Page:Curious myths of the Middle Ages (1876).djvu/566



brought away two children from Vinland, and they related that near their home was a land, where people walked about in flowing white robes, singing processional psalms. Northern antiquarians attempt to identify this White-man’s land with Florida, where they suppose was settled the Welsh colony led beyond the sea by Madoc in 1169. I have little doubt that it is simply an Icelandic reminiscence of the popular Irish superstition relative to the Soul Island beneath the setting sun. “In his crystal ark, Whither sail’d Merlin with his band of bards, Old Merlin, master of the mystic lore; Belike his crystal ark, instinct with life, Obedient to the mighty Master, reach’d The Land of the Departed; there, belike, They in the clime of immortality, Themselves immortal, drink the gales of bliss Which o’er Flathinnis breathe eternal spring, Blending whatever odours make the gale Of evening sweet, whatever melody Charms the wood traveller.” Madoc, xi.

This Flath Innis, the Noble Island, is the Gaelic name for the western paradise. Macpherson, in his Introduction to the “History of Great Britain,” relates a legend which agrees with those prevalent among other Keltic peoples. In former days there lived in Skerr a Druid of renown. He sat with his