But, as our countrymen aver, those who even to-day are said to dwell
in that rugged and inaccessible desert aforesaid, are, by the mutable
nature of their bodies, vouchsafed the power of being now near, now far,
and of appearing and vanishing in turn. The approach to this desert is
beset with perils of a fearful kind, and has seldom granted to those
who attempted it an unscathed return. Now I will let my pen pass to my
theme.



ENDNOTES:
(1) Waldemar the Second (1203-42); Saxo does not reach his
history.




BOOK ONE.

Now Dan and Angul, with whom the stock of the Danes begins, were
begotten of Humble, their father, and were the governors and not
only the founders of our race. (Yet Dudo, the historian of Normandy,
considers that the Danes are sprung and named from the Danai.) And these
two men, though by the wish and favour of their country they gained
the lordship of the realm, and, owing to the wondrous deserts of
their bravery, got the supreme power by the consenting voice of their
countrymen, yet lived without the name of king: the usage whereof was
not then commonly resorted to by any authority among our people.