Chapter XX: Section III: The Ride to Snæfell: View of the Vatnajökull

_Saturday, August 17._

I managed to draw the sleep-thorn from Gísli’s ears and, after the usual silly delays, to set off at 9.45 along the left bank of the Fljótsdalr, _alias_ the Norðurdalr: the wind was still southerly, clouds came from the east, but the aneroid was rising and the sun was taking the master’s place. The broad trap valley supports, on either side, many farms and Sels; Glúmstaðir, Hóll, Thuriðarstaðir; the large Egilstaðir, highest on the map, reached in two _orette_; and Kleif, with its Sætur and backing of western hill. The angry stream is crossed in many places by ropes and cradles; gradually it becomes a torrent-gorge, and the whole length receives a least a dozen rain-bred cataracts: everywhere we saw their smokes and heard the dull charge of cavalry, whilst the rattling of stones upon the sandy beds sounded like the distant pattering of musketry. There was, however, no difficulty in crossing the mouths and, after three hours fifteen minutes of mild work, we rested the nags and changed saddles at the sheep-house of Kleif.

Beyond this point the torrent-gorge is impracticable, and we ascended the rough, steep left bank, whose lower levels were garnished with stunted birches: it led to the monotonous Heiði, which I had now passed thrice. The streams on this line were more troublesome, owing to the slippery crossings of sheet-rock. We forded the Stóri-lækr (big rivulet) four times, and twice the upper waters of the Öxará above its ugly little cataract in a dwarf valley. A short tract of sandy, willow-grown ground led to the Laugará, which was girth-deep. Riding down its right bank, we came to the Laug, which much resembles that of Reykjavik: the waters show boiling point at the source, and 115° (F.) a few yards below. It lies on the north-eastern slope of Laugarfell, and nearly due east (mag.) of the pointed black cone Hafrsfell: these two detached hills, disposed upon a meridian, are mere outliers of Snæfell. Fifteen yards west of the Laug is the Laugarkofi, or the Warm-spring-cell, a hut some 7 feet by 6, with dry stone walls sunk two feet in the ground: the raftered roof is supported by a central post, and made tight with turfs. We were happy to find it in repair. The weather again broke, and a Scotch mist settled stubbornly upon the dreary landscape; the aneroid showing 27·60, and the thermometer 38°. Our day’s march had lasted only five hours fifteen minutes, and on return we easily covered it in three hours fifty minutes. The night in a warm and (comparatively) clean nest, with the howling wind outside, would have been delightful, but for misgivings about the morrow.

_August 18._

I rose at dawn with no little anxiety; in these altitudes man is wholly dependent upon weather: it is like a Polar expedition on a small scale. The rainy and windy night had cleared the air, and the sun rose bright, bringing with him a stinging and intensely dry[175] south wind from off the Jökulls. The baggage pony was loaded, and all preparations were made by 8.45. We began with the rotten and boggy ground, draining the Snæfell and its north-eastern outliers to the Jökulsá. Here began the trouble which lasted more or less throughout the morning. The surface is cut by gullies and earth-cracks, often twenty feet deep, and varying from a yard to ten yards in breadth. Few could be leaped by untrained animals, and the many which could not be crossed caused detours either up or down, often a furlong to cover a perch. The smaller sort were the most troublesome, owing to the badness of the take off and landing: the nags made themselves ridiculous in attempting to scramble over, with their hind legs in the hollows, whilst the forehand was holding on the farther bank. In the worst places, at least one of the caravan was sure to be sprawling upon the ground. The best parts were the stony spots, and the medium were the swamps, especially where Fífa and bright mosses spangled the ground.

The wind now veered to the south-west, and after two hours we easily forded the Hafrsá, a drain rising in the south-east of its “fell.” The latter, seen from the eastward, proves not to be a single cone, as the map shows; behind the knob lie a jagged, saw-toothed ridge and sundry outliers. At a distance, it appears to be lava, but when riding over it in the afternoon I noticed that such form of erupted rock is wholly absent from this line. The material, like that of Herðubreið, is Palagonite, which doubtless forms the base of the northern Vatnajökull. Unlike the basaltic conglomerate of the Broad-Shouldered, however, it is puddinged with cinders reddened and charred by the flames. The colours are ruddy, black-brown, chalky-white, green, and yellow, the two latter extending in a band through Snæfell from

south-west to north-east. Scoriæ also are scattered upon the sand, and these, with a strew of basalt, make up the sum of the surface rocks.

