Vietnam or Thailand ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Updated: June 9, 2025
"Not soon, not soon," said the dead Asa; but still he saw the light far off, and thought of what was to come. "Well, Hermod, what did she say?" asked the gods from the top of the hill as they saw him coming; "make haste and tell us what she said." And Hermod came up. "Oh! is that all?" they cried, as soon as he had delivered his message.
"Balder is the mildest, the wisest, and the most eloquent of all the AEsir," says the "Edda." A voice of wail went through the palaces of Asgard when Balder was slain by the mistletoe dart. Hermod rode down to the kingdom of Hela, or Death, to ransom the lost one. Meantime his body was set adrift on a floating funeral pyre.
But when Hermod reached the other end of the bridge, he found the courageous woman who, for ages and ages, had been sitting there to watch the dead go by, and she stopped him saying: "What a noise you make! Who are you? Yesterday five troops of dead men went over the Giallar Bridge and did not shake it so much as you have done.
Hermod told her straight and plain that he would not do so, at which the Queen grew terribly angry, and said that in that case neither should he have Hadvor, for she would now lay this spell on him, that he should go to a desert island and there be a lion by day and a man by night.
"Who are you?" she asked, fixing her piercing eyes on Hermod. "What is your name and parentage? Yesterday five bands of dead men rode across the bridge, and beneath them all it did not shake as under your single tread. There is no colour of death in your face. Why ride you hither, the living among the dead?" "I come," said Hermod, "to seek for Balder. Have you seen him pass this way?"
The maiden who kept the bridge asked him his name and lineage, telling him that the day before five bands of dead persons had ridden over the bridge, and did not shake it as much as he alone. "But," she added, "thou hast not death's hue on thee; why then ridest thou here on the way to Hel?" "I ride to Hel," answered Hermod, "to seek Baldur. Hast thou perchance seen him pass this way?"
She asked Hermod his name and family, and told him that on the former day there had ridden over the bridge five bands of dead men. "They did not make my bridge ring as you do, and you have not the hue of the dead. Why ride you thus on the way to Hel?" He said "I ride to Hel to find Baldur. Have you seen him on his way to that place?"
For she was Loki's daughter, and knew by whose act Balder had been sent below. Finally she said: "Hermod, I shall try whether the protestations that all things lament Balder are indeed true. Return to Asgard; and if, through all the earth, all things, living and dead, weep for Balder, he shall return. But if one thing in all the world refuses to shed tears, here he shall stay."
"If, therefore," she added, "all things in the world, both living and lifeless, weep for him, then shall he return to life; but if any one thing speak against him or refuse to weep, he shall be kept in Hel." Hermod then rode back to Asgard and gave an account of all he had heard and witnessed.
"Not you alone," she replied, "but any of the gods, would willingly die for Balder. But not in that way can he be brought back to Asgard. There is one chance speak to Hermod, fleetest of the gods; tell him to take Odin's horse, Sleipnir, and ride to Hela's abode. Perchance, if he entreat her, she may give Balder up."
Word Of The Day
Others Looking