CURIOUS CREATURES. i 4 t 



" It is really wonderful to what a length the credulity of 

 the Greeks will go ! There is no falsehood, if ever so 

 barefaced, to which some of them cannot be found to 

 bear testimony." 



This curious belief is to be found in Eastern writings, 

 and it was especially at home with the Scandinavian 

 and Teutonic nations. It is frequently mentioned in the 

 Northern Sagas but space here forbids more than just 

 saying that the best account of these eigi einhamir (not 

 of one skin) is to be found in The Book of Were-Wolves, 

 by the Rev. S. Baring-Gould. 



The name of Were Wolf, or Wehr Wolf, is derived 

 thus, according to Mr. Gould : " Vargr is the same as 

 u-argr, restless ; argr being the same as the Anglo- 

 Saxon earg. Vargr had its double signification in 

 Norse. It signified a Wolf, and also a godless man. 

 This vargr is the English were, in the word were-wolf, 

 and the garou or varou in French. The Danish word 

 for were-wolf is var-ulf, the Gothic, vaira-ulf" Lycan- 

 thropy was a widespread belief, but it gradually dwindled 

 down in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries to those 

 eigi einhamir, the witches who would change themselves 

 into hares, &c. 



Olaus Magnus tells us Of the Fiercenesse of Men who 

 by Charms are turned into Wolves : " In the Feast of 

 Christ's Nativity, in the night, at a certain place, that they 

 are resolved upon amongst themselves, there is gathered 

 together such a huge multitude of Wolves changed from 

 men, that dwell in divers places, which afterwards the 

 same night doth so rage with wonderfull fiercenesse, both 

 against mankind, and other creatures that are not fierce 

 by nature, that the Inhabitants of that country suffer 

 more hurt from them than ever they do from the true 



