Up the high hill he heaves a huge round stone.
The huge round stone resulting with a bound,
Thunders impetuous down, and smokes along the ground.
HOMER.
ALL pleasant sojourns must end; all oases must fade in the distance
as we journey o’er the desert sands of life. Though it rained hard,
an hour after I stopped with “mine host,” the intelligent clergyman
of Hruni, we were in our saddles, and the white, the black, and the
chestnut ponies were scampering “over the hills and far away.” The
farmer of Haukadalr left us here, and Mr. Briem sent one of his farm
servants to show us the way. It is two pretty good days’ ride from
the Geysers to Hekla; and we had yet two large rivers to cross, and
sundry mountains, valleys, lava-beds, and green fields to go over or
get round, before we were half way to the celebrated volcano. Near
the house we passed a very large spring of limpid water that looked
most deliciously tempting for a swim. Getting off my horse, I tried
the temper of it, and found it 96° of Fahrenheit, just comfortable
for a warm bath. Our route took us across the Laxá, a broad, shallow
river; and here were some of the best farms I had seen in Iceland. The
white clover was here, the first I had seen of it, and the meadows
evidently produced nearly or quite double the hay that those did which
were seeded down with the native grass alone. The blooming clover
whitening the fields gave the land a fine appearance, and half made me
think I was back home again. A forest of maple and beech trees would
have completed the illusion. I saw here, as I did in other places,
caraway growing spontaneously in the fields; and it was as tall, as
finely-flavored, and as well-seeded as you find it with us. It is not
indigenous here; but some being brought to Iceland and planted, it has
propagated itself over a good portion of the cultivated parts of the
island. The same is true of the white clover.
The meadow lands in Iceland are rough in surface, just in a state of
nature, not one acre in ten thousand ever having had the turf broken.
They are not plowed and “seeded down,” but get seeded and grassed over
by nature. As I have mentioned, there is not a plow or a harrow in the
whole country. The garden spots round the houses seldom exceed the
sixteenth part of an acre, and they are dug up with a spade. The
angelica—_angelica archangelica_—the same that grows in our wet meadows
in America, is here grown and used as a salad. It is a native of
Iceland. With us it is reputed poisonous; but here I have eaten it, and
think it has a very pleasant taste. Many a boy in our northern States
has made a _flute_ out of an “angelica stalk;” but probably few of them
ever ate it afterwards, or thought of applying the Highland proverb to
it, “Here’s baith meat and music, quoth the dog when he ate the piper’s
bag.” Every thing in Iceland seems to go by contraries, the angelica and
“red-top” grass, and other of our aquatic and swamp plants, flourishing
everywhere, on dry as well as on wet soil.
The peasant soon returned, leaving us pursuing our way south. In the
valley of the Laxá the lava is seen in great variety of color. Much of
it is in high, red hills, as bright as if it had been painted. Some of
it is black, and some brown. The red was the softest and most porous.
Some of the hilly river-banks were crumbling down like slate cliffs, but
a near view showed them to be lava. A few miles travel brought us to the
banks of the Thiorsá, a mighty river, far larger than any we had seen,
and I believe the largest in Iceland. It comes from near the interior of
the island, and cannot be much less than 200 miles long. It drains the
waters that flow from the glaciers of Hekla, Hofs Jokull, Skaptar
Jokull, Vatna Jokull, and Torfa Jokull. A profile view of this river, as
laid down on the large map of Iceland, shows the highest branches of it
to be 3,000 feet above the level of the sea; half as high as Mt. Hekla.
Here was a ferry, the first we had seen. The Thiorsá is nearly
three-quarters of a mile wide here; and its depth—I believe I will not
tell how deep it is—ask the great northern diver, for he may have been
to the bottom of it: I have not. The farmer-ferryman and his son left
their hay-field, and in a stout skiff rowed us across. The horses were
tied together in a string, the nose of one to the tail of another;
and the guide sat in the stern of the boat, and led the forward one.
The poor ponies had hard work in swimming the cold river, and seemed
to suffer some. They tried hard to get into the boat, but that would
have shipwrecked us inevitably. The powerful current threw us a long
distance down the river before we landed on the south side. The boatman
charged me half a dollar, Danish, about thirty cents; cheap enough
certainly for his fatigue and danger. At eight o’clock we arrived
at the farm and church of Skarth, where we tarried all night. The
clergyman of the parish does not live here, but the obliging farmer
did every thing he could to make me comfortable. I think I stated
that I had arrived at the dignity of sleeping under the bed. That is
a luxury that until lately has only been accorded to princes. The
eider-down bed, from the Iceland eider-duck, has long been noted for
its lightness and softness. It is perhaps the greatest non-conductor
of heat that can be used as a covering. It is altogether too warm. A
down bed a foot thick looks as if it would smother you when put on top
of the bed, but its perceptible weight is nothing. I usually kicked
off this down covering long before morning, for it is impervious to
all the insensible perspiration, and consequently in less than half an
hour the sleeper finds himself perspiring profusely. I sometimes put
the down bed under me, and used my Highland plaid for a covering. The
unhealthiness of down beds has been discovered, and kings and nobles
have ceased, in a great measure, to use them; and consequently the
price of down has greatly fallen, and now every peasant can afford
to have a bed of down. Here I slept in a church for the first time.
