56. ICELANDIC HOUSES.
The thick turf walls, the dirty floor, the personal uncleanliness of the inhabitants, all contribute to the pollution of the atmosphere. No piece of furniture seems ever to have been cleaned since it was first put into use; all is disorder and confusion. Ventilation is utterly impossible, and the whole family, frequently consisting of twenty persons or more, sleep in the same dormitory, as well as any strangers who may happen to drop in. On either side of this apartment are bunks three or four feet in width, on which the sleepers range themselves.
Such are in general the dwellings of the farmers and clergy, for but very few of the more wealthy inhabitants live in any way according to our notions of comfort, while the cots of the poor fisherman are so wretched that one can hardly believe them to be tenanted by human beings.
The farm-houses are frequently isolated, and, on account of their grass-covered roofs and their low construction, are not easily distinguished from the neighboring pasture-grounds; where four or five of them are congregated in a grassy plain, they are dignified with the name of a village, and become the residence of a Hrepstior, or parish constable.
Then also a church is seldom wanting, which however is distinguished from the low huts around merely by the cross planted on its roof. An Icelandic house of prayer is generally from eight to ten feet wide, and from eighteen to twenty-four long; but of this about eight feet are devoted to the altar, which is divided off by a partition stretching across the church, and against which stands the pulpit. A small wooden chest or cupboard, placed at the end of the building, between two very small square windows not larger than a common-sized pane of glass, constitutes the communion-table, over which is generally a miserable representation of the Lord’s Supper painted on wood. The height of the walls, which are wainscoted, is about six feet, and from them large wooden beams stretch across from side to side. On these beams are placed in great disorder a quantity of old Bibles, psalters, and fragments of dirty manuscripts. The interior of the roof, the rafters of which rest on the walls, is also lined with wood. On the right of the door, under which one is obliged to stoop considerably on entering, is suspended a bell, large enough to make an intolerable noise in so small a space. A few benches on each side the aisle, so crowded together as almost to touch one another, and affording accommodation to thirty or forty persons when squeezed very tight, leave room for a narrow passage.
These churches, besides their proper use, are also made to answer the purpose of the caravanseras of the East, by affording a night’s lodging to foreign tourists. They are indeed neither free from dirt, nor from bad smells; but the stranger is still far better off than in the intolerable atmosphere of a peasant’s hut.
Mr. Ross Browne thus describes the church and parsonage at Thingvalla; “The church is of modern construction, and, like all I saw in the interior, is made of wood, painted a dark color, and roofed with boards covered with sheets of tarred canvas. It is a very primitive little affair, only one story high, and not more than fifteen by twenty feet in dimensions. From the date on the weather-cock it appears to have been built in 1858. The congregation is supplied by the few sheep-ranches in the neighborhood, consisting at most of half a dozen families. These unpretending little churches are to be seen in the vicinity of every settlement throughout the whole island. Simple and homely as they are, they speak well for the pious character of the people.
“The pastor of Thingvalla and his family reside in a group of sod-covered huts close by the church. These cheerless little hovels are really a curiosity, none of them being over ten or fifteen feet high, and all huddled together without the slightest regard to latitude or longitude, like a parcel of sheep in a storm. Some have windows in the roof, and some have chimneys; grass and weeds grow all over them, and crooked by-ways and dark alleys run among them and through them. At the base they are walled up with big lumps of lava, and two of them have board fronts, painted black, while the remainder are patched up with turf and rubbish of all sorts, very much in the style of a stork’s nest. A low stone wall encircles the premises, but seems to be of little use as a barrier against the encroachments of live-stock, being broken up in gaps every few yards. In front of the group some attempt has been made at a pavement, which, however, must have been abandoned soon after the work was commenced. It is now littered all over with old tubs, pots, dish-cloths, and other articles of domestic use.
