The eastern and western sides of the crater converged towards the south, being shut in by lofty mountains, which rose in some places to the height of 1000 feet above the plain of Askja; so that they appeared to be shorn of their inner faces by the violence of the eruption, which had left perpendicular cliffs of great height. The edges of the crater, too, were rapidly tumbling in, and had formed in several places steep slopes of pumice and débris, which it was quite possible to descend; all access to the floor of the crater, however, was prevented by an interior rim of precipice immediately at the bottom of these heights. How long this shape will remain unaltered is, however, a matter of great doubt, for during our stay there, sometimes scarcely a minute elapsed between the roar of the stony avalanches, which increased the din and gradually altered the form of the crater! Three principal lines of fissures, pits, and irregular openings diverged from the centre of the crater to the south-east and west respectively. These, together with black patches of steaming ground and several minor cracks, were all that remained of the huge chasm which at one time must have occupied this valley.
I now selected a spot where there had been a considerable fall in the wall of the crater, forming a slope of a much smaller angle than anywhere else, and exposed a stratum of the previous winter’s snow which enabled us to obtain sufficient water for our breakfast.
My men slept here while I posted up my diary, but I was presently disturbed by a peculiar rushing sound. I instinctively looked towards the crater, and there saw what at first sight seemed to be a fog-bow amongst the steam, but presently the increasing noise gave sufficient evidence of its true character. It was a huge column of water springing up from a fissure in the bottom of the crater, which, being ejected in a slanting direction, almost described an arc, rising to a much greater height than even the level of the spot we were encamped upon, was, of course, converted into spray long before it reached such an elevation, and falling with great violence upon the opposite edge of the valley, caused a great portion of the wall of the crater at that point to fall away with a prodigious noise, the concussion of which produced a series of avalanches in various other parts of the volcano. One could imagine, from the effect of such a comparatively small body of water, what a terrible scene must have presented itself when the mountain was in a state of general activity, and when the entire crater vomited a vast volume of pumice, mud, and water, and the whole valley beneath was a seething cauldron of fire and water! We next removed to the lee of a large rock of agglomerate, and having scooped a bed in the pumice, slept comfortably, with the tent spread over all of us like one large blanket.
Upon awaking I ascended the highest point in the wall of the crater, which was almost its southern extremity, and there I found its height by my aneroid to be about 4500 feet above sea level, the angles by my azimuth compass being from Herðubreið 40° west, Skjaldbreið 103° east. From this point the floor of the crater appeared more bent about and upheaved, while many of its gaping fissures seemed much wider than before, doubtless the result of the longitudinal view of them which the position commanded; in fact, each fissure seemed trying to excel its neighbour in making the most horrible noise, while emitting the most nauseous smell. I doubt if even Cologne, in all its former nastiness and “thousand well defined and separate stinks,” could have produced anything so utterly putrid and abominable as the effluvia which were wafted to the summit we were standing upon! At one point it seemed just possible for us to reach the floor of the crater, and as it would save us a considerable detour if we were able to cross it, we packed up and began again to descend a very precipitous slope of pumice. From thence we descended as far as 750 feet, and then found our way barred by the interior rim of precipice before spoken of. Hitherto we had been unable to see its full extent from the overhanging wall of the crater, but from this vantage-ground it seemed to be about 300 feet deep, while the floor appeared to be dark mud: many of the fissures must have been twenty or thirty feet across, and others at least a quarter of a mile in length. I tried to measure the precipice by flinging over a large lump of the heaviest pumice, but it gave no sound as it reached the bottom, for it was so light I could not fling it far enough to see where it struck, hence we were afraid to go to the extreme edge of the precipice on account of the loose and crumbling nature of the rocks. Nothing now remained for us but to climb back again. This was no easy matter, because of the great angle of the slope, so I was compelled to dig my sore toes into the pumice with all my might; and in one place, for a distance of some 200 feet, to dig steps with my ice axe. We reached the summit at last, very warm, but very glad to be at the top instead of at the bottom of those 750 feet, for had we slipped, we should in all probability have fallen to the bottom of the crater. At last we arrived at the plain of Askja by following along the top of cliffs upon the eastern side of the crater, and there we found everything covered with a dark brown loam, which was still falling thickly around us. I next inspected the pit I had noticed in the morning, which was situated by itself at the top of the precipice, and found it about a quarter of a mile in circumference. Upon looking into it, for a long time nothing could be seen but dense clouds of steam and loam which were rising from it with intermittent violence; but after a while a large portion of the margin slipped in, and stopping the steam for a few moments, enabled us to discern a black funnel-shaped pit tapering towards the bottom, from which huge volumes of steam were again beginning to rise; then came a sudden burst of hot steam, loam, and stench, which again compelled us to make a precipitate retreat. I next investigated every part of this side of the crater in order to see if I could by any means descend to the floor of it, but I found the interior precipice extended all round, and at every point prevented my doing so. We therefore camped but a short distance from the pit, that we might be the better able to watch the wonderful and varying manœuvres which from time to time were enacted.
