Classics Retold – World's Greatest Tales Adapted for the Youngest. Гарриет Бичер-Стоу
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СКАЧАТЬ a door at each end. Down the middle of the room were flat stones in the dirt floor. Here the fires burned. In the roof above these fires were holes for the smoke to go out, but some of it blew about the hall, and the walls and rafters were stained with it. But it was pleasant wood smoke, and the Norsemen did not dislike it. There were no large windows in a feast hall or in any other Norse building. High up under the eaves or in the roof itself were narrow slits that were called wind's-eyes. There was no glass in them, for the Norsemen did not know how to make it; but there were, instead, covers made of thin, oiled skin. These were put into the wind's-eyes in stormy weather. There were covers, too, for the smoke-holes. The only light came through these narrow holes, so on dark days the people needed the fire as much for light as for warmth.

      Then they went and cut three long pieces of turf and put a spear into the ground so that it held up the strips of turf like an arch. Runes were cut on the handle of the spear, telling the duties of foster-brothers. The two men walked under this arch, and each made a little cut in his palm. They knelt and clasped hands, so that the blood of the two flowed together, and they said, "Now we are of one blood."

      Then each made this vow: "I will fight for my foster-brother whenever he shall need me. If he is killed before I am, I will punish the man who did it. Whatever things I own are as much my foster-brother's as mine. I will love this man until I die. I call Odin and Thor and all the gods to hear my vow. May they hate me if I break it!"

      An old Norse story says this about the Valkyrias: "With lightning around them, with bloody shirts of mail, and with shining spears they ride through the air and the ocean. When their horses shake their manes, dew falls on the deep valleys and hail on the high forests."

      FOOTNOTES:

      Suggestions to Teachers

       Table of Contents

      Possibly this book seems made up of four or five disconnected stories. They are, however, strung upon one thread,—the westward emigration from Norway. The story of Harald is intended to serve in two ways towards the working out of this plot. It gives the general setting that continues throughout the book in costume, houses, ideals, habits. It explains the cause of the emigration from the mother country. It is really an introductory chapter. As for the other stories, they are distinctly steps in the progress of the plot. A chain of islands loosely connects Norway with America,—Orkneys and Shetlands, Faroes, Iceland, Greenland. It was from link to link of this chain that the Norsemen sailed in search of home and adventure. Discoveries were made by accident. Ships were driven by the wind from known island to unknown. These two points,—the island connection that made possible the long voyage from Norway to America, and the contribution of storm to discovery,—I have stated in the book only dramatically. I emphasize them here, hoping that the teacher will make sure that the children see them, and possibly that they state them abstractly.

      Let me speak as to the proper imaging of the stories. I have not often interrupted incident with special description, not because I do not consider the getting of vivid and detailed images most necessary to full enjoyment and to proper intellectual habits, but because I trusted to the pictures of this book and to the teacher to do what seemed to me inartistic to do in the story. Some of these descriptions and explanations I have introduced into the book in the form of notes, hoping that the children in turning to them might form a habit of insisting upon full understanding of a point, and might possibly, with the teacher's encouragement, begin the habit of reference reading.

      The landscape of Norway, Iceland, and Greenland is wonderful and will greatly assist in giving reality and definiteness to the stories. Materials for this study are not difficult of access. Foreign colored photographs of Norwegian landscape are becoming common in our art stores. There are good illustrations in the geographical works referred to in the book list. These could be copied upon the blackboard. There are three books beautifully illustrated in color that it will be possible to find only in large libraries,—"Coast of Norway," by Walton; "Travels in the Island of Iceland," by Mackenzie; "Voyage en Islande et au Gröenland," by J. P. Gaimard. If the landscape is studied from the point of view of formation, the images will be more accurate and more easily gained, and the study will have a general value that will continue past the reading of these stories into all work in geography.

      Trustworthy pictures of Norse houses and costumes are difficult to obtain. In "Viking Age" and "Story of Norway," by Boyesen (G. P. Putnam's Sons, New York), are many copies of Norse antiquities in the fashion of weapons, shield-bosses, coins, jewelry, wood-carving. These are, of course, accurate, but of little interest to children. Their chief value lies in helping the teacher to piece together a picture СКАЧАТЬ