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The Pamphlet Collection of Sir Robert Stout: Volume 28

The Awakening of the Gods

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The Awakening of the Gods.

How the great gods awoke from their slumbers—
Out of the sleep of a thousand years;
How they arose, and with them the nations,
Long shall be told to tingling ears!

Thor's Journey.
Out of the North came Thor the Thunderer!
In his blue eyes the lightnings shone;
All the round world in silence beheld him,
As he descended from Odin's throne.

Southward straight fared he, the Ruler of Battles—
Swiftly behind the Valkyrior flew : *
Through the old Rhineland rustled their pinions,
Till on its borders the war-horns blew.

Where once again the brood of mud-giants
Out of their depths had risen to view :
There battle-ready—the great gods defying—
The world-old combat once more to renew.

* Meyiar flugo sumnan Myrkvidh í gognom. Völundrquidlia v. 1.

Thar voro hiá theim alptar-hamir theirra. Ib. prolog. Fiadhr-hamr dundi. Thrymsquidha 9, 1.

page 46

Loki's Errand.
Slid also southward, Loki the shifty—*
Cunningest, craftiest of gods and of men;
Southwards by side-paths, clothed round with darkness,
He slipped into Paris across the plain.

There laid Loki down his divinity,
Took on the French form of mortal race,
Marched down the Boulevards shouting "A Berlin!"
Or singing with ardour the Marseillaise.

Possessed Monsieur About—dwelt in the journalists—
Inspired Le Gaulois with Gallic fire—
Wrote hourly bulletins—edited Figaro—
"Summoned the universe to stand and admire—"

Counselled the councillors, filled them with folly—
Gave to Ollivier his cœur legère—
Sat in the Senate, and cheered on the Ministry—
Instructed each prefect and each loyal maire.

Low laughed Loki, the great mischief-maker—
Laughed when he found his wires pull well—
Laughed to behold Le Bœuf and De Failly
Lead on a nation to the mouth of hell.

Long laughed Loki, beholding the Frank land
Under the feet of traitors and knaves—
Shaking beneath them, while with light-heartedness
Slaves of a despot ruled over slaves.

* See Note ante page 30.

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Low laughed Loki, and looked to the northward :
"Hasten thy coming, O Thor! for here
All things are ready; break out in thunder—
Ruler of Battles, from Asgard appear!"

The Hammer.
Then on a sudden arose the Thunderer—
Arose once again as in days of yore—
Grasp'd, knuckle-white, * the old mighty hammer,
The mighty, all-rending Hammer of Thor.

Not now Miolnir name we the hammer,
Rather now Moltke ye may it call;
Weapon of Asgard, nimble, tremendous—
Truly of weapons the greatest of all.

Hurl'd from on high hurtled down the great hammer,
Shattering, smashing, it rose and fell;
Blow upon blow in thunderbolts falling,
Stroke after stroke struck deftly and well.

How the blows rang on the German anvil!
Anvil of metal well-tried and true;
Hard is the hammer and steady the stithy—
Under the hammer hits lightnings flew.

Hesmote them, he crush'd them, he ground them to powder,
He trampled them down in the miry clay!
All the round world held breath and beheld him
March to the goal of his conquering way.

* "Thor knit his brows, and grasped the handle of his hammer with such force that the knuckles became white from the strain." Prose Edda, cap. 44.

page 48

The Kaiser.
Then flew Loki, clad in dove-plumage,
Soared out of Paris, the goal of Thor's way—
Flew swiftly eastwards unto Kyffhaüser,
Where in his cavern the Great Kaiser lay. *

Still round the mountain the ravens were circling,
When the dun dove in the westward appeared;
Lo! in a moment, they vanish for ever :
Lo! Barbarossa has dreed his weird.

For out of Versailles shall come now the Kaiser—
The mightiest Kaiser the Reich has seen—
He shall ride home with his Princes surrounded,
And their brows all bound with laurels green.

Kirkwall: Printed by William Peace.

* Concerning Kaiser Friedrieh Barbarossa and his cavern, Mr Carlyle says:—"Nay, German tradition thinks he is not yet dead, hut only sleeping, till the bad world reach its worst, when he will re-appear. He sits within the hill near Salzburg yonder. A peasant once, stumbling into the interior, saw the Kaiser in his stone cavern: Kaiser sat at a marble table, leaning on his elbow, winking, only half asleep; beard had grown through the table, and streamed out on the floor; he looked at the peasant one moment, asked him something about the time it was, then drooped his eyelids again. Not yet time, but it will be soon! He is winking as if to awake—to awake, and set his shield aloft by the Roncalic Fields again, with: Ho, every one that is suffering wrong; or that has strayed guideless, devil-ward, and done wrong, which is far fataller!" Hist. Friedr II., Vol. 1, 65.

Like as the Great Kaiser sits in his hill-cave—according to German tradition—so the Norse folk say that their great chief, Harald Fairhair, sits through the centuries in his sea-cave. Down there, in the depths of the North Sea, sits King Harald, with the mermaid who has enchanted him by her magic arts, and knows not how the time goes by; but he will throw off the magic chains and come back to his Norse folk some day. Heine says about him, in one of his weird lays, how—

"The Great King Harald Harfager
Sits in the depths below,
With his beauteous water-fairy,
While the years come and go."