"Gracious heavens, what a place to be lost in in a snowstorm," said Helga.
"But what a country for Saga and song," said Oscar, "and if some one could set it to music, grim as its glaciers and fierce as its fires, it would take the world by storm."
"Do it, Oscar, do it, and I'll love you," cried Helga.
"As we are commanded to love one another?" asked Oscar.
"Perhaps," laughed Helga, and when he swung her to the saddle again her hand slipped from his shoulder and his lips touched her cheek.
After that they both sang as they cantered along, for the clouds that had hung over Oscar had gone by this time, and if the ground was grey the sky was blue and their blood was red and warm.
But suddenly a new scene opened at their feet--a deep plain with a shining blue lake in the midst of it, splashed with islands like spots on an eagle's egg and fenced by soft green fells. It was a dream in a desolate land, a cistern of sunshine encircled by countless peaks which stood round it clothed in white, like a surpliced choir that were singing their hymns to God. The black lava was there as elsewhere, and the valley was blistered with mounds and wrinkled with ruts and scored with fissures; but the blood-root grew in the clefts of the jagged rocks and the blueberry hung over the face of the gaping chasms, and it was almost as if an angel had passed over the surface torn by earthquakes and brushed it with the bloom of his wings.
This was Thingvellir, the place of the Proclamation, the Thing-place of the Northlands, the scene of a hundred Sagas, the subject of a thousand songs.
Oscar and Helga were now near the end of their journey and they watched for the townspeople to overtake them. Half an hour later the caravan came up in a cloud of dust, all noisy, but good-natured and ravenous for breakfast. There were some shouts at the pioneers, and certain dubious compliments, but Oscar did not hear and Helga did not heed. They took their places behind the Governor, and went down to the law-plain in his train.
The way to it was through a wide chasm whose parallel walls stood up on either side of the steep causeway like the ruined street of some prehistoric city, but thrice grander and more awesome than any work of the hand of man, because straight from the loins of nature and rent from the womb of the earth. There were great openings as of arches, empty spaces as of windows, broken peaks as of pediments and curious stones as of carvings, all shaken from their foundations and toppling as if to fall; while over them, from beetling side to side, hung the gay flags of the Danish man-of-war, and through them came the bright shafts of the morning sun.