On returning to the pastor’s, I found my companions fast asleep on the floor. The canvas tent which had been left by the French expedition served them for a bed, portmanteaus or packages were appropriated for pillows, and plaids and wrappers spread over them for blankets. They lay packed like herrings in a barrel. I stepped over them as quietly as I could, found an unoccupied space near the open window, speedily ensconced myself for the night, and in a few minutes sank into a well-earned and blessed state of obliviousness.
Saturday Morning, July 30.—Breakfasted and left Thingvalla at 9 A.M. The first five miles or so of our journey across the valley lay through low green brushwood, where the vegetation was fresh and luxuriant. This in Iceland is called a forest; but the trees, chiefly birches and willows, are all dwarfs. The birches were about 3 feet high, very few of them attaining to the height of 4 or 5 feet; the willows were of three kinds; one with a leaf resembling bog myrtle; the leaves of another white, green, and flossy—both these varieties only 10 to 12 inches high; while the third, although Professor Chadbourne assured me it was a genuine willow, was only about one and a half inches; we observed catkins on them all. Wild geraniums, forget-me-nots, butter-cups, the beautiful rose-coloured sedum so common in Iceland, clover, sea-pinks, &c., grew in profusion, and imparted to the whole the appearance of a rich fresh green coppice. When the ponies could snatch at a stray bite of grass as they passed along, in doing so, they would often at the same time take up a tree by the roots and carry it off in their mouths.
We came upon yawning chasms, every little way, where the rocks had been rent asunder; the cracks or fissures about 100 feet deep, 10 or 20 wide, dry, and all running in the same direction from the lake. These we either avoided, or crossed at places where blocks of stone had fallen in, so as to fill up part with debris, or form natural bridges which afforded as good footing as the most of the track we had ridden over. The lake of Thingvalla lay peacefully behind us on our right, fair as a silver mirror. Ascending a green bosky hill, where numerous hillocks around were clothed with low brushwood to the very top, we came to the Hrafnagjá, or Raven’s chasm, which forms the eastern boundary of Thingvalla. It is a deep broad irregular abyss, several miles in length, and on the further side, high like a rampart. We got across it, and up to the level of the plateau, by picking our way over the ridge of an avalanche of rock and stones, which had fallen in, leaving gaps, rude arches, and frightful openings into the darkness beneath us; while, right and left, the chasm itself stretched away like the dry fosse of a giant’s castle which, through successive ages, had withstood the assaults of all the rock-jötuns. Up this perilous way, steeper than a stair, winding, zig-zagging, doubling, leaping like cats from block to block, or standing for a second like goats with four feet on one stone to consider their next move, our patient ponies toiled upwards and took us safely across. Looking back, we bade adieu for a time to the lovely green vale of Thingvalla beneath us, and were lost in wonder, both at the wild savage grandeur of the chasm we had just crossed and at the sure-footedness and pluck of our trusty little steeds.
The plateau now attained was of the same level as that over which we had passed before descending into Thingvalla, but here, it did not extend very far, being bounded by irregular heights and bare hills.
Vegetation disappeared, everything seemed blasted. Plovers again sat quite close to us, or flitted past, uttering their shrill plaintive whistle; passing so near that we could distinctly observe the tremulous motion of their mandibles. The ponies stepped aside from holes in our very track, opening into hollow darkness, where stones thrown in were long heard striking against the sides. At one place, we came to a black cave 20 or 30 feet in size, arched right into and under great blocks of stone. It appeared to be a huge lava-blister which had taken its present shape in cooling. The bottom of the cave, protected from the warm rays of the sun, was covered with snow; and, for the same reason, white patches of snow lay in crevices of the bare rocky hills around us. The path now ascended flanking the sides of the hills on the left, while the whole region seemed fire-scathed and blasted. The hills and slopes were covered with dark volcanic sand, pulverized ashes, and slag, out of which abruptly rose irregular masses of rock. Here, leaving our horses, we turned aside to examine a small extinct crater or vent, called Tintron, crowning a little eminence to the right. In ascending it, we were up to the ancles in fine black sand or slag, which, yielding beneath the feet at every step, made walking extremely awkward, if not difficult. The crater itself was composed of great blocks of red and black vitrified lava, over which we looked down into the darkness as into Pluto’s chimney. We threw in some large stones, but could not from their sound form an estimate of the depth. Perhaps this vent may be only a lava-blister which has burst on the top, instead of forming a cave like the other we lately saw. However, though small, it presented the appearance of a regular crater. From it, we saw, on the one side, the beautiful Lake of Thingvalla; and, on the other, the near hills opposite, with the slope between them and us all covered with black scoriæ.
VENT OF TINTRON.
After pocketing a few specimens of the lava, I made a rough sketch of the crater and gathered a sprig of wild thyme, and a little white flower (parnassia), which was blooming all alone on its very brink. Mounting our ponies and descending for about an hour, on clearing the hill-side we came in sight of a level plain of green meadow land, lying below us, shaped like a horse shoe, and occupying an area of 3 or 4 miles. It appeared to have been submerged at no very distant period, and, like other Icelandic valleys, was sadly in want of drainage.
The rocky hill-range, which at the same time came into view on the left and formed the boundary of the plain, was one of the most singular I ever beheld. It was composed of black, yellow, and red volcanic rock; rising in fantastic cones, or receding into savage gorges, steep, abrupt, and angular. The surface was absolutely without vegetation of any kind, and every cleavage, rent or crevice, so fresh, bare, and unweathered, one could fancy that the rocks had only during the last hour been smitten, shattered, and splintered by Thor’s hammer; while the rich effect of their vari-coloured tints was heightened by the pure white clouds which incense-like were now muffling and rolling about their summits, and by the verdure which extended to their base like a carpet. Our track lay along the foot of them, and wonder only increased as we obtained a nearer view of their Tartarian wildness.
