and the curse only ceases to work when there is nothing more left for it to wreak itself upon. It is a story of great deeds, whose motives are the bitter passions of that early time before the culture of Christianity had softened the hearts of men. The psychological truthfulness of its characters, however, in spite of their distance from to-day, is none the less unmistakable; and we watch the action with bated breath, as they are hurried on by a fate as relentless and inevitable as any that ever pursued an Oedipus. They are not the indistinct and shadowy forms which in many early literatures seem to grope out toward us from the mists of the past, whose clinging heaviness the present is unable wholly to dispel, but are human men and women who live and act; and the principal characters, particularly, in this way become the realities of history, instead of what they actually are, the creations of legend and myth. Many of the poems of the 'Edda' have been several times translated into English. Notable renderings are those by Dean Herbert, and by William Morris in the translation of the 'Voelsunga Saga,' by Magnusson and Morris. The only metrical version of all the lays is that of Benjamin Thorpe (London, 1866). A literal translation of the entire extant old poetry of the North is contained in Vigfusson's monumental work, the 'Corpus Poeticum Boreale.' The 'Snorra Edda' has been translated by G.W. Dasent (Stockholm, 1842); by I.A. Blackwell in 'Northern Antiquities' (London, 1847); and by R. B. Anderson (Chicago, 1880). [Illustration: Signature of Wm. H. Carpenter] FROM THE 'SNORRA EDDA' THOR'S ADVENTURES ON HIS JOURNEY TO THE LAND OF THE GIANTS From 'Northern Antiquities': Bohn's Library (London), 1878