the midst of winter, while the storm howls over the naked waste, and the pale sun scarcely dispels for a few hours the darkness of the night. In every hut where they tarry on the road they are welcome, and have but rarely to pay for their entertainment, for hospitality is still reckoned a duty in Iceland. On reaching the fishing-station an agreement is soon made with the proprietor of a boat. They usually engage to assist in fishing from February 12 to May 12, and receive in return a share of the fish which they help to catch, besides forty pounds of flour and a daily allowance of sour curds or 'skier.'

All the men belonging to a boat generally live in the same damp and narrow hut. At daybreak they launch forth to brave for many hours the inclemencies of the weather and the sea, and while engaged in their hard day's work their sole refreshment is the chewing of tobacco or a mouthful of skier. On returning to their comfortless hut, their supper consists of the fishes of inferior quality they may have caught, or of the heads of the cod or ling, which are too valuable for their own consumption. These are split open and hung upon lines or exposed on the shore to the cold winds and the hot sun; this renders them perfectly hard, and they keep good for years. In this dried state the cod is called stockfish. About the middle of May the migratory fishermen return to their homes, leaving their fish which are not yet quite dry to the care of the fishermen dwelling on the spot. Towards the middle of June, when the horses have so far recovered from their long winter's fast as to be able to bear a load, they come back to fetch their stockfish, which they convey either to their own homes for the consumption of their own families, or to the nearest port for the purpose of bartering it against other articles. Haddocks, flatfish, and herrings are also very abundant in the Icelandic seas; and along the northern and north-western coasts the basking shark is largely fished for all the summer. Strong hooks baited with mussels or pieces of fish, and attached to chains anchored at a short distance from the shore, serve for the capture of this monster, which is scarcely, if at all, inferior in size to the white shark, though not nearly so formidable, as it rarely attacks man. The skin serves for making sandals; the coarse flesh is eaten by

FISHERIES OF ICELAND.

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the islanders, whom necessity has taught not to be overnice in their food; and the liver, the most valuable part, is stewed for the sake of its oil.

'We had observed,' says Mr. Shepherd, 'that the horrible smell which infested Jsa-fjordr varied in intensity as we approached or receded from a certain black-looking building at the northern end of the town. On investigating this building, we discovered that the seat of the smell was to be found in a mass of putrid sharks' livers, part of which were undergoing a process of stewing in a huge copper. It was a noisome green mass, fearful to contemplate. The place was endurable only for a few seconds; yet dirty-looking men stirred up the mass with long poles, and seemed to enjoy the reeking vapours.'

The salmon of Iceland, which formerly remained undisturbed by the phlegmatic inhabitants, are now caught in large numbers for the British market. A small river bearing the significant name of Laxaa, or Salmon-river, has been rented for the trifling sum of 100l. a year by an English company, which sends every spring its agents to the spot well provided with the best fishing apparatus. The captured fish are immediately boiled, and hermetically packed in tin boxes, so that they can be eaten in London almost as fresh as if they had just been caught.

The mineral kingdom contributes but little to the prosperity of Iceland. It affords neither metals, nor precious stones, nor rock-salt, nor coal; for the seams of 'surturbrand,' or 'lignite,' found here and there, are too unimportant to be worked. The solfataras of Krisuvik and Husavik, though extremely interesting to the geologist, likewise furnish sulphur in too impure a condition or too thinly scattered to afford any prospect of being worked with success, not to mention the vast expense of transport over the almost impassable lava tracts that separate them from the nearest ports. In 1839-40, when, in consequence of the monopoly granted by the Neapolitan government to a French company, sulphur had risen to more than three times its usual price, Mr. Knudsen, an enterprising Danish merchant, undertook to work the mines of Krisuvik, but even then it would not answer.

In 1859 a London company, founded by Mr. Bushby,-who having explored the sulphur districts, had raised great expectations on what he considered their dormant wealth,renewed the attempt, but after a year's trial it was abandoned as perfectly hopeless. The 'solfataras of Iceland,' says Professor Sartorius of Waltershausen, cannot compete with those of Sicily, where more sulphur is wantonly wasted and trodden under foot than all Iceland possesses. While the "Namars" of the north, which are far richer than those of Krisuvik, annually furnish scarcely more than ten tons, the sulphur mines of Sicily produce at least 50,000, and, if necessary, could easily export double the quantity.'

