ICELANDIC TRAVEL.
Not many years have passed since it was considered something of an
achievement to visit Iceland. The traveler who had the hardihood to
penetrate the chilly fogs of the North, and journey by the compass
through a region of everlasting snows and desolating fires, could well
afford to stay at home during the remainder of his life, satisfied
with the reputation generally accorded him by his fellow-men. It was
something to have plunged into rivers of unknown depth, and traversed
treacherous bogs and desert fjelds of lava--something to be able to
speak knowingly of the learned Sagas, and verify the wonders of the
Burned Njal.
An isolated spot of earth, bordering on the Arctic Circle, and cut off
by icebergs and frozen seas from all intercourse with the civilized
world during half the year, once the seat of an enlightened republic,
and still inhabited by the descendants of men who had worshiped Odin
and Thor, must surely have presented rare attractions to the
enterprising traveler before it became a beaten track for modern
tourists. A simple narrative of facts was then sufficient to enlist
attention. Even the unlearned adventurer could obtain a reputation by
an unvarnished recital of what he saw and heard. He could describe the
Logberg upon which the republican Parliament held its sittings, and
attest from personal observation that this was the exact spot where
judgments were pronounced by the _Thing_. He could speak familiarly of
heathen gods and vikings after a brief intercourse with the
inhabitants, who are still tinctured with the spirit of their early
civilization. He could tell of frightful volcanoes, that fill the air
with clouds of ashes, and desolate the earth with burning floods of
lava, and of scalding hot water shot up out of subterranean boilers,
and gaping fissures that emit sulphurous vapors, and strange sounds
heard beneath the earth's surface, and all the marvelous experiences
of Icelandic travel, including ghosts and hobgoblins that ramble over
the icy wastes by night, and hide themselves in gloomy caverns by
day--these he could dwell upon in earnest and homely language with the
pleasing certainty of an appreciative audience. But times have sadly
changed within the past few years. A trip to Iceland nowadays is
little more than a pleasant summer excursion, brought within the
capacity of every tyro in travel through the leveling agency of steam.
When a Parisian lady of rank visits Spitzbergen, and makes the
overland journey from the North Cape to the Gulf of Bothnia, of what
avail is it for any gentleman of elegant leisure to leave his
comfortable fireside? We tourists who are ambitious to see the world
in an easy way need but sit in our cushioned chair, cosily smoking our
cigar, while some enterprising lady puts a girdle round about the
earth; for we may depend upon it she will reappear ere leviathan can
swim a league, and present us with a bouquet of wonderful
experiences, neatly pressed between the pages of an entertaining
volume. The icebergs of the Arctic, the bananas of the tropics, the
camels of the East, the buffaloes of the West, and the cannibals of
the South, are equally at our service. We can hold the mountains,
rivers, seas, and human races between our finger and thumb, and thus,
as we gently dally with care, we may see the wonders of the world as
in a pleasant dream. Thus may we enjoy the perils and hardships of
travel at a very small sacrifice of personal comfort.
[Illustration: THE GREAT GEYSER.]
It was somewhat in this style that I reasoned when the idea occurred
to me of making a trip to Iceland. From all accounts it was a very
uncomfortable country, deficient in roads, destitute of hotels, and
subject to various eccentricities of climate. Neither fame nor money
was to be gained by such a trip--unless, indeed, I succeeded in
catching the great auk, for which, it is said, the directors of the
British Museum have offered a reward of a hundred pounds. This was a
chance, to be sure. I might possibly be able to get hold of the auk,
and thereby secure money enough to pay expenses, and make certain a
niche in the temple of fame. It would be something to rank with the
great men who had devoted their lives to the pursuit of the dodo and
the roc. But there was a deplorable lack of information about the
haunts and habits of the auk. I was not even satisfied of its
existence, by the fact that two Englishmen visited Iceland a few years
ago for the purpose of securing a specimen of this wonderful bird,
and, after six weeks of unavailing search, wrote a book to prove that
there was still reason to hope for success.
Upon the whole, I thought it would not do to depend upon the auk.
There was but one opening left--to visit Iceland, sketch-book in hand,
and faithfully do what others had left undone--make accurate sketches
of the mountains, rivers, lava-fjelds, geysers, people, and costumes.
In nothing is Iceland so deficient as in pictorial representation. It
has been very minutely surveyed by the Danes, and Olsen has left
nothing to wish for in the way of topographical delineation, but
artists do not seem to have found it an attractive field for the
exercise of their talent. At least I could obtain no good pictures of
Iceland in Copenhagen. The few indifferent sketches published there,
and in the journals of late English and German tourists, afford no
adequate idea of the country. I have seen nothing of the kind any
where that impressed my mind with the slightest notion of that land of
fire, or the spirit and genius of Icelandic life. It would therefore
be some gain to the cause of knowledge if I could present to five
hundred thousand of my fellow-citizens, who do their traveling through
these illuminated pages, a reasonably fair delineation of the country
and the people, with such simple record of my own experiences as would
render the sketches generally intelligible.
So one fine morning in May I shouldered my knapsack, and bade a
temporary adieu to my friends in Frankfort. By night I was in Hamburg.
The next day was agreeably spent in rambling about the gardens across
the Alster Basin, and at 5 P.M. I left Altona for Kiel, a journey of
three hours by rail across a flat and not very interesting tract of
country within the limits of Schleswig-Holstein. From Kiel a steamer
leaves for Korsor, on the island of Zealand, the terminus of the
Copenhagen Railway. This is the most direct route between Hamburg and
Copenhagen, though the trip may be very pleasantly varied by taking a
steamer to Taars, and passing by diligence through the islands of
Lalland, Falster, and Moen.