The death of Baldur was probably in the first place an expression of the decline of the Summer sun. At midsummer Freyja's husband forsook her, at midsummer also the bright god begins to turn his face Helheim-wards. Midsummer day is observed in the North of Europe under the name of Beltan, and fires are lighted upon the hills, a custom which evidently had its origin in a commemoration of Baldur's death. Some think that Baldur and Hödur typify the two halves of the year. At the turn of the day in Summer Höd kills Baldur, at the turn of the day in Winter Vali kills Hödur. Vali was the son of Odin and Rind, a giantess, whose name means the winterly earth, so that clearly Vali comes at midwinter. Why the mistletoe should be used to kill Baldur it is difficult to say. Might its being so weak and small imply the very small beginning of the day's decline. But Baldur, from the description given of him in the _Edda_, must surely be a personification of goodness morally, as well as the sun of the outward year, and his not returning from Helheim, being retained there through the machinations of Loki, seems to be a sort of connecting link between the first sorrow of the gods, the beginning of evil and their final defeat by the evil powers at Ragnarök--the giants have already one foot upon the gods. * * * * * The hero of the next story is Tyr, mentioned in the first chapter as the only one of the Æsir who could feed the monster Fenrir. CHAPTER VII. THE BINDING OF FENRIR. PART I. THE MIGHT OF ASGARD. I hope you have not forgotten what I told you of Fenrir, Loki's fierce wolf-son, whom Odin brought home with him to Asgard, and of whose reformation, uncouth and wolfish as he was, All-Father entertained some hope, thinking that the wholesome, bright air of Gladsheim, the sight of the fair faces of the Asyniur and the hearing of the brave words which day by day fell from the lips of heroes, would, perhaps, have power to change the cruel nature he had inherited from his father, and make him worthy of his place as a dweller in the City of Lords. To Tyr, the brave and strong-handed, Odin assigned the task of feeding Fenrir, and watching him, lest, in his cruel strength, he should injure any who were unable to defend themselves. And truly it was a grand sight, and one that Asa Odin loved, to see the two together, when, in the evening after the feast was over in Valhalla, Fenrir came prowling to Tyr's feet to receive his food from the one hand strong enough to quell him. Tyr stood up in his calm strength like a tall, sheltering rock in which the timid sea-birds find a home; and Fenrir roared and howled round him like the bitter, destroying wave that slowly undermines its base. [Illustration: TYR FEEDING FENRIR.]