Return to Djúpivogr and End of Journey, 303-328
APPENDIX--
On Sulphur in Iceland, by Henchel, Sir G. S. Mackenzie,
Mr Consul Crowe, Captain Burton (Notes
on Mr Vincent’s Paper), and C. C. Blake, 329-377
Leasing Contract--Report of the Althing, 378-389
Sulphur in Sicily, 390-400
Sulphur in Transylvania, 400-402
Sulphur in Andaman Islands, 402-404
INDEX, 405-408
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.
VOL. II.
PAGE
Danish Fishing Company’s Station at Berufjörð, _Frontispiece._
The Basalt Hammer and the Stone Weight, 21
The “Pretty Guide,” 28
Inventory of Reykholt Kirk, 70
Snæfellsjökull from the North, 86
Hafnafjörð, which ought to be the Capital of Iceland, 88
Snæfellsjökull from the South, 94
Sukkertoppr and Líkkista (Sugar-Loaf and Coffin), 99
The Amulet, 118
The Krísuvík Mines or Sulphur Mountains, 138
The Sulphur Spring, 140
Solfatara of Krísuvík, 146
The Rural Scene, 156
Lögberg and Almannagjá, 195
Human Clavicle, 217
The Broad-Shouldered, 265
Plan of Leirhnukr and Krafla Springs, 279
Reykjahlíð Church, 286
Map of the Mý-vatn and Vatnajökull District, 314
View of the Vatnajökull from the Southern Slope of (Eastern)
Snæfell, 320
Stone-Axe in Museum, Reykjavik, 328
ULTIMA THULE;
OR,
A SUMMER IN ICELAND.
CHAPTER VI.
THE PRESS--VISIT TO THE LATIN SCHOOL--LIBRARIES AND
COLLECTIONS--GUNNLAUGSSON’S MAP--NOTE (NATURAL HISTORY AND
ANTHROPOLOGY).
The first newspaper printed in Iceland began in 1775: in the catalogue
of writers prefixed to the work of Uno Von Troil, it is called the
_Isländische Zeitung_. This Islendingur, not long defunct, gained
considerable reputation; the back numbers are to be found at the College
Library. At present the island publishes three periodicals, of which two
are printed at the capital. The first, which appears regularly twice a
month, is called the _Thjóðólfr_,[1] an old Icelandic Christian name;
and in 1872 numbered its twenty-fourth year. The sheets vary from one to
two, according to the amount of news; the columns are double, the page
is about 10 inches by 8½; the subscribers’ list shows some 1100, and the
yearly subscription is $1, 2m. 0sk. The editor, Hr Procurator Jón
Guðmundsson, a barrister, conducts it worthily, and with great
intelligence; he is outspoken, but not factiously so. The _Tíminn_
(Times) appears once a month; its politics are of the “Hlut-lausir,”
lot-less, or neutral tint, which would have caused it to be ostracised
at Athens; and there is some mystery about the editor, who is usually
supposed to be Hr Páll Eyúlfsson, silversmith and cicerone. The third is
the _Norðanfari_ (Northern Traveller) of Akureyri,[2] the chief
commercial station in the north. It usually comes out some twenty-six
times a year in the full size of four pages, and at intervals with
reduced proportions: matter is fearfully scarce during the four winter
months, when there are no mails, and local subjects must be at a
premium. As regards the sparring of rival journalists, it is, to quote
Arlequin’s saying, “tout comme chez nous.”
The history of printing-presses in Iceland has been copiously treated.
They were first established at the two bishoprics of Skálholt and Hólar;
privileges were then granted to Leirá, Viðey,[3] and Hrappsey; and now
there are two, in Reykjavik and Akureyri. The office at the capital is
in High Street, where three men work the two presses and four cases: the
folding machine has yet to be introduced.
The Icelandic Literary Society (Hið Íslenzka Bókmentafèlag) still
survives: after passing through the usual phases, it is now loyal and
respectable. Concerning the first, or Societas Invisibilis (Hið
ósynilega Fèlag), established in 1760, ample information will be found
in Bishop Pètursson’s “Hist. Eccles. Isl.” (pp. 339-342). The second
(Hið Íslenzka lærdomslista fèlag), dating from 1779, is treated of in
Mackenzie (chap, vii.): it admitted corresponding and honorary members.
The third (Hið konunglega Islenzka lærdómslista fèlag) in 1787 became a
Royal Society: it is interesting because it first treats of the sulphur
mines and trade of Iceland in the reign of Frederick II. (1336-59); and
the presiding genius was the celebrated Jón Eiríksson. This worthy,
whilst under the influence of melancholia, committed suicide, a
proceeding as rare amongst men of distinction in the post-Christian as
it was common during the pagan times of Iceland. I inquired in vain
about the savant’s bust, which was broken on the voyage to this island;
my informants had only a hazy idea that the head had been returned to
Copenhagen. A medallion of the great Scandinavian literato, now in the
hands of Hr Sigurður Guðmundsson, shows him in profile, with protruding
chin and brow, a nose worthy of Fielding, a long-tailed wig with _ailes
de pigeon_, and a frilled shirt.
The fourth Royal Society of General Instruction in Iceland (Hið
Konunglega islenzska Landsuppfrædíngar Fèlag) was established by Magnús
Stephensen. The fifth, Vísinda og Upplýsingar-Stiftan (Institute for
Knowledge and Instruction), was conducted by Björn Gottskálkson, when
the press was removed from Hrappsey to Leirágarðar. The sixth, which
actually exists (Hið íslenzka Bókmenta Fèlag), was founded by the
celebrated Professor Rask in 1816, on March 30, which is kept as its
birthday. The bye-laws were printed in Icelandic and Danish at
Copenhagen in 1818: the Skýrslur, or annual report, first appeared in
1825.
The object of the Society is to publish and circulate, at the cheapest
price, useful, standard, and also original books, together with
newspapers and periodicals. Such literature is still a prime want in the
country, and an enterprising publisher like Mr N. Trübner might do a
“good stroke of business.” The two branches, Danish and Icelandic,
choose their own executive every year, and keep separate accounts, which
are blended in the general annual statement: the latter is published by
Hr Bianco Luno of Copenhagen, in French and English, as well as in
Scandinavian. The books are also printed at the metropolis, and sent out
to the island. The _magnum opus_ is the annual review, historical
report, and magazine of general literature, classically called Skirnir,
the Narrator, or Eddaic messenger of Freyr.
The Society numbers some 720 Fèlagar (members), besides a few
corresponding and honorary, French and English, German and “American.”
The subscription is $3 per annum. The Icelandic branch meets, besides
extraordinary occasions, twice a year, in March and July; the latter is
the Synod time, corresponding with our May meetings; and the venue is at
the Priests’ Seminary for want of other room. The first president was
Hr Ární Helgason; Bishop Pètursson has held it for twenty years, and it
is actually tenanted by Hr Jón Thorkelsson, head-master of the Latin
School. The rector, Hr Jens Sigurðsson, is the treasurer; Hr Páll
Melsteð is secretary; and Hr Hálldór Guðmundsson acts librarian.
Formerly there was a high school at each bishopric, and a prime
grievance of the island is that the two having been reduced to one, the
northern and eastern provinces are put to uncalled for expense and
inconvenience. Children learn the “four R’s” at home from their parents:
hence the unalphabetic are rare, and some priests even refuse to marry
them. At the capital both sexes may attend a preparatory school in
Harbour Street (Hafnarstræti), till the age of confirmation, or
fourteen. The cost is small, $8 per annum, but all the pupils, even
those who come from afar, must live in the town. Besides the elements of
knowledge, they learn history and geography, Danish and Icelandic, but
neither French and English. Music is little cultivated, the piano is not
unknown, but the singing is chiefly confined to hymns, and of these few
are original. Dancing and gymnastics are equally neglected.
I visited the Supreme Court, a low building in the row north of the
Landfógeti or treasurer’s office, under charge of the stiff old usher.
The left room is for the town councils; the right for the administration
of justice, as shown by the oval table, by four chairs within, and by
two small tables and bench without the cross-rail. It would be hard to
swing a cat, with anything like safety to the animal, inside this temple
of Themis, and its mean proportions gave me satisfaction. The next move
was to the Latin School, which has now taken the place of the Schola
Bessastadensis. The highly uninteresting building, already collapsing in
its twenty-ninth year, is approached by a bridge spanning the foul
drain, and is fronted by a sloping, grassy lawn kept in decent order.
The civil hall-porter acts cicerone. Turning to the left of the hall,
where a big clock stands, we find the younger classes preparing for
examination, a professor walking about to prevent “cribbing:” this is
the written portion; the _vivâ voce_ process will be conducted in the
front hall of the first floor, where the Althing meets. It is a
fair-sized room, with the royal portrait at the bottom opposite the
entrance, fronted by a long desk of green cloth: the rest of the
furniture consists of benches covered with green baize. The governor
sits on the proper right of royalty, and the president of the Diet on
the left. The last session (1871) was described to me as somewhat
stormy, and the nays (neis) far outnumbered the yeas: the latter (já),
when reiterated in excitement and pronounced _yäu_, sound somewhat
comically, a manner of bark, yow, yow, yow.
There are two dormitories in which the little beds stand side by side.
Everything is of the humblest description; even the ceiling of the
professors’ sitting-room wants repair. A change to the capital has
somewhat modified the excessive uncleanness which foreign visitors
remarked at Bessastaðir, but there is still much to be desired.
In the Introduction I have given the details of the High School. The
programme leaves little to be desired, but sensible Icelanders agree
with strangers that the education is sterile and not “serious,” in the
French sense of the word invented about 1830. The pupils learn a
smattering of many things, but nothing thoroughly. This is doubtless the
result of a social condition in which only superficial knowledge is at a
premium: the same may be remarked in the United States and in the
Brazil, compared, for instance, with Oxford and Coimbra, where students
find specialties necessary.[4] The consequences of studying Icelandic
and Danish, Latin and Greek, English, French, and German, are that very
little can be learned. At the beginning of the century every priest
could converse in Latin--I have now met many who cannot speak a word of
it, and I have not met one who spoke it even tolerably. The useful
cosmopolitan dialect has been exchanged for “modern languages:”
similarly the Magyar now cultivates his own dialect, and has abandoned
the Latin which, to him almost a mother-tongue, kept Hungary in contact
with the culture of the West.
The pupils are hard workers and have excellent memories; they must
chiefly, however, depend upon books, and the result is that whilst many
of them collect a fair stock of phrases, and pronounce them remarkably
well, they can hardly understand a word of the reply. Another and a
severer charge is brought against the establishment. The dissipations of
Reykjavik appear very mild to a dweller in European cities, but they
are, comparatively speaking, considerable. Youngsters between the ages
of fourteen and twenty-three easily learn to become boon companions, and
to lay the foundation of habits which affect their after-lives. The
professorial Hetæra being unknown, the students are apt to make any
connections which present themselves, and intrigues with the “ancilla”
sometimes end in marriage perforce. Thus the country clergyman or the
franklin begins life burdened with a helpmate utterly unmeet for him;
who neglects his house and children, who thinks of nothing but dress and
“pleasuring,” and who leads him rapidly on the road to ruin, in a
country where all domestic comfort and worldly prosperity depend upon
the “gudewife.” Hence the old system of schools at Skálholt and Hólar,
and even at Bessastaðir, is greatly preferred, and, perhaps, even now
the seminary might with profit be removed to Thingvellir. Here it has
been proposed to lay out a model farm, where the alumni could add
agriculture to their pastoral acquirements.
About the age of twenty-three the Skóla-piltar, or pupils, become
“students,” that is to say, B.A.’s. In order to enter the learned
professions, especially the law, they matriculate at the University of
Copenhagen, where they are housed and receive annual stipendiums of £15
to £20. They distinguish themselves by thrift and canniness, emulation,
energy, and abundant application, when the place agrees with them. But
often they suffer from the insidious attacks of a climate which even
Englishmen would call rigorous; the comparative mildness acts upon them
as tropical heat upon us, and in not a few cases they die of pulmonary
disease.
Medicine may be studied at Reykjavik. The school is simply a room in
the Hospital, and subjects for dissection cannot be had without a
permission, which is generally refused. On the other hand, students have
the benefit of lectures from thoroughly able men, Drs Hjaltalín and
Jonassen. The course lasts from three to five years, and after an
examination the Læknir (M.D.) may either practise in private, or aspire
to become “physicus,” at some out-station.
Theological students attend the Priests’ Seminary at Reykjavik. It
consists of two lecture rooms, fronting the sea, in Hafnarstræti, and
furnished with chairs and black desks, a stove, and a list of lectures.
The candidates who reside in the town are taught by the Lector Sigurðr
Melsted and two “Docents,” Hannes Árnason and Helgi Hálfdanarson. The
examinations take place in June and August; the former tests their
progress in logic and psychology, the latter in theology, ecclesiastical
history, exegesis, and canon law. The course lasts at least two years,
and at the age of twenty-five, after the final examination, students
obtain the degree of “candidat.” Some do not choose to be at once
ordained, reserving the final step for later in life, but the material
advantages of the profession in Iceland never allow it to lack recruits.
