Northern mythology

78 SWEDISH TRADITIONS.
were washed, and received gifts from the people for advice
in cases of sickness, as well as on other occasions. After
the country became Christian, the monks and priests took
the fomitains under their care, placed by them images
saints or a cross, and caused the people to make offerings
to, and seek health from, the saint that was supposed to
have the well under his protection. Thus did Christian
superstition step into the place of pagan, and continues
even to the present day. But the heathen Horgabrudar,
who died without baptism or sacrament, were still in the
remembrance of the people, and had become Elves, who
await salvation, dwelling till doomsday under their fountains'
silvery roof.
In song and in story the beauty of the
Fountain-maids is praised, when they have been seen by
mortal man and displayed their fair forms either in the
depth of a fountain, or reposing by its side on a bed of
flowers. To the person who cleanses a fountain, or plants
over it an umbrageous tree, the Fountain-maid will be
kind and propitious ;
of
while he who profanes or sullies the
fountain's salubrious stream will be followed by sickness
and misfortune.
III.
THE NECK AND THE STROMKARL.
The Neck appears sometimes in the form of a grown
man, and is particularly dangerous to haughty and pert
damsels ; sometimes in that of a comely youth, with his
lower extremities like those of a horse ;
sometimes like an
old man with a long beard ; and occasionally as a handsome
youth, with yellow locks flowing over his shoulders
and a red cap, sitting in a summer evening on the surface
of the water with a golden harp in his hand. If any one
wishes to learn music of him, the most welcome remuneration
that can be offered to him is a black lamb, especially
if the hope of his salvation—which the Neck has