Learning that it was customary for travelers in Iceland, I had no
scruples at sleeping under the same roof with the church mice. As we
are all destined to take a long sleep some day in a church yard, or
somewhere else, I thought I might as well begin now, try it by degrees,
and see how I liked it. I did not know but the rapping ghost of old
Thor with his sledge hammer would rap confusion into my noddle, after
his usual Iceland style of “thunder in the winter;” but I was not
disturbed. I slept perfectly sound, till the sun was high in heaven.
The green mounds around the church looked as peaceful, and no doubt the
spirits of the dead were as quiet in heaven, as if no Sassenach had
been here to disturb their slumbers. A good reason why old Thor did not
disturb me. He is a heathen deity, and totally indifferent to any use
whatever that churches may be put to. Perhaps, were I to go into one
of his caves without reverently laying my shoes aside, and offering up
my guide as a sacrifice, he might jump out of the crater of Hekla, and
hit me a rap that would give my “daylights” their exit, or knock me
where the sun never sets. I gave the farmer a dollar, for milk, cream,
horse-pasture, and church-rent, and for the first time got a hearty
Iceland salute. Throwing his arms round my neck he gave me a smack that
fairly echoed from the surrounding hills.
From Skarth, the Eyjafjalla and Tindfjalla Jokulls show their broad,
snowy sides and summits; but Hekla is the most conspicuous. The whole
mountain, near to the top, is black. Near the summit there are some
spots of snow that extend more or less down the north side, while a
curling wreath of smoke on the apex reveals the existence of the fire
within. We started directly towards the mountain, with the farmer for
our guide. On every side of Hekla, as far as we could see, much of the
ground was covered with black lava. The land over which we rode here was
covered with lava and volcanic sand, and, what is seldom seen in such a
situation, tufts of grass grew here and there. Heath is nearly the first
vegetation that finds root on the lava. Here, in a pasture near a river,
we saw a splendid lot of horses. What a wild, untamed look they had;
sleek and fat, with long, flowing tails and manes! They appeared like
the flock that crossed the path of Mazeppa. The Iceland farmers usually
keep great numbers of horses, and there is no country in the world where
they can be raised so cheaply. And they sell these animals cheap. I saw
a beautiful, jet black, four-year old, at the Geysers, an entire horse,
that had never been saddled. His form was symmetry itself. He was just
about twelve and a half hands high. I asked the price—less than ten
dollars, our money. In Boston or New York he would bring $150 or $200.
We crossed the Vestri Rangá, a small stream, and arrived about the
middle of the afternoon at Næfrholt, the last farm and the last green
spot this side of Hekla. The farmer was from home; and our farmer from
Skarth, who had accompanied us, started off after him. He had not got
far before down he came, thrown by his horse, or rather falling off, for
I could see nothing to bring him out of the saddle. Perhaps Mr. Cogniac
Brandy, or somebody else, had put a “brick” in his hat. He was a big,
beefy fellow, and fell tumbling down like a meal-sack. I thought he must
be killed, and ran to help him; but he was up in a jiffy, and under full
gallop in less than a minute, vaulting into his saddle on the off side
at that. It takes an Icelander, to fall and not hurt him. I rather think
this one would tumble down Mount Hekla and never bruise his shins. The
farmer came home, and told us we could put up at his house; and then the
Skarth farmer returned to his home. This was the first really pleasant
evening I had seen during my journey, and it bid fair for a clear day on
the morrow. Unless it were so, it would be useless to attempt the ascent
of Hekla, and expect to see any thing. I took the guide, and climbed to
the top of a steep mountain, one of several about a thousand feet high
that skirt the base of Hekla, and seemed to stand as sentries near their
fiery and warlike monarch. Here the recollection of my boyish days and
boyish sports came up, and I felt like having a little fun. There was a
grand chance for rolling stones down hill, and we improved it. After
setting off a number of different sizes, we noticed a ponderous boulder
partly buried in the earth. It looked as if it could be moved. It was
nearly round, and would weigh five or six tons. I called the guide to
help me push it off, but he looked ominously at the house far on the
plain below. I convinced him that it could not go there; and then he
showed me the farmer’s wall, a beautiful dyke of stones and turf that
separated the meadow below from the mountain pasture. I told him I would
pay all damage; and we got behind it. With our backs to the mountain,
and feet against it, we crowded it out of its bed. It fell with an awful
crash through about a hundred feet of jagged rocks, nearly
perpendicular, and then took the sloping plain below. But didn’t it
streak it? The ground fairly smoked. The surface was smooth sand and
gravel, and within thirty or thirty-five degrees of the perpendicular.
Lower down, the grass began to grow. The rock took a bee-line for two or
three hundred yards, till near the bottom, when it commenced a series of
flights of “ground and lofty tumbling” that would have done honor to
Ducrow. One leap that I measured was thirty-four feet, and there it
struck the farmer’s wall. It walked through it as if it had been a
cobweb, making a horrible gap near six feet wide, and moving one stone
that would weigh at least a ton. Well, it was capital fun. The old rock
curled round in a circuit, and rested in the meadow. The farmer and his
family ran out of the house at the noise, and he came up to meet us. The
guide got a furious blowing up, all of which he took very coolly. I
ended the confab by paying him a dollar for the damage done, and he went
away quite satisfied. As I had had my dance, it was all fair that I
should pay the fiddler.
The evening came on; as glorious a sunset as ever gilded the tops of
Arctic mountains. I retired early, hoping in the morning to climb the
rugged steep of Mount Hekla.