ICELAND. 
inclofures, with mofs fluffed between the pieces of lava. 
In fome houfes the walls are wainfcotted on the infide. 
The roof is covered with fods, laid over rafting, or fome- 
times over the ribs of whales; the walls are about three 
yards high,and the entrance fomewhat lower. Inftead of 
glafs, the windows are made of the chorion and amnios 
of fheep, or the mepibranes which furround the womb of 
the ewe. Thefe are ftretched on a hoop, and laid over a 
hole in the roof. In the poorer fort ,of houfes they em¬ 
ploy for the windows the inner membrane of the ftomach 
of animals, which is lefs tranfparent than the others. 
As the ifland of Iceland produces- no kind of grain, 
the inhabitants of confequence have no bread but what is 
imported; and which, being too dear for conimon ufe, is 
referved for weddings and other entertainments. The 
common and ufual food, therefore, is frefh and dried fifh, 
milk, oatmeal, and fleih ; but they chiefly live on dried 
nth drefl'ed with butter. It is remarkable, that they eat 
all their provifions without fait. Their common beverage 
is milk, either warm from the cow or cold, and fome- 
times boiled; they like wile ufe butter-milk with or with¬ 
out water. On the coafls they generally drink blanda and 
lour milk ; which is fold after it is fkimmed at two-fifths 
of a rixdollar per calk ; fome likewife fend for beer from 
Copenhagen, and fome brew their own. A few of the 
principal inhabitants alfo have claret and coffee. The 
common people fometimes drink a kind of tea, which 
' they make from the leaves of the dryas ottopetala, and the 
veronica officinalis. 
On the coafls the men employ themfelves in fifhing, 
both fummer and winter. On their return home, when 
they have drawn and cleaned their fifh, they give them to 
their wives, whofe care it is to dry them. In the winter, 
■when the inclemency of the weatherprevents them from fifh¬ 
ing, they are obliged to take care of their cattle, and fpin 
wool. In fummer, they mow the gral's, dig turf, provide 
fuel, go in fearch of fheep and goats that were gone aftray, 
and kill cattle. They prepare leather with the fpiraca ul- 
maria inftead of bark. Some few' w’ork in gold and filver; 
and others are inftrudted in mechanics, in which they are 
tolerable proficients. The women prepare the fifh, take 
care of the cattle, manage the milk and wool, few, fpin, 
and gather eggs and down. When they work in the 
evening, they ufe, inftead of an hour-glafs, a lamp with 
a wick made of epilobium dipt in train oil, which is con¬ 
trived to burn four, fix, or eight, hours. 
Among the common ‘people of Iceland, time is not 
reckoned by the courfe of the fun, but by the work they 
have done, and. which is preferibed by law. According 
to this prefefiption, a man is to mow as much hay in one. 
day as grows on thirty fathoms of manured foil, or forty 
fathoms of land which haS not been manured; or he is to 
dig feven hundred pieces of turf eight feet long and three 
broad. If as much fnow falls as reaches to the horfes’ 
bellies, a man is required daily to clear a piece of ground 
fuftxcient for one hundred fheep. A woman is to rake 
together as much hay as three men can mow, or to weave 
three yards of wadmal a-day. 
The wages of a man are fixed at four dollars and twelve 
yards of wadmal; and thofe' of a woman at two dollars 
and five yards of wadmal. When men are fent a-fifhing 
out of the country, there is allowed to each man, by law, 
from the 25th of Septemberto the 14th of May, fix pounds 
of butter and eighteen pounds of dried fifh every week. 
. This may feem to be too great an allowance; but it mult 
be remembered that they have nothing elfe to live upon. 
When they are at home, and can get milk, &c. every man 
receives only five pounds of dried fifh and three quarters 
of a pound of butter a-week. 
