14 



OLAFSEN AND FOVELSEN's 



diameter. They are dressed by exposing them to the fire on a 

 flag-stone, and they will keep for a long time. 



On Sundays they have a few dishes extraordinary ; such as 

 gruel made from barley or buck-wheat boiled in milk, or 

 porrige, composed of milk and flour. Fat soup, meat stewed 

 in skim milk, and eaten with different sauces ; to which may 

 be added a variety of other ragouts, customary in the coun- 

 try. On the grand festivals of Christmas and Easter, they would 

 think themselves lost, if they did not all have smoked meat, 

 which they dress on the preceding evening. The peasant is not 

 much in the habit of salting his meat, but prefers pressing it, to 

 expel the superfluous juice ; he then leaves it for a couple of 

 days, that the remainder of the juice may dry up, and afterwards 

 hangs it in the chimney, eight or ten feet above the hearth. 

 Some travellers have asserted, that meat prepared in this way is 

 liable to spoil, but they are mistaken : it on the contrary keeps 

 better than that which is smoked in other northern countries, and 

 which is known by the name of Hamburgh beef. At Christmas 

 each family kills a fat sheep, which is eaten with a sauce com- 

 posed of milk gruel. The peasant never roasts his meat, but 

 always eats it with this kind of broth, when inclined to regale 

 himself. Besides the above-mentioned festivals, there are other 

 days devoted to feasting. After the harvest they consume in each 

 family what is called the fat lamb, or a sheep, if they have no 

 lamb. On Shrove Tuesday they are obliged to give their work- 

 men and servants as much smoked meat as they choose to take ; 

 on the next day meat is forbidden till Easter ; and during this 

 time they even avoid pronouncing its name. On Shrove-tide 

 evening they make a joke of tampering and inciting each other to 

 pronounce the word meat, because any person who says it loses 

 his portion on the following day. This abstinence appears to be 

 one of the remains of Catholicism. On the first summer's day, 

 which commonly falls on a Thursday, between the 18th and 25th 

 of April, they are obliged to regale all their people with fresh, and, 

 to them, delicate food, such as sausages, smoked mutton, fish^ 

 and fresh butter. 



In the parishes that are distant from the sea, they have various 

 other dishes, of which milk forms the basis, the difference of 

 which our travellers did not fail to observe, in their way through 

 the districts and cantons. It should be added, that some of the 

 peasantry are in very easy circumstances, and procure many fo- 

 reign luxuries ; but the poor inhabitants are proportionately nu- 

 merous, and indeed the great majority are obliged to subsist 

 upon what their own country affords. 



With respect to vegetables, Iceland in general is very poor. 

 A royal ordinance of 1749 enjoined all the inhabitants to culti- 



