The scene of desolation is quite indescribable: a vast trench between walls of rock and heaps of snow; the crags of great height and flat-topped, with bare precipices of green ice and snow resting on them, ready to topple over in avalanches with the least disturbing cause, and bury us under their ruins; here and there a cone of snow, which has thus shot to the bottom and has not yet begun to melt; now a smooth sweep of undinted whiteness rising to the Jökull top, or barred with black steps of rock glazed with frozen streams. Not a bird, nor insect, not a sound. I stood

Alone, for other creature in this place,
Living or lifeless, to be found was none.'

Paradise Lost.

In the foreground a cairn of rib and leg bones of horses, which have died of starvation in the pass, with a patch of turf about it as large as a horse-walk in a threshing-mill, the grass grey not green, and that the last sign of vegetation we are to see for many hours.

The bed of the vale has not even the flash or tinkle of a rivulet to relieve its hushed monotony. The snow melts, and is absorbed into the spongy ground. Shoulder on shoulder of snow, buttress on buttress of rock, swell on swell of avalanche rubble for us to toil over; here and there the skeleton of a poor horse which has fallen lame and died before it could reach herbage. It was indeed an awe-inspiring scene among these Jökulls locked in everlasting stillness, folded in a white veil never to be raised till the crack of doom.

"The palaces of Nature, whose vast walls
Have pinnacled in clouds their snowy scalps,
And throned eternity in icy halls

Of cold sublimity, where forms and falls

The avalanche-the thunderbolt of snow!"
Childe Harold.

Two parties had traversed the dale this year before us, and one had left his best horse hopelessly lamed; and the other— the postman-had lost his way, and had been nearly driven to

cut the throats of some of his horses to spare them a lingering death by famine.

I waited at the cairn, wrapped in my Franciscan cloak, till the rest came up.

This is the Beinakerling (pronounced Bayna-kedling), or old woman of bones," said Grímr. "Every traveller is bound to write a message of God speed' for the next person who traverses this pass, and secure it in one of the bones of the heap."

We complied with the custom, and, after drinking a bumper to the Queen and to the "Old Folks at Home," dashed into the scene of desolation before us, in pursuit of the sumpter horses now crawling over a neck of rubble a mile ahead. Half way through this wilderness is a dark headland of tufa, the Hádografell, pronounced How-daigra-fedtl, or Half-day mountain; it flanks a noble and picturesque trachyte Jökull, whose pale ashen hue contrasts with the blackness of the tufa around. This is Thorishöfthi, and is believed to mask the mysterious glen.

The sky gradually became overcast, and we were afraid of the clouds descending upon the snow and enveloping us, but we were fortunate. A wildly beautiful scene opened on us now the glorious heap of Eireks Jökull, an isolated rounded head of snow supported on abrupt scarps, and looking something like a bride-cake; beyond this a blue horizon with water-specks flashing on it, the Arnarvatn-heithi with its network of countless lakes, over which our course was to lie in a few days. Still onward we pushed over soft earth, and through sludgy snow, whose crust had broken through in several places, and disclosed ugly pits ready to engulph us should the snow not support our weight; up a desperate stair of rock with blocks of glistening obsidian and cakes of amygdaloid, strewn on either side and under foot. Still more snow as we scrambled over a spur of Ok glacier, and then with a shout of joy we hail a wintry flake of turf; our horses break into a canter, the dog leaps about us joyously barking, and the pipe of the plover relieves the ear which has tired

with a stillness so oppressive, that few of us had been in spirits to speak, during the many hours in the cold dale.

But we were not at the end of our journey yet; we had two hours more fast riding and two rivers to cross, one of the hue of milk and water from the amount of unmelted snow it swept along with it. This was separated from the other river by a monotonous tract of volcanic sand and cinder, sprinkled with a minute rhododendron.

At eleven o'clock we reached Kalmanstúnga, and partook of an excellent supper off rice-milk, stirred with the instrument used in poking the fire, and lake trout. I was in especial glee, as my fever had left me suddenly in Kaldidalr.

The next day was so rainy that we were obliged to remain at Kalmanstúnga. Mr. Martin was glad of the opportunity for skinning his birds and preparing them for the taxidermist.

On the second day, June 15th, we started for Little Arnarvatn, intending to visit Surtshellir on the way. This cavern has been so frequently visited and described, that I have no heart for writing a fresh account of it. It has been investigated by Olafsen and Povelsen, by Henderson, by Capt. Forbes, by M. Preyer and Dr. Zirkel, and by Mr. Holland. Suffice it to say, that its interest has been much overrated. It consists of a chain of air bubbles in the lava, the top of two of which have fallen in; out of these branch tunnels, one of which served long ago as hall and cubicle for a robber gang, another as a receptacle for the bones of cattle. stolen from neighbouring farmers. These bones still remain in great numbers.

The band was destroyed through the treachery of a young man of the party, who led the armed bonders upon the robbers as they lay asleep in the sun on the side of a turfy split in the lava, some way off.

All the rogues were killed except Eirek, who, having had one foot cut off, escaped by running like a wheel with hands and foot, just in the manner of street urchins, till he reached the jökull, which he climbed, and then vanished among its

snows. Many years after, a ship came into the nearest fjord, commanded by a one-footed merchant. The cheap rate at which the goods were sold attracted the young man, among others, to the vessel. Scarcely was he on board, than the one-footed merchant shouted for the anchor to be raised and the sails to be set. The ship rolled out to sea, and neither youth nor merchant were seen or heard of again.

99

CHAPTER VI.

THE EAGLE TARNS.

Eiriks Jökull-Taxation-The Sheep's Disease-A Swan's-nest-LavaLose our Way-Camping-out-Glorious Scene-Cooking Arrangements -Rare Skua-Great Northern Diver-Storm on the Heithi-Gunnarssonarvatn―The Great Eagle Tarn-Desert-Hólma-kvísl.

WE were now approaching that desert tract which Captain Forbes says is only to be traversed if a sufficient supply of hay is taken for the horses. This is not quite correct; but grass is certainly scarce, and we were warned that it would be impossible for us to halt at the Great Eagle tarn (Arnarvatn, pronounced Atnarvat), as there was no herbage there for the horses.

We were, therefore, now bound for the Lesser Eagle lake, where the farmer of Kalmanstúnga assured us we should find enough for our poor brutes to crop. But as no one knew the way thither through the labyrinth of lakes, except himself, we were obliged to engage him as guide for a couple of dollars per diem. Messrs. Shepherd, Upcher and Fowler, had attempted to traverse the road by the great lake earlier in the year, but had been compelled to give it up, and cross to Efrinupr by the Wolf lake.

The road, a mere track, ascended continuously; we had to scramble over old curdled and plaited lava, sprinkled with the pale lemon-coloured stars of the Dryas octopetala. In many places the molten stone seemed to have been poured as treacle from a spoon, and then to have suddenly congealed.