death came it was the duty of the next of kin to close the eyes and
nostrils of the departed, and our Saga, in that most touching story of
Rodny's behaviour after the death of her son Hauskuld, affords an
instance of the custom. When Njal asks why she, the mother, as next of
kin, had not closed the eyes and nostrils of the corpse, the mother
answers, "That duty I meant for Skarphedinn". Skarphedinn then performs
the duty, and, at the same time, undertakes the duty of revenge. In
heathen times the burial took place on a "how" or cairn, in some
commanding position near the abode of the dead, and now came another
duty. This was the binding on of the "hellshoes," which the deceased was
believed to need in heathen times on his way either to Valhalla's
bright hall of warmth and mirth, or to Hell's dark realm of cold and
sorrow. That duty over, the body was laid in the cairn with goods and
arms, sometimes as we see was the case with Gunnar in a sitting posture;
sometimes even in a ship, but always in a chamber formed of baulks of
timber or blocks of stone, over which earth and gravel were piled....

CONCLUSION.

We are entitled to ask in what work of any age are the characters so
boldly, and yet so delicately, drawn [as in this Saga]? Where shall we
match the goodness and manliness of Gunnar, struggling with the storms
of fate, and driven on by the wickedness of Hallgerda into quarrel after
quarrel, which were none of his own seeking, but led no less surely to
his own end? Where shall we match Hallgerda herself--that noble frame,
so fair and tall, and yet with so foul a heart, the abode of all great
crimes, and also the lurking place of tale-bearing and thieving? Where
shall we find parallels to Skarphedinn's hastiness and readiness, as axe
aloft he leapt twelve ells across Markfleet, and glided on to smite
Thrain his death-blow on the slippery ice? where for Bergthora's love
and tenderness for her husband, she who was given young to Njal, and
could not find it in her heart to part from him when the house blazed
over their heads? where for Kari's dash and gallantry, the man who dealt
his blows strai