a
very comical appearance, being perfectly naked on one side, while on the
other it is still covered with wool.

The horses and cows are considerably smaller than those of our country.
No one need journey so far north, however, to see stunted cattle.
Already, in Galicia, the cows and horses of the peasants are not a whit
larger or stronger than those in Iceland. The Icelandic cows are further
remarkable only for their peculiarly small horns; the sheep are also
smaller than ours.

Every peasant keeps horses. The mode of feeding them is, as already
shewn, very simple; the distances are long, the roads bad, and large
rivers, moorlands, and swamps must frequently be passed; so every one
rides, both men, women, and children. The use of carriages is as totally
unknown throughout the island as in Syria.

The immediate vicinity of Reikjavik is pretty enough. Some of the
townspeople go to much trouble and expense in sometimes collecting and
sometimes breaking the stones around their dwellings. With the little
ground thus obtained they mix turf, ashes, and manure, until at length a
soil is formed on which something will grow. But this is such a gigantic
undertaking, that the little culture bestowed on the spots wholly
neglected by nature cannot be wondered at. Herr Bernhoft shewed me a
small meadow which he had leased for thirty years, at an annual rent of
thirty kreutzers. In order, however, to transform the land he bought
into a meadow, which yields winter fodder for only one cow, it was
necessary to expend more than 150 florins, besides much personal labour
and pains. The rate of wages for peasants is very high when compared
with the limited wants of these people: they receive thirty or forty
kreutzers per diem, and during the hay-harvest as much as a florin.

For a long distance round the town the ground consists of stones, turf,
and swamps. The latter are mostly covered with hundreds upon hundreds of
great and small mounds of firm ground. By jumping from one of these
mounds to the next, the entire swamp may be crossed, not only without
danger, but dry-footed.

In spite of all this, one of these swamps put me in a position of much
difficulty and embarrassment during one of my solitary excursions. I was
sauntering quietly along, when suddenly a little butterfly fluttered past
me. It was the first I had seen in this country, and my eagerness to
catch it was proportionately great. I hastened after it; thought