21 
1903-4.] Mr H. Annandale on the People of the Faroes. 
with a scorn of Shetlanders as intense as the Icelanders’ scorn of 
Faroemen, and it is worthy of note that the old dialect of Shetland, 
recently extinct, took a totally different line of development from 
that of the Faroes (8), though both sprang in the early Middle Ages 
from the old Horse, a language practically identical with the 
Icelandic of to-day. Young Faroe men and women who are 
anxious to make a little money still visit the west coast of Iceland 
during the fishing season, to help on the boats and with the pre- 
paration of salted fish, but the men rarely, if ever, bring home an 
Icelandic wife, and if a girl marries an Icelander she stays in 
Iceland. 
As I have frequently heard it hinted that the dark strain in the 
population of the Faroes, especially of Suderoe, is due either to 
casual intercourse with Breton fishermen or to the raids of the 
Barbary corsairs, it may be well to consider whether there can be 
any truth in either or both of these insinuations. With regard to 
the Bretons’ visits to the Faroes I have no information, but I have 
never heard it said that any of them settled in the islands; and 
the Faroe women are extremely modest, viewing the custom, so 
common in Iceland, of postponing marriage until a child is born or 
expected, with abhorrence. In Iceland, however, it is just possible 
that temporary connections formed between these foreign seamen 
and native women may have made dark complexions commoner in 
Beykjavik, as they certainly appear on casual inspection to be, 
than in the country districts, although, of course, a dark strain ex- 
isted among the vikings themselves, and still exists in parts of 
Horway where Bretons and Algerians alike have been unknown, 
whether as a remnant of the aboriginal population, as is very 
possible, or as a result of intermarriage in the ninth century or 
earlier between the Horse raiders and their Irish captives, is very 
hard to say ; probably its origin is mixed, perhaps even more 
mixed than has been suggested. 
As regards the Barbary corsairs, I am doubtful whether they 
ever raided the Faroes. There is a tradition, it is true, on Haalsoe 
to the effect that once, while all the men of that island were away 
at the fishing, the ‘ Turks ’ visited their homes and seized their 
women, but the women leapt into the sea from the ships to which 
they were hurried, and the ‘Turks’ cut off their breasts in the 