The food and manner of life of the Icelanders by no 
means contribute to their longevity, It is very rare 
indeed to fee an inhabitant of Iceland exceed the age of 
fifty or fixty ; and the greater part are attacked by grievous 
d.ifeafes before middle age. Of thefe the feurvy and ele- 
phantiafis or leprofy are the work. They are alfo fubject 
727 
to the gout in their hands, owing to their frequent em¬ 
ployment in fifhing, and handling the wet fifhing-tackle 
in cold weather. St. Anthony’s fire, the jaundice, pleuri- 
fy, and lownefs of fpirits; are frequent complaints in this 
country. The fmall pox alfo is exceedingly fatal, and 
not long ago deftroyed 16,000 perfons. By thefe difeafes, 
and the frequent famines with which the country has been 
afflifled, the inhabitants are reduced to a much fmaller 
number than they formerly were, infomuch that it is com¬ 
puted they do not in all exceed 6o,ooo. 
The exports of Iceland confift of dried fifh, falted mut¬ 
ton and lamb, beef, butter, tallow;, train-oil, coarfe 
woollen cloth, flockings, gloves, raw wool, fbeep-fkins, 
lamb-fkins, fox-furs of various colours, eider-down, fea¬ 
thers, and formerly fulphur; but there is no longer a de¬ 
mand for this mineral. On the other hand, the Icelanders 
import timber, fifhing lines and hooks, tobacco, bread, 
horfe-fhoes, brandy, wine, fait, linerr, a little filk, and a 
few other neceflaries, as well as fuperfluities for the better 
fort. The whole trade of Iceland is engrofled by a mo¬ 
nopoly of Danes, indulged with an exclufive charter. 
This company maintains factories at all the harbours of 
Iceland, where they exchange their foreign goods for the 
merchandife of the country; and, as the balance is in fa¬ 
vour of the Icelanders, pay^the overplus in Danifli mo¬ 
ney, which is the only current coin in this ifland. All 
their accounts and payments are adjulled according to the 
number of fifh ; two pounds of fifh are worth two fhil- 
lings in fpecie, and forty-eight fifh amount to a rixdollar. 
A Danifh crown is computed at thirty fifh ; what falls 
under the value of twelve fifh cannot be paid in money ; 
but mud be bartered either for fifh or roll-tobacco, an eiS 
of which is equal to one filh. The weights and meafures- 
of the Icelanders are nearly the fame with thofe uled in 
Denmark. 
The Icelanders being neither numerous 1 nor warlike, 
and altogether unprovided with arms, ammunition, gar- 
rifons, or fleets, (though, while an independent republic, 
they had fhips which traded to all parts of the world,) 
are in* no condition to defend themfelves from invafion, 
but depend entirely on the protefilion of his Danifh ma~ 
jelly, to whom they are fnbjedl. The revenues which he 
draws from this ifland confift of the income of divert 
ellates, as royal demefne,-amounting to about 8000 dollars 
per annum ; of the money paid by the company for an 
exclufive trade, to the value of 20,000 dollars; and of a 
fixed proportion in the tithes of fifh paid in fome parti¬ 
cular diftrifts. 
Iceland is noted for the volcanoes with which it abounds, 
and which feem to be more furious than any yet difeo- 
vered in the other parts of the globe. Indeed, from the 
lateft accounts, it would feem as if this miferable country 
were little other than one continued volcano. Mount 
Hecla has been commonly fuppofed to be the only burn¬ 
ing mountain, or at lealt the principal one, in the ifland. 
It has indeed been more taken notice of than many others 
of as great extent, partly from its having had more fre¬ 
quent eruptions than any lingle one, and partly from its 
fituation, which expofes it to the fight of fhips failing to 
Greenland and North America. It is fituated in the 
fouthern part of the ifland, about twenty miles from the 
fea, above which it rifes 50c 'o feet. The fummit is co¬ 
vered with fnow, except about the numerous craters, 
where the heat predominates. On the high eft point, in 
one of thofe hot fituations, where Fahrenheit’s thermome¬ 
ter was at 24 in the air, it rofe to 153 when placed on 
the ground. The eruptions from Hecla itfelf have not 
been numerous : there were only ten from the year 1104. 
to 1693, after which it remained quiet till *766, when it 
threw out flames and lava, ami committed ten 1 !e devaf- 
tations, fome of the matter being thrown to the diflance 
of 150 miles, and a circuit of nearly fury was laid wafle 
by the burning lava. But in'a lift of eruptions publifhed 
in the-Appendix to Pennant’s Arctic Zoology, it appears*, 
that out of fifty-one remarkable ones, only one third 
feavg 
