Svalbard

“ She beckoned to him to follow her, and, drawing out a lute, played on it, and Slagfid, flinging away his sword and coat of mail, began to climb the mountain. Half way up it seemed to him as if a hand from behind was pulling him back, and turning he fancied he beheld his mother and heard her say, 'My son, seek not after vain shadows, which yet may be your ruin. Strive not against the will of Odin, nor against the Norns.' The words caused Slagfid to pause for a moment, then the figure of Swanvite danced before him and beckoned to him again, and his mother was forgotten. ”

“ Svipdag killed one, and another wanted to avenge him but suffered the same fate, and Svipdag did not stop before he had slain four; then Adils said, ‘Great loss hast thou caused to me, and now thou shalt pay for it,’ and he asked men to rise and kill him. The Queen got men and wanted to help him, and said that the King could see that there was much more skill in him alone than in all the Berserks. The Queen made peace between them, and every one considered Svipdag to be a man of great prowess. Now he sat on the lower bench opposite the King, by the wish of Queen Yrsa. ”

“ I instantly thought of Swift's "Dearly beloved Roger," but on inquiry I learnt that some one had died that morning, and in Sweden it is customary to pray for the dead.
The sun, who I suspected never dared to shine, began now to convince me that he came forth only to torment; for though the wind was still cutting, the rocks became intolerably warm under my feet, whilst the herring effluvia, which I before found so very offensive, once more assailed me. I hastened back to the house of a merchant, the little sovereign of the place, because he was by far the richest, though not the mayor. ”

“ Yes, this is the White Swallow who shall fly in front of my regiments, bringing me honour and good fortune in the war, and therefore, Sihamba, your prayer is granted, though not all of it, for you shall go northward and not southward, and among your own people I will leave you and the Swallow with you, and for her sake I will spare your people, the people of Umpondwana, although they are subject to my foe, the Endwandwe, and of the same blood. Moreover, while you are among us all honour shall be done to you and the Swallow, and of the cattle we capture a tenth part shall be the Swallow’s. ”

“ Within ten yards of the lip of the river, the grey mare stopped suddenly, shivered like a leaf in the wind and sank to the ground.
“Now, Swallow,” said Sihamba as she slipped from the saddle, “you must choose between that raging torrent and Swart Piet. If you choose the torrent the great horse is still strong and he may swim through; I can say no more.”
“And you?” asked Suzanne.
“I? I bide here, and oh! I would that Zinti had left the gun with me.”
“Never,” cried Suzanne. “Together we will live or die. Mount, I say—mount. ”

“ Whether this be the root or not, Svein is in the North a strong youth, generally a servant, but in the form of Svend becoming the favourite name of the kings of Denmark, belonging to him whom Ethelred’s treachery brought down on England, where it was called Swayn, and translated into Latin as Sueno, while Tasso calls the crusading Swend, Sveno. Svinbjorn occurs in Iceland, and is our Swinburn. Svenke, again, is the active or slender youth. It is amusing to see how, from a strong man, the swain became a young man, then a bachelor, then a lover, and, finally, a shepherd. ”

“ Swanvite, Alvilda, and Alruna are sent by the Norns,
To bring joy to the princes of Finland.
Then the tongues of the young men were unloosed, and Slagfid married Swanvite, Eigil Alruna, and Wayland Alvilda.
For nine years they all lived on the shores of the lake, and no people in the world were as happy as these six: till one morning the three wives stood before their husbands and said with weeping eyes:
'Dear lords, the time has now come when we must bid you farewell, for we are not allowed to stay with you any longer. We are Norns—or, as some call us, Valkyrie. ”

“ Blake's estimate of Swedenborg, right or wrong, was, as we shall see, distinct and consistent; to this effect; that his inspiration was limited and timid, superficial and derivative; that he was content with leaves and husks, and had not the courage to examine the root and the kernel of things; that he clove to the heaven and shrank from the hell of other men; whereas, to men in whom "a new heaven is begun," the one must not be terrible nor the other desirable. ”

