122 
LETTERS FROM HIGH LATITUDES. 
going off during my absence made me almost too fidgety 
to enjoy tliem. The weather luckily remained beauti¬ 
ful, with the exception of one little spell of rain, which 
came to make us all the more grateful for the sunshine, 
—and we fed like princes. Independently of the game, 
duck, plover, ptarmigan, and bittern, with which our 
own guns supplied us, a young lamb was always in the 
larder,—not to mention reindeer tongues, skier,—a kind 
of sour curds, excellent when well made,—milk, cheese 
whose taste and nature baffles description, biscuit and 
bread, sent us as a free gift by the lady of a neighbour¬ 
ing farm. In fact, so noble is Icelandic hospitality, that 
I really believe there was nothing within fifty miles 
round we might not have obtained for the asking, had 
we desired it. As for Fitz, he became quite the enfant 
gate of a neighbouring family. 
Having unluckily caught cold, instead of sleeping in 
the tent, he determined to seek shelter under a solid 
roof-tree, and conducted by our guide Olaf, set off on his 
pony at bedtime in search of an habitation. The next 
morning he reappeared so unusually radiant, that I could 
not help inquiring what good fortune had in the mean¬ 
time befallen him : upon which he gave me such an 
