328 On the Revolutions of Iceland^ Political and Natural, 



risk, must be encountered and destroyed ; and sometimes carry 

 along with them great quantities of wood, which suggest the 

 idea of moving forests ; a singular sight, which instantly sets 

 the imagination at work as to the origin of so strange a pheno- 

 menon. Most frequently these great trees appear along with 

 the glaciers, connected with them, but intertwined among 

 themselves ; and they are sometimes so compressed and fretted 

 the one against the other, that they actually take fire, and then 

 exhibit the extraordinary spectacle of a devouring flame in the 

 midst of the sparkling ice. Whence proceeds all this wood ? — 

 and in what region is it produced ? Some of it carries its fruit 

 along with it, and is thus recognised to be the product of 

 Mexico ; other portions of it come from Carolina and Virginia ; 

 others have descended the Mississippi, or have been conveyed 

 to the ocean by the St Lawrence, while still other portions 

 seem to have drifted from the Pacific, and, finally, from the 

 northern shores of Siberia. By what opposing powers have they 

 all been forced to this spot as a rendezvous ? Is it the shock 

 of adverse currents which has produced all the agitation ? And 

 have these agitations forced this wood from its original direc- 

 tion ? Again, are these currents constant or successive ? Are 

 they promoted by, or in opposition to the prevailing winds ? Re- 

 garding these trees, it is not to be denied that they are a great 

 advantage to Iceland, for they supply all the wood which it 

 contains. And as to the glaciers, they alone are sufficient to 

 maintain in sterility a country which has been otherwise so ex- 

 ceedingly impoverished ; and of all its grievous calamities, this 

 is, beyond doubt, the most frightful. It is, in truth, clearly 

 demonstrated, that if the culture of corn, the cerealia generally, 

 is no longer, as formerly, practicable in Iceland ; — if vegetation 

 is both rare and insignificant ; — if, instead of magnificent forests, 

 this island can now support only a few sterile and mongrel 

 herbs ; if, consequently, it is deprived of fruit, and even of ve- 

 getables, it is owing to the cold which extends from these 

 masses of congelation far over the land, keeping fast bound all 

 germination, and extinguishing all vitality. In the years 1753 

 and 1754, this cold was so extreme, that it killed all the horses, 

 and even the sheep, though in every way protected. 



But notwithstanding, in the midst of so many causes of ruin, 



