in the Iliad, engages with Mars, and with like success.  Bartholsine[17] gives us repeated examples of the same kind.  “Know this,” said Kiartan to Olaus Trigguasen, “that I believe neither in idols nor demons.  I have travelled through various strange countries, and have encountered many giants and monsters, and have never been conquered by them; I therefore put my sole trust in my own strength of body and courage of soul.”  Another yet more broad answer was made to St. Olaus, King of Norway, by Gaukater.  “I am neither Pagan nor Christian.  My comrades and I profess no other religion than a perfect confidence in our own strength and invincibility in battle.”  Such chieftains were of the sect of Mezentius—­

“Dextra mihi Deus, et telum, quod missile libro,
 Nunc adsint!"[18]

And we cannot wonder that champions of such a character, careless of their gods while yet acknowledged as such, readily regarded them as demons after their conversion to Christianity.

[Footnote 17:  “De causis contemptae necis,” lib. i. cap 6.]

[Footnote 18:  “AEneid,” lib. x. line 773.]

To incur the highest extremity of danger became accounted a proof of that insuperable valour for which every Northman desired to be famed, and their annals afford numerous instances of encounters with ghosts, witches, furies, and fiends, whom the Kiempe, or champions, compelled to submit to their mere mortal strength, and yield to their service the weapons or other treasures which they guarded in their tombs.

The Norsemen were the more prone to these superstitions, because it was a favourite fancy of theirs that, in many instances, the change from life to death altered the temper of the human spirit from benignant to malevolent; or perhaps, that when the soul left the body, its departure was occasionally supplied by a wicked demon, who took the opportunity to enter and occupy its late habitation.

Upon such a supposition the wild fiction that follows is probably grounded; which, extravagant as it is, possesses something striking to the imagination.  Saxo Grammaticus tells us of the fame of two Norse princes or chiefs, who had formed what was called a brotherhood in arms, implying not only the firmest friendship and constant support during all the adventures which they should undertake in life, but binding them by a solemn compact, that after the death of either, the survivor should descend alive into the sepulchre of his brother-in-arms, and consent to be buried alongst with him.  The task of fulfilling this dreadful compact fell upon Asmund, his companion, Assueit, having been slain in battle.  The tomb was formed after the ancient northern custom in what was called the age of hills, that is, when it was usual to bury persons of distinguished merit or rank on some conspicuous spot, which was crowned with a mound.  With this purpose a deep narrow vault was constructed, to be the apartment of the future tomb over which the sepulchral