“ How Sverre the adventurer won the crown is a tale full of adventure and amply worth the telling.
No common man was Sverre and no common woman was his mother Gunhild, a cook in the kitchen of King Sigurd Mouth. Not handsome was she, but quick of wit and bright of brain. If the king had had his way the boy would have had a very short life, for he bade the mother to kill her child as soon as it should be born. ”

“ Swedenborg has said, ‘The earth is a man.’
“Your Science, which makes you great in your own eyes, is paltry indeed beside the light which bathes a Seer. Cease, cease to question me; our languages are different. For a moment I have used yours to cast, if it be possible, a ray of faith into your soul; to give you, as it were, the hem of my garment and draw you up into the regions of Prayer. Can God abase Himself to you? Is it not for you to rise to Him? ”

“ Dingaan the king is merciful, and he makes you this offer through my mouth: If you will return the cattle together with all your own by way of fine, and hand over your councillors and head men to be killed, then he will grant the rest their lives. But all the young men and the girls must come with me to pass into the service of the king, the married women and the children going where they will. Perhaps Bull-Head here will take them with yourself and White Swallow. ”

“ Thus, when he might have cut off his foe, he preferred to grant him the breath of life; so far did his mercy qualify his rage.
After this he prevailed over a great force of men of the East, and came back to Sweden. Swipdag met him with a great fleet off Gottland; but Hadding attacked and destroyed him. And thus he advanced to a lofty pitch of renown, not only by the fruits of foreign spoil, but by the trophies of his vengeance for his brother and his father. And he exchanged exile for royalty, for he became king of his own land as soon as he regained it. ”

“ Kolbert, acquiescing, threw the chessmen in a heap. Arwed stepped to the pharo table and seized some cards which were quickly thrown to him.
'Take the king,' said Swedenborg to him: 'he is the banker's enemy.'
Megret was evidently startled, and with a Vehemence vastly disproportionate to the occasion, he asked Swedenborg, 'what do you mean? Do you intend to insult me?'
'He who is evil has evil thoughts,' answered Swedenborg quietly. ”

“ After giving all these details, the learned writer sums up his arguments by saying that he believes the Tzippor-deror to be the White Swallow, which is small, and has claws so sharp that by means of them it can cling to the wall. Now this action is one of the characteristics of the Swifts, who often cling to walls for a time, and then resume their flight. They do so in preference to sitting on the ground after the fashion of the Swallow, because the great length of the wings causes the Swift to find some little difficulty in rising from a level surface. ”

“ EMANUEL SWEDENBORG: PARENTAGE AND EARLY LIFE
In the middle of the seventeenth century was living an honest, God-fearing, and prosperous miner named Daniel Isaksson, with his wife Anna, daughter of a Swedish pastor, on his homestead called Sweden, a hundred and twenty miles northwest from Stockholm. Grateful for the large family Heaven sent them, Daniel would often say at dinner, "Thank you, my children, for this meal, for I have dined with you and not you with me: God has given me food for your sakes." His second son Jesper, born in 1653, took the name Swedberg from the homestead. ”

“ In the east of Scythia rises suddenly from the plain so vast a mass of rock, that it assumes the appearance of an immense structure or palace. Passing by this pile with his friends, one evening after sunset, having freely enjoyed the pleasures of the banquet, Svegder was surprised to behold a Dwergur, a Fairy or Dwarf, sitting at the foot of the rock. Inflamed by wine, he and his companions boldly advanced towards the elf, who, then standing in the gates or portal of the pile, addressed the king, commanding him to enter if he wished to converse with Odin. ”

“ A cut, a swirl, an indescribable motion, and shouts became to those in the High Tariff whispers, men became ants, and they were gone.
V.
"Look! For God's sake, look! What is it?"
Swift strained his eyes to the southward, toward the death-bound territory. The malignant cloud that settled over plain and mountain slope was broken on the Gopher lake. As soon as Swift had recovered from the first bound of the balloon he had scanned the dark mist, and by the borders of the lake he had found a rift. This rift indicated the spot where the city of Russell should have been. ”

