Such a

making hay and in raising sheep, cattle, and horses. thing as the rotation of crops never occurs to an Icelandic farmer. He lets the grass grow where it will and takes it as a gift of Providence. In rare cases he raises a few turnips and potatoes, but these may be practically disregarded.

The reason for this narrow range of activity lies, in part, in the poverty of the soil and the rigor of the climate. The truest description of Iceland that I have ever heard came from the bluff and profane old Scotchman who has, for a score of years, lived in Reykjavik and who knows every mountain torrent and every glacier in the country. "Iceland," said he one day, with a pious addition-" there's nothing to see in Iceland. It's nothing but a big cinder that's got cold on top." The entire country is,, indeed, a vast volcanic mass about the size of Virginia or Ohio, or more than eight times as large as Connecticut. If we could get a bird's-eye view of the country, we should see a great barren plateau, three hundred miles long at the longest and two hundred miles wide at the widest-the whole elevated at the center more than two thousand feet above the level of the sea. The south coast would present the form of an irregular bow, bending toward the south and broken by few inlets. On the east, the north, and the west we should see deep fiords indenting the coast line; and we might learn, according to one estimate, that if we were to sail round the island from one headland to another we should make a voyage of nine hundred miles, while if we followed the windings of the coast we should go more than twice as far. From our height we should look upon plains of barren volcanic sand, inclosing black lakes, with shores hardly tinged with green; upon long, jagged floods of lava, rent by earthquakes; and upon interminable fields of ice and snow, from which would dart gray rivers in terrible cataracts to the sea. Here and there we should note volcanoes, like Hekla or Askja or Krisuvik, and many reddish-brown ash cones, that burned themselves out thousands of years ago. But columns of steam and bursting geysers would still remind us that, if this is a land of ice, it is, also, a land of fire.

Many people imagine Iceland to be exceedingly cold, and they sometimes picture the Icelanders as dressed, even in summer, in robes of fur and as living in houses built of blocks of

ice. But the climate is not so severe as one might expect. During the winter of 1892-93 the frost was almost unfelt, and on the coldest day the mercury stood twelve degrees above zero. In sheltered nooks flowers sometimes bud and blossom in midwinter. Yet Greenland, the land of icebergs, is but a few hours' sail west of Iceland; and sweeping down the eastern coast of Greenland so as to strike the northern coast of Iceland full in the middle is a polar current, which fills every ford on the north and the east with drift-ice that remains till June or July. On the south, the polar current is met by a branch of the warn Gulf Stream. These two great ocean currents are thus in a perpetual struggle for the mastery, and Iceland is the breakwater between them. Whenever the flow of Greenland ice is great the summer is cold and wet. Furious storms of icy rain, accompanied by dense fogs, sweep over the country, stunting the grass and killing every other green thing. Taking the year through, we find that the average annual temperature on the north side of the island is just at the freezing point. In summer it is about 45° Fahrenheit, and in winter nearly 21°. On the south side of the island the average temperature is seven degrees above the freezing point. In July and August I was constantly reminded of our October weather. These are somewhat dull facts, but they are indispensable for a right understanding of the condition of the Icelandic people.

We are now prepared to consider the significance of these facts. The soil of Iceland, as already remarked, is volcanic rock, which has weathered a little, so that in some of the river bottoms and along the fiords an atteinpt at agriculture may be made. The desert of the interior is surrounded by a belt of turf, skirting the ocean. This turf has, at widest, a breadth of less than fifty miles; and where the naked cliffs rise precipitously out of the sea the strip of green has almost no breadth at all. Yet wherever the fiords cut into the coast wall we may expect to see bright greensward and, outlined against the hillside, the low gables of a turf-roofed farmhouse, with the thin blue smoke of a peat fire curling above it. The conditions outlined above are realized on most farms in Iceland. We may now turn to a particular farm and study the everyday life a little more closely.

Every visitor to Reykjavik has his attention drawn at once

to the great mountain barrier of Esja, a few miles to the northeast of the town. Anyone standing on the top of Esja might see a narrow trail winding round the bay, round the base of the mountain, and then up the valley on the west side to the farmhouse of Háls. This road I followed, three days after my arrival in Iceland. I had become acquainted at Reykjavik with the farmer from Háls, and had arranged with him to have my luggage taken to the farm in his boat, while I should go on horseback. Promptly at nine o'clock on a Saturday morning, my guide, a dignified man with a patriarchal beard, appeared at the hotel door with two horses. We mounted at once and soon trotted out of the ugly little town. My guide rode ahead, prodding with his heels the flanks of his horse at every step, so as to keep up a trot. When we paused, after an hour or two, to graze our horses the old man showed me his sheepskin breeches, which had the wool inside, and his high sealskin boots, which were lined with fur and tied at the ankle. The boots, he said, cost eight or nine crowns, and the breeches about six.