The result of such a course is to saturate the mind with the Bible,
learnt from translations and explained by the individual opinions of
swarming commentators. It makes men “fall down and worship” (as the
great Spinoza has it) “an idol composed of ink and paper, instead of the
true word of God.” And when the superficial and ill-taught “divine” has
to do battle with a polemical Catholic or a pugnacious Rationalist, the
action generally ends in a ludicrous defeat. I especially allude to the
late controversies with M. Baudouin, and the disputes with
“Free-thinkers,” recorded by Professor Paijkull: the Great Book, or
Commentary on St John, written by Candidat (Theologiæ) Magnús Eiríksson,
is attacked by an “Old Pastor,” with an obsolete virulence worthy of the
Inquisition.
I was introduced to Professor Hannes Árnason, the geologist of the
Government College, who kindly showed me the collections of natural
history. Of botany there is none, the hortus siccus seems to be
generally neglected in the smaller museums of the world: the student
must content himself with Dr Hjaltalín’s work, and the “Flora Danica,”
of which a good, but untinted, copy is found in the College Library.
Zoology is confined to a few stuffed birds.[5] The mineralogical
collection is richer; mostly, however, it is a _rudis indigestaque
moles_; the upper part of a chest will be labelled, and the lower
drawers in most unadmirable disorder. Moreover, where the traveller
wants only local specimens, they are mostly general; for instance, a
small cabinet of fourteen drawers contains Germany.[6]
We then proceeded to the College Library, a detached building of solid
construction, but suffering sadly from damp accumulating in the porous
stone. In the big bluewashed room fires are neglected, consequently the
books are damp and mildewed.[7] At the bottom, above a broken globe, is
a votive tablet erected to an English benefactor, Charles Kellsall of
London, who supplied funds for the building, and who left it a library,
which, they say, has not yet begun its journey Icelandwards: there is
none to Mr John Heath, who printed the Rev. Jón Thorlaksson’s well-known
Eddaic paraphrase of “Paradise Lost,” and to whom the Icelandic Literary
Society owes a heavy debt of gratitude.
The principal library is in the Dómkirkja, under the charge of Hr Jón
Árnason, inspector of the Latin School--in Iceland, as amongst Moslems,
the church is considered the natural place for the library. You open the
Lich-gate, ascend the right-hand staircase, and a second dwarf flight
leads to the greniers under the roof. When the sun shines, the slates
are too hot for the hand: this keeps the collection dry; and the reader
is disposed to enjoy it.
The library opens on Wednesdays and Saturdays between twelve and one
P.M., when you are allowed freely to borrow after signing your name. The
interior is not prepossessing. The total of the volumes may be 14,000;
but the catalogue is still to be made. Printed papers lie about in
extreme confusion, and “vieux bouquins” are so strewed and piled that
you can hardly find what you want. Many of the sets also are imperfect,
having been lost or stolen. The three large deal stands, and the shelves
ranged against the higher wall, do not supply accommodation enough, and
the single writing-table is always desert. The curiously-carved black
press from the west, and the pulpit with the four evangelists rudely cut
upon it, are interesting, but should be transferred to the Antiquarian
Museum.[8]
The manuscripts are a private collection belonging to the librarian, Hr
Jón Árnason. They number 226, but not a few of them are copied from
Sagas, and other works already printed; this is often done in Iceland,
where time is cheap and books are dear. A comparison of the state of
Icelandic with that of Persian literature would bring out a curious
similarity, resulting from similar conditions, mental as well as
physical; and it is the more interesting when we consider the intimate
blood connection of the two families. Hr Jón Árnason wanted £200 for his
neatly bound collection, and it has, I believe, been sold in London.[9]
The Antiquarian Museum, two rooms fronting north, is upon the same floor
as the Library, under the charge of Hr Sigurðr Guðmundsson, who, like
Hr Jón Árnason, is unsalaried. The former, smitten in youth by love of
art, has given his life to painting, and to the study of Icelandic
antiquities. The sketch and plans of the “Skáli,” or ancient hall, and
the plan of Thing-vollur in “Burnt Njál,” are productions of which he
need not be ashamed. He usually makes the Hospital his studio; and he
showed me some portraits which have the rare merit of representing the
person, and not another person. Unhappily, it was his fate to lack the
patron; a few years of youth spent like Thorwaldsen at Rome, where
models are found, and where Nature inspires the brain, would have given
warmth and life to a fancy frozen by the unartistic atmosphere of the
far north.
The Collection, open at the same time as the Library, is in “apple-pie
order,” and, though young and small, it promises a goodly growth. There
is a catalogue (Skýrsla um forngripasafn Íslands í Reykjavík, i.
1863-1866, published by the Icelandic Literary Society, and printed at
Copenhagen, 157 pages, octavo), to which addenda should be appended; the
specimens, as well as the cases, also require numbering, for easier
reference. It is to be hoped that my excellent correspondents, the late
Dr Cowie and Mr Petrie, have so arranged the collections at Lerwick and
Kirkwall that the Shetlands and Orkneys may not blush in the presence of
Iceland. I shall describe this museum at some length in a note at the
end of this chapter: here we are amongst the past centuries, and older
life in Iceland is prominently brought before our modern eyes.
Through the kindness of Hr Jón Árnason, I managed to “interview” the
venerable Professor Björn Gunnalaugsson, who, being now eighty-four
years old (born 1788), partly blind, and very deaf--his wife also an
invalid--rarely opens to strangers. He is a fine old man, with large
prominent features, shaven face, long hair, with small hands, here very
unusual, and thin knees, rarer still. His portrait, taken in middle age,
with two wellearned decorations upon the black dress-coat, shows an
unusually sympathetic figure.
Welcoming us kindly, the Professor sat in his stuffed chair before a
little table, and I noticed that he swayed his body to and fro like a
Moslem boy reading the Koran. We talked of his past life: he had
forgotten the details, but he remembered the main points. After spending
his youth in teaching mathematics and natural philosophy at the College,
he resolved to map out his native island with theodolite, compass, and
reflecting circle, and to this labour of love he conscientiously devoted
twenty years, not twelve nor eighteen, as has been generally said. He
was not very sure about his proceedings upon the Vatnajökullsvegr, the
path north of the great south-eastern glacier, before his time
considered utterly impracticable; and my curiosity was chiefly for this
point. He mentioned his fellow-traveller, Síra Sigurðr Gunnarson, then a
young man, who had just taken his degree. He believed that the march
took place in July or August, but not after. Of the eight ponies, two
were laden with hay, and they found grass at Tómasarhagi, north-west of
the Vatnajökull. During his march, no volcano was observed, either in
the glacier or to the north of it; and he seemed to have neglected
tracing out the sulphur diggings.
When consulted about the Vatnajökullsvegr, Professor Gunnlaugsson
strongly advised me to avoid it, as the animals would be exhausted
before the real work of exploration began. The easiest attack upon the
great glacier, he said, was from the north, especially when the polar
winds were blowing, and thus travellers might penetrate to the centre
without encountering the difficulties of the Klofajökull to the south.
Altogether he was in favour of Berufjörð, the starting point. As the
Danish steamer is bound, weather permitting, to touch at that port, I
had thought when in England of making it my base; unhappily, the line
was represented as too rugged for transit, in fact, impassable, whereas
it is distinctly the reverse.
The Napoleon Book (p. 94) declares that Professor Gunnlaugsson began the
wrong way by details instead of by an _ensemble_ or general plan--a
primitive style which would leave much of perfect topography to be
desired. It forgets the preliminary trigonometrical labours of the
Danish officers, detailed in the Introduction to these pages, and which
left to Professor Gunnlaugsson only the task of filling in the already
measured triangles. These meritorious men, as often happens, did the
best part of the work, yet their names have well nigh sunk into
oblivion. But what can we expect when politics and party-spirit enter
into science?
NOTE ON ANTIQUARIAN MUSEUM.
The room first entered is divided into two by a glass case, containing
the toilette of the past century, when dress, worth some $300, was an
heir-loom, and when costume was purely insular; not as now, a mixture of
Icelandic, Danish, and cosmopolitan. The Museum of Science and Art at
Edinburgh contains some articles presented by the gentleman to whom
these pages are inscribed; and M. de Kerguelen (1772) sketches a “lady
of Iceland” intelligible only when the several items are seen. The case
is surmounted by a rude portrait, with Latin verses, in honour of a
certain Frú[10] Hólmfríðr: her hair is concealed by a white koffur or
fillet wrapper, somewhat like that worn by the married German Jewess at
the four holy cities of Palestine, and this is surmounted by the Hæltve,
or travelling hat. The steeple-crowned broad-flapped felt is precisely
the Pétasus of the old Greeks, and probably came to Iceland with the
pilgrims of the Middle Ages. For the house there are skull caps in
plenty, mostly black velvet and gold embroidered; some of them have
flaps like the “Kan-top” of Hindostan, others show the rudimental crest
which culminated in the Skaut-faldr.[11] This foolscap, built with a
card-board frame, is then covered with linen; a thin plate of metal
forms the crest shape, and the white material is stuffed with cotton,
like the Húfa (pronounced _Húa_,= our hood). It is fastened to the hair
by pins; and an outer band, spangled with a dozen silver-gilt stars,
secures it round the brow, ending behind in a cravat bow and two
ribbons, which hide the fastening. Finally, a deep fall or lace veil is
turned back, passed over it, and thrown upon the shoulders, reaching
almost to the waist. This Skaut-faldr is an excrescence, which deserves
to be compared with the Tantúr, or silver horn of the Libanus, which was
and is generally confined to married, though sometimes worn by
marriageable women.
The other articles of dress are the Skirta (shift) of woollen stuff,
worn next to the body: according to some authorities, the health of the
people has been improved by cotton, which others deny. The Upphlutur is
the long-sleeved bodice, or waist piece, with gold embroidered cuffs,
and velvet stripes covering the seams. In modern days it is of velvet,
brought from Europe. The Fat is a Wadmal petticoat, extending to the
ankles, and of these articles sometimes two or three were worn for
warmth. The outer one is copiously worked, and is faced by the coloured
Svinta (apron). The Treja is a tight-fitting jacket, with chased
buttons: the Hempa, a short outer coat, worn by men and women, buttoned
over the chest, is wide at the bottom, about a hand’s breadth shorter
than the skirt, and open at the flaps to show the embroidered petticoat.
The Uppslög or cuffs are slashed; round the neck is a Hálsklútr (white
cravat), a Háls-sikener, or cravat of purple silk; and for full dress
Strútr, little black collars on the jacket neck, and Kragar, stiff hoops
or ruffs of black embroidered stuff, which make the head look as if it
were dished up. The terminations are Sokkar, coarse woollen stockings,
and Skór, the Iceland papushes: finally, Kvenn vetlingar, rough gloves,
protected the hands. The trimmings of the gowns, skirts, and petticoats
are very handsome; nothing of the kind can be found in the present day;
and the people have the lost art of cutting wool so as to resemble
velvet-pile. The black dye is admirable; it is a fast colour, and lasts
exceptionally long. According to the Custodian, it was made by steeping
the cloth in dark mud, and then treating it with the juice of the
arbutus (_Uva ursi_, Surtarlýng), our bear-berry and the cane-apple of
Ireland. The modern toilette has been greatly simplified to the
Skaut-faldr and bodice, the skirt of black broadcloth and velvet,
embroidered with green silk, and the waist-belt, a poor filigree copy of
old work. It costs £17 to £18, and might answer for a civilised fancy
ball: the general aspect is that of a Circassian woman’s dress--in
Circassia.
The ornaments, belts, buttons, bodices, chains, and rings, mostly
heir-looms, are as numerous as the articles of dress: they are survivals
of the time when people wore all their wealth. Some of the Hnappar
(buttons), round and of worked surface, have one or more figures of the
Crucifixion hanging to them. These are no longer made. There are
Ermahnappr, silver-gilt buttons, for the sleeves,[12] and much larger,
with clasps, for the waist; bodkins (Laufa priónar), ornamented with
silver; Keðja, chains of sorts; Hálsfesti for the neck, and Herðafesti
for the shoulder; rings of gold, silver and brass, one of them spiral
and elastic; Nisti (bracelets), and Mallinda, velvet girdles,
embroidered with silver. Some of the belts are plates of gold and
silver, linked together, and hanging down in front almost to the knees.
There is an immense demand for these curios: every stranger carries off
some specimens of the old work, with which the owners are compelled by
necessity to part: the country people would be buyers, not sellers.
Modern imitations are made without any success at Reykjavik, but not
elsewhere. You give German dollars to Páll Eyúlfsson, or to Hr
Sigfusson, if the latter is sober, and they convert them into filigree
work, which does not contrast well with the neat, plain jewellery of
Norway, now becoming known in England. Needless in these days to warn
strangers against counterfeits, the “Iceland snuff-boxes” of walrus
tooth are mostly made in Germany.
