CHAPTER XX.

ON THE COAST OF ICELAND.

This first glimpse of the great northern island so fascinated Breeze that he could not take his eyes off the distant spot of glistening whiteness. It seemed too wonderful to be true, that he, a poor fisher-lad, should be about to visit the mysterious land of fire and snow that the majority of travellers consider to be far beyond their limit of time and money. He thought over all that he knew or had ever heard of Iceland, and found that it was very little indeed. He knew that it was an island, that it contained icy glaciers, smoking volcanoes, vast deserts of broken lava, and was noted for its geysers, though he had no clear idea of what a geyser was or even looked like. He had heard that Mount Hecla was the principal volcano of the island, and he wondered if the distant white object at which he was gazing might not be it. This was about all that Breeze could remember concerning this wonderful country, and I do not believe that many of the readers of this story know any more about it than he did. Do you?

After gazing long through his glass at the snow-topped mountain they were approaching, and carefully studying his chart, Captain Coffin said it was not Mount Hecla, but must be the Snäfell Jökull, or mountain, near the end of the long narrow promontory of Snäfells (snow-hills). This projects from the western coast of the island, and separates the two great bays, or fiords, of Breda on the north and Faxa on the south. Although the halibut grounds, for which the _Fish-hawk_ was bound, lie on the northern side of the island, while Reykjavik (pronounced Rike-ya-veek), the capital, is situated at the head of Faxa Fiord, in the south-western corner, Captain Coffin determined to run in there and have a look at the place before beginning work. Besides having a desire to see something of the capital city and the people of this out-of-the-way corner of the world, the schooner’s supply of fresh water was running short, and he was anxious to replenish it.

While Breeze is still gazing at the Snäfell Jökull, and Captain Coffin is altering his schooner’s course a point more to the southward, so as to fetch the light-house on Cape Reykjaines (smoking cape), let us take a sort of a general look at the curious island, and see if we can find out any more about it than these Yankee fishermen knew.

In the first place, everybody knows, or ought to know, that Iceland, as well as Greenland, belongs to Denmark, and is ruled by a governor appointed by the Danish king. Everybody, however, does not know that, while Iceland is over six hundred miles from the nearest point of main-land in Europe, it is only one hundred and forty miles from Greenland, and is now generally regarded as being a part of America. It is as large as Scotland and Wales taken together, or as the American States of Maine and New Hampshire. Two of its northern points just touch the arctic circle, but owing to the influence of the warm ocean-currents surrounding it, its average winter weather is no more severe than that of New England, though its summers are short, wet, and chilly.

The whole island is of volcanic origin, and though it was thrown up from the sea thousands of years ago, it still smokes and steams in many places, and displays every evidence of containing some of the principal vents for the everlasting fires that rage just below the earth’s crust.

There are now no trees in Iceland, other than stunted willows and birches, eight or ten feet high; but it is said to have been formerly covered with fine forests of fir-trees, from which ships were built and furnished with spars. Such of these forests as were not cut down were destroyed by the awful volcanic eruptions of the last century, which covered the whole country with lava, pumice-stone, sulphur, or ashes, killed nearly ten thousand human beings, and immense numbers of horses, cattle, and sheep, poisoned vast shoals of fish in the surrounding ocean, and threatened the total destruction of everything living, both animal and vegetable, on the unfortunate island.

Since that time the fortunes of Iceland have gone steadily from bad to worse. Its climate is slowly but surely growing colder. Its people are becoming poorer and poorer, and are leaving it for more favored lands in ever-increasing numbers. Each winter thousands of icebergs and vast fields of floe-ice drift across from Greenland, and pile themselves up on its western coast, clasping the island in a deadly embrace, and threatening its very life with their chill breath.

Only the coasts of the island are inhabited, while the interior is a desolate, lifeless, and almost unexplored waste of lava plains, bogs, volcanic mountains, and ice-filled valleys. The people live in huts built of wrecked timbers, picked up in the western fiords, or of blocks of lava roofed with turf. They cultivate forlorn little patches of oats and watery potatoes, raise flocks of lean, long-legged sheep, herds of black cattle, and shaggy ponies about the size of those that come from the Shetland Islands. They gather and export sulphur, Iceland moss, and the downy breast-feathers with which the eider-duck has lined her nest. Above all, they fish for cod, halibut, ling, haddock, and herring. But for the fish with which its surrounding ocean teems, the island would have long ago been abandoned to its icebergs and volcanoes. To these northern people fish is what bread and meat are to us. They eat it from year’s end to year’s end, and exchange it for all the other scanty necessities of their lives. They even feed their ponies, cattle, and sheep on dried fish during severe winters, after their meagre supply of coarse hay has given out. Fish are everything to Iceland, and it seems to furnish everything to them; for they swarm by millions in its waters. After them up into those wild seas go the fishing boats of England, France, Denmark, Norway, and even far away Massachusetts in New England; and after them had now come the good schooner _Fish-hawk_ of Gloucester, bringing Breeze McCloud in her crew.

