46 ICEIAND. 



children, that the whole population are said to be very 

 efficiently educated. 



The Icelanders are true Scandinavians of the unmixed 

 sangre-bleu. They speak the pure Norse, from which 

 some 60 per cent, of our own language is derived. In 

 their honesty, truthfulness, hospitality, maritime enter- 

 prise, courage, and humble piety, we British are fain to 

 trace some of our most cherished national traits, and 

 from them undoubtedly we obtained our ideas of repre- 

 sentative parliaments, trial by jury, and other honoured 

 institutions. 



In manners, the Icelanders are quiet, subdued, and 

 contented. Music and dancing are said to be almost 

 unknown ; we certainly saw no evidence of either art 

 being practised. The long, dawnless winter nights, when 

 the sun is replaced by the pale reflection of the stars from 

 snow and ice, or the flashing coruscations of the Aurora 

 wandering from horizon to zenith in brilliant tints of 

 evanescent glory, must give a complexion to the thoughts 

 and dispositions as it moulds the habits and occupations 

 of men. 



So frigid and inhospitable a climate must cramp the 

 conception and harden the temperament. How different 

 are the external influences which surround the Icelander 

 from those affecting the Italian, Egyptian, or Indian ! And 

 yet that the grand scenes of the North are well fitted to 

 fire the imagination, and develop the more thoughtful 

 faculties, is well evinced in the Eddas and Sagas of the 

 many Icelandic writers. It is now well understood that 