Near the door is a quaint bird’s-eye sketch, dating from 1770, brought
from the Borgafjörð Sýsla, and illustrating the dress of the time at a
Bær,[13] or farm-house. In front of the buildings, which are all out of
perspective, as if the painter had Chinese eyes obliquely set, stand
groups of men and women, walking, riding, and working. The former have
knee-breeches, and one of them not a little resembles in suit the
portraits of Doctor Johnson. There are two sawyers, and others ply the
iron-shod wooden spade, of which a specimen hangs in the room. The
women, raking hay, or pumping, drawing, and carrying water in pails,
bear the Skaut-faldr, now confined to Sundays and festivals. Another
portrait of a woman (1772) wears a foulard round the head, instead of
the skull cap or foolscap. A curious pencil sketch, probably copied from
the original in the Skarð church, Breiðafjörð, shows Daði Bjarnarson
(ob. æt. 68, A.D. 1643) and his wife Arnfrydur, both kneeling with
cuffed hands: he wears a Skegg (beard), in cut and shape most like a
tile, huge trunk hose, tight stockings, and shoes with big rosettes.
The same room contains a variety of domestic implements, especially
worked tapestry: in another part specimens of large-meshed white lace
are preserved. There is a bed, dating from 1740, box-shaped, but not so
much as the modern: on the outer side the occupant and the clothes are
guarded by rudely carved Rúm fjöl (bed foils) or planks, five feet long,
still used here and at the Færoes. Being carpentered into the
chamber-walls, the other side requires no such protection. Curtains
shelter it from the cold: there are coverlets and a night-cap, in those
days often used as a day-cap; and the outer corners are supplied with
rude human figures. The mannikin at the tester holds a kind of
candlestick, evidently to facilitate the practice, pleasant but wrong,
of reading in bed. Upon the top of a press stands a lantern, with scanty
glass, and woodwork rising flamboyant, or rather like green sausages,
above it. All the rooms contain upright planks, grotesquely carved:
these are lineal descents from the consecrated high seats of the
heathenry, and in more modern times they were ranged round the hall,
with hangings between. One of them shows a mermaid with pendent bosom
and child; of course, _desinit in piscem_. The single chair has a tall
carved back and inside the two doors are sets of ornamental iron work.
The quaint-shaped knockers are purely Roman--they are still dug up in
Syria.
The weapons, which date from A.D. 1050 to 1400, are represented by old
spears and halberts. A good imitation Toledo blade, with sunk midrib;
daggers and battle-axes, one of which was taken from under a heap of
stones in the Vestmannaeyjar; chain armour, and a variety of large and
small Bigones (hones), of smooth compact basalt, for cleaning and
sharpening weapons. A saddle cloth, hanging against the wall, shows
figures of various animals, tolerable tambour work, in the Persian
style. There is a collection of iron, wooden, and bone stirrups, and
sundry prick-spurs. The cups are interesting; and one of them, probably
intended for a man and his wife, contains at least a quart bottle. The
finest are made of walrus teeth (Rostungr, _Trichecus rosmarus_), the
animal being often cast ashore in the north: poorer specimens are of
horn. Here we find the material for the Guma Minni, or memorial bowls;
the Guðfödurs Minni, or cup quaffed to God the Father; the Heilags Anda
Minni, to the Holy Ghost; the toast to the Archangel Michael, a fighter
like old Thor; the Mariu Minni, of the Blessed Virgin; and the
Marteinn’s Minni, to Martin (Turonensis). The snuff-boxes are unlike the
horns now used: one is an oval, with an upper plate of ivory and wood
below, hooped round with brass, and containing a cullender, probably
used for pulverising the leaf. Mangling seems to have been a favourite
occupation; the hand articles (Kefli) are found in numbers: the roller
is smooth; the upper stick is carved, and gaudily painted;[14] and the
_étuis_ are as numerous as the mangles. One case containing bobbins is
fastened to an embroidery cushion; another bears date 1677. Some hold
horn spoons, others razors, others buttons, and all are shaped like the
inkstands of the East, and curiously but artlessly carved. There is a
coarse plane for the carpenter. The weaver of rude cloth worked his
sword-shaped shuttle of polished bone, yielded by the whale, whose ribs
also supplied rafters, more expensive but more durable than wood. The
mammal gave material for dice and draughtsmen played at Kotra (tables),
and these are the nearest approaches to the “chessmen made of fish
bones,” mentioned in old books. There is a specimen of the Langspiel
(violin), and its horsehair bow, formerly so well known in the
Scoto-Scandinavian islands.[15] This instrument has three pegs for
strings, and seventeen frets, but no bridge: possibly it was played with
the thumb, as the Barber of Seville is still wont to do. Uno Von Troil
supplies it (p. 92) with six brass wires, acting strings; but I do not
understand what his “symphon” is. Mackenzie sketches it, but shows the
side instead of the face; and Hooker, drawing it from memory, draws it
incorrectly.
The spoils of the Old Church are not numerous: they consist of two
altar-cloths embroidered in colours; the altar stone from the Skálholt
Cathedral, white marble, blackened above by use; an antique monstrance
with a Latin inscription; and some fine enamelled and jewelled
crucifixes, said to date from A.D. 1300: many of the stones have been
picked out, but the eyes remain. There is also a rudely carved salmon,
supposed to have been an _ex voto_.
In the same room stand two cases (unnumbered) containing finds from a
grave opened at Baldursheim in the north, and supposed to date before
the Christian era (A.D. 1000). Besides a few bits of rusty iron, serving
for different purposes, it has a calvaria without front teeth, and with
a large occipital projection like a woman’s. A third case, also from the
same place, shows fragments of another calvaria, a large jaw and other
bones, a small tooth-comb, and sundries. A fourth has horse-bits of
bronze and rust-eaten iron, shaped like the modern, and huge spurs with
and without rowels, now unknown in the island except to foreigners. A
fifth and a sixth preserve fine old filigree buttons and gold brooches,
larger than crown pieces, used as fibulæ for the breast and shoulders:
they are said to be pre-Christian; and the Edda (Völundarkviða, 24)
alludes to a curious ornamentation:
“But of the teeth
Of the two (children),
He (Völundr, or Wayland Smith[16]) breast ornaments made.”
And even in modern days maternal affection sometimes mounts a
sucking-tooth in a ring. The necklace beads are very interesting; some
are of jade, others of crystal, and others of amber. There is a long
blue bugle, not unlike the Popo bead of West Africa, and the specimen
which Mr Rattray found at Sáhib el Zamán (Cælesyria), and presented to
the Anthropological Institute. Others are irregular tubes with green,
red, and white upon black ground; the forms, and even the decorations,
may be found everywhere, from the British Islands to the Arabian Desert.
It is hard to say whence these articles came to Iceland, beads are
indestructible as gums and cowries: of all ornaments they seem to have
travelled farthest.
There are also two presses containing antiquities, presented by Mr
Henderson, son of the well-known Icelandic traveller; the Lord’s Prayer
in old characters, ancient annotations of music, and a document with the
signature of the martyr (?) Jón Árason, “Biskup à Hólum.” The seal,
printed on red wax, bore a crucifix with the bishop standing to the
left: on the right was a mitre and a shield charged with a lily.
The most interesting parts of the collection to me were what have been
contemptuously called in Scotland “chuckie stanes.” Strictly speaking,
no pre-historic remains exist in Iceland: perhaps it is safer to say
that none have yet been found. At present we must believe, despite the
synecdoche of “Ultima Thule,” that the island, when colonised by the
Irish monks, was a desert, and we must continue to hold this opinion
until Mongoloid skulls or other remains shall have been discovered. The
neolithic-stone age still endures in Iceland, as it does in the Brazil,
not to mention other countries. Here almost every cottage, in places
where iron is wanting, has a stone-hammer for pounding fish: it is a
rounded ball of porous basalt about four inches in diameter, and bored
through to admit a wooden handle. The general use of the article may
convince students that the pierced celts and stone axes which, on
account of easy fracture, were held to have been intended for worship or
display, and, perhaps, for reproducing copper or bronze forms, might
have been used for battle if not for work.
The stone articles in Iceland seem to be imitated from those of the
outer world; and the similarity of type, extending from England to
Australia, has not a little astonished anthropologists:[17] “Tant il est
vrai,” says Sig. Visconti, “que l’esprit de l’homme, malgré la
différence des siècles et des climats, est disposé à agir de la même
manière dans des circonstances pareilles, sans avoir besoin ni de
tradition ni d’exemple.” Hence the New Zealanders, as well as the old
Icelanders, gave names to their ancestral canoes, their paddles, and
their weapons. The steatite bowls might be from Minas Geraes: the
material, according to the people, was supplied by the southern islands.
On the other hand, Mackenzie (chap. ix.) found about Drápuhlíð, “a
yellowish white substance, having a smooth, shining fracture; it may be
cut with a knife, and appears to be steatite.” He also mentions (p. 428)
friable, white and reddish-brown steatite, near the hot springs of
Reykjavik. A truncated, tetragonal pillar of bluish soap-stone, with a
square cornice and a shallow cup ending in a cylinder pierced right
through, is somewhat mysterious: possibly it was used, and so local
tradition asserts, as a portable font.
The basaltic specimens are: 1. Weaver’s weight bored for stringing; 2.
Sinker for fish-net, with deep groove round the longer waist of the
oval; 3. Weight, dating from 1693, shaped like a conical cannon-ball,
and adorned with bands and bosses; 4. Circular quern-stone with hole
through it; 5. Cone, with flat base, used to grind colours; 6. Rude
ladle with broken handle; 7. Pierced stones for spindles, resembling the
African; 8. Various hones, before alluded to; 9. Prismatic column with
runes, taken from a tomb; and, lastly, what seems to have been a club or
axe. Though made of the hardest and closest basalt, with broad ribs
whose angles are now rounded, the specimen is imperfect: the handle, one
foot one inch long, is partly broken away, and the head, four inches
broad, lacks the edged part. Still it is the most valuable of the
“ceraunei lapides.”
[Illustration: THE BASALT HAMMER.]
[Illustration: THE STONE WEIGHT.]
The east room has a large central stand of four compartments. We
especially remark: 1. The seals of ivory and bone. 2. An iron châtelaine
to which hung a knife, a skewer, and a key, not unlike those we use for
watches, but with the handle more rounded: it is inscribed I. H. S. 3. A
diminutive “Hammer of Thor,”[18] with a magical character on the head
which discovered thieves: the only other “Miölner” on the island
belongs to a widow at Hofsós. 4. Buttons of horsehair from the mane and
tail; they were still used by the Færoese in 1810. 5. Two specimens of
the Lausnarsteinn, a flat, hard seed two or three inches in diameter,
which here, as in Cornwall, was supposed, when drunk in infusion, to
facilitate parturition: the superstition vanished when it was found to
be not a magic bean but only a horse-chestnut thrown ashore, like the
_Dolichos urens_ and the _Entada gigalobium_, by the currents. 6. Onyxes
and agates, called Nachturn-steinn (nature stones), which, being banded,
were held to be charms, and prevented the owner losing his cattle,
whilst the Oska-steinn (asking-stone) gave him all he wished. 7. A fine
Christ, evidently from a crucifix; the blood is enamelled, and the work
appears to be Byzantine.
Two cases to the east contain a few early types cut in wood, and one of
them is devoted to those of Hreppsey. Only one letter of 1488 remains,
and there are a few capitals used by Bishop Guðbrand at Nupúfell in
Eyjafjörð. The drawers beneath protect old manuscripts written with
decoction of willow-bark, or with the arbutus-juice which served as
cloth-dye: the colour is well preserved. A glass box hanging to the
western wall contains German coins, pottery, quaintly rounded silver
spurs, and Bishop Guðbrand’s drinking-cup. Another and a similar case
shows the only procession flag in the island; it is of faded pink silk,
almost colourless, with a white linen cross and an edging of three
lappets fringed with green and gold. There are also narrow webs for
weaving ornamental cords.
Over the western doorway hangs an old lace bed-curtain, white, and well
made. Scattered about the room are various articles--viz.: 1. A wooden
plank with an epitaph dated 1755, and quite in the style of the “lying
tombstone;” 2. Carved door-posts for the church or the house; 3. A large
wooden chair, the arms ending in carved knights, whose horses are those
of our chessmen; and 4. A beam, ten feet long, pierced with thirty-two
holes--with such an instrument Penelope might have woven her web. There
is also a specimen of the old Flekí, two or three boards thirty-two
inches long by twenty-eight; it was drilled with holes pierced for
snares of twisted horsehair, and anchored off some skerry with ropes,
and stones or horse-bones. A decoy bird upon each instrument was useful
to catch guillemots.
CHAPTER VII.
TOURISTS AND TOURS--GUIDES AND HORSES--HORSE GEAR, TRAPS, AND TENTS.
Presently the steamers left Reykjavik, and the torpid little community
hybernated once more: it will awake and buzz for a while when the next
mail comes. In the meantime--
“The skies they are ashen and sober,
The streets they are dirty and drear.”
The weather makes the faintest struggles, even in mid-June, to be fine,
but a tolerable day appears always to exhaust its efforts, and to be
followed by a violent break. The Reykjavik climate is essentially
fickle, and the invalid can rarely neglect, till late summer, the warm
overcoat of which the cicerone at St Petersburgh persistently reminds
his charges. A bitter north-easter, with high cirri, and
“The shrieking of the mindless wind,”
remind us that we are in high latitudes. All the thoroughfares are
deserted, and the houses are fast closed against the roaring, screaming
blast.
