TRAVELS IN ICELAND. 



55 



and often dangerous to travellers. There is an ancient law, 

 which expressly commands farmers to keep in summer their bulls 

 within inclosures, and which makes the owners responsible for 

 any damage that these animals may occasion, as well as for the 

 injury they may do to cows with calf. When they fatten their 

 oxen, they feed them upon hay of the best quality and finest 

 scent, taking care, that it is not heated, and often cutting it 

 into chaff. They feed them in the stable; and on fattening 

 young calves, they first give them pure milk, afterwards milk 

 and water, and lastly skim-milk. 



With respect to their management of sheep and other cattle, 

 there is nothing particularly worthy of notice. In the lambing- 

 season, which takes place about the middle of May, they keep 

 A\\e sheep in stables near the houses, till they have recovered ; 

 but the lambs require the greatest care to secure them from the * 

 attacks of wolves, foxes, ravens, and eagles. The eagle in par- 

 ticular, is their most dangerous enemy, and the greatest precau- 

 tion is necessary to protect the lambs from its violence, because 

 it hovers at a great height in the air, till an opportunity offers 

 for darting on its prey. As it suddenly falls upon the animal, 

 in an oblique direction, and fixing its talons in its reins, flies off 

 w ith it to a distance. The best method adopted by the shep- 

 herds, is to light fires in the fields of horn, wool, and other 

 fetid substances, in order to prevent the eagles from hovering in 

 the air. When a lamb is so weak as not to be able to follow 

 its mother, or when the dam has not milk enough to rear it^ 

 they take it into the house, and feed it on the milk of another 

 sheep or a cow, by means of a quill covered with leather to 

 resemble a teat. When a sheep loses its lamb the shepherd 

 adopts a singular piece of artifice ; he places the sheep in a 

 dark stall, and taking a lamb from another sheep which has 

 yeaned more than one, he puts it to her, when it generally 

 happens that she adopts it, without farther formality; but if the 

 contrary, he skins the dead lamb, and puts the skin over the one 

 intended as a substitute. If this last attempt do not succeed, 

 they hold a lamb near the sheep, and force it to suck. 



They milk the sheep like cows, regularly tw r ice in twenty-four 

 hours, and some of them afford a very considerable quantity : 

 the milk is made into butter and cheese, or it is eaten in various 

 ways. 



The Icelanders do not shear their sheep, but let the wool 

 fall off spontaneously, which occurs in spring when the atmo- 

 sphere begins to be warm. The first wool of these sheep is fine 

 and short, but at the beginning of winter, it becomes hard, long, 

 and knotty : it is used at Copenhagen for making garters of 

 various colours, where the greatest connoisseurs are deceived by 



