The above narrative is taken from the Saga of Erick Randa, as quoted by the learned Bartholine in his curious work. He mentions similar instances, particularly of one Heida, celebrated for her predictions, who attended festivals for the purpose, as a modern Scotsman might say, of spaeing fortunes, with a gallant tail, or retinue, of thirty male and fifteen female attendants.—See De Causis Contemptæ a Danis adhuc gentilibus Mortis, lib. III., cap. 4.
Note II., p. 32.—Promise of Odin.
Although the Father of Scandinavian mythology has been as a deity long forgotten in the archipelago, which was once a very small part of his realm, yet even at this day his name continues to be occasionally attested as security for a promise.
It is curious to observe, that the rites with which such attestati