We were the first batch of the year’s tourists, arriving, however, only
one day before the “Diana,” which brought with it sundry others. Whilst
I remained at the capital to continue my studies, Messrs B. and S.
determined to “do” the usual trip as soon as possible. A five days’
delay, without books or some definite object, makes the headquarter
village a purgatory to strangers. Most of them bring out an Eton Latin
grammar, under the impression that, by its good aid, with a course of
Matthæus Corderius, they will make themselves at home amongst the
learned. But the English pronunciation is impossible, and too often a
total neglect of the “literæ humaniores,” persistently distributed over
long years, has swept away all memory of _musa, musæ_, and of _hic, hæc,
hoc_. Consequently, second-hand Anglo-Latin grammars are cheap and
plentiful at Reykjavik.
Those who would save time in travelling can hardly expect to spare their
expenditure. My companions wisely called in the head guide, Geir Zoega,
pronounced _Sögha_, and frequently simplified by the Briton to
“Goat-sucker.” The classical Italian name (De Origine et Usu
Obeliscorum, etc.) shows his origin, but the family has drifted through
Germany, and, as his grandfather settled in Iceland, he has wholly
thrown off the Latin aspect. A tall, robust man, with harsh Scotch
features, high cheek bones, yellow hair, and blue eyes, in earlier days
he would have been most useful to explorers; now, however, he has waxed
rich: he is farmer and fisherman, cattle-breeder and capitalist,
boasting of house, boats, beasts, and other symptoms of wealth. These
may represent a capital between £500 and £700, and almost unincumbered
by expenses--a century and a half ago the same fortune would fully have
contented a master-cutler at Sheffield. Consequently, Geir Zoega will
only engage for short trips, and, despite rumours of $15,000, he refused
to accompany the two young “Counts d’Elbe,” who came with the intention
of spending some six weeks in the interior. Having business of his own
in the east, he undertakes the tourists as far as the Geysirs, but he
positively refuses Hekla, forage being still wanting there. During the
bargain he amused me by certain points of resemblance with the Syrian
dragoman taking command of a party of youngsters: the same covered and
respectful contempt of greenhorns, the same intense objection to
innovation, the same unwillingness of experience to be guided by
“bumptious” inexperience, contrast curiously with the pliability of the
Italian courier or cicerone, who thinks only of his bill.
Finally, Hr Zoega agreed to supply a tent, absolutely necessary for the
Geysirs, a change of horses for each rider, and three baggage animals,
_moyennant_ a total of $14 per diem--his own fee being a daily $5.
Moreover, the travellers were to feed their nine beasts at the rate of
a mark each per march. This confirms Mr Newton’s opinion that, on the
whole, travelling in Iceland is not more expensive--perhaps he might
have said much cheaper--than in most parts of Europe.[19] Yet we find
Professor Melsted, an Icelander, describing his native land to Metcalfe
as “the most difficult and expensive country in the world.” During one
day on the Congo, I have been asked, for simple permission to pass
onwards, three times more than the cost of a three months’ tour in
Iceland.
Mr S. being a barrister, drew out a written agreement, which the guide
signed: the precaution, however, is of little value, as the stranger is
completely in the native’s power, and a threat to drive away the horses
will bring the most recalcitrant Griff to absolute submission. If you
turn off your leader, as a certain traveller did, he will assuredly sue
you in damages at Reykjavik; and for one who cannot speak Icelandic, or
at least Danish, to be guideless is to be cast naked upon a desert
shore. It is only fair to say that Hr Zoega gave ample satisfaction, and
we only regret the more that the deceitfulness of riches has spoiled a
thoroughly honest and intelligent guide.
My companions found no difficulty in starting: the dilatory Icelandic
movement, of which old travellers complain so loudly, is now a thing of
the past. The weather improved, as usual, after they left Reykjavik, and
there were only a few showers to gladden the peasant’s heart. The birds
were hatching, so they did not shoot: the water, cold, and clear as
crystal, wanted vegetation, without which even gold-fish cannot live,
consequently there was no fishing. There had been scanty reason to
complain of what the Brazilians call “immundicies”--the smaller animal
creation--but a Neapolitan might have recited every morning the popular
song
“Quando mi cocco a letto,” etc., etc.
They lamented only one thing, not having taken a pack of cards, or a
cribbage board, to while away the long, slow hours of halt.
The next that effected his escape was a young painter, who came out for
the purpose of sketching Iceland scenery, and who wisely chose the
seldom-visited south coast. Thus he was able to imitate the _Conte di
Haga, che molto vede e poco paga_; and all his expenses during forty-two
days were limited to a couple of florins per diem. He resolved to buy
ponies, and laid out £17, 10s. upon three, expecting after return to
sell them for two-thirds of the outlay, whereas the usual hire would
have absorbed $126. And he was successful. But travelling in this way
becomes exceedingly slow, as the animals must be the first
consideration, if at least they are to fetch anything like cost price at
the end of the journey. He secured a guide, of whom more presently: the
fellow at once became painfully familiar, “independent” would be the
polite word, and stuck to his victim like a leech.
Captain J. and Dr S. of the Indian Army allowed themselves six weeks for
a sporting tour, which was a dead failure. Unfortunately they fell into
bad hands. Metcalfe advises the traveller to engage some student by way
of interpreter; and I found it a good plan in the eastern country.
Moreover, even at Reykjavik, good guides are procurable. But they lent a
willing ear to a certain Helgi Magnússon of the Latin School,
half-brother to an Icelander, who, after two years’ study at the Latin
School of Reykjavik, went to England for the purpose of translating
Icelandic documents, and managed, no one knows how, a good appointment
at Cambridge. People here inquire if the great English university is so
destitute of talent that it must come to Iceland. In reply, I can only
plead British eccentricity; the same curious policy which made the late
Colonel Sykes advocate the employment of the brothers Schlagintweit,
when a dozen Anglo-Indian officers were as well fitted for, as they were
ambitious of, being so employed. The following is Hr Helgi’s
_signalement_: tall, spare, blond, and clean shaven, except the long
mustachio, which is in the habit of being pulled. He claimed to know
English, meaning he was able to pronounce articulately a few sentences;
the answer, however, was an idiotic stare, and an ejaculated “No,”
invariably introduced. He began by finding fault with everything, and by
telling his employers that they must cook, make beds, groom,
saddle, and unsaddle for themselves. Presently he scented English
provisions--feeding amongst these people is all-important as to the
Bedawín--and the discovery greatly modified his tone. They did not,
however, come to terms; and he amused himself by doing all he could to
hinder the tourists. The same worthy called upon us, proposing an
exchange of sovereigns, not for our benefit, a form of annoyance
recognised by previous travellers; he also brought a cow’s horn, very
badly cut, for which he modestly asked a pound sterling.
[Illustration: THE “PRETTY GUIDE.”]
After maundering about for several days in despair, the travellers
engaged one Haldór Johannsen, a saddler, and certainly one of the
ugliest saddlers in the world. He began by objecting to the English
ropes, of which they had brought a store, and he could not travel
without Iceland gear, which stands about as much work as twisted straw.
He proved himself a perfect Mark Tapley on the road; but, on his return
from the first trip, he so abandoned himself to the cultus of Bacchus
that he could not be re-employed. This party lost time and money in
purchasing nags, at first they were asked £10 for animals worth at most
£4. They bought, after weary bargaining, three animals, for £7, £8, and
£9, and the consequence was that two out of three came to grief. They
also brought out a very extensive “kit,” which they flattered themselves
would readily sell after return to Reykjavik--it fetched the liberal sum
popularly called “half nothing.” They made two trips, one to Hekla viâ
Krísuvík, and the other to Surts-hellir, praised the fishing, and found
the shooting a farce.
As will be gathered from the following pages, the Icelandic Fylgimaðr
(“fugleman” or guide) is still in a rudimentary stage. He is apt either
to lag behind like the African, or to gallop ahead like the Gaucho of
the Pampas, utterly reckless of his charge. He is sure not to be cunning
in those details of country which save so much time and which, ignored,
so often lead to grief. As a rule, old paths have been broken up by
weather, and only those on the spot can know the later lines: when,
therefore, you see the least doubt, engage a temporary assistant for a
few marks, which are not wasted. He has one great merit: his language is
not foul, and he does not “exhort the impenitent quadruped” with the
emphasis of his brother bipeds elsewhere; he believes that swearing will
cause his tongue to become black-spotted. In point of conservatism he is
a Hindu; wain-ropes will not move him from settled “use and custom.”
Those I found of most account were Páll Eyúlfsson, Sigurð Jonasson, who
accompanied Lord Dufferin; Einar Símonsson, and Bjarni Stefansson, the
two latter speaking a little English.
And now to add a few remarks about Iceland ponies,[20] concerning which
gross exaggeration prevails: one traveller, who is generally remarkable
for sobriety, would ride them “over the ruins of Westminster Abbey.” The
origin of the horse, as of the man, is Norwegian; these “norbaggers”
reminded me of the little hay-fed nags of the Continent, and of
Wrangell’s Siberian travel. In Scandinavia, however, breeding has done
something, here nothing. No signs of an indigenous horse, like the
zebra-shaped Hipparion of Europe, Asia, and America, have yet come to
light, but the old bones dug up in several parts of the island show a
much larger animal. The “troops of wild Icelandic horses, which shift
for themselves even in the severest winters, when they perish in large
numbers,” is a traveller’s dream, like tales of wild camels. Traces of
the pony breed are found in Ireland and the Scoto-Scandinavian
archipelago, not to mention New Forest; the Asturiones, or small
mountain-ponies, which were so called, says Sir James Ware, because
imported from the Spanish Asturias, waxed scarce during the end of the
last century, and now they are well nigh extinct. The sheltie of
Hjaltland has been wrongly derived from Iberian blood: it is also
becoming rare, and, curious to say, though enjoying a much milder
climate, and a comparatively plentiful forage, it is more stunted and of
lighter build than those in the more barren north. The Orkney “garron”
was an admirable animal, and, _pur sang_, like the old Norman, which I
have seen in the “haras” of Abbeville, fine-limbed and high-spirited as
an Arab. The common “garron,” a mixed breed, was short and ugly, but an
excellent roadster, like the Tartar Yábú, which we have allowed to
become obsolete in India: ten years ago it fetched £5; the race has been
ruined by breeding for size, the sires being big hammer-headed stallions
from Aberdeen. The Færoese, unlike the Icelanders, have sold off all
their best animals, and it is hardly fair to judge from the refuse. I
would back against any Icelander, a New Forest pony or a Maharatta
“tattoo;” and my Kurdish Rahwán at Damascus would have knocked the wind
out of any in the island.
It has been shown that the total of horses in 1871 was only 3164 over
the number assigned to 1804. The reason is not hippophagy, which is
almost unknown, but which might have been practised with advantage save
for an obsolete superstition: as a rule, also, those classes are most
particular about their diet who can the least afford it; and the
obsolete Mosaic Code, so well adapted to its day and latitude, has not
yet been exchanged for the sensible omnivorous system of China. Thus, it
is now said, while horses are eaten in France, they eat us up in
England. The three commandments issued by Christianity to her proselytes
were, “Marry only one wife, expose not your children, and feed not on
horse-flesh.” These were accepted by all parts except the southern
coast, where hippic meat, like the Giftessen (arsenic-eating) of
mountainous Styria, ensured a good complexion; and it is well known that
in the Far West men prefer “three-year-old mustang” to bison or common
beef. But Hrosseitr became a word of reproach, and Iceland gave up what
was supposed to be unhallowed flesh offered to idols; the horse being,
as in the Aswamedha of the old Hindus, a great and ceremonious
sacrifice. The Devil always “scratches his writing on a blighted horse’s
bone;” the heathen swore by the “shoulder of a horse and the edge of a
sword;” and the horse’s head formed a “nithing-post” of peculiar
efficacy. The truth is, that the Icelander wants every blade of grass
and hay for his cows and sheep; he, therefore, either “traded off” his
colts, or cut their throats and sold their skins. Under the influence of
a ready market, breeding will again be resumed.
The export was caused by the rise of prices elsewhere; the New Forest
nag advanced, for instance, from £5 to £12. But the Icelander has had
the sense to part with inferior animals, jades fit only for the knacker
and the kennel. He has a curious idea that ponies used in the English
mines are first blinded, like decoy singing-birds upon the shores of the
Mediterranean.
In 1770 the horse fetched $3 (rixdollars, say half-crowns). During the
early part of the present century Mackenzie and others paid $6 where we
now disburse pounds sterling. In 1862 a picked animal sold from $12;
this price, in 1864, rose, as has been shown, to £5, 5s. a head. The
Consular Report of 1870-71 says, “The price for a good horse averages at
present from £2 to £4.” During my visit, the mean sums paid by the
steamers were £3 to £4. Baggage ponies for travellers commanded £5 to
£6, and good riding-nags £7 to £9. Perhaps no article in Iceland has run
up so rapidly as horse-flesh, and the resident feels it as well as the
traveller. This, however, is, as I have shown, probably a provisional
grievance; and, despite the inconvenience, the trade is perfectly
legitimate. Happily for Iceland, no class corresponds with our small
fund-holder, who is in a fair way of finding life in England impossible,
and who must disperse, like the large British colony of small rentiers
in Paris, when income became stationary and outlay became imperial.
