HORSES AT ODIN'S PALACE. lOg 



They launch'd the burning ship, 



It floated far away 



O'er the misty sea. 



Till like the moon it seem'd. 



Sinking beneath the waves. 



Balder returned no more ! ' 



It is curious to note, that among the Sea Dyaks of 

 Borneo, the dead chief is placed in his canoe, with his 

 favourite weapons and principal property, and is then 

 turned adrift. 



In the Scandinavian barrows, great quantities of horses' 

 bones are found with human skeletons. The only pleasure 

 and business of life with these old turbulent spirits, was 

 war ; and their political, domestic, and religious institutions 

 were all founded on this characteristic. A warrior, there- 

 fore, could not but fight well when the pleasures after 

 death were, as his religion taught him, those which he most 

 relished during life. ' The heroes who are received into 

 the palace of Odin,' says the Edda, ' have every day the 

 pleasure of arming themselves, of passing in review, of 

 ranging themselves in order of battle, and of cutting one 

 another in pieces ; but as soon as the hour of repast ap- 

 proaches, they return on horseback all safe and sound 

 to the hall of Odin, and fall to eating and drinking.' 



With the Danes the age of tumuli or hillocks was 

 styled Hoigold and Hoielse-tlide. The corpse was buried 

 with all the arms he had wielded or worn during life, and 

 all his ornaments ; and his horse was killed and laid be- 

 side him. 



The Patagonians, to whom the horse is, comparatively 

 speaking, a novelty, also inter it in their burial-places, and 

 the stories about the immense size of these people probably 