Two or three hours more of hard riding brought us to a redgabled farmhouse at the foot of the mountain. Here we ob tained a cup of lukewarm coffee and some stale sweet biscuits. It was late in the afternoon when I caught my first glimpse of the great valley through which the brawling Laxá dashes down to the sea. The rugged hills rose, brown and treeless, and part way up the opposite slope was the square, white farmhouse of Háls, with its cluster of farm buildings. We dashed into the river, our horses' hoofs slipping on the stones as we rode between the two falls, and then climbed the bank to the narrow road that led to the house. Five minutes later I was standing in a diminutive bedroom with a single tightly closed window and a bed that occupied one whole side of the room, and endeavoring to see how I might turn without injuring myself or the furniture. The farmer received me very cordially and made me feel at home at once; but most of the rest of the family, in true Icelandic fashion, kept carefully out of sight, and thus afforded me an excellent opportunity to study my surroundings.

Háls valley is a typical Icelandic farming country. On both sides rise impenetrable mountain ridges, perhaps two thousand

feet high, that sweep in great curves to the northeast and make the valley look like a huge oblong bowl with one end broken off. Away to the northwest stretch long fields of snow, contrasting sharply with the black peaks. Through the middle of the broad valley courses the sinuous Laxá, which at length rolls into the ford in two broad, low cascades. Huge columns of basalt form a dike on the brow of the mountain above the farmhouse; but so great is the height that their outlines are but faintly visible from the valley. The play of light and shadow upon these brown hills is almost magical. A hundred times a day I used to watch the sunshine breaking through the clouds and turning then to golden mist. The light was reflected by the glistening snowbanks, until the whole mountain was aglow. Yet the sun was not visible, and I could see only long bars of light that brought out sharply the rugged lines in the cliffs and the bright glint of the turf on the mountain slopes.

The extent of the farm was not easy to estimate. There was no other farmhouse within two or three miles, and the boundaries of the land were not sharply drawn. In all there must have been several hundred acres; but much of the land consisted of long stretches of rock and gravel, with only the faintest trace of green. The group of farm buildings consisted of a story-and-a-half frame house about twenty-four feet square, a shed for storing peat, a detached kitchen, a small blacksmith's shop, used also for smoking salmon, a cow shed, a horse shed, and a hay barn. At two or three different points on the farm were large sheep houses. The farmhouse was a very modern structure, of a type that has appeared within a few years. The older types are more picturesque, if not more comfortable. A New England farmer builds his house, in many cases, fronting boldly to the highway, and places the outhouses, the sheds, and the barns somewhat in the rear. The Icelander builds his house low, rarely more than a story and a half in height, and ranges half a dozen gables, often painted red, side by side, with low connecting walls of turf and stone. A suitable gradation is thus observed. A cow stable or sheep pen may begin the series, and a parlor or guest room may end it. Not infrequently, the farm buildings form an irregular square and at a little distance look like a considerable village. An Icelandic farm is, indeed, almost a village community of itself, and

necessity often makes it sufficient unto itself to a degree unknown on our farms that lie just outside of a town.

The interior of the house was divided on the ground floor into four rooms of unequal size-a narrow kitchen, with a pantry at one end, two sitting rooms, and a tiny guest chamber, which was assigned to me. None of the rooms was plastered; but they had walls and ceilings of painted, matched boards. Sheepskin rugs supplied the place of carpets. The principal sitting room contained upholstered chairs, a sofa with a sloping seat, a table, and two chests of drawers. In one corner was an iron stove, and in another a large clock. Most attractive to me was a case containing about a hundred and fifty books, some in English, some in Danish, but most in Icelandic. In my little room I had feathers to sleep on and feathers to sleep under. There was also a washstand, with bowl and pitcher, a cake of soap, and a well-worn toothbrush that had evidently served more than one visitor. The rooms above were still plainer than those below. They were reached by a narrow flight of stairs, like a ladder, at the top of which was a heavy trapdoor. The upper floor was, indeed, a mere garret, with no ceiling or other finish, and was cut into three sleeping rooms. The first occupied half the space up stairs and contained four beds. Two small bedrooms, shut off by low partitions, used up the remaining space. The partitions were a mark of advancing civilization. As a general thing, an entire Icelandic family sleeps in one long room--master and men, mistress and maids. The old sagas are full of allusions to this custom, which is one of the most characteristic of modern Icelandic life. Decorum is decently observed according to Icelandic standards; but American notions might at first be slightly shocked.

It was in this largest sleeping room that I caught my first glimpse of most of the household the morning after my arrival. I had settled down to read in the sitting room when I heard, shortly after eleven o'clock, a weird sort of crooning from the rooms above. I looked inquiringly at the farmer. He pointed out the word húslestur, "family prayers," in a little dictionary and asked if I would like to go up. I said, "Yes;" and we went softly up the creaking stairs. He took a seat on the edge of his bed, and I sat in a chair at the door of his bedThe mother was at the service, with her daughter Kris

room.