Sokvabek is the brook of the deep. From the deep arise the thoughts and roll as cool refreshing waves through golden words. Saga can tell, Odin can think, about it. Thus they sit together day after day and night after night and refresh their minds from the fountain of history. Saga is the second of the goddesses. She dwells at Sokvabek, a very large and stately abode. The stream of history is large, it is broad and deep. Saga is from the word meaning _to say_. In Greece Klio was one of the muses, but in Norseland Saga is alone, united with Odin, the father of heroic deeds. Her favor is the hope of the youth and the delight of the old man. SECTION XV. ODIN AS THE INVENTOR OF RUNES. The original meaning of the word rune is _secret_, and it was used to signify a mysterious song, mysterious doctrine, mysterious speech, and mysterious writing. Our ancestors had an alphabet called runes, before they learned the so-called Roman characters. The runic stave-row was a futhore (_f_, _u_, _th_, _o_, _r_, _k_), not an alphabet (_A_, _B_) as in Greek or Latin. But what does it mean mythologically, that Odin is the inventor of the runes? Odin himself says in his famous Rune-song in the Elder Edda: I know that I hung On a wind-rocked tree[48] Nine whole nights, With a spear wounded And to Odin offered, Myself to myself; On that tree Of which no one knows From what root it springs. Bread no one gave me Nor a horn of drink, Downward I peered, To runes applied myself Wailing learnt them, Then fell down thence. Potent songs nine From the famed son I learned Of Bolthorn, Bestla’s father, And a draught obtained Of the precious mead, Drawn from Odrœrer. Then I began to bear fruit And to know many things, To grow and well thrive: Word by word I sought out words, Fact by fact I sought out facts. Runes thou wilt find And explained characters, Very large characters, Very potent characters, Which the great speaker depicted And the high powers formed And the powers’ prince graved. Odin among the asas, But among the elves, Daain; Odin as inventor of runes And Dvalin for the dwarfs; Aasvid for the giants runes risted, Some I myself risted.