Chapter II

“Yet still even here, content can spread a charm,
Redress the clime, and all its rage disarm.
Though poor the peasant’s hut, his feast though small,
He sees his little lot, the lot of all;
Sees no contiguous palace rear its head
To shame the meanness of his humble shed;
No costly lord the sumptuous banquet deal
To make him loathe his vegetable meal;
But calm, and bred in ignorance and toil,
Each wish contracting, fits him to the soil.”

GOLDSMITH.

“Who’s for shore?” cries the captain immediately after breakfast. “I am,” “and I,” “and I,” respond about a dozen of us, and in a few minutes we are afloat in the gig, and steering towards Heimaey. We soon find ourselves in very shallow water, and passing over, and between, a number of black reefs, which must not only be dangerous to the fishing craft in stormy weather, but present a grand sight

“When there’s a gale a blowin’, and the waves run in and break On the shore with a roar like thunder, and the brown cliffs seem to shake.”

The weather is rarely such that the Camoens can lie at her present anchorage, for during the north and north-east gales the bay is “a hell of waters” which it is impossible to enter.

I am reminded very strongly of another lovely summer Sunday morning nearly two years ago, when my companion and myself landed, under exactly similar circumstances, on the very spot where Captain Cook first put foot on the shores of New Zealand. In the pier at Heimaey, crowded with men and women, and in the wooden huts beyond it on the hill side, and along the beach, I seem to see Gisborne once more.

But how different the social conditions and prospects of the two communities,—of the Danish and the British colonist! Iceland with an area of 40,000 square miles—little less than that of the North Island of New Zealand, which contains 44,000,—was colonised a thousand years ago; New Zealand a hundred years ago. Yet the population of the one, which in the year 1100 was estimated at 50,000 has, after a lapse of nearly eight centuries, only increased to 72,000, while the other is inhabited to-day by half a million of people of European descent. Both countries are of volcanic origin, both are subject to earthquakes, both boast of their burning mountains and geysers. One, however, to use an expression more forcible than elegant which fell from the lips of a sailor on the Camoens, is “naething but a dawmed cinder,” the other is, comparatively speaking, a Paradise.

As I stand on the pier a few minutes later and watch the busy gangs of women and girls engaged in carrying sacks of flour on handbarrows to the neighbouring stores; or stroll among the hardy fishermen who are loafing about in groups, eagerly discussing the news brought by our good ship; or exchange smiles with the neatly-dressed, bright-looking, good-featured little lads and lassies, who are looking on with childish curiosity; I cannot help wishing that I could spirit them all away to the “Brighter Britain” in the Southern Seas, where Nature has bestowed her blessings upon man with bounteous profusion. I suppose, however, that were I to tell the people round me what is passing through my mind there is scarcely a man among them who would not turn his eyes all the more fondly towards the little cot where he was born and bred, and where he no doubt hopes “to die at home at last.”

“Dear is that shed to which his soul conforms,
And dear that hill that lifts him to the storms;
And as a child, when scaring sounds molest,
Clings close and closer to the mother’s breast;
So the loud torrent and the whirlwind’s roar,
But bind him to his native mountains more.”

Meanwhile, the women, who are working in couples, toil like ponies, and the crews of the whale boats are of course actively employed; but it seems to me that some of the strong men who are looking on, with their hands in their pockets, and their pipes in their mouths, ought to be between the shafts of the handbarrows instead of “their sisters and their cousins and their aunts.” It would be unfair to forget that they take their share of work, as well as of danger and hardship, during the fishing season; but I am afraid that the condition of woman in Iceland is no better than in the fishing and agricultural districts of England and Scotland, though probably scarcely so bad as that of the girls whom I have seen slaving round the coal pits of Lancashire.

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PLATE II.

