330 



On Wayland 1 s Smithy, and on 



They say that in this cave did dwell 

 A smith that was invisible ; 

 At last he was found out, they say, 

 He blew up the place and vlod away. 1 



To Devonshire then he did go, 



Full of sorrow, grief, and woe, 



Never to return again ; 



So here I'll add the shepherd's name — 



Job Cork. (06. 1807, astat. 67). 



These tales are to be taken for what they are worth. Together, 

 they seem to form a strangely travestied version of a well known 

 mythical story of the North. 



It was reserved for M. Depping 2 to show that in the Wayland 

 of Berkshire tradition is to be traced Ycelund or Weland the 

 Smith, so famous in connexion with the Norse mythology, as well 

 as in the legends of our Saxon forefathers. His story is told 

 at great length in the Edda ; and, with variations, in the Wilkina 

 Saga : in brief it is as follows. Yoelund was the son of the giant 

 Wade, who obtained from the mountain dwergr or dwarfs, the 

 ait of working metals by fire ; and excelled in making arms and in 

 all kinds of smith's work. He fell into the hands of King Nidung, 

 in Jutland, who, to ensure his remaining at his forge, had him 



1 Sir Walter Scott had perhaps heard of this part of the story. See his account 

 of the explosion of Wayland Smith's dwelling, in the Eleventh Chapter of 

 Kenilworth, first published in 1821. Scott calls the " cave " " "Wayland Smith's 

 Forge," which is the name in the Ordnance Map, No. xxxiv, published in 1828, 

 and was probably taken from this celebrated fiction. 



2 Veland le Forgeron, &c, par Gr. B. Depping et Francisque Michel, Paris, 

 1833. M. Depping published his original essay in English, in 1822, in the New 

 Monthly Mag., vol. iv., p. 527. The later Dissertation has been translated by 

 Mr. S. W. Singer (Pickering, 1847, 12mo,) " Wayland Smith a Tradition of the 

 Middle Ages, from the French ; " and from this we quote. The reader may 

 refer to the papers in which Mr. T. Wright has given a more condensed account 

 of the legend; (Archeeologia, 1847, vol. xxxii., p. 315; Journ. Brit. Arch. 

 Assoc. vol. xvi.) ; and likewise to Keightley's "Tales and Popular Traditions," 

 (1834, p. 270.) It was the publication of Kenilworth which, as he 

 himself avows, led to that of M. Depping's Essay ; and also to the remarks on 

 the legend of Wayland, by Price, in his introduction to " Warton's History of 

 English Poetry," in 1824. The writer is not aware whether Grimm or the 

 Danish writers, who wrote on the story of Vcelund at an earlier date, have 

 taken any notice of the Berkshire story, but he concludes that they were not 

 aware of its existence. 