As coal is too expensive a fuel for any but the rich in the small seaport towns, and peat, though no doubt abundantly scattered over the island, is dug only in a few places, the majority of the people make use of singular substitutes. The commonest is dried cow's and sheep's dung; but many a poor fisherman lacks even this 'spicy' material, and is fain to use the bones of animals, the skeletons of fishes or dried sea-birds, which, with a stoical contempt for his olfactory organs, he burns, feathers and all. There is, however, no want of fuel in those privileged spots where driftwood is found, and here the lava hearth of the islander cheerfully blazes either with the pine conveyed to him by the kindly Polar currents from the Siberian forests, or with some tropical trunk, wafted by the Gulf Stream over the Atlantic to his northern home.

Discovery of the Island by Naddodr in 861-Gardar-Floki of the Ravens-Ingolfr and Leif-Ulfliot the Lawgiver-The Althing-Thingvalla-Introduction of Christianity into the Island-Frederick the Saxon and Thorwald the Traveller -Thangbrand-Golden Age of Icelandic Literature--Snorri Sturleson-The Island submits to Hakon, King of Norway, in 1254-Long Series of Calamities -Great Eruption of the Skapta Jökull in 1783-Commercial MonopolyBetter Times in Prospect.

THE Norse vikings were, as is well known, the boldest of

navigators. They possessed neither the sextant nor the compass; they had neither charts nor chronometers to guide them; but trusting solely to fortune, and to their own indomitable courage, they fearlessly launched forth into the vast ocean. Many of these intrepid corsairs were no doubt lost on their adventurous expeditions, but frequently a favourable chance rewarded their temerity, either with some rich booty or some more glorious discovery.

Thus in the year 861, Naddodr, a Norwegian pirate, while sailing from his native coast to the Faeroe Islands, was drifted by contrary winds far to the north. For several days no land was visible-nothing but an interminable waste of waters; when suddenly the snow-clad mountains of Iceland

were seen to rise above the mists of the ocean. Soon after Naddodr landed with part of his crew, but discovered no traces of man in the desert country. The viking tarried but a short time on this unpromising coast, on which he bestowed the appropriate name of Snowland.

Three years later, Gardar, another northern freebooter, while sailing to the Hebrides, was likewise driven by stormy weather to Iceland. He was the first circumnavigator of the island, which he called, after himself, Gardar's holm, or the island of Gardar. On his return to his native port, he gave his countrymen so flattering an account of the newly discovered land, that Floki, a famous viking, resolved to settle there. Trusting to the augury of birds, Floki took with him three ravens to direct him on his way. Having sailed a certain distance beyond the Faeroe Islands, he gave liberty to one of them, which immediately returned to the land. Proceeding onwards, he loosed the second, which, after circling for a few minutes round the ship, again settled on its cage, as if terrified by the boundless expanse of the sea. The third bird, on obtaining his liberty a few days later, proved at length a faithful pilot, and flying direct to the North, conducted Floki to Iceland. As the sea-king entered the broad bay, which is bounded on the left by the huge Snäfells Jökull, and on the right by the bold promontory of the Guldbringe Syssel, Faxa, one of his companions, remarked that a land with such noble features must needs be of considerable extent. To reward him for this remark, which flattered the vanity or the ambition of his leader, the bay was immediately named Faxa Fiord, as it is still called to the present day. The new colonists, attracted by the abundance of fish they found in the bay, built their huts on the borders of a small outlet, still bearing the name of Rafna Fiord, or the Raven's Frith; but as they neglected to make hay for the winter, the horses and cattle they had brought with them died of want. Disappointed in his expectations, Floki returned home in the second year, and, as might naturally have been expected from an unsuccessful settler, gave his countrymen but a dismal account of Iceland, as he definitively named it.

Yet, in spite of his forbidding description, the political