250 
REYKHOLT. 
us when we. reached a firm and level country of 
barren and broken rock to travel with little in¬ 
terruption at a very quick pace. The first object 
worthy of notice which we passed was an exten¬ 
sive fresh-water lake, in the centre of which was 
a small grassy island, where the Tatsroed in¬ 
formed me grew a Scotch fir (Pinus sylvestris), 
diminutive indeed in size, but the only one that 
was ever seen in Iceland. There was no boat on 
the water, by means of which I might myself 
have ascertained this fact, and the distance from 
the shore was too great for me to be positive how 
far a little dark spot which I could discern was 
really the fir in question, or, indeed, a tree of 
any kind. Some future naturalist may, perhaps, 
have the opportunity of visiting the little island, 
and learning the truth of a story, which I believe 
the Tatsroed only knew from the report of the 
natives, who are said to have remarked the tree 
for very many years. Not far from this lake we 
passed a large heap of stones, much resembling 
a Scotch cairn, concerning which, Icelandic his¬ 
tory is silent, but tradition relates that it covers the 
remains of some unknown ancient warrior. Our 
course was nearly north-east, and sometimes close 
by the banks of the broad river Hvitaa # which, 
* This must not be confounded with the stream which 
bears the same name, and runs near the Geysers from the 
lake Hvitaa-vatn. 