The worst of our position now was, that it lacked both snow and water, but the loam made us a tolerably nice soft bed, and we slept soundly. Soon, however, a heavy fall of loam upon our tent awoke us, and our eccentric friend outside was uttering such fiendish noises, and giving off such a putrid stench, that we thought the better part of valour was to retreat; so we hastily packed up amid a copious shower of loam, our movements being quickened by the surmise that we might also be treated to a little pumice and hot water. Moreover, the stench was beginning to tell upon us, causing us to feel sick. We next proceeded along the N.N.W. side of the crater, as I wished to count the number of paces along it, in order that I might approximate the size, which I found to be about one and a quarter miles in length. The ground was now much fissured, and disclosed in many places the snow of the previous winter at the depth of six feet beneath the pumice, as well as a quantity of loam which had been flung out by the volcano. After breakfasting beside one of these fissures, at mid-day we turned our backs upon what I can imagine to be one of the most marvellous, and perhaps I may add, one of the most indescribable sights the world can anywhere present! On resuming our journey, we set our faces towards Skjaldbreið, alias Trölladyngjá, and the first part of our journey was across the little plain of Askja, over a lava stream, which here enters from the Ódáðahraun, and had run for some distance up hill. The loam which had been showered down by Öskjugjá had taken the edge off the lava, which was a great source of comfort, and soon we were glad to sight the broad black desert of the Ódáðahraun. There was the snowy mound of Skjaldbreið, spotted with black lava, with its curious tuft of rock at the top, somewhat similar to that on Herðubreið. Before us there was Kistufell, by which we had first descended into Norðurland, and behind all, the broad expanse of the Vatna Jökull, sweeping the horizon from east to west, where it appeared in the distance to be joined by Tungufell and Tindafells Jökull. From here, we could not see the Sprengi Sandr, which lay between them, but perceiving through my telescope a patch of snow upon the hills which almost joined Skjaldbreið upon the east, I determined to strike a line across the Ódáðahraun to it, that I might take another rest and relinquish all our loads before we ascended Skjaldbreið the next morning.
