The poetical works of Sir Walter Scott, with memoir of the author.

198 THE LAY OF [CANTO VI.
For thither came, in times afar,
Stern Lochlin's sons of roving war,
The Norsemen, train'd to spoil and blood,
Skill'd to prepare the raven's food;
Kings of the main their leaders brave,
Their barks the dragons of the wave.'
And there, in many a stormy vale,
The Scald had told his wondrous tale;
And many a Runic column high
Had witness'd grim idolatry.
And thus had Harold, in his youth,
Learn'd many a Saga's rhyme uncouth,Of that Sea-Snake, tremendous curl'd,
Whose monstrous circle girds the world; 2
Of those dread Maids,3 whose hideous yell
Maddens the battle's bloody swell;
Of Chiefs, who, guided through the gloom
By the pale death-lights of the tomb,
1 The chiefs of the Vakingr, or Scandinavian pirates, assumed the title of Scekonungr, or Sea-kings. Ships, in the inflated language of the Scalds, are often termed the serpents
of the ocean.
2 The jormungandr, or Snake of the Ocean, whose folds surround the earth, is one of the wildest fictions of the Edda.
It was very nearly caught by the god Thor, who went to fish
for it with a hook baited with a bull's head. In the battle
betwixt the evil demons and the divinities of Odin, which is
to precede the Ragnarockr, or Twilight of the Gods, this
Snake is to act a conspicuous part.
3 These were the Valcyriur, or Selectors of the Slain, dispatched by Odin from Valhalla, to choose those who were to
die, and to distribute the contest. They are well known to
the English reader, as Gray's Fatal Sisters.