262 Mh. MACKiyiiAi's Xotes of a Visit to Iceland. 



exceeding 198°. The play of light on the walls of the pool at all hours 

 of the day and night is most exquisite. It is hardly right, however, to 

 speak of night at a season of the year when the glow of the rising sun 

 is merely a continuation of the setting. The water shelves for three 

 or four feet under the silicious covering of the south side of the pool, 

 and then dips down into an abyss which makes one almost shudder to 

 look into. Last century Blssi was an erupting spring, but an earth- 

 quake silenced it. 



The most of the springs are at some distance from Blesi, at the very 

 bottom of the hill. Here they lie so close together that one cannot 

 help feeling at first as if the whole ground were cavernous. All the 

 ovei-flowing springs are clear as crystal ; but a few which boil without 

 overflowing are tinged of a grayish white. Near one of the smaller 

 openings there is a hidden pool whose violent boiling imparts a con- 

 stant vibratory motion to the earth above it. Indeed, in walking about 

 among those springs, one treads almost instinctively with cautious 

 steps ; for here and there the water underlies a crust of earth so thin, 

 that one fears being precipitated into the gulf below. All the springs 

 which I tested, save one, had an alkaline reaction, and gave out more 

 or less sulphuretted hydi'ogen. (The paper was illustrated by speci- 

 mens of the mineral products of the country, and by articles of dress 

 worn by the people.) 