I may here remark that the Ódáðahraun is a desert of sand and lava, extending over an area of 1200 square miles, the greater part of which seems to have flowed from Skjaldbreið, so I think it must be one of the oldest lava flows in Iceland, for this volcano has not erupted since 1305. Some of the lava may, however, have flowed from the Dyngjufjöll, or, possibly, from fissures in the plain itself. I could, however, trace no distinct stream from the above-named mountains, nor has any one, I believe, travelled along the west side of them for the purpose of ascertaining. In several places the lava of the Ódáðahraun has run up hill. This, I believe, has been occasioned by the crust which flowed upon the surface of the lava stream, constituting a sort of pipe with the ground upon which the stream rested; and the air being thus excluded, the still liquid lava underneath has acted in the same way as water would when enclosed in a pipe, by finding its own level, or approximately so, according to its degree of fluidity. At any rate it took us five hours to cross the Ódáðahraun and reach the snow patch I had seen. There we rested, and early next morning, accompanied by Thorlákur, I set off for Skjaldbreið, leaving Eyólfur, who was very tired, in camp. We next followed an immense lava stream about half-way up the mountain, and during the early part of our walk I several times heard the muffled sound of water running beneath the lava. When about half-way up, we reached deep indurated snow, through which protruded the black hummocks and masses giving Skjaldbreið such a mottled appearance when I first saw it from the Dyngjufjöll mountains. Skjaldbreið is, however, nothing but a huge mound of basaltic lava, partially covered with snow, rising by a very gradual slope to about 4000 feet above sea level, and from it has evidently flowed the greater part of the Ódáðahraun, though, as all the neighbouring mountains seem to have erupted at some period or another, it is but fair to presume they have also helped to swell this vast wilderness of volcanic dregs; but I have been unable to trace any lava stream in the Ódáðahraun to any other source than Skjaldbreið. The summit of Skjaldbreið I found was thickly enveloped in clouds, so I stopped when within 300 feet of the top to look at the surrounding country. To our north lay the arid waste of the Ódáðahraun, the unearthly desolation of which I have never seen equalled. Truly, it may be said that it extends over but a small area when compared with many of the mighty deserts in other parts of the world, but there is a forbidding, yet fascinating grimness about this which is an especial characteristic of Icelandic scenery, and as this savage region extends as far as the eye can see, it produces none the less vivid impression upon the mind of the beholder, although one can refer to the map and find that it extends over only about 1500 square miles. When first gazing at a dreary Icelandic lava desert the sensations are something akin to those experienced when for the first time one sees a prairie immediately after the fire has swept across it; but although one is conscious that there may be a million instead of a thousand square miles of burnt, black, cindery country around, it does not impress one with its awful magnificence and grandeur of desolation as the Ódáðahraun does. To the north and east were the Dyngjufjöll mountains, with their volcanoes smoking away with renewed vigour in the cold morning air. A point further to the east was the long weary route we had just traversed, stretching away bleak and bare to where the grey pumice in the distance gave the country the appearance of lying in bright sunshine. To the south rose the Vatna Jökull, cold and gloomy, with its heights wrapped in fog and mist. Kverkfjall and Kistufell, however, were exceptionally clear; the former was smoking in three places, and a great quantity of sand and lava appeared to have proceeded from it. Between us and the Kverkfjall swept the broad tongue of glacier, reaching two-thirds of the way northward towards the Vaðalda hills, and from its extremity I counted five arms of the Jökulsá which issued from it, while the small stream from Kistufell was hidden by the intervening hills. We next continued our journey to the summit, and then found a small but perfectly formed crater, about 500 yards in circumference, but of no great depth, while in the centre rose a ridge of burnt lava, which gave the mountain the black tufted appearance I had noticed in the distance.
The latest eruptions, I should imagine, from the contour and disposition of the surrounding lava, have taken more the form of prodigious boilings over than of explosive outbursts, and it seems as if it had continued to burn tranquilly long after its last outburst. From here we descended a short distance upon the north-west side, in order to get below the fog, and obtain a view of the country to the west. The same dreary desolation presented itself—the pure white Jökull, with the black sand and the rugged lava fields were alike cold, silent, motionless, and dead! The mountains were a little different in form, but there was the same grand desolate wilderness, seeming ready to blast every living thing that dared to intrude on its enchanted solitude. We therefore returned to camp, and were not sorry to sit down to a good breakfast of pemmican, bread and butter, and water. The sun shone fiercely at midday, and the heat, radiated by the sand and lava, became so great that we rested till the cool of the evening, when we struck for the south-east end of the Dyngjufjöll, which we reached about midnight, but as a thick fog descended upon us, I steered close along the base of the mountains, preferring a little circuit to wandering about all night in uncertainty upon the plain. Our course from here was over an old lava stream, buried in light volcanic dust, which was very trying to travel over, for we sunk rather deeply into it, and had to stop every now and then to empty our shoes, which were constantly becoming filled with sand. At length we struck upon the pumice, which showed we were nearing the volcano of Öskjugjá; soon after we came to a small stream, and being all very thirsty, the water was highly appreciated. Seeing that the pumice increased, and fearing we should be getting too far to the east, I resolved to follow the course of the next stream, conjecturing that it would bring us down to the pools by which we had made our cache. It was a crooked way, but it brought us right at last; for as the mist dispersed we sighted the pools, and it was not long before we gladly lighted upon our cache. The first thing that came to hand was a box of Fry’s chocolate powder, so we all sat down upon our packs and with our broad knife blades began to operate upon the powdery treasure. Eating chocolate powder we found was thirsty work, so having emptied the box, we took a good drink of water, pitched the tent, and turned in.
