Northern mythology

210 NORTHERN MYTHOLOGY.
On hearing it slie said slie could have given better counsel,
and wondered that among so many men there was found
so little wisdom. These words reached at length the ears
of the king, who was angry at her boldness and conceit,
and declared he would soon put her to her wit^s end.
promised to take her to his counsel, but on condition that
she should come to him not on foot nor on horseback, not
driving nor sailing, not clad nor unclad, not in a year nor
a month, not by day nor by night, not in the moon^s increase
nor wane. Disa, in her perplexity at this order,
prayed to the goddess Frigg for counsel, and then went
to the king in the following manner.
He
She harnessed two
young men to a sledge, by the side of which she caused
a goat to be led ; she held one leg in the sledge and placed
the other on the goat, and was herself clad in a net. Thus
she came to the king neither walking nor riding, nor
driving, nor sailing, neither clad nor unclad. She came
neither in a current year nor month, but on the third day
before Yule, one of the days of the solstice, which were not
reckoned as belonging to the year itself,
but as a complement,
and in like manner might be said not to
belong to
any month. She came neither in the increase nor in the
wane, but just at the full moon ; neither by day nor by
night, but in the twilight. The king wondered at such
sagacity, ordered her to be brought before him, and found
so great delight in her conversation, beauty and understanding,
that he made her his queen.
Following her advice,
he then divided the people into two portions, one of
which, according to lot, he furnished \^^th arms, hunting
gear, and as much seed-corn as would suffice for one
sowing, and sent them to the uninhabited regions of the
north, there to establish a colony and cultivate the land.
Much other good counsel this queen gave for the benefit
of the country, for which she was loved and honoured both
by king and people ; and so highly was she prized for her