1 Heimaey and Heimaeyklett, from the Cemetery.
2 Lava Cairn on Helgafell.—3 An Icelandic Whaleboat.
4 The Church at Heimaey.—5 Altar and Candelabrum of Church.
]

Let me describe the appearance of the people near me. “Place aux dames;” of course, if only as a compliment to their industry. They are strong fresh-faced fair-haired maids and matrons, who regard us modestly, but curiously, out of cold pale-blue long-lashed eyes, as they trot backwards and forwards with an energy and an alertness which speak volumes for their physical powers. As a rule they are by no means pretty, but there are, of course, exceptions, and here and there we see a face which would attract notice, even in an English ball-room, where, I have no hesitation in saying, one may look for—and find—the loveliest women in the world. Their figures are not good, as is to be expected from their mode of life, and owe nothing to their dress, which is exceedingly plain and unbecoming, though, no doubt, warm and comfortable. Their gowns, made of linsey-woolsey, or similar heavy material, are sombre in colour, unrelieved by a single bit of bright ribbon, or a yard of trimming, tight-sleeved, and just short enough in the skirt to afford every opportunity of admiring a shapely foot, a neat ankle, or a well-turned leg, were there any or either of these to admire, which unfortunately there is not. A loose cotton jacket, a coloured apron, thick grey worsted stockings, and peculiar sheepskin shoes, pointed at the toes, without soles, and sewn into shape by cross-stitching, complete their costume. The latter, which would make very comfortable slippers, seem to be ill-adapted for a country whose roads,—where there are any,—are so rough and stone-strewn, but are nevertheless generally worn, imported boots and shoes being rarely seen among the poorer classes. The hair, which is generally fair, is smoothed down neatly on each side of the brow, and plaited at the back into two long queues which are looped up, and fastened to the crown of the head, in such a fashion as to form cross-festoons.

Every woman, however, has on one distinctive article of attire, the “hufa,” or national head-dress, a small knitted cap, in shape resembling a night-cap, worn jauntily on either side of the head—generally on the left—like the forage cap of a British hussar. It is invariably black, no other colour being used, is made of either silk or wool, and is ornamented with a heavy black silk tassel which hangs down as far as the shoulder from a brass, silver-gilt, or solid silver ferrule about two inches long, and half an inch in diameter, that adds greatly to its smartness.

The men, bronzed and bearded, are dressed in rough woollen jackets and trousers, wear caps, billycocks or sou-westers, and bear a strong family likeness to “oor fisher folk at hame,” the only thing which strikes us as peculiar being the sheepskin shoes to which I have already referred.

Our worthy captain—one of the kindest-hearted and most genial men I have ever met, and certainly the most obliging skipper I have ever sailed with,—informs me that the Westmann’s Islands were originally so called because they were discovered, and occupied, by emigrants from Ireland, who are said to have been the first Icelandic colonists. On this point let me quote Dr Jon A. Hjaltalin, one of the best informed and most reliable authorities in Iceland, a gentleman who has lectured in many towns in England, and to whom I had the pleasure of being introduced at Akureyri. In a little historical pamphlet which he wrote on the occasion of the “Thousandth Anniversary of the Norwegian Settlement in Iceland,” and which he has been kind enough to send me since my return, Dr Hjaltalin says “If we can believe the Irish monk Dicuil the Irish were the first discoverers of Iceland. Dicuil, who wrote his book ‘De mensura orbis terrarum’ about the year 825, states that, some thirty years before, clerics had told him that they had been to an island far to the north, where there had been daylight throughout the night at the summer solstice, and where they were able to do whatever they wanted by night as well as by day. Local names, preserved to this day, as well as the records of the old Icelanders, prove the fact that Irish monks had visited the island before the Norwegians.”

Subsequently the Scandinavian settlement took place, and emigrants arrived from the Orkneys, the North of Scotland, and Ireland. It is not surprising, therefore, that I should remark to my companion, as we leave the pier, that if the children of Heimaey were at a port in my own country, instead of where they are I should pass them without notice; it is so evident they spring from the same stock as ourselves. It is worthy of note before I leave this subject, “that the Irish do not seem to have met with any human being, or aborigines, when they discovered Iceland, nor have any traces of such been found in later times.”

Passing between the two lines of female porters, who are ascending and descending like the angels on Jacob’s ladder, we turn to the right into a narrow macadamised path, or street, containing several little dwelling-houses, two or three sheds or stores crammed with imported produce, and a number of rough wooden huts filled with fish either cured or in process of being cured. Outside each of the latter stands a deal table on which the fish are prepared, the heads being cut off and dried for home consumption, and the remainder set aside for export.

