In 1792, Walter Scott was twenty-one years old, and one of his note-books of that year contains this entry: "Vegtam's Kvitha or The Descent of Odin, with the Latin of Thomas Bartholine, and the English poetical version of Mr. Gray; with some account of the Death of Balder, both as related in the Edda, and as handed down to us by the Northern historians--_Auctore Gualtero Scott_." According to Lockhart,[13] the Icelandic, Latin and English versions were here transcribed, and the historical account that followed--seven closely written quarto pages--was read before a debating society. It was to be expected that one so enthusiastic about antiquities as Scott would early discover the treasury of Norse history and song. At twenty-one, as we see, he is transcribing a song in a language he knew nothing about, as well as in translations. Fourteen years later, he has learned enough about the subject to write a review of Herbert's _Poems and Translations_.[14] In 1813, he writes an account of the _Eyrbyggja Saga_ for _Illustrations of Northern Antiquities_ (edited by Robert Jameson, Edinburgh, 1814). There are two of Scott's contributions to literature that possess more than a mere tinge of Old Norse knowledge, namely, the long poem "Harold, the Dauntless" (published in 1817), and the long story "The Pirate" (published in 1821). The poem is weak, but it illustrates Scott's theory of the usefulness of poetical antiquities to the modern poet. In another connection Scott said: "In the rude song of the Scald, we regard less the strained imagery and extravagance of epithet, than the wild impressions which it conveys of the dauntless resolution, savage superstition, rude festivity and ceaseless depredations of the ancient Scandinavians."[15] The poet did his work in accordance with this theory, and so in "Harold, the Dauntless," we note no flavor of the older poetry in phrase or in method. Harold is fierce enough and grim enough to measure up to the old ideal of a Norse hero. "I was rocked in a buckler and fed from a blade," is his boast before his newly christened father, and in his apostrophe to his grandsire Eric, the popular notion of early Norse antiquarianism is again exhibited: In wild Valhalla hast thou quaffed From foeman's skull metheglin draught? Scott's scholarship in Old Norse was largely derived from the Latin tomes, and such conceptions as those quoted are therefore common in his poem. That the poet realized the inadequacy of such knowledge, the review of Herbert's poetry, published in the _Edinburgh Review_ for October, 1806, shows. In this article he has a vision of what shall be when men shall be able "to trace the Runic rhyme" itself.