Henderson (i. 19) and other travellers make the “Hross”[21] average from
13 to 14 hands. If this be true they have fallen off since the beginning
of the century, which is improbable as the degeneracy of peaches
recorded in “Gil Blas.” Baring-Gould says 14. I should lay down a high
average between 12 and 13: out of a number which were measured the
shortest was 10·3; and only one in a dozen barely reached 13. The
curious fact that the climate least fitted for the horse, and the land
where it fares worst, produces larger and stronger animals than the
southern islands, can be explained only by the superior size of those
first introduced. After a time the eye becomes accustomed to the stunted
stature, at least when not contrasted with a tall rider. The best
specimens are shaped somewhat like the Suffolk “punch,” with big
barrels, thick necks, and short, stout legs. They have round noses of
the Norman type, bearded chins, well-opened eyes, ears short and pretty,
erect manes, and the square box-head which appears in the classical
horse of medals and statuary. The strong points of the fubsy little
animals are the manes and tails; the former even when hogged conceal the
crest like a lion’s _crinière_, and if not cut would hang to the knees;
the latter would be ornamental but for the local fashion of thinning
them at the roots, and of tying up wisps of hair in small knots.
The horse in Iceland is an inevitable evil, the climate being too cold
to breed mules. The beasts show many signs of falling off besides size,
and we should wonder if it were otherwise. Stallions are allowed freely
to run with the mares; and the evil of inbreeding is exaggerated by the
small number--sometimes a parish will not have more than one. In the
classical days of Iceland men rode entire horses, and a favourite festal
pastime was a fight: the Hesta-thing (“horse meeting”) suggests the
champion camels which bite each other at Smyrna. It seems to have been a
brutal custom, as the animals had to be flogged, like the older sort of
Chinaman soldier, to the fray; what a contrast with the Indian
“man-eater,” which safely faces a tiger! The Sagas also mention racing
as a popular amusement: this, also, is apparently obsolete, at least I
never saw it. Stallions are now considered too fierce for general use,
and yet, like all the animals in the country, they will be found
exceptionally free from vice: mares also are rarely ridden, and the
people tell you that they are incapable of hard work, of course, an
utter prejudice; in fact, geldings, as with us, are the rule. The Arab,
it is well known, mounts the mare because she has more endurance and is
less given to neighing at times when surprises are intended: the
Spaniard preferred stallions, and to show his contempt for the
Ishmaelite, put the jester and the buffoon upon the mare--this custom
has prevailed throughout South America, though its origin is now
forgotten, and “Yeguas” are still slaughtered in thousands for their
hides and fat. And there are superstitions about marks and colour which
remind us of complicated Arabian system; for instance, a horse marked
with a cross will never drown you.
The effect of promiscuous intercourse appears in wall-eyes, locally
called “glass-eyes,” which are painfully common, and in coats of many
colours, fit only for the circus. The noble bay, chestnut, and iron-grey
are rare: many are skewballs, and the piebald, which in Texas would be
called “Paint,” and in the Brazil Jardim (a garden), are perhaps
considered the best. Some writers declare that the white are most
esteemed, and the black least--I found both exceptional as in the
Arabian breed. The foals often wear long fleecy coats, and here the
renowned Mr Barnum might have bought many “woolly horse,” real, not
manufactured; but whether the few would have lasted in the latitude of
New York, deponent sayeth not. Of course they are hardy and sagacious
from mode of life. In winter none but favourites are stabled and fed on
hay; the others are left out to fare as they best can, on the refuse of
the cows and on offals, such as fish bones and heads.[22] At last, when
it becomes a matter of life and death, the poor brutes are put under
shelter, and fed with a few handfuls of fodder. On the other hand, they
are perfectly free from the dire cohort of equine diseases produced by
the close and heated stable.[23] Like the sheep, they thrive upon the
many and plentiful fuci that line the shore; a similar necessity teaches
the horse in the interior of the Brazil to paw open and eat the cactus
flesh. Thus the price is nearly all profit to the breeder. During the
cold season Icelanders ride very little, if at all: where the snow is
deep and hard they use sledges and rough-shoe their nags. They are ready
for travel in early June, although I was told the contrary in England by
those who should have known better; but the razor-backs at this season
require carefully-padded saddles. From that time they get into better
condition; they are best in July, but in August again they are soft and
blown out by too much green meat. All are shod, and very badly shod; the
stones are sure to injure the frog, and Arab plates would be a great
improvement. The only remedy known for sore backs and saddle galls are
cruel setons in the breast: the Raki of Syria and the Caxaça of Brazil,
applied when the saddle is removed, would prevent much of this evil, but
spirits are too precious for “uso esterno.” The ears are cut off, not to
prevent the Pasha impounding them, but as a mark; and the nostrils are
slit with the silly idea of improving the wind. They never see grain,
which they must be taught to eat, and salt is not regularly served out
to them. From perpetually licking one another’s skins, they supply fine
specimens of Œgagropiles, the light and polished balls of hair, the
_Tophus Ovinus_ of Norway, so commonly found in the stomachs of
Brazilian cows. Broken wind is common, and cow-houghs are the rule.
The domestic animals of all countries bear testimony to the character of
their owners: reason, or the result of a developed brain, acts and is
acted upon by instinct, or the imperfect brain produce, the two being
different in quantity, not in quality. Man and beast learn to resemble
each other much after the fashion of Darby and Joan: the servants of
menageries, like those of mad-houses, become peculiarly brute-like,
whilst animals educated by men have an unspoken language which it is not
difficult to understand. In Iceland the horse has learned much from his
master. The hardy and hard-working little brutes are, like other
quadrupeds and bipeds too, curiously headstrong and self-willed. Their
obstinate conservatism is offended by anything savouring of innovation:
I tied a bell to the leader, and he showed his resentment by all the
pettishness of a spoiled child; as a rule, they appeared rather
frightened than pleased by the music so attractive to the Spanish mule.
Each has his own peculiar likes and dislikes: one shuns the puddles,
objecting to wet feet, another avoids rock, and all hate loose stones:
the lazy tread in preference upon the tops of the grassy mounds,
bog-trotting like humans; and these are the least safe; others step in
the hollows, as the trusty Brazilian mule in the “caldeirões.” They
resemble the riders in their dislike to beaten paths, probably from
experience of cracks and holes; they will at times resolve to go no
farther, and they have been known to stand in the same position until
killed by the cold. Upon bogs and swamps they seem to feel the surface,
to walk with the head down, and noses depressed, smelling the ground.
They change pace and swerve, as if starting, when they come upon
crevasses, with a suddenness and an agility which has unseated many a
traveller; and like mules and asses, they are unwilling to part
company--another sure sign of ignoble blood. Those over nine years old
are much preferred, because more prudent and experienced: they are even
better when nearly double that age, and they live from twenty to
twenty-five years.
The best roadsters are natural pacers (Skeið hestar, or Vakur-hestar),
moving like the camel and the elephant, two legs on one side, instead
of traversing: this is the well-known Paço, introduced into Southern
Europe by the nearer East. Many have a false amble (að valhopa),
cantering with the forehand, and bog-trotting behind: this the people
like because it easily covers six miles an hour. They are utterly
untrained to trot and canter (að stikkva); consequently, all go false: I
cannot but think the trot proper a purely artificial pace; in the
so-called wild horse it serves only to connect the walk and the canter,
and it is never kept up for long distances. This does not apply to the
amble or shuffle of the Barb and his American descendants: the former
was driven to this specialty by the necessity of raising the forelegs to
clear rough, thorny ground, and the peculiarity has been artificially
developed. If you attempt to make them back, they will probably, like
Argentine animals, tangle their legs and fall; few are accustomed to
leap, and the smallest ditch makes them spring like buck-jumpers when
put to it. They might be expected to prove surefooted, yet systematic
tripping and stumbling on easy ground are inveterate evils; the people
blame the rider when the pony breaks its knees, and the arms ache with
the exertion of holding the brute up. I once tried, for experiment,
giving my nag its head upon a tolerable road, and it came down with me
three times in a few hours’ march: my military saddle, however, was
unusually heavy; and, of course, increase of weight requires exceptional
animals.
It is a good plan for the first day or so to use spurs, which, as I have
said, are now all but unknown to the people. The only instrument of
punishment is a whip with short handle and strap, the latter always
coming off, and if this be absent the animals become utter slugs. The
comfortable traveller brings with him an English whip, and the long
thong is very useful for driving. Education is confined to making the
animal stand still when the reins drawn over the head are thrown upon
the ground: the custom is general throughout Australia and the Argentine
Republic; and I should recommend it to cavalry where the thongs are not
always liable to be wet and dirty; they are great at climbing
mountain-paths and hopping from rock to rock; they ford rivers well,
walking crab-wise with heads up stream, and in the “scour,” violent
shallow water, they kneel to their work. The worst footing for them is
the boulder-paved bed. If they happen to fall in fording, the best way
is to slip off on the current side, to hold the rein firm, and to steady
one’s self by pommel or cantle till the shore is reached. Those taken to
England soon sicken under change of diet and climate; some have done
well as ponies for children, and I saw a neat pair driven at Edinburgh.
There is an art in riding these little mustangs, and an Icelander will
get more work and better pace out of them than a stranger. Of course the
slowest gives the rate to the caravan, and this will sometimes not
exceed three miles an hour--making the journey an _écœurante corvée_.
All assure you that they never kick; you hear the same in the Argentine
Republic; you believe, and sooner or later you are kicked: two
Englishmen of my acquaintance suffered in the flesh, and an Iceland pony
suddenly did its best to knock out my teeth. Rearers and bolters are
rare, and I saw only one biter; the people are not brutal to their
beasts, but only careless. Temper never shows so much as when they are
loaded; the worst are the riding animals, which lose all manners,
apparently feeling insulted by the proceeding. They will never keep
Indian file like mules, they rush past one another, bumping and striving
to destroy the traveller’s traps; if a load happens to become loose or
to shift on one side, there is a grand scene of plunging, of lashing
out, especially at pots, kettles, and kegs, and of running away till
everything is strewed on the ground. About evening when hunger becomes
imperious, and especially where forage appears, they wax wild as
antelopes.
“Omnis commoditas sua fert incommoda secum;”
but this is an inconvenience worse than anything that I have seen, even
when travelling with half-broken Brazilian mules.
The people boast that their shaggy, long-backed, short-legged poodles
equal the noble blood of Arabia, cover 100 miles a day, and carry 300
lbs.--Uno Von Troil says 400. The Thingmannaleið, the recognised march
to the Althing, however, is from twenty to twenty-five English statute
miles, and I have found 100 lbs. to be a full baggage-load.[24] By
proper management, the Lest (caravan) may be pushed on at a pinch some
thirty-five to forty miles a day, but every third march should be
followed by a halt. On one excursion we allowed three rests in twenty
days, but the nags did not recover for many a week. They must not start
before ten or eleven A.M., after they have had a good morning feed. They
are allowed to drink when and where they please, but only after the
chill is off the water. The Icelander seeing a fresh, green grazing,
generally dismounts to let his animal have a bite and stretch its limbs,
like a dog fresh from sleep. A careful man will walk up and down the
heaviest places. About three or four P.M. there is usually an hour’s
halt and, during the summer, as the nags suffer greatly from the sun,
night-travelling, if we can so call it, where all appears one night and
one day, is the rule. Straying is also an inveterate evil, especially in
bad weather; the hobbles are rotten cords or withers fastened by bits of
sheep’s shanks. Side-hobbling must be attended to; if only the forehand
is tethered or knee-hobbled, the beasts have learned by practice to hop
as fast and as far as kangaroos, and they will easily waste the best
part of an afternoon. Like the Norwegian nags, they are exceedingly fond
of rolling in the sand, and consequently the saddle suffers. The shoes
should be inspected after every march; in the country parts they may
generally be replaced for $1 the pair.
Icelanders ride from the days “when they first see the blood upon their
teeth;” their foot gear and the nature of the country incapacitate them
from walking, yet with our shoes they would soon learn to climb well.
There is a fashion in these things. The Mamlúk Bey would never cross
even the street except upon his mare; and the Brazilian church-goer will
send many miles for his horse to ride the same number of yards. A walker
in Iceland is a low fellow, like the “Zalamah” of Syria. The islander
mounts as often on the wrong side as not--of course every cavalry-man
should be trained to do the same. His long back and short legs make him
a curious contrast with his dwarf monture, and apparently he is easily
dislodged--I have seen men come off even when the animals are only
bogged. Another element of grotesqueness is the perpetual hammering of
the unarmed heel against the animal’s ribs; this “devil’s tattoo” keeps
the feet warm, and the horses will lag without it, as the Egyptian
Fellah wakes when his water-wheel ceases to creak and groan. The effect
is an indescribably loose and shambling seat.