These dried cods’ heads tied up in bundles, and ready for conveyance into the interior on pony-back, may be seen everywhere, and you will probably not meet a single train of ponies, on any track in the whole country, whose load does not include some of these necessary articles of diet. I am told on enquiry that they are worth about a penny each, which I consider a high price, and that, in times of scarcity, after all the flesh has been carefully picked off, the very bones are often eaten, having first been softened in buttermilk. The offal is thrown to the dogs and ponies, which sometimes also get the powdered fish bones when these can be spared by the family. In rear of some of the houses in the outskirts we observe large square platforms built of round undressed lava stones, and raised about a foot from the ground. On these the fish are exposed to dry in the sun.

The stench in this neighbourhood exceeds the combined odours of the nine and forty distinct smells for which Cologne is said to be remarkable, and is such that, with our noses in the air, and taking care to sniff as seldom as possible, we hurry on towards Helgafell, which we have made up our minds to ascend before returning to the Camoens for lunch. We stop for a moment at the house of the Syslumann or Sheriff to say au revoir to our friend the captain who has some business to transact with this official. Then we strike across a few fields so thickly covered with stones of every shape and size that it seems as if Heaven must have rained them from the skies; jump one or two low stone fences; stumble over some of the thousands of green frost-made hummocks that form such a curious feature of the landscape; tramp along the bottom of several of the foot-deep winding rain-channels that are commonly used as paths; and then boldly attack the precipitous mountain slope. Up, up, up we go, now slipping upon black shifting volcanic sand; now tramping upon sharp-edged fragments of lava; now clambering up very steep places on hands and knees; and not unfrequently pausing to take breath, and to wipe the perspiration from our brows at some friendly boulder, which affords us secure foothold, or the opportunity of sitting down.

We arrive at the edge of the crater at last, and descend into its grassy hollow, where a few sheep are quietly grazing. Making a final rush towards the cairns which some of our companions have already reached, we see a panorama on every side of us to which no other name than magnificent can possibly be applied. In front on the distant mainland both Hekla and Myrdalsjökull rise in all their snowy beauty; and the islands of Elirey and Bjarnarey, the harbour with its shipping, and guardian promontory, the little straggling town stretching along the beach and inland towards the farmhouses on its outskirts that stand within their small stone-fenced enclosures or crofts under grass or potatoes,—green spots which look like so many oases in a waste of treeless barrenness—are all spread out before us. On our right and on our left, and behind us, washing the shores of the low encircling line of hills that beats back its surges, is the Atlantic Ocean, studded with huge island-rocks of various shapes and sizes,—(including one which we specially note on account of its extraordinary resemblance to a haystack)—and so calm and peaceful under the flood of sunshine that pours down upon its glassy surface from the blue heavens above, that one can scarce believe that it is so often a source of dread and danger and death to the poor fishermen of Heimaey.

We spend half an hour in gazing admiringly upon the scene before us, and then reluctantly, but rapidly, make our way down the hillside towards the little white-washed church, at which we arrive shortly before the hour of service. The præstur, or pastor, and a few of his flock are standing outside in serious conversation, and we take advantage of the opportunity to enter. There is only one door, which is under the hexagonal belfry, whose clock with three dials is a hopeful sign in a place where one sees so many evidences of poverty and so few of progress. There are six windows with diamond panes, and the interior has a clean and comfortable appearance. A chastely decorated altar, railed off in front, occupies the end opposite the porchway. A handsome candelabrum, a well-executed painting of a sacred subject, and two smaller pictures, one on either side of the latter, greatly add to the general effect, which is altogether rather pretty.

It is near the hour of prayer, and men, women, and children may be seen approaching from different directions. The sobriety and seriousness of their demeanour, the neatness and cleanliness of their dress, and the general air of well-being and well-doing which characterises them, impress me favourably, and I cannot help recalling the fact that in many of our crowded cities at home, there are at the same moment, thousands, aye tens of thousands of people, who though rich in comparison with the members of this little Icelandic congregation would be unable, even if they were willing, to go to church so comfortably and so respectably clad. It occurs to me that there may be advantages even in a life of poverty and isolation. I remember that Cæsar, in his commentaries, over which I used to pore in my school days, records the fact that of the three great tribes among whom Gaul was divided in his time the Belgæ were the bravest, “because,” as he puts it, “merchants had least access to them to import those things which tended to effeminate their minds.” As I remember the passage it occurs to me that the Icelander ought perhaps to be grateful to Heaven for the poverty which protects him from “luxury’s contagion weak and vile,” and leaves him in possession of virtues which under other circumstances he might have been unable to retain.