In this far northern latitude the midsummer sun is only out of sight, below the horizon, for about two hours, or from eleven o’clock in the evening until one o’clock in the morning; and at midnight, or the darkest hour, the twilight is hardly to be distinguished from the high noon of a cloudy day. As the time of the _Fish-hawk’s_ reaching Iceland was about the middle of June, she sailed in unbroken daylight, and consequently the lamps were not lighted in the only two light-houses of which the island can boast, one on Cape Reykjaines and the other at the entrance to Reykjavik harbor.

About nine o’clock in the evening they passed the Mealsack, which, rising from the sea about fifteen miles from the Smoking Cape, is one of the most remarkable rocks of the world. It is nearly round, about one hundred and fifty feet in diameter, and its black, rugged sides rise sheer and straight for two hundred feet above the surface of the water. Its top is snowy white, from the excrement of the innumerable sea-fowl that circle screaming above it, and find rude resting-places in its crevices, or on its spray-wet ledges. It is perhaps needless to say that no human being has ever trod its summit, or even effected a landing upon it.

After leaving it, the _Fish-hawk_ skirted the coast of Reykjaines, which presents as awful a scene of desolation, and of terrific struggles between fire and water, as can be imagined. The beetling cliffs of black lava are rent and broken into every conceivable shape. Deep fissures, into which the waves rush and roar with a mad fury only to be churned into foam, draw back their stony lips, as though grinning over the fate of the vessel that shall approach them too closely. Dark caverns echo the hollow booming of the waters that fill them. Peaks, pinnacles, and spires rise sharp and forbidding above the chaotic masses piled about their feet. Everywhere through the milk-white foam of the ceaselessly dashing breakers jagged rocks show themselves, like the black fangs of monstrous beasts cruelly eager for their prey. It was a sight to sober even the merry face of Breeze McCloud; while poor Nimbus, after a single glance at it, buried himself in the forecastle and refused to come out so long as they remained in the vicinity of such a “Debbil place,” as he called it.

A few hours later, after carefully threading her way through narrow channels, between numerous rocky islets that rose boldly from the water, the _Fish-hawk_ dropped her anchor, and furled her sails in the harbor of Reykjavik. There were two or three square-rigged vessels in the port, and a number of fishing boats; but though it was still broad daylight, there were no signs of life aboard them, nor in the forlorn-looking little town in front of them. A solemn stillness, broken only by the occasional barking of dogs, brooded over the entire scene, and it was hard to realize that this was the capital of one of the oldest nations of the old world.

Breeze thought they must have made some mistake, and got into the wrong place, and Captain Coffin would have been inclined to agree with him if it had not been for the evidence of his chart; but there was no room for doubt there. Probably no coasts on the globe have been more accurately or thoroughly surveyed than those of Iceland, and no one who has a knowledge of how they were made ever disputes the maps issued by the Danish War Office.

“It’s all right, Breeze,” said the skipper. “This is the place we’ve been hunting for, miserable as it appears. We’d better turn in now for a few hours’ sleep, and perhaps things will look better to us to-morrow.”

But they did not; for under the lowering skies, and through the drizzling rain in which they next came on deck, the scene looked, if possible, more dreary than it had done the night before. About six o’clock the schooner was boarded by a man wearing an official cap, a long-skirted coat, and big boots, who was rowed off from the town in a small boat carrying a green flag. He was very polite, and talked a great deal of Danish, together with a few words of English, some French, and another language, which Breeze afterwards discovered to be Latin.

In spite of all this, he finally succeeded in giving them to understand that he was the Health Officer of the port, and wished to see the schooner’s papers. Being shown into the cabin, he carefully inspected these, though he was evidently unable to make anything from them, except that the vessel came from the United States.

