95 



OLAFSEN AND POVELSENS 



appear before them ; they were asked, why they quitted their" 

 sepuchres to torment the living with similar questions put 

 in all due pomp ; after which sentence being pronounced upon 

 them, they disappeared for ever. Although this account can 

 only be considered as a fable, or reverie, the result derivable 

 from it is, that a single man of genius and good sense may easily 

 destroy the most rooted prejudices of the ignorant. 



VOYAGES IN THE WESTFIOfiD. 



Our travellers being obliged to regulate their conduct accord- 

 ing to time and circumstances, made several voyages in the West- 

 fiord, and took notice of a variety of tracts of country along the 

 shore, as well as of some little islands, almost unknown to 

 foreign navigators ; but which, being mostly barren and uninha- 

 bited, afforded nothing worthy of particular remark, except 

 two Glaciers, the Glaama and the Drange, which are of a 

 prodigious height and extent. The former is situated in the dis- 

 trict of Isefiord, and runs in a southerly direction ; while the 

 latter reposes on the top of a mass of rocks, between the districts 

 ef isefiord and Bardestrand. It takes its rise from a great chain of 

 mountains, that form a ridge near the land of Trochyllis,, 

 run in a direct line to those of Skorar, and are twelve miles in ex- 

 tent by six in breadth, some of these mountains are 300 feet in 

 height, and others upwards of 500, as were ascertained by ad- 

 measurement, though to the view they appear much higher. 



The district of Dale, a bailiwick in the Westfiord, which con- 

 tains" seven tribunals of justice, fourteen churches and six 

 parishes, is, incontrovertibly, the finest and best in Iceland. 

 Next to this is the Reykholt-Sveit, which contains a number of 

 the largest and most remarkable boiling springs in the western 

 quarter of Iceland. We proceeded thither to ascertain their de- 

 gree of heat, and to observe, whether salt water was not conveyed 

 thither, and evaporated, as the sea is at no great distance ; and 

 it is not easy to find so convenient a situation for this effect. 

 We stopped at three springs near the farm of Reykholt, which 

 rise from a hillock about forty feet in height : the water issues 

 from numerous veins in a kind of rock ; and the inhabitants fre- 

 quent these springs for domestic purposes. The principal of the 

 three, called Krablande, has a reservoir only two feet in diame- 

 ter, which is in a compact rock, and from which the boiling 

 water issues to the height of four feet, making the air resound 

 with a harsh and disagreeable noise i it sometimes rises to a 

 greater elevation ; but the people, in order to cook their victuals 

 more conveniently, have thrown a quantity of stones into the 

 basin, which obstruct the apertures. In these springs they 



