Page:The Mythology of the Aryan Nations.djvu/600

568 BOOK II. upon two sticks, who represents the Hmping Hephaistos not only in his gait but in his office. Like him, the Valant is a smith, and the name, which has assumed elsewhere the forms Faland, Phaland, Foland, Valland, passes into the English form Wayland, and gives us the Wayland Smith whom Tresilian confronts in Scott's novel of Kenil- worth.^ Like the robbers who steal Indra's cattle, he is also the dark, murky, or black being, the Graumann or Greyman of German folk-lore.^ Like the Fauns and other mythical beings of Greek and Latin mythology, he has a body which is either wholly or in part that of a beast. Sometimes he leaves behind him the print of a horse's hoof, and the English demon Grant, another form probably of Grendel,^ showed itself in the form of a foal. The devil of the witches was a black buck or goat; * that of the fathers of the Christian Church was a devouring wolf ^ Like Ahi, again, and Python and Echidna, he is not only the old serpent or dragon but the hell-worm, and the walfish or leviathan (a name in which we see again the Vala or de- ceiver).® Like Baalzebub, he assumes the form of a fly, as Psyche may denote either a good or an evil spirit. As the hammer which crushes the world, and inflicts the penalty of sin on the sinner, he plays the part of the Aloadai and Thor Miolnir. As the guardian of the under world, he is the hellward and the hell-shepherd or host. Kis gloomy abode lies towards the north, whether as the gloomy Ovel- gunne, which has furnished a name for many places in Germany, — the Hekelfelde, Heklufiall, or hag's fell, — or the nobiskroech, nobis-krug, which answers to the gate beyond which the lost souls leave hope behind them.'' The same process, which converted the kindly Holda into the malignant Unholda, attributed to the devil occu- pations borrowed from those of the Teutonic Odin and the Greek Orion. But it is no longer the mighty hunter following his prey on

1 Grimm, D. M. 945. In Sir W. Scott's romance, Wayland is a mere im- postor who avails himself of a popular superstition to keep up an air of mystery about himself and his work: but the character to which he makes pretence belongs to the genuine Teutonic legend. demon is the Slavish Tschernibog (Zer- nibog), who is represented as the enemy of Bjelbog, the white god, — a dualism which Grimm regards as of late growth, D. M. 936. » Grimm, D. M. 946. specially sacred to Donar or Thor; but it is possible that this transformation, like that of LykaOn and Arkas, was suggested by an equivocal name; and the buck may be only a kindred form to the Slavish Bog, which reappears among us in the form of Puck, Bogy, and Bug. Grimm couples the hell-hound and black raven, the former answering to the Hellenic Kerberos. He also com- pares the Old German warg, a wolf, with the Polish wrog, the Bohemian wrah, the Slovinian vrag, an evil-doer. ® Grimm, ib. 950. ' Jb. 954. This word nobis is formed from the Greek d^vccros, through the Italian form uabisso for in abysso — a change similar to that which con%'erted is Kvva% &tiWety into aKv^aou
 * Grimm, D. M. 945. This black
 * Grimm, ib. 946-7. The buck was
 * Grimm, ib. 948. With these