Northern mythology

74 NORTH GERMAN TRADITIONS.
found a little dog lying before his door. He took it in,
and together with his wife fed and cherished it. But in
the following year, and exactly at the same time, the dog
suddenly disappeared, and in his bed there lay a large
lump of gold. That must have been intended by Fru Gode
for the farmer, who until then was a poor man, but now
at once became rich.
The name of Fru Gode, though applied in the middle age to a female
being, Grimm (D. M. p. 231) considers a corruption from Fro Woden
(Dominus Woden). In her annual tour and transformation of the shavings
into gold, she resembles Berhta. Fru Gauden was, as we are told (D. M.
p. 877), a lady of consideration and wealth, who was so enthusiastically
fond of the chase that she uttered the sinful words :
" If I might always
hunt, I would never wish to enter heaven." She had twenty -four daughters,
all as mad as herself. One day, when mother and daughters were dashing
in full gallop through field and forest, and in their vn\d joy uttered the
profane words : " The chase is better than heaven!" behold! before the
eyes of the mother the daughters' clothes are turned to hair, their arms
to legs, and four-and-twenty hounds bark round the hunting car of the
mother ; four of which take the duty of the horses, the rest accompany
the carriage, and away goes the wild group up into the clouds, there, between
heaven and earth, to hunt, as they had wished, without cessation,
from day to day, from year to year. Long have they been weary of their
wild amusement, and deplore the sinful wish ;
but they must bear the
consequences of their crime, until the hour comes for their release. Come
it one day will, but when? no one can say. In the twelve days of
Christmas' (for at other times we mortals are not aware of her presence),
Fru Gauden directs her course to the habitations of men ;
on Christmas
night, or the last night of the year, she likes to traverse the streets of the
village, and where she finds a house-door open, she sends in a little dog.
In the morning a little dog comes wagging its tail to the inhabitant ;
it does
no harm beyond disturbing the nocturnal quiet by its whining. It will
be neither appeased nor driven away. If any one kills it, it wUl by day
be changed into a stone, which, if thrown away, will return to the house
and again become a dog. This dog will whine and moan during the whole
year, bring disease and death to man and beast, and peril of fire on the
house ; and not till the return of the twelve days will the house regain its
quiet. ' Hence every one takes especial care, both morning and evening,
to keep the house-door well-closed. Some people were once foohsh
enough to kill the dog, but from that day they never prospered, and at
length their house was burnt to the ground. More fortunate are they
who render a service to Fru Gauden, who, in the darkness of the night,