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84 THROUGH NORWAY WITII A KNAPSACK.
specialty of this family was petrifaction. The cruel
brother exercised that power on the messengers from his
sister’s lover, and turned them all into rocks. Now the
lover was not aware of the brother’s existence, for the
fair giantess had very improperly concealed the fact, on
account of his extravagant habits having imperilled her
dowry. Believing thus that his plighted one was the
last of her race, and who alone possessed the power of
petrifaction, he of course concluded that she had put the
stony insult on him; so mounting his steed, and
shouldering his crossbow, lie shot a heavy bolt at the
dwelling of the Jutuless: his specialty being the power
of unerring aim.
Her brother was bathing at the time, and it being a
very wet morning he wore his sou’-wester. The bolt
sped through seventy miles of air, passed through the
hat of the treacherous Jutul, and carried away a portion
of his skull; but then, impeded by this resistance, failed
to make the ricochet the archer had relied upon, and
simply skimmed the water and fell at the fair one’s feet.
Slie knew the bolt, and that none but he could have shot
it. She saw her brother (who with all his faults she
dearly loved) sinking beneath the wave never to rise
again, and all that remained of him for her loving eyes
to gaze upon was his perforated sou’-wester floating on
the waters. She thought of the perfidy of the lover slie
had believed so true, and her heart was broken; but as
she died she exercised lier power of petrifaction; and
herself, the floating perforated sou’-wester, her lover, and the
horse he rode, were all converted to fast-rooted rocks.
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