“ The horse who bears his rider over the salt sea is a reminiscence of Sleipner, which Svipdag rode on more than one occasion; and when it is stated that Sveidal on this horse galloped over the castle wall, this reminds us of Skirner-Svipdag when he leaps over the fence around Gymer's abode, and of Hermod-Svipdag when he spurs Sleipner over the wall to Balder's lower-world castle. The shepherds, who are "god's angels," refers to the watchmen mentioned in Fjölsvinnsmal, who are gods ”

“ Swift’s peculiarity is in the curious sobriety of fancy, which leads him to keep in his most daring flights upon the confines of the possible. In the imaginary travels of Lucian and Rabelais, to which Gulliver is generally compared, we frankly take leave of the real world altogether. We are treated with arbitrary and monstrous combinations which may be amusing, but which do not challenge even a semblance of belief. ”

“ From what has now been said, we trust that Swedenborg's meaning, when he says that heaven is in the human form, will be sufficiently plain. And although the heavenly societies are innumerable, and all different from each other, yet there exists the most perfect union among them—a union corresponding to, and beautifully symbolized by, that among the different organs of the human body. ”

“ Then, Lady Swallow, you send me down to death and your hands are red with my blood. I am weary, I will not live to see more trouble; life is hard and death is easy. Finish your own battle, Swallow, and fly out your flight alone,” and drawing a knife from her girdle Sihamba laid it upon her knee. ”

“ Forster states:—
"The rule of measuring what is knowable of a famous man by the inverse ratio of what has been said about him, is applicable to Swift in a marked degree. Few men who have been talked about so much are known so little. . . . Swift's later time, when he was governing Ireland as well as his deanery, and the world was filled with the fame of Gulliver, is broadly and intelligibly written. ”

“ If ever there was murder done on this earth, 'twas Swift's assassination of Miss Vanhomrigh. I had the facts in all their naked cruelty from his bosom friend Sheridan. I cannot admire the genius of a Titan when it is allied with the heart of a savage."
"O, damn it, sir! we must bow to genius wherever we find it," said Topsparkle peevishly; "we have nothing to do with hearts. Swift is the cleverest man in the three kingdoms, and can make or mar a ministry. He dined at Chelsea t'other day, and I am told Sir Robert means to give him the next English bishopric that falls in." ”

“ We have not yet exhausted Saxo's contributions to the [Pg 794] myth concerning Svipdag. In two other passages in his Historia Danica Svipdag reappears, namely, in the accounts of the reigns of Frode III. and of Halfdan Berggram, in both under the name Ericus (Eirekr) , a name applied to Svipdag in the mythology also (see No. 108) .
The first reference showing that Svipdag and Erik are identical appears in the following analogies:
Halfdan (Gram) , who kills a Swedish king, is attacked in war by Svipdag.
Halfdan (Berggram) , who kills a Swedish king, is attacked in war by Erik. ”

“ Broken through at last by a yell, and the sharp whirr of arrows, and the cling, clang, from the armour of the terrace as Prince Harald staggered through unhurt, struck by the broad point on the helmet.
‘What, War?’ shouted Svend wrathfully, and his voice sounded like a clap of thunder following the lightning flash when a tower is struck. ‘What! war? swords for Svend! round about the king, good men and true! Sons of the golden-haired, show these men WAR.’
p. 128As he spoke he let his black cloak fall, and up from their sheaths sprang seven swords, steel from pommel to point only ”

“ Large numbers are truly described by Swedenborg, who found hells whose occupants believed themselves in heaven and sang praises therefor. Such praises we may hear in the loud laughter proceeding from dens where paradise has been gained by the cheap charm of a glass of gin or a prostitute’s caress. ”

“ The voluptuous warmth and wealth of color, the exquisite levity, the débonnaire grace of the Swinburnian drama we seek in vain. Björnson is vigorous, but he is not subtile. Mere feline amorousness, such as Swinburne so inimitably portrays, he would disdain to deal with if even he could. Such a bit of intricate self-characterization as the English poet puts into the Queen's mouth in the first scene with Chastelard, in the third act, lies utterly beyond the range of the sturdier Norseman. ”