[194] Vendsyssel and Aalborg are both in North Jutland.--The story is told by the ferrymen to travellers: see Mythology of Greece and Italy, p. 68. [195] See above p. 89. According to what Mr. Thiele was told in Zealand, Svend Fælling must have been of prodigious size, for there is a hill near Steenstrup on which he used to sit while he washed his feet and hands in the sea, about half a quarter of a mile distant. The people of Holmstrup dressed a dinner for him, and brought it to him in large brewing vessels, much as the good people of Lilliput did with Gulliver. This reminds us of Holger Danske, who once wanted a new suit of clothes. Twelve tailors were employed: they set ladders to his back and shoulders, as was done to Gulliver, and they measured away; but the man that was highest on the right side ladder chanced, as he was cutting a mark in the measure, to clip Holger's ear. Holger, forgetting what it was, hastily put up his hand to his head, caught the poor tailor, and crushed him to death between his fingers. [196] This tale was taken from oral recitation by Dr. Grimm, and inserted in Hauff's Märchenalmanach for 1827. Dr. Grimm's fidelity to tradition is too well known to leave any doubt of its genuineness. [197] Aslög (_Light of the Aser_) is the name of the lovely daughter of Sigurd and Brynhilda, who became the wife of Ragnar Lodbrok. How beautiful and romantic is the account in the Volsunga Saga of old Heimer taking her, when an infant, and carrying her about with him in his harp, to save her from those who sought her life as the last of Sigurd's race; his retiring to remote streams and waterfalls to wash her, and his stilling her cries by the music of his harp! [198] This is Saint Oluf or Olave, the warlike apostle of the North. [199] A legend similar to this is told of Saint Oluf in various parts of Scandinavia. The following is an example:--As he was sailing by the high strand-hills in Hornsherred, in which a giantess abode, she cried out to him, Saint Oluf with the red beard hear! My cellar-wall thou'rt sailing too near! Oluf was incensed, and instead of guiding the ship through the rocks, he turned it toward the hill, replying: Hearken thou witch with thy spindle and rock! There shalt thou sit and be a stone-block! and scarcely had he spoken when the hill burst and the giantess was turned into stone. She is still seen sitting on the east side with her rock and spindle; out of the opposite mass sprang a holy well. Grimm. Deutsche Mythologie, p. 516. NISSES.[200] Og Trolde, Hexer, Nisser i hver Vraae. FINN MAGNUSEN And Witches, Trolls, and Nisses in each nook.