In the _Earthly Paradise_ the double current of the poet's fancy above alluded to is most strikingly apparent. The very framework in which the various tales are set seems to have been designed with that view. Guided probably by a vague tradition of a pre-Columbian discovery of America by the Vikings, the prologue relates how during a terrible pestilence certain mariners leave their northern home in search of the land where old age and death are not and where life is rounded by unbroken pleasure. Sailing west they come to a fair country. They gaze on southern sunshine and virgin forest and fertile champaign, but death meets them at every step, and happiness is farthest from their grasp when the people worship them as gods and sacrifice at their shrine. Escaping from this golden thraldom they regain their ship, and after many dangers and privations are driven by the wind to an island inhabited by descendants of the ancient Greeks, who have preserved their old worship and their old freedom. Here the weary wanderers of the main are hospitably received, and here they resolve to dwell in peace, forgetful of their vain search for the earthly paradise. At the beginning and the middle of every month the elders of the people and their guests meet together to while away the time with song and friendly converse. The islanders relate the traditions of their Grecian home, the mariners relate the sagas of the North, and Laurence, a Swabian priest who had joined the Norsemen in their quest, contributes the legends of Tannhäuser and of the ring given to Venus by the Roman youth. Here then there is full scope for the quaint beauty of romantic classicism and for the weird glamour of northern myth. Without encroaching upon the field of criticism proper the writer may state that, in his opinion, amongst the classic tales none is more graceful and finished than "The Golden Apples", and amongst the northern none more grandly developed and more epical in the strict sense of the word than _The Lovers of Gudrun_ based upon the Icelandic Laxdæla saga. The latter, unfortunately, cannot find a place in this volume for reasons of space.