[204] The traveller cannot but think that our scientific political economists are apt, in outlying countries, to neglect the first rule of taxation, namely, to avoid imposing novelties, and to levy imposts with which the people are accustomed. Thus India willingly contributes salt and capitation taxes, and especially Nazaránah, or legacy duties, whilst she hates the name of income-tax. No one will deny that the two former are objectionable for a host of reasons, but the question is, whether they are less injurious than those which lead to the many evils engendered by chronic discontent.
[205] The system of hundreds will be discussed when treating of taxation. Suffice it here to say that in modern Iceland, as in England of former times, the value of land tenure was estimated not by extent, but by produce. Indeed, superficial land-measures, such as the “mark” of the Færoes (=32,500 square English feet), are unknown to the island.
[206] It should be remembered that “Heimili” (households, families) are quite different from “Jarðir” (farms); and the two must not be confounded. The number of the former is 9306, of the latter 4357.
[207] In 1872 contested elections were almost unknown; at least only one was quoted, and the candidate had learned the practice in England. The position of Al-thíngis-maðr was also an object of scanty ambition except to those who required the small salary, or who had a political theory to work out. The assertion in the text is denied by Icelanders; but the author repeatedly heard it made by Danes and other foreigners settled in the island—at any rate, we may expect to see it realised by the new constitution. Knowledge is power in Iceland as elsewhere, and the numbers of the priesthood secure their influence, whilst the physicians and lawyers are too few to be of much account.
[208] The English Midwife means “with-wife,” from the Icel. “Með,” the German Mit.
[209] So Styria and Istria boast of a “Kohl-fuchs,” so termed from his coal-black waistcoat.
[210] May not the idea have arisen from a confusion of “Tó,” a grass-tuft, with “Tóa,” or “Tófa,” a tod? The older name, Mel-rakki, is derived from burrowing in the sand.
[211] Uno Von Troil (p. 140) also mentions wild cats (Urðar-kettir, cats-o’-stone-heap) and rats.
[212] The Irish “town-land,” i.e., yard and meadow; Scotch “toun;” Cornish “town;” Dutch. “tuyn,” a garden; and Germ. “tzaun.”
[213] This bird (Charadrius pluvialis, Icel. Hey-ló and Hey-lóa, the fem. Hey-láa commonly used, the hay-sandpiper), “quite the commonest in Iceland” (Baring-Gould, p. 411)—the snow-bunting being perhaps the commonest of the small birds—is black breasted in the breeding season, and afterwards becomes “golden.”