Thor and the Miser (original)
On the longest night in Scandinavia, the God Thor goes from house to house on a cart pulled by two magical goats. They may have had names in lore that is lost to us now, but in this story their names are Myrgth and Sorga. When on the Long Night a man comes to your house in a cart pulled by goats, you are even more careful than usual to treat him as befits an honored guest. He must have food and drink and want for nothing. All night he will eat and drink and sing and tell stories, and when dawn is coming he will make ready to depart. But before he goes, you will exchange gifts, for that is the custom. And the gift you give will be the measure of your heart's worth, and the gift you receive will be no more nor less than your due.
On this longest night, Thor arrived (as he arrived at every other holt and hall, but that is the magic) cold, wet, hungry, and thirsty, at a great hall with a great door fitted with bronze. He smote the door and called out, and finally, one thin servant came to the door.
"My master says we have nothing to give you," he said, quavering and distraught.
"Nothing to give!" Thor roared, astonished. He might have left that house, or left that house in ashes, but some mischief took hold of him. "Go before me and tell your master that Thor wants only a stable for his goats this evening."
The servant turned and went into the hall, where the lord of the house sat—alone by a tiny fire, in a great dark room—and whispered in his ear.
But had Thor stood outside all this time with his cart and his two goats? Not he! In he came, goats, cart, and all, right into the hall.
"I thank you for your hospitality," Thor said, his rumbling voice laden with sarcasm. He leapt off the cart, shaking the walls. It was his custom to tell stories and boast of his exploits to help his hosts while away the long winter night, but now that he was soiling the flagstone floor of his sullen host's home with the hooves of his goats, he thought he might make the best of it. So he bent to unhitch and unharness them.
"Do you think my hall is a shed for livestock?" the miser cried. "How dare you act this way, you barbaric man?"
"I think this... hall... must indeed be a shed for livestock, for so you treat your guests, your servants, and your wife, who has gone back to live with her father, so I hear. Besides, any hall fit for men has some life to it, and this is a bare wooden shack with hardly a stick of furniture." Thor's voice softened a bit. "You must be impoverished indeed, to live in a goatshed; therefore I've come to offer you charity."
"Faugh on your charity!" the miser spat. "My fields and herds yield well; why should any man benefit from my hard work but me? But this last year my servants have all left me, all but this one old man, and so I plow and plant myself and have little time for luxury."
"Well then," said Thor. "Since you will neither give nor receive, here I will sit—" and he leaned against his cart— "and entertain myself to while away the night. Perhaps I can even warm this place up a bit."
And he clapped his hands twice, and one of his goats leapt up on his hind legs and began to dance, rapping his hooves on the flagstone floor while Thor beat the time with his meaty palms.
And all the while the goat did dance, it seemed there was music playing, and the hall full of people laughing and joking. Meat and drink was on every plate and in every horn, and Thor and the servant ate and drank their fill, and the old man remembered Yuletide feasts of his childhood and wept for joy. The miser's stomach rumbled, but his heart was cold, and when he thought some ghostly figure tried to pass him a plate, it slipped through his fingers and vanished. In fact, there was merriment enough for everyone in the hall but him.
And then the goat stopped dancing and lay down, and the brightness and merriment faded away. The servant and Thor felt warmed by their food and drink, but the miser had had nothing, and the hall now felt colder than ever.
"Make it dance again," he demanded.
"Alas, I fear Myrgth is tired out for this night," Thor said, just as if the miser had made a polite request instead of a loutish one. "But I will tell a tale."
And he began speaking. Thor is not generally known to be a man of words, but this was a tale of his own adventures, and at these he excels. So once again it seemed the hall filled with merriment and excitement, and now that hunger was sated, horns were passed around full of mead. The old miser, who had sold his honey for gold rather than put by for the Poets' Gold, longed to taste a drop, for it looked like the finest mead he had ever seen. But once again the horn slipped through his grasp and vanished.
At last the story came to an end, and left the hall barer and colder than before. The old servant sighed.
"Please, Earth's Son, tell another tale, full of your valor and heroic deeds," he entreated. But Thor shook his head.
"Alas, friend, no more tales come to mind for this night. It is your turn—Why do not you tell the tale that is burning on your tongue, that you heard from your old uncle at your seven-year?"
