That is to say, the land Meru--the same as the island Mero of the ancient Egyptians, from which Egypt was first colonized; the Merou of the Greeks, on which the Meropes, the first men, dwelt--was the scene where this battle between the fiends of the air on one side, and the heavenly bodies and earth on the other, was fought. The Asuras are painted as "gigantic opponents of the gods, terrible ogres, with bloody tongues and long tusks, eager to devour human flesh and blood."[2] And we find the same thoughts underlying the myths [1. "American Cyclopædia," vol. v, p. 793. 2. Ibid.] {p. 239} of nations the most remote from these great peoples of antiquity. The Esquimaux of Greenland have this myth: "In the beginning were two brothers, one of whom said, 'There shall be night and there shall be day, and men shall die, one after another.' But the second said, 'There shall be no day, but only night all the time, and men shall live for ever.' They had a long struggle, but here once more he who loved darkness rather than light was worsted, and the day triumphed." Here we have the same great battle between Light and Darkness. The Darkness proposes to be perpetual; it says, "There shall be no more day." After a long struggle the Light triumphed, the sun returned, and the earth was saved. Among the Tupis of Brazil we have the same story of the battle of light and darkness. They have a myth of Timandonar and Ariconte: "They were brothers, one of fair complexion, the other dark. They were constantly struggling, and Ariconte, which means _the stormy or cloudy day_, came out worst." Again the myth reappears; this time among the Norsemen: Balder, the bright sun, (Baal?) is slain by the god Hodur, the blind one; to wit, the Darkness. But Vali, Odin's son, slew Hodur, the Darkness, and avenged Balder. Vali is the son of Rind--the rind--the frozen earth. That is to say, Darkness devours the sun; frost rules the earth; Vali, the new sun, is born of the frost, and kills the Darkness. It is light again. Balder returns after Ragnarok. And Nana, Balder's wife, the lovely spring-time, died of grief during Balder's absence. [1. Brinton's "Myths of the New World," p. 200.] {p. 240} We have seen that one of the great events of the Egyptian mythology was the search made by Isis, the wife of Osiris, for the dead sun-god in the dark nether world. In the same way, the search for the dead Balder was an important part of the Norse myths. Hermod, mounted on Odin's horse, Sleifner, the slippery-one, (the ice?) set out to find Balder. He rode nine days and nine nights through deep valleys, _so dark that he could see nothing_;[1] at last he reaches the barred gates of Hel's (death's) dominions. There he found Balder, seated on a throne: he told Hel that all things in the world were grieving for the absence of Balder, the sun. At last, after some delays and obstructions, Balder returns, and the whole world rejoices.