INTRODUCTION 5 



poetical ideas contained so large a kernel of observation 

 that our fathers may be said to have possessed a re- 

 markably clear conception of the true nature of thins^s. 

 How soberly and correctly they observed may best be 

 seen a couple of hundred years later in Kongespeilet 

 (" The Mirror of Kings "), the most scientific treatise of 

 our ancient literature, where it is said that " as soon as 

 one has traversed the greater part of the wild sea, one 

 comes upon such a huge quantity of ice that nowhere in 

 the whole world has the like been known. Some of the 

 ice is so fiat that it looks as if it were frozen on the sea 

 itself; it is from 8 to lo feet thick, and extends so far 

 out into the sea that it would take a journey of four 

 or more days to reach the land over it. But this ice 

 lies more to the northeast or north, beyond the limits 

 of the land, than to the south and southwest or 

 west. . . . 



" This ice is of a wonderful nature. It lies at times 

 quite still, as one would expect, with openings or large 

 fjords in it ; but sometimes its movement is so strong 

 and rapid as to equal that of a ship running before 

 the wind, and it drifts against the wind as often as 

 with it." 



This is a conception all the more remarkable when 

 viewed in the light of the crude ideas entertained by 

 the rest of the world at that period with regard to 

 foreign climes. 



The strength of our people now dwindled away, and 



