These statements, printed in the Standard (November 1, 1872), have lately been criticised by a certain “Brimstone” (Mining Journal, August 29, and September 19, 1874). He is kind enough to say, “I have the greatest respect for Captain Burton as a traveller, but none whatever as an inspector of mining properties”—where, however, a little candour and common sense go a long way. And he is honest enough to own, despite all interests in pyrites or Sicilian mines, that the “working of the sulphur deposits in question may possibly, with great care and economy, give moderate returns on capital.” His letters have been satisfactorily answered by Dr C. Carter Blake and Mr Jón A. Hjaltalín. It only remains for me to remark that nothing is easier than to draw depreciatory conclusions from one’s own peculiar premises. “Brimstone,” for instance, reduces the working days to 150, when the road would be open all the year round to carts and sledges; he considers the use of sledges upon snow a “fantastic idea,” and he condemns the horses to “eat, month after month, the oats of idleness,” whereas they can be profitably employed throughout the twelve months either at the diggings or in transporting the ore. The statistics of Iceland emigration prove that even during the fine season a sufficiency of hands might, if well and regularly paid, be “withdrawn into the desert from fishing and agricultural operations,” which, after all, are confined to the Heyannir, or hay-making season, and which take up but a small fraction of the year, between the middle of July to the half of September. Moreover, there is little, if any, fishing on the coasts near the northern mines. The report of the Althing shows that ten, and sometimes twenty, labourers worked at the Krísuvík diggings, where fishing is busiest, during almost the whole winter of 1868-69, and the silica mining of Reykjanes was not interrupted during December and January 1872-73. The spell is from five to six hours during the darkest months, the shortest day in Iceland being five hours. About mid-March the island night is not longer than in England, and from early May there is continual daylight till August, when the nights begin to “close in.” The hands in the southern mines were paid from 3½d. to 6d. per hour. Professor Paijkull made the northern sulphur cost 3 marks per cwt., and the horses carried 3 to 3½ cwts. in two days to the trading station: Metcalfe also declares that 200 cwts. per annum were melted at Húsavík, and that the price was half that of Sicilian. “Brimstone” complains that the distance from the coast is variously laid down at 25 (direct geographical), 28⅘, 40, and 45 (statute) miles, when the map and the itineraries of many travellers are ready to set him right. He need hardly own that he has no personal knowledge of Húsavík, Krísuvík, or any part of Iceland, when he sets down “such necessary little items as loading, lighterage, harbour-dues, improving Husavik, brokerage, et cætera,” confounding the ideas of Snowland and England. After a startled glance at the cost of British labour, “and, worse still, of idleness during the greater part of the year”—a phantom of his own raising—he asks, “What about the demoralisation consequent on the latter, and on the inevitable use and abuse of the spirits of the country, in order to while away the time?” The Brazil is surely as thirsty a land as Iceland, yet my host, Mr Gordon, of the gold mines in Minas Geraes, would be somewhat surprised, and perhaps not a little scandalised, to hear that his white, brown, and black hands cannot be kept from drink. Briefly the objector’s cavils may be answered in the “untranslatable poetry” of the American backwoodsman, “T’aint no squar’ game; he’s jest put up the keerds on that chap (Sicily) from the start.” I have no idea who Mr “Brimstone” is, but I must say that he deserves a touch of his own mineral, hot withal, for so notably despising the Englishman’s especial virtue—Fair Play.
On the other hand, my notes on the Mý-vatn mines drew from a Brazilian acquaintance, Mr Arthur Rowbottom, the following note, containing an inquiry which unfortunately I could not answer:
“I read your account of the sulphur mines of Myvatn with great interest and pleasure; and from your report I should feel disposed to believe that boracic acid exists in the same district. You will, no doubt, remember the conversation we had on board the ‘Douro,’ returning from Brazil, about the very large fortune made by Count Larderel out of the boracic acid produced in the Tuscan lagoons situated near Castelnuovo. Wherever native alum and brimstone are found, there are always traces of borate of soda in one form or another. Boracic acid exists at the Torre del Greco, and in Volcano of the Lipari Islands.[169] The locality where the ‘Tincal’ is found in Thibet is reported to be plutonic; in fact, nearly all the countries from whence the borate of soda is drawn are somewhat similar to the sulphur districts of Iceland; and I should feel greatly obliged if you could inform me if boracic acid or borate of lime exists in the island.”
CHAPTER XV.
RETURN TO DJÚPIVOGR AND END OF JOURNEY.
Section I.—Ride to Herðubreið.
August 10.
We were humanly threatened with rain on the fourth day, but my aneroid gave me better news. The principal difficulty was to find a guide for the southern Öræfi. Hr Pètur’s sons shrugged their shoulders and pleaded illness—“pituitam habent” explains the student—they swore that the farm horses were not strong enough to traverse the grassless waste. After a three days’ search, I managed to secure a dummer junger, named Kristián Bjarnason of Eilífr, who had once almost reached the base of Herðubreið; and old Shylock lent him, for a consideration, two lean nags, with orders to go so far and no farther. My own stud consisted of eight, and only one of these carried the little tent and provisions—a loaf of brown rye-bread, two tins of potted meat, a diminutive keg of schnapps, and rations for my companions, the student Stefán and Gísli Skulk. The latter showed some alacrity in preparing to return home; as he had a grudge against Mr Lock, so he contrived to nobble all the ropes, and tried furtively to drive off all the baggage-horses. I looked carefully to the tethers of my nags, and personally saw them shod with good irons and new-made nails: I strongly suspect my henchman of having stolen a march upon me; he could not smash my hammer, but he managed to lose the extra nails. More than one shoe proved to be broken on the second day, and several were found fastened with only three mere “tacks,” the best contrivance in the world for permanently injuring a hoof.
The start was, as usual, painfully slow; although I rose at five A.M., the journey did not begin before 10.30. The Messrs Lock accompanied me part of the way; we were all to meet at Djúpivogr on the seventh day, but that meeting was not written in the Book of Fate. After shaking hands with the good Bowers, I pricked sharply over the plain, glad to escape the reeking valley of Mý-vatn; the cool and clear north-easter at once swept away the mournful grisaille of the charged sky; presently the sun came out, afflicting the horses, and the dust rose, troubling the riders. About half-way to the river we turned off south-eastward, and rode over the usual mounds, which resemble
“The grassy barrows of the happier dead.”
After this rough, tussocky ground came black sand, bordering black and ropy lava; the former was grown with oat-clumps seven to eight feet high, many of them dead at this season: they sheltered the normal vegetation, and extended immense roots to collect nutriment from the barren soil. The path was pitted, especially on the outskirts of the various stone-floods, with blind holes (Gjá), wearying, and even dangerous, to horses—I soon preferred the rougher riding. The floor-rock again was yellow Palagonite, barred with white waves, soda and potash. At four P.M. we crossed the Fjallagjá, a yellow wady, which might have been in the heart of Arabia Deserta; we were approaching its recipient, the foul Jökulsá. Finally, after entering broken ground of deep sand, and crossing a black hill, Gleðahús, the gled’s house, we come to our halting-ground, Valhumall-lá,[170] the “low land of milfoil,” another wady, but black with sand, and showing lava-streams to the south. The guide declared that we were on the parallel of Víðidalr, which, however, could not be seen.