P. 129, 1. 10, 11.  We have purposely altered the text from:  en þu oeruggr i einangri, i.e., ‘but thou stout in danger,’ into:  en þo, i.e., ‘but stout in danger none-the-less.’  The former reading seems barely to give any sense, the last a natural and the required one.

P. 169.  Hallmund.  Our saga is one among the historic sagas of Iceland which deals with traditions of ancient belief in the spirits of the unknown regions of the land that are interested in the well-being of the mere men who dwell near them.  Hallmund and the giant Thorir are the representatives of these powers in our saga.  Of these Hallmund is the more interesting of the two, both for his human sympathies, his tragic end, and the poetry ascribed to him.  At one time or other he has had a great name in the Icelandic folk-lore among the spirits of the land, the so-called land wights (land-voetir), and there is still existing a poem of ancient type, the refrain of which is closely similar to that of Grettir’s song on Hallmund, but which is stated to be by some cave-wight that lived in a deep and gloomy cavern somewhere in Deepfirth, on the north side of Broadfirth.  In the so-called Bergbuaþattr or cave-dweller’s tale (Edited by G. Vigfusson in Nordiske Old-skrifter, xxvii., pp. 123-128, and 140-143, Copenhagen, 1860), this song is said to have been heard by two men, who, on their way to church, had lost their road, and were overtaken by the darkness of night, and, in order to escape straying too far out of their way, sought shelter under the lee of a sheer rock which chanced to be on their way.  They soon found a mouth of a cave where they knew not that any cave was to be looked for, whereupon one of the wayfarers set up a cross-mark in the door of the cave, and then with his fellow-traveller sat down on two stones at the mouth of the cave, as they did not dare to risk themselves too far in the gloomy abode away from the cross.  When the first third part of the night was spent they heard something come along from within the cave doorwards out to them.[20] They signed themselves with the sign of the cross, and prayed God’s mercy to be on them, for they thought the doings within the deep of the cavern now grew big enough.  On looking into the darkness they saw a sight like unto two full-moons, or huge targets, with some monstrous figure (unreadable in the MS.) between them.  They thought this was nothing but two eyes, and that nowise narrow of face might he be who bore such torches.  Next they heard a chanting of a monstrous kind and in a big voice.  A lay there was sung of twelve staves, with the final refrain of each twice repeated.

[Footnote 20:  Innan eptir, as here rendered, is the reading of the MS. from which Bergbua pattr is edited. Innar eptir, as the aforesaid edition of the tale has it, is wrong.]

The poem seems to be a death-song over the cave-kin of the country by the new change of thought brought in by Christianity.