At noon we forded the Thjófagilsá (water of the thief’s gil) below the little waterfall dashing down columnar basalt, and we halted near the Hálskofi, a hut like the nest near the Laug. After half-an-hour we resumed our ride along the eastern flank of Snæfell, which greatly altered in shape. The first view (August 2) from the heights above Hallormstaðir showed a Háls or _col_ to the north, in fact the Snæfellsháls of the map, which should be countermarched to the south: “Snowfell” also seemed attached to the Vatnajökull by a long Rani, or tongue of raised ground, to which it acts tip: this must be changed for lowland and lake; and the shape suggested climbing on the western side, where it is almost perpendicular. Viewed from the north-west (August 14), Snæfell hill assumed a sphinx shape, the hindquarters being like those of Herðubreið to the south.

Snæfell projects to the north-north-east, or above our path, a long clean _arête_ of yellow Palagonite, flanking a great fissure: the lower parts are here snowy, the upper are revetted with dark conglomerate. Behind, or to the west of this ridge, is a large snow-field, one of the many buttresses, extending to the flat-topped summit. We ascended stony ground when working to the south; and here an unpleasant surprise awaited me. Instead of the clear course of the little Jökulsá draining the peaks and pins of the Snæfellsjökull, a northern section of the Vatnajökull, the whole expanse lying between the glacier and the height upon which we stood formed a broad and apparently shallow lake, in part composed of clear pools, and the rest of muddy veins. At its head is a great depression in the Jökull, marked eastward by Eyjarbakki (island bank), a black cone, which may be a crater. The delta-shaped mass of water projects its point to the north, where we can distinctly see it falling over the Eyjarbakka-foss into the Jökulsá gorge. This formation may be temporary, dry ground flooded by the late rains: the farmers, however, know it by the name of Eyjarbakka-vatn. Permanent or not, it was utterly impassable without boats, whilst the Jökulsá was too full to be forded.

A near view of the Vatnajökull, from the south of Snæfell, confirmed my previous impressions. The snowy base-line is formed by the descending angle of the wind: this must explain how all is congealed at a height where Snæfell is free from frost (aneroid, 27·75): perhaps the thrust from behind may perpetuate the _névé_. Beyond the long white wave, pure ermine above, and below spotty like a Danish dog, stretching far to the west, rose the quaint form of Kverk, the throat or angle beneath the chin,[176] with two big, blue buttresses to the east: the black outlier of conical shape has a deep gullet to the north, vomiting a light-blue glacier upon the snow-fields lying at the base; it is prolonged north by the Kverkhnúkrrani (snout of the gullet-knoll), apparently containing two distinct patches of volcanic aspect.

Resuming our ride to the west over the true Snæfellsháls, whose stony flanks delivered us from bog and earth-crack, we found that even here the summer pasturages are not unused. The dandelion and the violet, dead elsewhere, still enjoyed the autumn of life; sign of reindeer was seen in two places, and we flushed sundry coveys of ptarmigan. A couple of ravens and a snow-tit composed the remnant of animal life; happily for us the midges were absent.

At two P.M. we reached our farthest southern point, the long dorsum which prolongs Snæfell southwards to the Snæfellsháls. On the far side of the _col_ rose Thjófahnúkr, a big, black, cindery cone, like the rest. Between it and the northern hypothenuse of the Vatnajökull lay a dark saddleback, with all the appearance of a volcanic crater; the absence of lava may be explained by its vomiting, like Hverfjall and Herðubreið, cinder and ashes. As we turned up the Thjófadalr, between the Thieves’ Knoll and the Snæfell proper, the ice-wind struck full on our backs. The amphitheatre was girt on both sides by jagged, rocky peaks, like the edges of bursten bubbles and blisters; and the shoulders of Snæfell projected to the south-west, a sharp ridge and a cone of warm-yellow Palagonite--here the ascent would have offered no difficulties. This part of the valley discharges to the south many streamlets of melted snow, some clear, others of white water. Crossing the divide, we struck the Hrafnkelsá, which is prolonged by the Jökulkvisl and the Sauðará (sheep-water) to “Jökulsá of the Bridge.” The line presently became a deep and grisly gorge of black and copper-coloured Palagonite; and we passed sundry long bridges of hard snow which were excellent riding. So far I can confirm the experience of the French naval officers, who assured me that in Iceland these formations, so redoubtable farther south, offer no risk.

