Was this plant confidered in the fame favourable light among the Scandinavians, or honoured by them with the same observances? Nothing like this appears. It is mentioned in this one place of the EDDA, as a little inconfiderable shrub, that was made use of by a malicious Being to perpetrate great mischief. I am afraid therefore, that the reasoning of our elegant and learned Author will be found here to amount to this, viz. " In GAUL the Mifsseltoe was the Instrument of Good, in the north the instrument of EVIL; therefore the Gauls and the northern nations must have been the same people; and there appears a striking conformity between them both in their opinions on this fubject."One might rather infer that there was an essential difference and opposition between the religious tenets of these two nations: and that therefore they were, ab origine, two distinct races of men.-But it will perhaps be urged, How should the followers of ODIN think of affixing any peculiar arbitrary qualities to the MISSELTOE at all, if they had not th's notion from the Celtic Druids? -I answer, From the Celtes they probably learnt all they knew about the Misseltoe: but as they entertained so different an opinion concerning this plant, it is plain they could never have the Druids for their instructors. The truth probably is, The Gothic nations, in their first incursions upon the neighbouring Celtes, had observed the superstitious veneration that was paid to this plant by their enemies; and. their own religious modes being different, they therefore held it in contempt and abhorrence:-So in fucceeding ages, when Chriftianity was established in Gaul and Britain, the Scandinavians (still Pagans) turned ther facred rites into ridicule. Thus Regner Lodbrog, in his DYING ODE, speaking of a battle, (fought perhaps against Christians) says, in ridicule of the Eucharift, " There we celebrated a MASS [Mifsu. In.] of weapons * !" 66 * Five Pieces of Runic Poetry, p. 32. VOL. II. L Some Some of the Celtic nations (the Britons for instance) have a traditionary opinion that the dominions of their ancestors were once extended much farther north, than they were in the time of the Romans; and that they were gradually dispossessed by the Gothic or Teutonic nations, of many of those countries, which the latter afterwards inhabited. Whether this tradition be admitted or not, it is certain that the Gothic and Celtic tribes bordered on each other; and this, no less than through the whole boundary of Gaul and Germany. Now the frequent wars, renewals of peace, and other occafions of intercourse in consequence of this vicinage, will account to us for all that the Gothic nations knew or practised of the Celtic customs and opinions. Perhaps it would be refining too much upon the passage in the Edda, to explain it as an allegory; or to suppose that the disturbance wrought among the Gods by the Misseltoe, was meant to express the opposition which Odin's religion found from the Druids of the Celtic nations. Such an Interpretation of this ancient piece of Mythology would be neither forced nor unnatural: but it is not worth infifting upon. To return to KEYSLER, he says (p. 305.) that there are " plain vestiges of this ancient Druidical " reverence for the MISSELTOE still remaining in some " places in Germany; but principally in Gaul and "Aquitain: in which latter countries, it is customary " for the boys and young men on the last day of De"cember, to go about through the towns and villa " ges, singing and begging money, as a kind of New" year's gift, and crying out, Au GUY! L' AN NEUF! "To the Misseltoe! The New Year is at hand!"This is a curious and striking instance; and to it may be added that rural custom still.observed in many parts of England, of hanging up a Miffeltoe-bush on Christmas Eve, and trying lots by the crackling of the leaves and berries in the fire on Twelfth Night.All these will easily be admitted to be reliques of Druidical superstition, because all practifed in those very countries, in which the Druids were formerly eftablished.-KEYSLER then proceeds to attribute to the fame Druidic origin, a custom practifed in Upper Germany by the vulgar at Christmas, of running through the streets, &c. and striking the doors and windows (not with MISSELTOE, for that plant does not appear to be at all used or attended to upon the occafion, but) with HAMMERS (Malleis, Lat.) crying GUTHYL, GUTHYL. Now Guthyl or Gut Heyl, he owns is literally Bona Salus; and therefore might most naturally be applied to the birth of Christ then celebrated: but, because the words have a distant resemblance in meaning to the Omnia-Sanans, by which the Gauls expressed the MISSELTOE, according to Pliny; therefore he (without the least shadow of authority) will have this German term Guthyl, to be the very Gallic name meant by that author: And his reasons are as good as his authority: viz. "Because, (Ift) he says, The lan-guage of the Gauls, Germans, Britons, and northern nations, were only different dialects of ONE COMMON tongue; (2dly) Because the German name for this plant Mistel, as well as our English Miffeltoe, are foreign words, and BOTH DERIVED from the Latin Viscum." That the ancient language of the Gauls, still preserved in the Welsh, Armoric, &c. is or ever was the fame with those dialects of the Gothic, the Saxon, German and Danish, &c. believe who will. But that our English name Misseltoe, as well as the German Mistel, are words of genuine Gothic original, underived from any foreign language, is evident from their being found in every the most ancient dialect of the Gothic tongue: viz. Ang-Sax. Mırtıltan. Island. [in EDDA] Mistilteinn. Dan. & Belg. Miftel, &c. &r. We see then what little ground this passage of the EDDA now affords us for supposing the Gothic nations of Scandinavia and Germany, to be the fame people Anglice Good Heal; or Good Health, with A with the Celtic tribes of Britain and Gaul; or for calling the Icelandic and Gothic EDDA, a System of Druidical or CELTIC MYTHOLOGY: For as for the present German inhabitants of Holsace calling the MISSELTOE " the branch of spectres," that proves no more that their ancestors revered it as falutary and divine; than its being anciently represented in the north as the death of Balder proves it to have been intitled there to the Druidical character of Omnia Sanans. A T THE THE TWENTY-NINTH FABLE. B Hermode's Journey to Hell. ALDER having thus perished, FRIG GA, his mother, caused it to be published every where, that whosoever of the Gods would go to Hell in search of Balder, and offer DEATH such a ransom as the would require for restoring him to life, would merit all her love. HERMODE, sur named the Nimble or Active, the son of Odin, offered to take this commiffion upon him. With this view he took Odin's horse, and mounting him, departed. For the Ipace of nine days and as many nights, be travelled through deep vallies, so dark, that he did not begin to fee whither he was going, till he arrived at the river of Giall, * In this, as well as the preceding chapter, the Latin Verfion of Goranson differs exceedingly from the French of M. Mallet (which is here followed) wing, I suppose, to the great variations in the diffe rent copies, which they respectively adopted. T. |