And as the _Elder_ and _Younger Edda_ claim that the Northmen were
the giant races, and that their kings were of the blood of these
Asas; and as the bronze-using people advanced, (it has been proved by
their remains,[1]) into Scandinavia from the _southwest_, it is clear
that these legends do not refer to some mythical island in the Indian
Seas, or to the Pacific Ocean, but to the Atlantic: the west coasts
of Europe were "the outer strand" where these white colonies were
established; the island was in the Atlantic; and, as there is no body
of submerged land in that ocean with roots or ridges reaching out to
the continents east and west, except the mass of which the Azores
Islands constitute the mountain-tops, the conclusion is irresistible
that here was Atlantis; here was Lanka; here was "the island of the
innocent," here was Asgard.
And the Norse legends describe this "Asgard" as a land of temples and
plowed fields, and a mighty civilized race.
And here it is that Ragnarok comes. It is from the
[1. Du Chaillu's "Land of the Midnight Sun," vol. i, pp.
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