Although cavalcades look tolerably well from afar, individuals are
ungraceful and unhandy riders compared with the Gauchos: an Englishman
observed to me that the latter will do in the dark what would puzzle the
former in the light. The general seat is somewhat like the English, a
kind of _juste milieu_ never adopted by purely equestrian races. The
Eastern horseman, take the Tartar for a type, sits his horse with
“crumpled legs,” as if upon a chair. The Western, that is to say, the
peoples of the New World, without exception, stand, as it were, upright
with legs apart, riding by balance alone. The Oriental style was
probably suggested by the greater steadiness of aim, with bow or gun,
obtained by rising upon the shovel-iron stirrups clear of the animal’s
back. The Occidental seat was evidently the result of long weary marches
over monotonous prairies and pampas, and it never leads to rupture like
our cavalry seat; riders carry little weight, and their waists are not
tightly buckled down so as to press upon the part most likely to give
way.
It is a spectacle likely to be remembered, the shoeing of Iceland ponies
by the farrier, who is almost always unprofessional. Five men, without
including half-a-dozen spectators and advisers, bodily engage in the
task; one holds the cruel twitch, two hang on to the several limbs, one
or two hold up the hoof, and number five plies the hammer. And the
result is that in travelling you must always expect your animals to be
pricked.
The traveller should take out with him a comfortable pony bridle, if he
intends to ride far. An Iceland bit is horrid to look at, but the long,
heavy mass of brass is never cruel; the chain is not tightened, often,
indeed, it is absent, and sometimes a bit of cord does duty. Happily for
the horses, they have no curbs, and I have many a time wished that we in
England could unlearn the use of them, or rather learn to use them only
when required. Nothing more unpleasant than to see both sexes in Rotten
Row worrying their animals into perpetual fidgets, and making them throw
up their heads like giraffes on the run. And this is not confined to
Hyde Park: at Edinburgh I saw an escort of one of our best cavalry
corps so pulling at their curbs, that every charger seemed to be upon
wires. A light hand is not given to every rider, but all can spare the
mouth by using the snaffle.
Upon the whole, I should say, hire your nags. Buyers no longer sell for
a song, as the foreign horsedealers are ready to pay fairly for good
animals; yet besides the risk of being jockeyed--and in the matter of
horseflesh the Icelander is quite the peer
“Of a Yorkshireman hippodamoio”--
the owner, as has been said, will be obliged to travel slowly, and he
will incur additional troubles where the inevitable amply suffice.
Tolerable riding beasts (Rið hestar) may be hired for $1 (= 2s. 3d.) a
day, and baggage-animals (Puls or Klifia hestar) for four marks. The
hire should be paid after return. The guide is sure to take the best, in
order to whip up stragglers, and he will be the more careful of his
monture if he be its owner. Formerly, dogs trained to bark and to keep
the Indian file straight, always accompanied caravans: now they are rare
and dear. The use of the Madriña, or bell-mare, is utterly unknown--what
does Henderson mean by making the Arab’s bell-camel go last in the line
instead of first? An extra baggage-animal, besides remounts, is always
necessary: the day of the Hesta-kaup is long past when you could
exchange a lame or tired-out animal at any farm-house.
The Iceland saddle (Hnakkur), well stuffed and provided with a
sheepskin, can be bought at Reykjavik at prices varying from $15 to $50,
but the old campaigner will prefer a roomy old English hunting saddle,
duly prepared for “razor backs.” The woman’s saddle (Söðull) costs from
$40 to $80: it is a kind of arm chair, fronting the near side, and
covered with brass ornaments: the feet are supported by a piece of
board; and the whole affair is very dangerous--M. l’Abbé Baudouin saw a
woman drowned when crossing a not very rapid river by the fault of her
riding gear.[25] The lower classes ride _à califourchon_ like the
_hautes et puissantes dames_ of the old noblesse de Campagne, and roll
off like bundles of old clothes. However unseemly, the straddling style
is ever the safest, and I should strongly advise the seat _en cavalier_
in countries where the side-saddle might lead to accidents. The form of
riding should be that of the Libanus, with a long arm and a short
bridle, always ready to hold up the animal, but never attempting to
check it. And those disposed to _vertiges_ should look at the bank,
never at the fast-flowing water.
The baggage will be a perpetual trouble. I deposited at the rooms of the
Anthropological Institute a specimen of the Klifberi (crook-saddle), the
Klibber of the Shetlands, with its pegs of reindeer horn, so useful for
fraying everything they touch. This article will cost the stranger $3 to
$6. There is, however, a modern and improved form, which is far worse;
the arch, banded with iron, rises some five inches above the animal’s
back, and effectually destroys whatever rubs against it. If the people
could be induced to adopt the Otago pack-saddle, used by the transport
trains in the Abyssinian expedition, and commended by Messrs Freshfield
(Caucasus) and Stanley, it would be invaluable. I also exhibited
specimens of ropes with horn circlets, for making fast the luggage; they
are expensive as useless, and $3 buys a very small supply. Finally, I
showed the popular “namdah” of the island, two heavy slabs of turf, not
unlike a very thick mat: they are the fibrous roots of the buck bean or
marsh trefoil (_Menyanthes trifoliata_), in books called Hor-blaðka, but
here known as Reiðinga-gras. The damp heat produced by this article
acting upon chafes causes back-sores, which are sometimes fatal: the
Færoese smoke and chew the leaves of the “Bukka Blaa” as tobacco, and
hold that in infusion they cure scurvy. In the pagan days of Iceland,
strips of buck-bean turf made a yoke under which criminals were
compelled to walk; and when two men swore brotherhood or
foster-brotherhood, they passed through an arch of three long sods,
whose ends were attached to earth, and whose centre was raised by a
spear.
The Iceland box is very like that which old-fashioned Brazilians use for
mule travel: it admits wet; it readily falls open; and, when tourists
are numerous, it is not easily found at Reykjavik. Mr Shepherd, of
North-West Peninsula fame, had a model pair made by Silver & Co., which
own but one disadvantage--being “un-Icelandic,” the guide will object to
load them. One writer sensibly advises travellers to pack up and to roll
everything down the staircase; if the cases stand this test, they may be
passed with approval. Still everything will by degrees be smashed and
spilt: cartridges will be crushed or shaken loose; salt and sugar will
be mixed; oil and spirits will swamp books and flies; and collections of
botany and geology, unless inspected every day, will be lost or damaged;
strong tins will be crushed like paper; even cast-iron would not be
safe. The scene on unpacking for the first time after a march is “a
caution:” Iceland in this matter reminded me of Blá-land (Blue Land,
_i.e._, Blackland), where the ingenious negro managed to split a Papin’s
Digester, making me “marvel how.” Saddle-bags are hardly fair to the
ponies, and carpet-bags and canvas-bags being strange luxuries, will be
stowed away over the boxes, and will be worn through by the hide-lariats
which assist the rotten woollen ropes. Though bred to loading from his
childhood, the Icelandic guide has neither the skill nor the appliances
of the Iberian or Brazilian “Arriero;” anything like a miscellaneous
load will at once be shaken off by the rough jog-trot of the ponies; the
girths break, and the halts for reloading become hourly, and even
bi-hourly. There are two ways of conducting a caravan: one is to drive
the animals loose (að reka hestar), the other is to lead them (leiða
hestar í taumi, _i.e._, in team); the latter is generally done by the
care-taker (Lestamaðr) when approaching the farmhouse-tún, and halters
are fastened to tails in a way that would surprise a Syrian thoroughbred
into the height of misbehaviour. This “cringing,” as Shetlanders call
it, is also the tether for short halts, and it proves effective enough,
as they can only wheel round in a narrow circle--vicious withal.
The traveller will find a tent necessary in the interior, but only on
account of the rain. During their September excursions, when the farmers
ride considerable distances to collect sheep from the distant pastures,
they camp out like Bedawin: as amongst the Canadian Indians, this change
from the superheated atmosphere of the house grows a plentiful crop of
colds, rheumatisms, and lumbagos. When they travel with baggage, they
carry tents like miniatures of the East Indian “pál,” and the large
inmate rising from the minimum of space suggests a “Jack in the box.”
Two uprights, four or five feet high, are connected by a cross-pole of
five to six feet, and over this frame is thrown the cover of coarse
white Wadmal, braced by cords at the edges. The flaps have small holes
for wooden pegs, generally three behind, and the same number on each
side; when these are lost, stones and turf (Siberian fashion) do duty
for them. Goods not likely to be injured are piled outside as a
“break-wind” and, even when the fore-flap is closed against rain, two
men will stow themselves away inside. My friend, Mr Robert Mackay Smith,
kindly lent me a little bell-tent, which had already seen service in
Iceland, and which proved uncommonly useful. A mattress is usually held
a necessary, but I found a Syrian Postín of black sheepskin spread upon
a caoutchouc, by far the most satisfactory article. The traveller,
however, must beware of “waterproof blankets,” which are sadly apt to
belie their name in an Iceland “shower.”
Writers who know Oriental travel only by books are fond of finding
reflections and resemblances in the far north; the differences, however,
are far greater, and the general likeness is soon destroyed by the
details. The horse, the tent, the bivouac, and the desert are salient
points of similitude; the want of life, of colour, and of
picturesqueness, the main accident of the East, soon break the spell.
And the traveller in Iceland will miss many things of which he has read,
as the “kiss of peace,” the pulling off boots, etc., by the daughters of
the house, and the parting salute by way of good night. These things may
survive on the rarely visited south coast; on the beaten tracks they are
of the dead past--at least I never saw a trace. Civilised coarseness and
polite vulgarity have made Icelanders deny that the custom of public
undressing ever existed: they are wrong to be ashamed of it. The removal
of muddy boots, wet stockings, and drenched garments, without any sense
of the “sho’king,” was a sign of innocence; the action was without any
sense of impropriety, even as the primitive matrons and maidens of St
Veran thought it uncivil to leave the room before the guest was fairly
in bed.
CHAPTER VIII.
EXCURSIONS ABOUT REYKJAVIK--THE ISLANDS--THE LAUGAR OR HAMMAM--THE
SOUTHERN LAXÁ OR SALMON RIVER.
The weather appears to be that of the Inferno-circle, especially rich
in--
“La piova
Eterna, maledetta, fredda e greve.”
However, we take heart of grace to visit the islands. A boat is readily
found at the Bridge-House pier, the centre of industry. Here are knots
of fishermen, who might be in Leith, save that they are a wee bit
rougher; and the stout young women labouring with coals and rolling up
barrels of spirits, reminded me of the Teutonic emigrants to Rio de
Janeiro, where each one would girth double, and probably weigh treble,
the average _Brazileira_. At times there is a lively scene when ponies
are shipped, an operation managed very rudely, not to say brutally: the
animals are dragged or driven down the slimy, slippery plankway, and are
forced to spring into the nearest barge; they are accustomed to ferries,
but not to this kind of embarkation, which barks the shins and wounds
the hind legs. At times a little animal is jostled off the narrow
gangway, but instead of falling or leaping down, it clings like a cat
with the forelegs, and holds on long enough for men to run down and
catch it in their arms. The most amusing scene was when an Englishman
inflated a waterproof cloak, the Halkett-boat, and another, taking in
hand two apologies for paddles, began a series of astonishing gyrations.
All Reykjavik flocked to the pier, possibly under the stimulus thus
poetically recorded:
“Pull him out! pull him out! he fell from yonder boat,
We shall either get a sov’reign or a one-pound note.”
They were disappointed, however, for the Britisher gallantly held his
own, and taught the spectators “a thing or two.”
A few minutes of sharp sailing placed us at Engey, meadow-islet, the
central of the three largest which defend the Rade of Reykjavik. It
projects to the south-east, a long spit of loose rocks, covered, as
usual, with fucus[26] and seaweed: here two huge ravens are hung up as
scarecrows to keep off their kind, and to frighten away the great Erne
or cinereous eagle (_Falco albicilla_): this determined enemy of the
eider duck sometimes haunts the Laxá mouth. The “beneficent palmipède”
is about two feet long, and weighs 6-7 lbs.: it swims the water
gracefully as a swan, and is a strong and straight-flying bird, giving
excellent sport: the drake’s plume is silver, tipped with jet; the duck
is much more modestly clad. The Æðr has a good time of it in Iceland.
Their homes are, like those of olden commerce, the islets near the
coast; they will not build, as some travellers have related, in inland
lakes, and they are rarely seen ashore, preferring damp rocks, where
they can feed on seaweed and insects. From its haunts dogs and cats are
carefully excluded. No salute must be fired at Reykjavik for fear of
frightening “somateria mollissima.” The drake is sometimes poached after
the breeding season in August and September: I never tasted it, but
should imagine that the flavour must admirably combine fish and sea
tang. The people declare the flesh to be excellent eating, worth all the
other game put together, but fine and confiscation of the offending
weapon await the poaching gourmand: the _amende_ is a rixdollar per
shot, and if the offence be repeated, confiscation of the gun. How we
longed to see this happen to our Cockney friend!
The landing-place is the normal natural pier, a horrid mass of slimy,
slippery boulders near a small curing establishment, whose rich aroma
made us hurry frantically past, kerchief over nose. Here the islet is a
strew and scatter of cods’ heads, cods’ bones, and cod’s sounds: they
would be the best of compost if systematically used. Hopping from
hillock to hillock of fishy grass, we reached the large and
prosperous-looking farm-house, which occupies a domed rise to the
north-west. The owner, Hr Christian Magnússon, was superintending his
eider-down: he lives too near Reykjavik to ask us within his doors.
