DBAGONS 21 



cold and deep snows, full of pathless forests, haunted by 

 dreadful beasts. King Gorm and his followers were met 

 by a huge man named Gudmund, the brother of Giant 

 Garfred, who gave himself out to be the guardian — the 

 most faithful guardian — of all men who landed in that 

 spot. In reality he was a treacherous scoundrel, but 

 at the outset he invited them to be his guests, and ' took 

 them up in carriages.' ' As they went forward they 

 saw a river which could be crossed by a bridge of gold. 

 They wished to go over it, but Gudmund restrained them, 

 telling them that, by this channel, Nature. had divided 

 the world of men from the world of monsters, and that 

 no mortal track might go further.' Well, here we take 

 leave of King Gorm and Gudmund, and we will cross in 

 imagination that golden bridge into monster-land, though 

 they did not, nor does our historian, give any particular 

 description of the monsters which lived there ; but, from 

 other ancient writers, we can get a pretty fair idea of 

 what he would have been likely to say about them if it 

 had suited his purpose. He would certainly have in- 

 cluded a stray dragon or two ; indeed, elsewhere, he does 

 actually give us two dragon -slaying stories, the first of 

 which concerns King Fridleif, who was wrecked on an 

 unknown island. 



He fell asleep, and dreamt that a man appeared before 

 him, and ordered him to dig up a buried treasure, and to 

 attack the dragon that guarded it. To withstand the 

 poison of the creature, he was told to cover hjmself and 

 his shield with an ox -hide. When he awoke he saw the 

 dragon coming out of the sea, but its scales were so hard 

 that the spears thrown by Fridleif had no effect, and the 

 only thing that happened was the uprooting of several 

 trees by the monster, which wound its tail round them 

 in a tit of temper. However, the King observed that by 

 constantly going down to the sea the dragon had worn a 

 path, hollowing the ground down to the solid rock to 

 such an extent that a bank rose sheer on each hand ; so 



