Page:The Folk-Lore Journal Volume 5 1887.djvu/345

 Rh although I had no idea then that I was in so eerie a place. It is reached by a trap-door from the roof, but the ancient approach is by a passage twenty-seven feet long, through which a man could just crawl and no more. The dwelling is about fifteen feet long by ten wide, with a roof of irregular height, nowhere exceeding six feet. It is lined by twelve enormous blocks of Swedish granite. Such is the Denghoog, and here Ekke came to visit King Finn, who entertained him most hospitably and told him how he won his own bride, who now sat beside him in finest raiment, crowned with wild flowers and diamonds and with rings on every finger. Thus encouraged Ekke made sure he would get a bride from Braderup, a neighbouring village,—a long way from Rantum. Up he rose early in the morning and sat on his hill and saw the dawn in the east, and the moon in the west, and thought of such things as a love-sick sea-god may. And then there passed him a bright youth, Dorret Bundis of Braderup, one of three who had crossed on the ice from the continent some time before, and went to bathe in the bay beneath. Ekke had been himself so long out of the water that he felt he must bathe too; perhaps, says the Sylt tale, he wanted to make the lad's acquaintance or to teach him to swim. But sea-gods are "kittle-cattle," and Dorret seeing Ekke coming, ran away crying out. For this there was a particularly excellent reason, since Dorret was no boy at all, but a girl, who wore men's clothes to prevent King Finn and his underground folk taking a fancy to her. However Ekke caught her; she begged to get away and that he would keep her secret. At last Ekke promised this, if she would wed him in a year and a day. Dorret had no choice. She was in a peculiarly literal sense " between the devil and the deep sea," and she plighted her troth to Ekke. His joy knew no bounds, and he sang gaily on his lonely sand-hills,—

But this song by-and-bye all the Braderup people heard, and other