We then walked over the tussocky ground to the west, where the warm
exposure has special attractions for the brown mothers. Our companions
were troops of noisy peewits and terns: the former are spoil-sports, as
in the Brazil, where I have often been exasperated into giving them the
benefit of a barrel; and the latter, here termed Kría (plur. Kríur),
whence our “Cree,” sweep down upon the intruder in resolute style,
screaming furiously, and sometimes administering a vicious peck.
Possibly _Sterna hirundo_ knows that its egg is delicate food for man,
and becomes a winged Timon accordingly. In places these birds seem to
have fled the sea, and are found hovering over the fields in search of
food: they should not be shot, as they serve to keep down the
earth-worms, and here the lumbricus is a pest, as in the Færoe Islands.
Poultry would be useful for the same purpose, but it causes trouble, and
is seldom seen in the interior. It will be remembered that the ancient
Britons kept fowls only “voluptatis causâ,” which some understand “for
the sake of cock-fighting.”
Travellers describe the eider as a very wild bird in winter, but a mere
barn door during the summer season, so tame that, like the frequenters
of the gull-fair, Ascension, or of the Lage near Brazilian Santos, it
can be taken up with the hand. We found that they scurried away from us,
uttering a hoarse “crrr,” and only one showed mild fight in defence of
her flappers. Nor did we see more than a single monogamous duck in each
nest, despite the reported Mormon arrangements, strange if true. The
usual number of eggs was two, proving that the first lay had been
plundered; three was not, four was, rare. At this time (June 12) a few
hardly-fledged ducklings appeared, and some could just follow the
mother’s flight. The old ones teach their young the art and mystery of
swimming, by leading them to the shore, bearing them on their backs a
few yards out, and slipping from under them--a process which the tutor
of my childhood unconsciously imitated. The nests, which are always near
water, for facility of feeding, are built in hollows, like dwarf
arm-chairs, or the old fur-cap of Istria: in the centre is a thin
saucer-shaped lining of brown, grey, or mouse-coloured fluff,
exceptionally unclean. About mid-July all these matrons will become
frisky, gadding about the Fjörðs and river mouths.
Another pleasant excursion is to Viðey (wood-holm), the largest and
easternmost of the three great breakwaters. In some thirty-five minutes
we ran before the stiff breeze to the little landing-place, a hole in
the Palagonite rock. As we approached the islet, it appeared double,
connected, like the defunct Siamese twins, by a band which was bright
green with grass, and which carried a few wild-looking sheep. We had
seen M. Gaimard’s atlas, and we had read of the “beautiful pillars of
basaltic lava,” but we did not find them. The formation generally is
that of Arthur’s Seat: in places the stone is sub-columnar; here and
there it is quaquaversally disposed, the effect of lateral pressure, and
in most parts it can hardly be distinguished from the amorphous. The
basalts on the south of the island, and adjoining the remnants of a
crater to the west, are best worth seeing, but again--bad is the best.
A rough path leads to the tall wooden-barred gate and weather-cock which
defend the property of good Magnús Stephensen, Chief Justice of Iceland,
the friend of “Baron Banks,” and far-famed for his hospitalities in the
olden day. Though travellers say that he rented it from the Crown, he
was the owner of the islet which still remains to his family; and about
1820 he died at the satisfactory age of eighty-two. The house is a large
and substantial building of stone and lime, with ten windows facing the
south, a counterpart of the smallpox hospital at Laugarnes. The
characteristic remnant of the monastery, which was founded in A.D. 1226,
is the chapel to the west of the mansion, a solid box of rough basalt,
squared only at the corners, with rude arches over doorway and windows;
the dwarf “campanile,” a shed perched upon the roof, shelters three
bells. In the massive red door was a huge iron key, which may date from
the days of the ghostly owners. The roof is supported by heavy solid
rafters, and the furniture is older and more ornamental than usual; the
benches are carved, and the colours are the tricolor, blue, red, and
green.
As in many country churches, the tall pulpit stands behind the humble
altar which Lutheranism in Iceland has not reduced to a table, but
converted into a safe for priests’ vestments. The confessional still
lingers in the shape of a tall-roofed chair, like that of a hall porter;
it is now used by the Prófastur (archdeacon) when he makes his visits,
but the people no longer confide their sins to the ecclesiastical ear.
Metcalfe (p. 317) seems to think that Icelanders are shrieved before
they communicate. The only “Reformed” remnant of the old Catholic custom
is the practice of seating the expectants round the chancel, when the
parson exhorts them in set phrase to repent their sins, and to amend
their lives. They do so, or are officially supposed so to do, and
absolution duly follows.
We looked into the western room of the old monastery where the
printing-press was wont to work; the rubbish lay in admired confusion,
almost as bad as the sacred hill-town of Safet can show, after parting
with its typographic reliques to the curious and the collectors of
Europe. The owner, lounging about, hands in pockets, prospected us more
carefully than courteously. Here the neighbourhood of Reykjavik is not
the only cause of inhospitality: the son of the old Chief-Justice was
notoriously unhappy in his family; and the heir to the “antiqua domus”
is locally famed as an _animal_, in the French and Spanish senses of the
term. So we wandered over the island, much to the confusion of the terns
and sheep, and enjoyed a charming bath in the sea to the north: the
walking was foul as usual, the swamplets have not been drained, nor have
the grass tussocks been levelled during an occupation of a thousand
years. Of course, in Wood-isle no wood exists, but near a farm-shed upon
the western half there is an eruption of turf-stacks, which show what
has become of the name-giving growth.
The tract behind and about Reykjavik is an epitome of Iceland, which we
can see in a day’s work; it admirably combines the quaking bogs of
Ireland with the Pantanaes of the Brazil, the rock-slides of the
Kasrawán and the metal domes and boilers of the Haurán.
“God made the country and man made the town” is a poor poet’s
sentimental say, which has passed into a truism, whilst every traveller
knows its falsehood. The country wants the hand of man almost as much as
the town does. Hereabouts, where the surface lies comparatively
unbroken, the absolute absence of trees gives the dreariest impression.
We do not feel the same want amongst the labyrinths of serrated ridges,
where the vapours break like seas in the morning, and which are
transfigured by the evening mists into glimpses of purple and golden
glory; nor amongst cataracts, “tumbling in a shower of water rockets”
over the perpendicular strata of basaltic rock; nor when fronting the
inverted arches of the Fjörð-mouths, where the sweeping lines of mist
and cloud are worthy the inspired pencil of Gustave Doré. And, though
throughout the island there is not one spot which “smiles with corn,”
the stretches of bright green pasturage, with spangled flowers,
relieving the blackness of the trap, serve passing well in the artistic
eye to take the place of cultivation. In these places we escape from the
eternal black and white, white and black, which sadden the eye in the
interior.
The lakelet south of the capital drains large bogs and peat-mosses at
its upper or inland end. It is poor stuff, which, however, like that of
the Brazil, burns without chemical treatment, and it contains, as in the
Færoe Islands, large quantities of birch trunks and bark, proving, if
proof were wanted, that the land was not always bare of trees. Although
the first colonists found the country wooded from the sea to the hills,
here, as elsewhere, first colonists regarded a tree as a personal and
natural enemy, to be annihilated with fire and steel. Consequently the
land became bog, the centuries deepened and added to it, and now it is
absolutely irreclaimable. Under the blessing of St Blazius, however, it
supplies the people with fuel. The turf-digger uses a rough instrument,
a straight bar of wood, with a side projection for the foot, and shod
with a crescent-shaped iron: it is the toysker familiar to the
Shetlanders.[27] The material is stacked in early June, and by September
it is ready for use; almost every family has its own turbary, where a
fortnight’s hard work would collect an ample supply for the whole year.
Yet the absence of fire is one of the characteristics of the Icelandic
farm-house, in which the people prefer to “pig” together for animal
heat, like the lower creation, rather than take the trouble of cutting,
stacking, and carrying in their peat. But here probably inveterate
custom perpetuates what arose from simple indolence.
The Landnámabók (De Originibus Islandiæ Liber), corresponding with our
Domesday Book and the Book of Joshua amongst the Hebrews, tells us that
in A.D. 1231 the plough was drawn by oxen and slaves. The Aryan
implement, never invented by the African nor by the “red man” of the
Western Hemisphere, is now simply impossible. The surface is either
quaking bog, where man is easily mired and “laired;” or covered with
runs and boulders of basalts and lavas, porous and compact, grey, brown,
red, and black; the grey being of course the oldest. This has never been
cultivated, and probably never will be. The grass land reminds you of a
deserted country churchyard. Many of the warts which garnish it are
originally formed like “glacier tables,” those pillars of ice bearing
tabular rock, which protects their bases whilst the sun melts the
surrounding matter. The scattered boulders keep the lump firm, whilst
the ground about it is washed away: mostly, however, the tussocky warts
are formed, as on the Irish bog, the Scotch moor, and the flanks of Ben
Nevis, by the melting of spring-snows and the heavy rains which carry
off the humus from the sides; and they show us on a small scale the
effects of weathering upon hills and mountains. The water, here and in
the bogs and peat-mosses, is a “gilded puddle,” rich in diatomaceous
silica and iron: as in parts of Ireland, it readily converts adipose and
muscular tissue into a saponaceous matter like spermaceti, and it forms
the “precious medicine Múmiyá” (human fat) once so highly valued for
fractures and pulmonary complaints.
These warts are exaggerated by the treading and grazing of cattle in the
depressions. Not a few travellers have asserted that the people,
forgetting that grass grows perpendicularly, leave the knobs _in situ_,
because a curve affords more surface than a plane. To a similar
prejudice, also, they attribute the use of the toy scythe, which shaves
round the lumps, wasting much time, and exposing the precious crop to be
destroyed by rain or snow. The real cause, of course, lies much deeper.
Firstly, there is the want of hands; secondly, there is the expense of
day labour; and thirdly, a man must be certain of tenure before he is
justified in undertaking such a task as levelling the surface of his
field. The turf must be carefully removed from every knob, the latter
must be planed away with the hoe, and lastly, the grassy covering must
be replaced: after a few years the snows and showers will require the
operation to be repeated. Meanwhile, the result is a short thin turf
like that of England, but exceptionally springy to the tread, as if it
had no solid foundation--in fact, something like a water-bed. A little
top-dressing brings out a goodly crop of grass, and although we must
despair of seeing even oats and rye, yet roots like potatoes and turnips
might become much more common than they are. But then--the landlord
would raise the rent.
A favourite walk with foreigners is to the Laug (pronounce _Lög_), the
reeking spring, lying about two miles from and nearly due east of the
town. The only bathing-place, especially on fine Sundays, between
church-time and dinner at two P.M., it is the haunt of many washerwomen,
and yet, during the last millennium, no attempt at a decent path has
been made. You leave the town by the Krísuvík, more properly the general
eastern, road, passing the fine new prison, which is rising rapidly from
the ground: the exceptionally thick walls are made of hewn and unhewn
trap, with an abundance of imported lime, blackened by basaltic sand.
There are apartments for the officials, and ample accommodation for all
the criminals in the island; indeed, if the interior only equal the
exterior, its superior comforts may act, it is feared, like our old
transportation system, and offer a premium for breaking the law. On the
right, you leave the Skolavarða,[28] or school mark, so called because
it was built for the College. This “observatory,” as foreigners call it,
is a two-storied building, ascended by two sets of double ladders: the
view from the green-painted hatchway which defends the opening above
lays the land before you like an embossed map. The lower story is foul
in the extreme, and there are scandals concerning the uses to which it
is normally put. The wooden building of old charts has clean
disappeared. No place could be worse adapted than this for an
observatory, at least, if magnetic instruments are to be used. The
French expedition found that the surrounding volcanic rocks gave the
most discordant results, for instance, 2° 32´ to north, and 11° 15´ to
south, upon the same rhumb. M. Lottier (p. 35) offers the following
comparison of magnetic declinations:
1. At Reykjavik, 43° 14´.
2. “ Thingvellir, 40° 8´.
3. “ Geysirs, 45° 50´.
4. “ Selsund, 40° 49´´.
He remarks that the first is probably correct on account of the care
with which the site had been prepared, two granite blocks having been
laid down upon the hard ground below the turf. The second was vitiated
by a huge _coulée_ of lava; the third by the looseness and Plutonic
nature of the soil, whilst at Selsund the Hekla _massif_, distant only a
mile to the north-east, must have exercised a disturbing effect.
Striking to the left, we pass the detached farm-houses, and hit the
shingly and rocky margin of the shore, which here and there shows heaps
and scatters of sub-columnar basalt. Presently, after treading the
pebbly bank and stony tracts, well garnished with mud, we reach the
mouth of the little stream, or rather the place where it should mouth.
Here, as on many parts of the coast, where not protected by islands to
windward, or where the rock does not come down to the water’s edge, a
high bank of sand and shingle is thrown up, and retains the water in
pools of various extent. Mostly, these basins are briny, being affected
by the percolating tide which ebbs and flows regularly inside: they
explain the presence of the upper bog; the matted roots of the
vegetation prevent free drainage; and the want of slope would probably
render even deep-ditching ineffectual.
