translated since the publication of his Romantic Ballads of 1826.  “I am terribly afraid,” writes Borrow, “of being forestalled in the Kæmpe Viser by some of those Scotch blackguards,” a hit, no doubt, at Jamieson.  He was working hard at his translations, and he was further stimulated by meeting in London with the Danish theologian and poetical student, Nikolai Frederik Severin Grundtvig, who had done much to popularise the kjæmpeviser in his native country.  But Bowring proved a broken reed, and Borrow suffered once

again one of those disappointments which so naturally embittered him.  It was not until 1874, however, some seven years before his death, that he finally gave up all hope.  The MSS. of his translations of the kjæmpeviser passed into the hands of Mrs. MacOubrey.

The ballad of Grimhild’s Vengeance (Grimhilds Hevn) is given in three versions by Abrahamson, Nyerup and Rahbek.  Borrow has closely followed the editors of 1812 and has translated each of the versions.  He added a number of notes, the MS. of which is mutilated, but not so much so as to prevent us from observing that these are translated word for word from the appendix of Abrahamson, Nyerup and Rahbek, but, so far as can be discerned from the fragmentary and mutilated Manuscripts at our disposal, without a sign of acknowledgment.

Edmund Gosse.

GRIMHILD’S VENGEANCE
Song the First

It was the proud Dame Grimhild
   Prepares the mead and beer,
And unto her the valiant knights
   She bids from far and near.

She bade them come and not delay
   To tournament and strife;
It was the Hero Hogen
   Who lost his youthful life.

It was the Hero Hogen
   Along the shore went he,
And there he found upon the sand
   The maiden of the sea.

“Now hail, thou maiden of the sea,
   Of wisdom thou art rife;
Say, if I go to Hvenild’s land,
   Can I retain my life?”

“Of castles hast thou plenty, knight,
   And store of gold so red,
If thou shouldst go to Hvenild’s land
   Thou wilt be smitten dead.”

It was the Hero Hogen,
   He straight drew forth his blade,
And he struck off at a single blow
   The head of the ocean-maid.

Then out amid the Sound he cast
   The head all dropping gore;
The body rolled down after it,
   In the deep they joined once more.

It was the Hero Hogen,
   He further wandered on,
Until the Ferry-carl he spied
   The ocean beach upon.

“Now list to me, good Ferry-carl,
   Convey me o’er the Sound,
And I’ll give thee my good gold ring,
   It weighs full fifteen pound.”

“I will not take thee o’er the Sound
   For all thy gold so red,
If thou dost go to Hvenild’s land
   Thou wilt be smitten dead.”

It was the Hero Hogen
   His faulchion round did whirl,
And he struck off at a single blow
   The head of the Ferry-carl.

He gave the gold ring off his arm
   Unto the dead man’s wife:
“Take that as an atoning gift
   For the Ferryman’s young life.”

Sir Gunter and Sir Gernot [17]
   The vessel pushed from shore;
So wrathful was the weather then,
   So wild the waters’ roar.