To his surprise, the servant realised that he did recall the story, and he told it, as vibrant and full of life and magic as his uncle the skald told it to him. And in the crowd of merry-makers now filling the hall, he spotted his uncle's ghost, leaning on the shoulder of a friend, raising a horn in salute. Now young women and men danced together, arms entwined, and the old servant felt his hand touched and thought of his bride, and there she was, recalled from sleep in their far away shack and looking astonished to be there. Sif put her arms around Thor as he listened, captivated.
The old miser thought of the wife he had used so badly, who had left him, but he could not see her face, and the other women would not look at him. When one seemed to come near, he put out his hand, but as soon as he did so she vanished.
And when the old servant's story ended, all the merry-maker's vanished—Sif and the old man's wife as well, back to their dreams. And the hall seemed unbearably cold and empty and depressing, and the miser thought he might go mad with hunger and thirst and loneliness. He clutched his hair and beat his palms against his face.
"Tell another story, quickly!" he shouted at his servant. but dumbfounded, the servant shook his head; it seemed his tongue had cleaved to the roof of his mouth and he could say nothing.
"It is not his turn," Thor said gravely. "It is yours."
"I am no foolish teller of tales!" the miser snarled. "You are here to entertain me, since you must insist on abusing my good nature this way. Make your other goat dance!"
And all looked at the white goat, who lay quiet in the corner of the room, almost forgotten.
"She does not dance," Thor said. "She sings. But it is not her turn to entertain, and you do not want her to, for once she begins she will not stop until it pleases her." He looked back at the miser. "Are you sure you can do nothing to while away the time? Perhaps... some trick, some sleight of hand we might all find amusing?"
"No!" the miser sneered. "Such things are for servants, minstrels, and vagrants! I am lord of this hall, and you will make your goat sing, if sing she can... I command it!"
"Very well, then," Thor sighed. "Sorga."
And the goat began to sing.
Her voice was like ten years full of nights without a lover, twenty years without a sight of a child, fifty years without a friendly word, a hundred years without a smile, five hundred years without a friendly touch. Her song was of the last lonely voice at the end of the world, unceasing, after all beings had gone home into the dark. Her song was of the end of all good things that humans do for one another that keeps the world turning—the kindness that makes day follow night, the help that makes summer follow winter, the generosity that makes life follow death. Everything gone, and long past recall.
At once, the hall became so cold, so empty. The miser was alone with Sorga, for he and he alone could hear her. He called out to Thor, he commanded him, he berated him, he threatened him, he railed against him, and finally he entreated him by name. But there was no answer. The song went on forever, and there was no one else in all the world to hear.
It seemed that hours passed, days without sun, months, years without summer. The pitiful fire in the great hearth had gone out long ago. The miser had worn himself out pacing the hall, trying to escape (but the door seemed forever further away), covering his ears to shut out the sound of that agonizing voice. He tried beating her, to no avail. In a rage, he grabbed a mace from his mantel and crushed her skull and killed her! But the voice went on, and now he was truly alone with the song and no other living being, not even the goat, whom he now realized had at least looked on him with pity. He wept for her, and for all the things in the world he had left behind. And he stroked her poor broken head.
Suddenly, firelight filled the hall, and laughter. The song had stopped. Sorga knelt as she had before, unharmed. The servant stared at his master, astonished, for he had heard the goat bleat, and now such a change had come over his master's face. The lord ran to him and embraced him, and then fell at Thor's feet and begged his forgiveness. He took the mace and ran out into the snow and killed his best pig, and laid it on the fire himself, and then he pulled open his store of wealth and began distributing golden arm rings, to Thor, to his servant, to each of the goats (who seemed to delight to wear them around their hind legs), and finally a golden necklace he gave to Sorga.
"Kindness," said Thor gravely, "is the only defence against sorrow."
Every Yule thereafter, there was such a feast in that hall that lords around the countryside put aside their quarrels, packed up their households, and came to where the best meat and drink would be given, the best skalds were given rich gifts to entertain the company, and every poor person for miles around came to have meat and drink just as good and plentiful as the lords'. And there was always a spot at the table for a big gruff warrior, and a bed of straw right in the hall for two goats, one merry, one solemn.
If this tale has any truth, the truth in it is from the Gods, and if it has any falsehood, the fault for that is mine. |
