HARBOUR OF REIKIAVIK.
The Icelander is honest, temperate, hospitable, possessed with a fervent spirit of patriotism, and strongly wedded to the ancient usages. He is also industrious; and though his industry is but scantily remunerated, he earns enough to satisfy his simple tastes. In the interior his chief dependence is on his cattle; and as grass is the main produce of his farm, his anxiety during the haymaking season is extreme. A bad crop would be almost ruin. He is, however, wofully ignorant of agriculture as a science, does but little for the improvement of the soil, and employs implements of the most primitive character. The process of haymaking in Iceland is thus described:—
The best crops are gathered from the “tún,” a kind of home-park or paddock, comprising the lands contiguous to the farmstead—the only portion of his demesne to which the owner gives any special attention, and on the improvement of which he bestows any labour. This “tún” is enclosed within a wall of stone or turf, and averages an extent of two or three acres, though sometimes it reaches to ten. Its surface is usually a series of closely-packed mounds, like an overcrowded graveyard, with channels or water-runs between, about two feet deep. Hither every person employed on the farm, or whom the farmer can engage, resorts, with short-bladed scythe and rake, and proceeds to cut down the coarse thick grass, and rake it up into little heaps.
Afterwards the mowers hasten to clear the neighbouring hill sides and undrained marshes.
This primitive haymaking, so unlike the systematic operation which bears that name in England, is carried on throughout the twenty-four hours of the long summer day. The hay, when sufficiently dried, is made up into bundles, and tied with cords and thongs, and packed on the back of ponies, which carry it to the clay-built stalls or sheds prepared for it. And a curious sight it is to see a long string of hay-laden ponies returning home. Each pony’s halter is made fast to the tail of his predecessor; and the little animals are so overshadowed and overwhelmed by their burdens, that their hoofs and the connecting ropes alone are visible, and they seem like so many animated haycocks, feeling themselves sufficiently made up, and leisurely betaking themselves to their resting-places.
During the protracted winter the Icelander, of course, can attend to no out-of-door labour, and passes his time within his hut, which, in many parts of the island, is not much superior to an Irish “cabin.”
The lower part is built of rough stones up to a height of four feet, and between each course a layer of turf is placed, which serves instead of mortar, and helps to keep out the cold. The roof, made of any available wood, is covered with turf and sods. On the southern side the building is ornamented with doors and gable-ends, each of which is crowned by a weathercock. These doors are the entrances to the dwelling-rooms and various offices, such as the cow-shed, store-house, and smithy. The dwelling-rooms are connected by a long, dark, narrow passage, and are separated from each other by strong walls of turf. As each apartment has its own roof, the building is, in effect, an aggregate of several low huts, which receive their light through small windows in the front, or holes in the roof, covered with a piece of glass or skin. The floors are of stamped earth; the fireplace is made of a few stones, rudely packed together, while the smoke escapes through a hole in the roof, or through a cask or barrel, with the ends knocked out, which acts as chimney.
In some parts of the island lava is used instead of stones, and instead of wood the rafters are made of the ribs of whales. A horse’s skull is the best seat provided for a visitor. Too often the same room serves as the dining, sitting, and sleeping place for the whole family, and the beds are merely boxes filled with feathers or sea-weed. There are, however, a few houses of a superior character, in which the arrangements are not much unlike those of a good old-fashioned English farm-house; the walls being wainscotted with deal, and the doors and staircase of the same material. A few prints and photographs, some book-shelves, one or two little pictures, decorate the sitting-room, and a neat iron stove, and massive chests of drawers, furnish it sufficiently.
From the houses we turn to the churches. In Reikiavik the church is a stone building, the only stone building in the town; but this is exceptional: most of the churches are not much better than the houses. We will be content, therefore, with a visit to the Reikiavik sanctuary, which is a neat and unpretending erection, capable of accommodating three or four hundred persons. The Icelanders are not opposed to a “decent ritual,” and the Lutheran minister wears a black gown with a ruff round his neck. The majority of the congregation, here as everywhere else, consists of women; some few dressed in bonnets, and the rest wearing the national black silk skull-cap, set jauntily on one side of the head, with a long black tassel drooping to the shoulder, or else a quaint mitre-like structure of white linen, almost as imposing as the head-dress of a Normandy peasant. The remainder of an Icelandic lady’s costume, we may add, consists of a black bodice, fastened in front with silver clasps, over which is drawn a cloth jacket, gay with innumerable silver buttons; round the neck goes a stiff ruff of velvet, embroidered with silver lace; and a silver belt, often beautifully chased, binds the long dark wadmal petticoat round the waist. Sometimes the ornaments are of gold, instead of silver, and very costly.
Towards the end of the Lutheran service, the preacher descends from the pulpit, and attiring himself in a splendid crimson velvet cope, turns his back to the congregation, and chants some Latin sentences.