The established form of religion in Iceland is that of the Lutheran Church, which superseded Roman Catholicism between 1540 and 1551, as the latter had superseded Paganism in the year 1000, at which time the worship of Thor and Odin and the other deities of Scandinavia prevailed. The story of the manner in which Christianity was introduced is an interesting one. At a meeting of the Althing, or Parliament, it was proposed to abolish heathenism, but the proposition was strongly opposed, and there appeared to be danger of a war of religions, which was, however, happily averted by the judgment of the Speaker, or President of the Althing, who influenced by the bribes,—perhaps even more than by the arguments,—of the Christians accepted the task of proposing such legislation as would satisfy both parties. The curious manner in which he prepared himself for, and effected this undertaking is thus referred to by Dr Hjaltalin, who says “He (the President) went to bed, and covered himself up for twenty-four hours. Then he rose, and called all the assembled multitude to follow him to the Lögberg or Law Rock. On arriving there he explained the serious consequences to which the disruption of the Commonwealth was likely to lead. ‘If we have not laws and religion in common,’ said he, ‘our peace is gone.’ Such was the persuasive power of his words that both parties promised to keep the laws propounded by him. He then proposed that all Icelanders should become Christians by being baptised, but to pacify the heathen party, suggested that they should be permitted to worship the old gods and to eat horseflesh in secret. If the latter, however, was done in the presence of witnesses, it was to be punished with outlawry. These propositions were accepted by both parties, and thus Christianity was established in the land.” Would that all religious differences could be as happily settled now-a-days by the exercise of a little mutual forbearance, and in reliance upon the old adage, “magna est veritas et prævalebit.”

From God’s house we proceed to God’s acre, a small rectangular area in two divisions enclosed within four walls of turf and rubble, and covered with a number of green mounds, from two to three feet high, each marking a grave. One or two of these are railed round, and iron crosses have been placed on others—(in one instance a quaint and artistically-carved headstone)—but in nineteen cases out of twenty the Westmann’s Islanders seem to share, not the ostentatious pride and vainglory of the great emperor Shah Jehan, who built for himself and a favourite wife the grandest and most costly sepulchre in the world, the famous Tag Mahal at Agra; but rather the touching humility of his daughter, whose pious wish engraved on the simple stone that marks her last resting place amid the ruined tombs of Delhi, is beautifully expressed in these words, which I remember listening to with a feeling of reverence as our guide translated them: “Let no rich canopy cover my head; grass alone is the only covering for the poor in spirit.”

On our way from the city of the dead to the pier we have once more to pass through the city of the living, and the first shanty that there attracts our attention is the “Thing Hus,” or Parliament house, which is really the Town Hall, although dignified with a higher title. It is a shabby little wooden shed, to extend or reconstruct which on the same scale would not cost many pence in the pound on even the rateable value of Heimaey.

Near it are several curious-looking dwellings, one of which we stop to examine. I will attempt to describe it. Imagine a low one-storied building, irregular in shape, and looking as if it had been built by instalments to provide room for a crib for every separate addition to the owner’s family. The roof is made of shingle, but the walls, built principally of rough undressed lava stones, imbedded in layers of turf which bind them together and fill up the chinks, are thick and substantial. Entrance is effected through a low wooden porchway leading into a long narrow dark passage, with turf-and-rubble walls, and a mud floor. This passage admits to another which crosses it at right angles, and is if possible dingier still. Into this second passage the doors of several stuffy, inconvenient, badly-ventilated, smoke-filled dens—(it would be a libel on the English language to call them rooms)—open. The cooking is carried on in the “Eld hus” (Fire House) or kitchen, and the smoke escapes into the chimney through a hole in the roof. The whole of the exterior, except parts of the shingle roof, is covered with green sods, which convert it into an inhabited tumulus, on which the grass flourishes so luxuriantly that it seems a pity the half-starved ponies cannot walk on the perpendicular like the house fly, for if they could they might find excellent pasture on the walls and roof of the mansion before us.

