Its legs from fence-stakes, its head from a root of ash,
The rest of its body from rotten wood—its hair from horsetail grass.
This short piece may be compared with the humorous description in the Kalevala, xiii, 105-194, of the elk, made by the Hiisi folk, after which Lemminkainen had such a wild-goose chase. There are several Finnish riddles in which Hiisi's elk means a pine-tree pure and simple. Hiisi's elk has 100 horns, its skin is eaten, its blood is sold, its flesh is burnt? Answer.—A pine, its bark (eaten in seasons of scarcity), tar and wood.
Father was seeking lynxes, was hunting Hiisi's elks; he struck down an elk in Hiisi's land, its bones rattled down on the heath, he carried off the blood to Abo? Answer.—A tar-burner is seeking tarwood in the forest, lops off the branches, and carries the tar to a town.
An elk was killed in Hiisi's land, the bones were charred upon the heath, the blood was carried to a town? Answer.—Tar-burning; a pine-tree, the branches, the tar.
As Hiisi's name is of frequent occurrence, a word of explanation is due to those who are not conversant with Finnish mythology. The Finns have several words for "devil, fiend", such as Hiisi, and its diminutive Hitto, Lempo, Perkele, Piru, Pirulainen, paha henki (evil spirit). Paholainen (the Evil One), Juutas. Of these, Perkele and Piru are derived from the Sclavonic Perkunas, Perun (the thunder god); Juutas is thought to be the New Testament Judas; the others are native words. To Finnish ears Hiisi sounds less bad than Perkele; "Go to Hiisi" means "Go to the deuce", while "Go to Perkele" means "Go to the Devil". The reason probably is that the latter is the Biblical word for Devil, and therefore connotes all that the Christian doctrine teaches of him. Hiisi in the genitive, before the adjective "big", corresponds with the English expression "devilish big" or "deuced big". Originally he seems to have been a mountain or a wooded mountain divinity. In the magic songs he and his people are sometimes said to
