a sword, shield, and armor. Hrolf declines the preferred gift, whereupon
Odin tells Hrolf that he is not as wise as he thinks he is, and Hrolf
soon, but too late, realizes that the rejection of the gift augurs ill
fortune. There is nothing unusual in the appearance of Odin as a
one-eyed old man, for it is a common characteristic of saga literature.
But though Hrolf's expedition to Sweden is mentioned in _Snorri's
Edda_,[45] where the passage concerned is based on the old
_Skjọldumgasaga_, the oldest authority in regard to the matter, but
unfortunately now lost, no mention of Odin is made in this
connection.[46] Furthermore, Odin again appears in the saga (at the
close), where Bjarki vows that if he could get his eye on the god he
would use him roughly for permitting the enemy to gain the victory in
the battle that is being fought and that is going against Hrolf and his
men. In the latter instance, Odin belongs originally to the story
(_Gest. Dan._, second book, where Odin is represented as riding his
steed Sleipnir and being invisibly present at the battle to take the
dead to Valhalla). The two conceptions of Odin--on the one hand as
appearing in the disguise of an old man; on the other, as riding his
horse, Sleipnir, and taking those fallen in battle to Valhalla--are
quite different, the former being distinctly Norwegian, one of the
circumstances that Olrik uses to show that the Siward saga originated
under strong Norwegian influence, while the latter was the conception of
Odin current in Denmark and Sweden.[47] As already stated the
introduction of Odin as an old man is a motive that occurs frequently in
saga literature. It cannot, therefore, be stated definitely that his
appearance in the Siward saga suggested the use of him in the Bjarki
story. But the two stories were current in the same locality; they were
formed under similar conceptions of saga literature; in both stories
Odin directs the hero in question as to the most advisable course to
pursue and offers him a present; the Bjarki story already contained an