We had hitherto been using stones for tent pegs, but here there were none to be had, and as we could not now avail ourselves of little screws of hay, as we had done when last camped upon the same spot, we took off our mocassins and buried them, with a string attached to each, at intervals round the tent; these answered the purpose of pegs very well, and as it is always necessary to bury untanned mocassins while resting, to prevent them from shrinking and becoming too hard to wear, we, by this device, managed to “kill two birds with one stone.” After a good sleep, I debated on the possibility of reaching the Kverkfjall, which I particularly wished to examine, but the Jökulsá and a long stretch of country lay between us, and as Thorlákur assured me if we did so we should have soon “to go on our naked feet,” it was a matter for grave consideration what was best to do. The lava had already played sad havoc with our foot-gear—we had each of us worn out four pairs of mocassins since we left Grímstaðir—and those which were doing duty as tent pegs were almost played out, while there were but two pairs remaining in our small stores, which was anything but encouraging. Moreover, we had a long way before us yet; so all things considered, I came to the conclusion that Kverkfjall was impracticable. I determined, therefore, to ascend the Dyngjufjöll again, and from the peak above us take a farewell look around, directing Eyólfur in the mean time to carry all our things to a small stream at the foot of the mountains, about two miles north of our present position, which could be easily done in two shifts. Accordingly, I began my climb accompanied by Thorlákur, but our progress was continually interrupted by deep “gjás,” or fissures, many of which were of great depth, probably several hundred feet. In some cases, however, we found bridges of snow and pumice, by which we were able to cross these chasms.
At this time the sun was wending its way westward across the snowy slopes of the Vatna, as we reached the top of this part of the Dyngjufjöll, and really language quite fails me when I attempt to describe the wildness of that view! Behind us was the volcano, from which vast volumes of dark smoke and steam were rising; the various mountains which studded the sterile wastes before us were all clothed in the same dull grey covering; the black sand of the Mývatns Örœfí was just visible to the north, and as far as the eye could see eastward, there stretched a series of mountains, valleys and wasted plains. During nearly two hours we might almost be said to have slept in the view before us; indeed, I was hardly conscious how the time had gone until the sun seemed to have slipped behind the Hofs Jökulls, giving their snows a golden outline, while my watch reminded me that it was nearly 11 P.M.
The atmosphere now turned very cold, the frost was already sparkling upon the surrounding rocks, a purple glow stole over the mountains, blending their softened outlines with the tinted sky, and we felt that a little brisk work would sensibly add to our comfort. Our descent afforded us some amusement, sliding down the steep beds of small pumice, which we did at a furious rate. It had taken us more than three hours to ascend the mountain, but less than one to come down it! We found Eyólfur where I had directed him to wait; making a good meal, we patched up our mocassins as well as we could by moonlight, and by a different route to that by which we came we struck a straight line for Herðubreið. Ultimately we reached Herðubreið with the sun, and I was not at all sorry to find myself on my way home; for increased inflammatory symptoms in my great toe showed that a liberal application of blue-stone and rest were absolutely indispensable to its cure. The weather by this time appeared very uncertain, for the heavens were spotted all over with masses of golden nimbus, drifting rapidly before a wind which was blowing above, though the atmosphere beneath was perfectly calm, which are invariably indications of storm in Iceland.