There are a number of more modern houses built of wood, roofed with shingle, and painted drab. We enter one of these on the courteous invitation of the doctor, who has just been good enough to explain to us in very broken English that the ghastly-looking, mutilated, long-billed, dark-feathered objects which are hanging from a sort of miniature goalpost in an adjoining croft are the bodies of sea-fowl which have been killed, and are being dried for—“For what! Sir?” we ask in surprise? “For fuel,” is the reply. “The breast having been removed for food the remainder of the bird will probably be used to cook it.” I have eaten meals in South Africa prepared over a fire made of cakes of dried cow-dung; I have warmed myself in New Zealand and in the American backwoods at a log fire; I have been half-stifled in a Highland shieling by the smoke of a peat fire; I have drunk many a cup of tea in Japan infused with water boiled on a smouldering fire of charcoal ashes, but this is the first time among savage or uncivilised that I have come across fuel for a dried-bird fire. “Necessity,” I remark, “is said to be the ‘mother of invention.’ If so the life of a Patent Office official in Iceland ought to be no sinecure, for ‘necessity’ stares one in the face everywhere.”

The doctor’s residence,—a humble one for the only consulting physician and surgeon in the Westmann’s Islands,—seems to consist of little more than what the Scotch call a “but” and a “ben.” It is scantily and plainly furnished, and contrasts somewhat ludicrously with the gilded salons of some of his professional brethren in the chief city of the adjacent island of Great Britain who, with perhaps little more skill and knowledge but greater opportunities than those of our kindly host, pocket fees, in the course of a single forenoon, which exceed the total annual income received by the Icelandic Esculapius for looking after the health of an entire community. From this reference to the social surroundings of a leading citizen,—one of an élite which scarcely includes more than the Syslumann (Sheriff), the præstur (parson), the doctor, and a vice-consul or two,—it will be inferred that the Westmann’s Islands cannot boast many people of fashion or “culchaw,” and that the population generally is a very humble one.

After lunch, having obtained permission to take one of the ship’s boats, we row ourselves to the caves of Heimaklett and Ystaklett, and spend an hour in sailing into these, in awakening the echoes, and in ineffectual attempts, at the risk of broken bones and worn-out unmentionables, to scale the cliffs, and get among the screaming puffins that literally darken the air above us as they dart or circle over our heads. Then we go ashore again and take another saunter through the streets, and then dinner-hour arrives, and our experiences of the Westmann’s Islands for the present come to an end.

About 9.0 p.m. we sail for Reykjavik, and as we are slowly steaming out of the bay, a whale boat, manned by six rowers, rounds Ystaklett and makes for Heimaey. An Icelander from America, who has just joined us, says that the occupants of the boat having sighted the Camoens on the previous evening have come over from the mainland to buy provisions. He tells me that his countrymen are miserably poor, and that this year they are even worse off than usual, the fishing having proved a failure for the third year in succession, and the grass being late and scarce in consequence of the inclemency of the weather. Fancy a state of being in which an entire community literally depends for existence upon the fish it catches in a stormy sea, and the grass yielded by its untilled pastures! He adds that on the mainland people are even poorer than on the islands, and mentions the case of a woman who recently made her way on foot along the coast, and crossed the Straits in an open boat, to beg bread for her starving children. She was so emaciated and so weak and worn out from famine and exhaustion that she had to be carried from the pier to a place of shelter.

The charity of the poor towards the poor is proverbial.

Few, save the poor, feel for the poor,
The rich know not how hard
It is to be of needful rest
And needful food debarr’d.

The poverty-stricken Icelander is no exception to a rule that happily applies to all mankind. Out of their scanty and insufficient store the people of Heimaey supplied the poor creature with food for herself and family, and sent her on her way rejoicing.

In the course of conversation with my informant, who was once a clerk in a store in the Westmann’s Islands, but has for some years been earning 65 dols. a month as a foreman platelayer on the Denver and Rio Grande Railway, I learn that a number of his countrymen have emigrated to America during recent years, not a few of whom have joined the Mormons. One almost regrets that the whole population cannot be deported en masse, but with local self-government, increasing knowledge, and the stimulus of unrestricted trade, it is not improbable that the Icelander,—who has hitherto been “contentit wi’ little” and “canty wi’ mair,”—may yet succeed in making something out of his inhospitable country, whose progress has been so hindered and handicapped by the ravages of fire, frost, flood and famine.