At four P.M. we halted for an hour at the head of the Eastern Jökulsá, quietly enjoying the warm western exposure. From this point there was an extensive view of the river-drained plain which, broken by detached lumps of hill and broken ridges, separates Snæfell from the eastern edge of the Ódáða Hraun. When the nags had enjoyed a bite we resumed the descent of the deep and broken river-valley that passes between the Hafrsfell and its western outliers: the buttresses and banks of loose wind-blown sand descended bodily with our weight. Again we saw a spine of Palagonite, showing a fair ascent to the upper snow-field; and we looked in vain for the delicate ripple-marks which from a distance betray hidden crevasses. Here the surface material melting in the sun sinks into the lower strata, making the whole a solid mass--hence the glacier growth which exists in Greenland, and which is suspected in Iceland. As we rode under the precipices of North-western Snæfell, the snow, sliced off as if by a razor, forms a wall some fifty feet thick, soft above, and below pale-blue, like the Blaabreen of Norway, where hardened to ice by excessive pressure. This fine “snout” showed a few thin ribbons, but nothing like “veined structure,” that vexed subject of the glacialists. The whole “snow-fond” for perfect beauty wanted only the lovely background of mazarine-coloured skies to be seen in more southern latitudes.

At six P.M. we forded the Hauká (hawk-water), one amidst a score of shallow, bubbling, pebbly streams, random rivulets, which the afternoon heat was setting free from the vast sheets of snow. Beyond Hafrsfell we recognised with disgust the sodden, rotten ground of the morning, and the weary ponies so lost their tempers that they seemed unwilling to rise after the frequent falls. Yet I could not but admire the pathos, the strange double nature of the wild prospect. Here it was a hard and uncompromising photograph, a weird etching by Rembrandt or Doré, in which, from the vivid whiteness of the snow and the blackness of the rocks, the far appeared near: amongst the chaotic rubbish heaps there was no shadow within shadow, no dark as opposed to a light side. There, beyond a middle ground of steely blue plain, lay a “lovely Claude,” a dream-landscape of distant Jökull. The delicate tints, cool azure-white and snow warm with ethereal rose-pink, seemed to flush and fade, to shift and change places, as though ghostly mists, unseen by the eye of sense, were sailing in the pale beryl-coloured sky. Anon the sun sinking towards the hilly horizon rained almost horizontal floods of light, transfiguring the scene with golden glory as every feature kindled and lit up with a peculiar freshness of expression--a region so calm and bright did not seem to be of this world. Yet a few moments more and its rare spiritual loveliness, passing through gradations of matchless tenderness, began to fade; the pale-grey shadow came, “stealing like serious thought o’er joyous face,” and all disappeared in the dark nothingness of night. These splendours of the Trolls’ home were well worth a journey to the “Brumous Isle,” but the long search and the short fruition almost tempt me to “point a moral.”

After some ten hours’ hard work for man and beast, we were cheered by the steam rising from the Laug, and we again thanked Iceland for laying on such plenteous supplies of hot water. The memory of the last touching view, with its “wild beauty of colouring,” moved me to issue, about midnight, from the nest and to compare the dark with the light hours. But the moon and stars seemed to count for nothing in that “inspissated gloom.” The scene was

“All ruined, desolate, forlorn, and savage.”

The deepening glooms made the silence something more oppressive--τῆς σιγῆς βάρος--than the mere negative of sound; it became an indescribably awful presence, weighing on and deadening to the spirit as the sense of utter solitude--even the nasal music within the Laugarkofi was a positive relief. I can easily imagine a man lost in this utter stillness and swoon of Nature finding the horror and oppression unendurable.