380 
LETTERS FROM HIGH LATITUDES. 
M-Donnell genealogy, ending a long list of great poten¬ 
tates, with “ somebody, who was the son of somebody 
else, who was the son of Scotha, who was the daughter 
of Pharaoh ! ” 
In bygone ages, beyond the Scythian plains and 
the fens of the Tanai's, in that land of the morning, to 
which neither Grecian letters nor Roman arms had 
ever penetrated, there was a great city called Asgaard. 
Of its founder, of its history, we know nothing; but 
looming through the mists of antiquity we can discern 
an heroic figure, whose superior attainments won for 
him the lordship of his own generation, and divine 
honours from those that succeeded. Whether moved 
by an irresistible impulse, or expelled by more powerful 
neighbours, it is impossible to say; but, certain it is 
that at some period, not, perhaps, very long before the 
Christian era, under the guidance of this personage, 
a sun-nurtured people moved across the face of Europe, 
in a north-westerly direction, and, after leaving settle¬ 
ments along the southern shores of the Baltic, finally 
established themselves in the forests and valleys of 
what has come to be called the Scandinavian Peninsula. 
That children of the south should have sought out so 