We cross the streamlet higher up, and ascend the right bank, where
walking is better than on the left, wondering the while that during so
many centuries of use the feet of the washerwomen have not worn a way.
Here at length is some sign of life. “The lady-hen sings to the riv,” as
the Shetlanders say of the lark, but her carol is at the gate of a
milk-and-water heaven. The curlew and the whimbrel scream their wild lay
in the lower air; the snipe rises with a peculiar twitter; the snippet
bathes where the water is warm; the water-rail (_rallus_) courses before
us; the true sandpiper (_tringa_), accompanied by a purple congener (_T.
maritima_), with brown back, white waistcoat, black colours extending
over the eyes and crest, with long red beak and legs, forages busily for
food; whilst waterfowl, including the ubiquitous eiders, male and
female, float lazily off shore. In many places the sandpiper behaves
like the Brazilian João de Barros, alighting before the traveller, and
apparently enjoying the fun of narrow escapes.
A number of ponies, awaiting transportation to the mines of Great
Britain, were grazing about, and bolted as we drew near. The few cows,
almost all hornless, had small straight bodies, and large udders, which
are said sometimes to give from ten to twelve quarts of milk per diem,
and 3000 per annum; the proportion of butter being 1:16. Wretched
bullocks, not weighing more than a Syrian donkey, were fattened for
foreign markets: surely the roast beef of Old England never appeared in
meaner form. Presently they will be lashed to ponies’ tails, and afford
much amusement to the gamins of Reykjavik by springing over the little
drains with such action as the Toro at Ronda attempts the barricades.
The ewes, dull-yellow, straight-eared, and thin-tailed, some with coats,
others sheared, or rather plucked, in Shetland parlance “roo’d,” were at
a distance to be mistaken for goats; in June most of them are
accompanied by lambs, singlets or twins, looking extra innocent. They
yield a couple of quarts of milk per diem, or about fifty per annum, and
their fat is said to contain an unusual proportion of stearine. Merinos
have been tried, and to them many people attribute the dreadful scabies
which has raged since 1855. The goat, once so common, is extinct in this
part of the island, at least I never saw a specimen in Iceland: this
destructive animal could not have been much at home where there is so
little wooded land; and it was proscribed for climbing upon the turf
roofs, and doing other damage. The happy mean has been hit by Istria,
which issued laws in early ages _de capris non tenendis_, and which now
allows goats only in the wildest and stoniest parts. It will be a
fortunate day for the Libanus and Syria generally when the graveolent
there falls into like disfavour.
The comparatively fertile banks, clothed with the _Lecidea Lindleyana_
grass, shows us, for the first time, the pretty Icelandic flora in full
bloom; and the general effect is yellow, as that of Palestine is red:
this arises from the large proportion of buttercups (Icel. Sóley) and
dandelions. The properties of _Leontodon taraxicum_ in hepatic disease,
either as coffee or as salad, are here quite unknown; the Icelanders
call it Unda-fill, and the Færoese Heeasolia. Its flowers are used in
the southern islands for yellow dye, and the leaves are eaten in spring:
after that time they become bitter. There is an abundance of golden
liverwort (_Parnassea palustris_) and cross-worts (_galiums_) of many
kinds, locally called Maðra and Kross-maðra; of Alpine saxifrages (_S.
hircula_ and _oppositifolia_), of azaleas (_A. procumbens_), pretty red
flowers, loved by sheep; of lilac-tinted butter-worts; and of the yellow
ranunculus, common in the Pyrenees and Alps. The wild thyme (_T.
serpyllum_), which preserves a strong perfume, whilst the four violets
have lost it, is termed Blóðlýng by the people, and, mixed with other
leaves, is extensively used in ptisanes to “thin the blood.” An orchis,
an equisetum with small stiff leaves, and a “fox grass,” as the fern is
locally named, faintly remind us of the tropics--ferns always have this
effect. Very familiar to the eye are the daisy (in the Færoes,
Summudaar), the white chickweeds (_Stellarium_ and _Cerastium vulgatum_,
locally called “Musar-eyra,” (mouse’s ear); the forget-me-not
(_Kattar-auga_), which flourishes everywhere; the white cardamine (_C.
pratensis_); the common bitter cress, which Icelanders call
Hrafna-(pron. _Hrabna_) klukka, or raven’s bell; the other pretty little
crucifers, and the rhododendron (_laponicum_, Icel. Kalmanstúnga), with
a delicate red flower. The Iceland heath (_Erica vulgaris_) here becomes
a valuable plant: the people say that sheep cannot die where it abounds,
and they use it with peat and brushwood to smoke their meat. The
geranium (_G. silvaticum_) is common, especially the malva, known as
Ljons-kló or-löpp (lion’s paw), a name evidently given by those who had
never been presented to King Leo. The Fífa, or cotton-grass (_Epilobium_
or _Eriophorum polystachion_), with bright white pods, which extends
from Iceland to South Germany, and which fattens sheep in Dumfriesshire,
will haunt us in every swamp: it is a much maligned growth, and it
serves to make the bog far more solid and less like a rolling carpet
than the “Serbonian” feature otherwise would be. The less familiar
plants are the crowberry (_Empetrum nigrum_), eaten by Corvus in
Scotland before the grain is ripe; the red cowberry (_Vaccinium
vitis-idæa_), which mostly affects the hills, and is preserved for
pancakes; the grass of Parnassus (Icel. Mýra-sól-ey); and a moonwort,
rare in the British Islands.
The deep, narrow ditch winds through the plain, with bulges here and
there, which make good bathing-places: what little steam there is,
generally courses before the wind down the valley. The old centre of
ebullition is denoted by a small green mamelon or tumulus on the right
bank, supposed to be the site of a large spring once boiling: hereabouts
poor, brown, and fibrous peat is stacked, and on week-days it is the
meeting-place of a dozen Baðkonur (washerwomen),[29] of all ages, from
grandmother to small girl. A baylet in the right bank shows the present
focus of ebullition, though a little below, on the left side, the water
above a dwarf rapid is scalding hot: at the former, the thermometer (F.)
readily rises to 175°, and soon cools down stream. Higher up again the
little ditch, coloured with bog iron, and with strongly chalybeate
taste, is icy cold: as at the celebrated Snorri’s Bath, all degrees of
temperature can here be combined, and whilst one hand is parboiled, the
other is chilled.
The water after traversing heated substances, evidently pyritic,
effervesces from a bottom of dark-grey mud; and when the stone is
exposed, we find heat-altered bazalt covered with a whitish
incrustation, silica, the chief ingredient, being deposited in a
gelatinous state. There is a strong smell of sulphuretted hydrogen, so
commonly remarked in dormant springs, and the offensive presence should
recommend it to skin diseases, especially where the _Sarcoptes scabiei_
is present. From the muds and deposits of these waters none of the rarer
earths, like yttria, glucina, and oxide of cereum, have been found,
though traces of cobalt occur: lime and magnesia abound; manganese, iron
and silica, soda and sulphuric acid, also exist in considerable
proportions. Dr Murray Thomson has carefully analysed the produce of the
Laug.[30] Eels are mentioned by travellers, but we never saw them: in
the lower course there are shell-less snails and a variety of worms
(pupæ?).
Broken bottles and fragments of the “Constitutionnel” show the favourite
place for bathing: formerly here, as at Thingvellir, a wooden shed was
set up; now every inch of it has disappeared. It is no joke to dress and
undress in the raw high east winds and the bursts of storm, but the
exceptionally healthy nature of the climate asserts itself under these
unpleasant circumstances. As there are traditions of a French sailor
having died of pleurisy after a bath, common prudence would suggest a
sunny afternoon. The amount of refreshment derived from the “Hammám” is
immense. Strangers in Iceland often attribute to other and less cleanly
causes the sudden eruption of Lichen (misnamed _Tropicus_) or prickly
heat, the nettle rash which the Danes call “Red Hound:” it seems to be
as common about the poles as throughout the tropics, and many of my
English acquaintances suffered severely from it in Iceland without
recognising it.
From the bath we walked over the stony bog to the nearest Bær, which is
generally deserted: it is occupied by the caretakers of the Laugarnes
Hospital. The two-storied whitewashed house is built of irregular and
unsquared basaltic blocks: the frontage is south of west. Each of the
two floors has three windows, and the wings two on the east and west,
but none to the north. Formerly the episcopal palace, it was last
occupied by Bishop Steingrímur Jonsen: the present dignitary has always
preferred the town. It has now been converted into a smallpox hospital:
two patients died there this year (1872); since then, as no cases have
come in, the doors are locked, and the attendants are engaging
themselves elsewhere. In olden times it was connected with the town by a
_chausée_, a causeway somewhat like the remains of the Saracen,
miscalled Roman, roads which cross the flat country south of Damascus.
Bad as it is, the fragment teaches a useful lesson--never, if possible,
to quit an Iceland road. “Follow the highway tho’ it winds,” say the
Tartars.
A Scotch gentleman, well-known in Iceland as a firm and hospitable
friend to Icelanders, proposed to buy Laugarnes for a summer residence,
to pay $3000, and, moreover, to conduct the water in tubes to Reykjavik,
where it might lead to a habit of Russian baths. Unhappily, it belongs
to a company, or rather to half-a-dozen proprietors, who have added
Klepp, the adjoining property: they showed their unwisdom by asking
$4000 for the original estate, and now their terms fluctuate, according
to chances, between $8000 and $14,000.
From the Hospital we follow the shore to the Laxá River East. On the way
there is a deposit of very light blue-grey hydrate of iron, cellular and
globular, and rich in water, and phosphorus: it is supposed to result
from the decomposition of titaniferous iron, contained in the underlying
dolerite. Close to the sea, and conspicuous to those who sail by, is a
classical spot, the Haugr, howe or cairn of Hallgerða, the fair-haired
with the thief’s eyes. That lady, so famous in Iceland legends,
virtually murdered three husbands; the last was the “peerless Gunnar,”
who, some years before, had slapped her face. She lived upon this farm,
which she inherited from Glum, her second victim; she died in A.D. 996,
and she was buried with all the honours of her rank. The tumulus always
remains green, doubtless a token of Heaven’s approval bestowed upon one
of the strongest-minded of her sex. Should Mary Stuart succeed in being
sanctified, the abominable Hallgerða surely has a chance: at present she
is known to local fame chiefly from the beauty of her locks, which hung
down to her waist. She is one of those women in history whom one would
like to interview.
Another tract of stone and bog led us to the Laxá River, which
discharges into the usual broad Fjörð, fronting Viðey, and bounded on
the east by the low, chapelled point of Gufunes (screw naze). The name,
often written Danicè Lax[31] (salmon) Elbe or Elve (river), is common in
the island, which may contain a dozen Laxás: there are four near
Reykjavik, each distinguished by some local affix. Henderson erroneously
calls it Hellirá, river of caverns, from the many holes in its lava bed;
others prefer Hellurá, river of slabs: so Newfoundland was first called
Hellu-land. The classical term, however, is Elliðaá, from the ship
“Elliði,” which Ketilbjörn Gamli (the old) caused to be dragged through
river and lake. It rises in the Elliða-vatn (Ellwich-water), a circular
lake with tuff walls, showing an extinct volcano: this place, about one
hour’s ride south-east of Reykjavik, is a famed place for picnics, and
is much affected by men who go a-fishing. The stream, or rather torrent,
rushes fiercely between tall and rocky banks, flares out at the mouth,
and finds rest in the broad bosom of Reykjavik Bay.
Presently we reached the salmon ground, which is now but a shadow of its
former self, doubtless the result of “barring” with weirs, traps, dams,
and nets. Until the beginning of this century it was held by the Crown,
and tradition declares that sometimes 3000 head, with a maximum weight
of 40 lbs., were taken in a single afternoon. It was first rented to Hr
Scheele, a Danish merchant at Reykjavik, and was afterwards sold in
perpetuity to the father of the present Hr Th. A. Thomsen. The sum
mentioned is $1200, a poor bargain for the local Government, as the
yearly revenue is said to be $1000. The owner has placed six common box
weirs, with crates, allowing the fish to work up stream, but not to
return; and stone dams, which are removed before the ice sweeps them
away in autumn--salmon and trout here spawn in October. They might be
placed a little higher up for the convenience of the fish, but at any
rate they are better than the standing nets, with which a Scotch
contractor “barred” the very mouth of the river.
I saw the boxes opened about mid-July; but rain had been scarce, and the
whole take was 15 salmon, the maximum being 5 lbs., and the average
under 4 lbs.: we heard, however, that some weeks before, one box had
yielded 63, and the six a total of 179. They are readily sold in the
town for 22 skillings per lb., and in the country the price falls to 12
or 13. By an arrangement with Hr Thomsen, the traveller might be allowed
to fish for salmon and trout in the lower stream, and in the upper
waters he can so do gratis. At the same time he must keep well out of
the owner’s limits, or there will be work for the lawyers.
CHAPTER IX.
FURTHER AFIELD--ASCENT OF THE ESJA AND THE SKARÐSHEIÐI--THE HOF OR
HEATHEN TEMPLE OF KJALLARNES.