In return, he handed the captain a long printed paper, of which nobody on board could read a word, and gravely selected a single silver coin from the handful that was offered him in payment of the port charges and his services. He satisfied himself by looking at them, that the crew were all in good-health; and learning that the schooner was in need of water, accepted one more dollar as a water fee, and pointed out a place on shore where they could take all they wanted. Then politely lifting his cap, he stepped into his boat, and was pulled back to the town.

“Well, boys,” said the skipper, when this official had gone, “I suppose it’s all right now, and we are free of the city, though I’m blamed if I can make out who that chap was. He may have been the governor himself for all I know. However, let’s get our water aboard, have a look at the place, and get away again as soon as we can, for we’ll all have the blues if we stay here many hours.”

When Captain Coffin and Breeze went on shore, soon afterwards, they found the city to consist of about a hundred one-story houses, painted black, and containing two or three rooms each, half a dozen stores in two-storied buildings, a comfortable-looking governor’s residence, a university, a forlorn-looking hotel, a stone church called the cathedral, and a windmill. These were crowded together, without any attempt at regularity, on a narrow strip of rocky land between the harbor and a lagoon.

Drawn up on the beach, in front of a row of rickety old wooden warehouses, were scores of fishing boats, and the whole place reeked with the smell of fish, fresh, dried, and decaying. Everywhere were nets, oars, and piles of fish. Brawny, hard-featured women trudged along the ill-paved streets carrying great loads of fish on frames like stretchers; while the men of the town lounged at the corners, with pipes in their mouths, and watched them. A drove of ponies fastened in a line, each to the tail of the one ahead of him, bore immense packs of merchandise on their backs; and between the houses prowled lean, villanous-looking dogs in search of something to eat or a chance to fight.

Inside of an hour Breeze and the captain had seen all they wanted to see of the city, and began to retrace their steps towards the landing. Just before they reached it they heard a great noise of shouting and laughter, and upon turning a corner they came upon a most comical sight.

Surrounded by a crowd of men, women, children, ponies, and dogs stood Nimbus, who was evidently the greatest curiosity these Icelanders had seen in many a day. He had stopped to examine one of the ridiculous little Iceland ponies that appear to be more than half mane and tail. Its owner thought he wanted to buy it, and had tried to tell the stranger what a splendid, strong animal it was. Somehow Nimbus gathered an idea of what he was saying, and, to show his utter contempt for such a specimen of horse-flesh, he had suddenly thrown his great arms about the little beast and lifted it from the ground, kicking, squealing, and trying to bite. Other horse-traders had hurried to the spot, dragging their ponies after them, and a crowd had quickly collected to stare at the black man who could carry a horse.

Finally Nimbus seized and lifted from the ground a pony with a man on his back, at which feat the crowd roared with delight. Suddenly the struggling pony screamed out,

“Wow! wow! put me down, or I’ll kick you!”

Nimbus dropped him like a hot coal, the man on his back tumbled off in affright, and the crowd scattered from about the marvellous beast as though he had been a roaring lion.

“Come, Nimbus, let’s get back to the schooner,” said Captain Coffin, who had slipped up behind him; and, turning, the black man now for the first time noticed Breeze, and understood how the pony had been gifted with the power of speech.

They hurried away without explaining the wonder to the bewildered natives, and probably to this day that pony is regarded with awe and veneration as having once opened his mouth and talked.

Three days after this, Reykjavik had been left far behind, and the _Fish-hawk_ was sailing over the stormy waters that wash the desolate northern shore of the island. This was where Captain Coffin had supposed the halibut, or “spraka,” as the Icelanders call them, would be found, but thus far there was no sign of them. In order to search the ground thoroughly, he decided to drop dories at intervals of about a mile apart, and give those in them an opportunity to fish with hand-lines, by which means he hoped some feeding-ground of the halibut might be discovered.

Near each dory was left an anchored buoy, bearing a flag with a number painted on it, and each crew was instructed to fish in a circle about its buoy, but on no account to lose sight of it. As the schooner sailed away the skipper carefully noted the bearing of each of these flags, and the distance between it and the next one, so that there might be no difficulty in returning to it.

Breeze and Nimbus were in the first dory thus left, and the flag on their buoy was marked No. 1. In less than three hours after they had been dropped, the _Fish-hawk_ returned to pick them up. All the other dories had been sighted as she came back, and the crews of two of them were catching fish hand over hand. The buoy bearing flag No. 1 was easily found, but to the dismay and distress of Captain Coffin and old Mateo, who were the only ones left aboard the schooner, no trace of the dory to which it belonged, nor of its occupants, was to be seen.