WE START. 
77 
a good idea, but whether I can contrive to draw for you 
anything like a comprehensible picture of the shape 
and nature of the Almannagja, the Hrafnagja, and the 
lava vale, called Thingvalla, that lies between them, 
I am doubtful. Before coming to Iceland I had read 
every account that had been written of Thingvalla 
by any former traveller, and when X saw it, it ap¬ 
peared to me a place of which I had never heard; 
so I suppose I shall come to grief in as melancholy 
a manner as my predecessors, whose ineffectual pages 
whiten the entrance to the valley they have failed to 
describe. 
Having superintended—as I think I mentioned to 
you in my last letter—the midnight departure of the 
cook, guides, and luggage, we returned on board for 
a good night’s rest, which we all needed. The start 
was settled for the next morning at eleven o’clock, 
and you may suppose we were not sorry to find, on 
waking, the bright joyous sunshine pouring down 
through the cabin sky-light, and illuminating the white- 
robed, well-furnislied breakfast-table with more than 
usual splendour. At the appointed hour we rowed 
ashore to where our eight ponies—two being assigned 
