HISTORY OF ICELAND. 



97 



to be distending. Dreadful cramps forced the patient to strange contortions. 

 The gums loosened, the decomposed blood oozed from the mouth and the ulcer- 

 ous skin, and a few days of torment and prostration were followed by death. 



In many a secluded vale whole families were swept away, and those that es- 

 caped the scourge had hardly strength sufficient to bury the dead. 



So great was the ruin caused by this one eruption that in the short space of 

 two years no less than 9336 men, 28,000 horses, 11,461 cattle, and 190,000 

 sheep — a large proportion of the wealth and population of the island — were 

 swept away. 



After this dreadful catastrophe followed a long period of volcanic rest, for 

 the next eruption of the Eyjafialla did not take place before 1821. A twelfth 

 eruption of Kotlugja occurred in 1823, the twenty-sixth of Hecla in 1845-46 ; 

 and ultimately the thirteenth of Kotlugja in 1860. Since then there has been 

 repose ; but who knows what future disasters may be preparing beneath those 

 icy ridges and fields of snow of Skapta and his frowning compeers, where no 

 human foot has ever wandered, or how soon they may awaken their dormant 

 thunders ? 



Besides the sufferings caused by the elements, the curse of monopoly 

 weighed for many a long year upon the miserable Icelanders. The Danish 

 kings, to whom on the amalgamation of the three Scandinavian monarchies the 

 allegiance of the people of Iceland was passively transferred, considered their 

 poor dependency as a private domain, to be farmed out to the highest bidder. 

 In the 16th century the Hanseatic Towns purchased the exclusive privilege of 

 trading with Iceland; and in 1594 a Danish company was favored with the 

 monopoly, for which it had to pay the paltry sum of 16 rix-doUars for each of 

 the ports of the island. 



In the year 1862 a new company paid 4000 dollars for the Icelandic mo- 

 nopoly ; but at the expiration of the contract, each of the ports were farmed out 

 to the highest bidder — a financial improvement which raised the revenue to 

 16,000 dollars a year, and ultimately to 22,000. The incalculable misery pro- 

 duced by the eruption of the Skaf)ta had at least the beneficial consequence 

 that it somewhat loosened the bonds of monopoly, as it now became free to 

 every Danish merchant to trade with the island; but it is only since April, 1855, 

 that the last restrictions have fallen and the ports of Iceland been opened to 

 the merchants of all nations. It is to be hoped that the beneficial effects of 

 free trade will gradually heal the wounds caused by centuries of neglect and 

 misfortune ; but great progress must be made before Iceland can attain the de- 

 gree of prosperity which she enjoyed in the times of her independence. 



Then she had above a hundred thousand inhabitants, now she has scarcely 

 half that number ; then she had many rich and powerful families, now medioc- 

 rity or poverty is the universal lot ; then she was renowned all over the North 

 as the seat of learning and the cradle of Hterature, now, were it not for her re- 

 markable physical features, no traveller would ever think of landing on her 

 rugged shores. 



7 



\ 



