lonely mound that looks across plain and sea to Westman Isles may still
find traces of the burning, and see what appears to be the black sand
with which the hands of Bergthora and her women strewed the earthen
floor some nine hundred years ago, and even the greasy and clotted
remains of the whey that they threw upon the flame to quench it. He may
discover the places where Fosi drew up his men, where Skarphedinn died,
singing while his legs were burnt from off him, where Kari leapt from
the flaming ruin, and the dell in which he laid down to rest--at every
step, in short, the truth of the narrative becomes more obvious. And yet
the tale has been added to, for, unless we may believe that some human
beings are gifted with second sight, we cannot accept as true the
prophetic vision that came to Runolf, Thorstein's son; or that of Njal
who, on the evening of the onslaught, like Theoclymenus in the Odyssey,
saw the whole board and the meats upon it "one gore of blood."

Thus, in the Norse romance now offered to the reader, the tale of Eric
and his deeds would be true; but the dream of Asmund, the witchcraft of
Swanhild, the incident of the speaking head, and the visions of Eric
and Skallagrim, would owe their origin to the imagination of successive
generations of skalds; and, finally, in the fifteenth or sixteenth
century, the story would have been written down with all its
supernatural additions.

The tendency of the human mind--and more especially of the Norse
mind--is to supply uncommon and extraordinary reasons for actions and
facts that are to be amply accounted for by the working of natural
forces. Swanhild would have needed no "familiar" to instruct her in her
evil schemes; Eric would have wanted no love-draught to bring about his
overthrow. Our common experience of mankind as it is, in opposition to
mankind as we fable it to be, is sufficient to teach us that the passion