of thought and speech of our forefathers in that "dark backward and abysm of time." We have it here at first hand, 'proving,' in Chapman's words,

"-how firm truth builds in poet's feigning ;"

and it is scarcely an exaggeration to say that we may live with our ancestors and know them-which surely is the chief end of history-better in this poem than in all the bulky volumes of professed historians.

That some of the persons mentioned in the poem are historical there can be little doubt, but of the hero himself the utmost we can assert is, that he may not impossibly have been a real man. The two theories about him propounded by Kemble show in a very striking manner the difficulty of the question. In 1833 the great Anglo-Saxon scholar has no doubt that Beowulf is historical; in 1837 he retracts the erroneous views developed in the earlier volume, and Beowulf becomes a mere phantom of mythology. The truth probably lies somewhere between these extreme views, and indeed Kemble would very likely have modified his later theory if he had known of the identification of Higelac, the uncle of Beowulf, with the Chochilaicus, King of the Danes,' whose death in battle with the Attoarii in 511 is recorded by Gregory of Tours, and in the Gesta Regum Francorum. The dry record of these chroniclers is a remarkable confirmation of the passages

in the poem which tell of Higelac's fatal expedition to Friesland and slaughter by the Hetwars, and we thus get, what Kemble craved in vain, a key-date of the highest value.* A farther trace of Higelac is found in the passage from a writer of the tenth century, quoted by Grein in the article already referred to, which relates that the bones of Huiglaicus qui imperavit Getis et a Francis occisus est were still preserved on an island in the Rhine, near its mouth, and shown to strangers as a wonder for their immense size.

If then it is pretty certain that the uncle really lived, why should we doubt the existence of the nephew merely because a heap of fables has gathered round his name? We have no record of him, it is true, elsewhere. In the shadowy realm of Northern history or legend he is unknown, but not assuredly, as the poem testifies, caret quia vate sacro. AngloSaxon and Norse genealogies are alike silent about him; but this may be explained by the fact that he was a childless man, and after his death his little kingdom was probably soon swallowed up in the dominions of greater neighbours. On the whole, therefore, if we have little reason to affirm his existence we have as little to deny it, and

* The Hetwars are evidently the Attoarii. They are identified with the Chatti of Tacitus, as their neighbours the Hugas are with his Chanci. The fact that Chochilaicus is called King of the Danes' is of no moment. The ecclesiastical historian probably used the word as including northern barbarians of all kinds.

though we may not place him on the terra firma of reality, we may yet justly refuse to consign him absolutely to the cloudland of mythology.

In that hazy region

"Where nothing is, but all things seem,"

his name is analyzed, and is found to mean 'cultivator,' with an honorary termination, 'wulf.' He is the god of husbandry ; he is Thor struggling with the great serpent; he is, in short, whatever anybody may choose to read into his name and story. It would not be difficult, I think, to extract a myth of the dawn fighting with the powers of darkness from the tale of Beowulf going with his twelve companions to do battle with the dragon ; and something might even be made out of Grendel, who is expressly called 'the servant of evening,' and his more terrible mother, by any one with a taste for inquiries of this kind. In all such theories there is no doubt a kernel of truth. The sources of the Grendel and the dragon stories must be sought in the vast Serbonian bog of Gothic legend-nay, even farther afield—and the most resolute stickler for the historical reality of the hero himself will hardly deny the mythical nature of his adventures.

But I utterly reject all rationalizing interpretations of his marvellous exploits. Grendel and his mother, we are told, mean hurricanes and inundations, but Beowulf purifies "seas

and all wide land," and thus cultivation, and so forth, triumph over the forces of nature. Or-and this time it is even Grein who suggests it-Grendel means the attacks of pirates from which Beowulf delivered the Danes. At this rate Grendel may mean anything. One might hazard a theory that he was bad drainage, fatal to the sleepers in the hall that Hrothgar had built at Heorot, until Beowulf, with improved sanitary arrangements, came to the rescue of the distressed householder and put things right. The fiery dragon, again, might be only an imperfect water supply, which Beowulf-not unlike Faust in his old age-cured with dams and canals and reservoirs, and so got untold wealth. But why should we always try to explain away whatever seems strange to us? We do not believe in fiends and fiery dragons, but the poet of Beowulf did, and I think he would have opened the eyes of astonishment if he had been told that he only meant night and darkness, hurricanes, inundations, and the attacks of pirates.

Whether Beowulf really lived or not the poem asserts that he was a Geát. Who were the Geáts? Kemble maintained that they were Angles; but eminent scholars have found serious objections to this theory, and Thorpe, Grein, and Mr. Arnold agree in identifying them with the Goths of the Swedish province of Gotland. The prefix 'Weder' is supposed to

indicate the inhabitants of the 'weather' or western side of the peninsula. Unhappily the name of Higelac's capital is nowhere

given. The modern Gottenborg, however, both in name and position answers very well to the description of the "burg," in which the Gothic king dwelt, and whence Beowulf set sail on his voyage to Heorot. Gustavus Adolphus, when he founded the city, may have availed himself of an old site and an old name. Moreover, on an island a little higher up the river on which Gottenborg stands, at a point where the stream divides into two channels to reach the sea, are the ruins of a stronghold built by the Norwegian king Hakon IV. in 1308. The name of this place is Bôhûs, which, according to Grein, means domus Boi, and as Bous is identical with the Beaw, or Beow, of the genealogies, we may have here some trace of the Beowulf of "Beowulf's mound," says Grein, must be sought

the poem.

on some promontory in the neighbourhood, and it may be, he adds, that close inquiry might still find some tradition of the hero lingering among the country folk.

But what connection have Swedish Goths with England ? and why should an English poet celebrate with such enthusiasm the great exploits in Denmark and in Gotland of a Gothic hero? Thorpe's reply to such questions is that the poem is founded on a lost Norse Saga brought to England, and translated during the sway of the Danish dynasty in the eleventh

* Kemble, I hardly know why, calls Hrafnesholt, "the Raven's wood," (Part III. vi.), Higelac's capital, and identifies it with Ravensburg in Sleswick.— (Beowulf, vol. i., Preface, p. xvii.)