It is not with Nature alone that he has to contend. He has but few sources of wealth, and even these until comparatively recently have been prevented from development by iniquitous laws imposed upon him by the Danish Government whose subject he is. Did I say sources of wealth? I withdraw the words. Let me rather say means of existence. Until a few years ago—when the Leith firm to whom our good ship belongs began to open up a trade with his country on the basis of ready-money, which they imported from Denmark for the purpose,—he scarcely knew what money was like, except in the petty transactions of daily life.

Between 1600 and 1788 he was shut out by the most tyrannous restrictive legislation, from direct commercial intercourse with the world, being compelled to do all his business with a few Danish Trading Companies, who had, by heavy payments, secured from Government the privilege of absolute monopoly. These companies took from the Icelander his dried fish, his shark oil, his wool, and his skins, and gave him in exchange the barest necessaries, and such articles as were absolutely indispensable in his simple mode of life. On all imports the importer, being master of the situation, naturally put enormous profits.

The consequence of a business thus conducted on the basis of what is known as “the tick and truck system” was that not only the commercial prosperity, but the improvement of the social and intellectual well-being of the population were grievously retarded. And as if to render the condition of the Icelander more hopeless and intolerable still the Danish Government by law prohibited him from building or purchasing a decked vessel; a high-handed and one-sided policy the object of which was to make the monopoly of the trading companies more secure, and by the establishment of protection in its worst form to enrich the mother country at the expense of its great island-colony.

It is unnecessary to dwell too strongly upon the iniquity of the past policy pursued by Denmark, and it would ill become a Briton to do so in the face of the fact that a similar line of action adopted by the British Parliament years ago led to the almost total extinction of the Irish woollen trade. When we behold the mote that is in our brother’s eye it is well to consider the beam that is in our own.

In 1788 there was a break in the cloud of misrule which had so long over-shadowed Iceland. The law relating to decked vessels was repealed, and the power of the monopolists broken to a certain extent, inasmuch as not only Danes, but all Danish subjects,—(which of course included the Icelanders)—were permitted to engage in foreign trade. On the 25th of April, 1854, the last vestige of monopoly was swept away, and from that date until the present hour, the ports of the country have been open to the traders of the whole world. Let us hope that the present policy which has happily inaugurated a better state of things, both politically and commercially, may result in an improved condition of the people, and in the development of the resources of the country; and that the sun of prosperity may rise and shine upon a land which has enjoyed few natural advantages, and which has hitherto been prevented, by the unwisdom of its rulers, from turning even these to the best account.

The Icelander is accused by his detractors of being lethargic, indolent, and wanting in ambition and enterprise. If he be so, and I am not disposed to deny it, the reason is, in my opinion, not far to seek. No man will work under conditions similar to those imposed upon the galley-slave, and to enrich either trader or landed proprietor who has him at his mercy, and who, whether by a hateful system of monopoly, or by unjust and oppressive laws, can prevent him from enjoying the fruits of his labour. Take away from a man or from a nation the incentive to exertion, by denying him or them the legitimate rewards of toil, and there must be moral and material deterioration. It has been so in Iceland, as it has been in that unhappy country whose sons were its first discoverers, and for much of whose misery and discontent and crime we, as a nation, are seriously responsible. Happily in both cases rulers have become alive to a higher sense of their duties, and now see that it is only by drastic reforms and just laws that they can bring about political regeneration.

More happily still the people recognising the force and truth of the Laureate’s words:—

“Are figs of thistles? or grapes of thorns?
How can a despot set men free?”

have taken their future, to a great extent, into their own hands, and are looking forward to better times in the immediate future. May the results in both countries be shown by their marked improvement in social and moral well-being, and by their progress in all those things which tend to exalt nations, and which alone can make them great!

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PLATE III.

1 Turf and rubble-cottage, Heimaey.
2 The Althingis Hus, Heimaey.—3 Woman riding man-fashion.
4 Drying birds for fuel.
]

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