The grandeur and ruggedness of the scenery of these western and northern European countries, and the frequent sombreness of the climate are faithfully reflected in the prevalent Teutonic myths and superstitions. Thor and his mallet found a congenial home among the Scandinavian mountains and fjords. There, too, was the appropriate haunt of the Frost-giants. The race of giants, with their fondness for stones and rocks, to whom so much influence in altering the external aspects of nature was ascribed by the Teutonic races, might have had their ancestral abode among the crags and defiles of the north-west, but they readily naturalised themselves among the less rugged tracts of northern Germany and of Britain. The dwarfs, trolls, fairies, and hill-folk who, whether or not they are to be regarded as representatives of a diminutive human population that originally inhabited those regions, were believed to dwell under the earth and in caves, and who were regarded as having played a distinct though subordinate part in changing the surface of the land, would find appropriate haunts wherever the Teutons established themselves. The personification of natural forces and the effects produced by the supernatural beings so pictured to the imagination, certainly bear a marked family likeness all over the west and north-west of Europe. There is, moreover, one feature that distinguishes the myths and legends of those northern lands--the grim humour which so often lights them up. The grotesque contours of many craggy slopes where, in the upstanding pinnacles of naked rock, an active imagination sees forms of men and of animals in endless whimsical repetitions, may sometimes have suggested the particular form of the ludicrous which appears in the popular legend. But the natural instinct of humour which saw physical features in a comical light, and threw a playful human interest over the whole face of nature, was a distinctively Teutonic characteristic. A few examples from the abundant collection that might be gathered must here suffice. Some of the most singular features of the landscapes of the north-west of Europe arise from the operations of the ice-sheets, glaciers, and icebergs of that comparatively late geological period to which the name of the Ice Age is given. The perched boulders which stand poised near the verge of cliffs or scattered over the sides and summits of hills, everywhere suggested the working of supernatural agency. In some districts they were looked upon as missiles hurled by giants who fought against each other. In others, they were regarded as the work of giantesses, or 'auld wives,' as they were called in Scotland, who to exhibit their prowess would transport masses of rock as large as hills from one part of the country to another.