parents, there is a small Cathedral, a Latin School containing 90 students; a small archæological Museum in the Cathedral, a public Library also in the Cathedral, numerous warehouses full of dried fish, and a few shops kept by Danes.

On the morning of Thursday, August 15th, we started at 10 a.m. for Thingvellir. The temperature in the shade at Reykjavik at 9 a.m. was 13 R. 61.25 Fah. Our cavalcade consisted of 34 ponies, a chief guide named Zöega, who had the management of the whole affair; four men to look after the ponies, unload the luggage, raise the tents, and so on; a cook without whom we should have been literally nowhere; and six of ourselves. We each had a spare pony, which we rode during the second half of the day's journey. Tents were already waiting for us at the Geysirs, and some additional stores at Hruni on the way to Hekla. The other ponies carried our baggage either in oblong boxes, or in waterproof bags; also provisions in the form of tinned meats, flour for bread, sugar, coffee, whisky, and so on. For a short distance we had a made road along which we scampered as fast as we could go; then the small river Laxa was forded, and we halted at 12.30 p.m. at Middalurge Farm to rest the ponies, and to lunch. They gave us some rye bread and butter, and capital coffee and cream. During the afternoon the road became very rough, and we passed through a country covered with masses of lava, forded a river a good many times, and finally entered upon a region of old moss-grown lava, which continued until we found our. selves on the brink of the Almannagjá—the great eastern volcanic rift at Thingvellir. Here we dismounted, and led our ponies down a steep causeway to the bottom of the valley, and then having forded the Oxará, we found ourselves at our quarters for the night-the Church at Thingvellir. Our journey terminated at 5.30 p.m The distance from Reykjavik is 24 geographical miles as the crow flies, and by the only available route 35 miles. We had pushed over some of the rough country at a pace which astonished all of us, some of it country across which you would not dare to take an English horse. The best sort of Iceland ponies are very sure footed and very fast; they climb like goats, swim swift and deep glacier rivers, pick their way over morasses, and gallop up hill, and down hill, and over stony grounds.

On our arrival, the priest of Thingvellir appeared and handed over to us the key of his Church. Churches are commonly used throughout Iceland as sleeping quarters; the library of the hamlet, and some of the priest's stores are often kept in them The Thingvellir Church, which is larger than some which we afterwards saw, is a tarred wooden structure, having three windows on each side. It is 24 feet long, 15 feet broad, and 7 feet high under the gallery (a mere loft), and 12 feet high in the rest of the building.

The wooden pulpit is dated 1683. It might contain 50 people. Two of us slept in the gallery, one in a hammock, and the rest on the floor; our beds were comfortable enough :-first a thick layer of new hay, then a waterproof sheet and a blanket, and a second blanket as a covering. Our dinner was cooked in the open air, over a fire constructed within a heap of stones. The cook, a black man who had been a ship's steward, proved a most handy fellow, wherever we might be he gave us capital soup for dinner, usually curry, and some kind of meat, and invariably good coffee and cream. Some of the best fritters I ever tasted were cooked over the forge fire of a smithy near Hekla; and some char which was caught in the Thingvellir lake was as delicately cooked as one could wish.

We spent the next day at Thingvellir:-a word which signifies the Plains of the Council, in allusion to the fact that the Iceland Parliament met here for several centuries. For some unaccountable reason most writers call the place Thingvalla-the genitive case.

It is declined:-N. Thingvellir

G. Thingvalla

D. Thingvöllum

The "American in Iceland," after acknowledging this, goes on throughout the whole of the chapter calling it Thingvalla.

The great volcanic chasm called the Almannagja is about 4 miles in length, and runs from the Thingvellir lake to Armannsfell, a parallel fissure called the Hrafnagja, 4 miles distant, runs along the other side of the valley, and the inclosed ground is more than 100 feet below the surrounding lava plains. The whole valley appears to have sunk during some volcanic eruption from Skaldbreid, a volcano in the vicinity. The "American in Iceland," after committing the most extraordinary errors as to distances, positions, and areas, speaks of Thingvellir as "the grandest and most awful scenery in Iceland, and probably unsurpassed in beauty, which may be called diabolic, anywhere on the globe." Burton says "This morning we spent in prospecting the humble wonders of Thingvellir."

The true estimate is probably to be found between these extremes. A man who has been all over the world like Burton, depreciates everything which is not very wonderful. A traveller who has ascended Chimborazo or Aconcagua calls Mont Blanc a mole hill, and the Rhine is a rivulet when compared with the Amazous or the Missisippi. The wonders of Thingvellir are to our mind by no means "humble," at the same time the scenery does not surpass that which one meets with, between Fairhead and the Giant's Causeway. In addition to the major volcanic chasms, the Almannagjá, and the Hrafnagya, the ground about Thingvellir is traversed in all directions by minor rifts, the result of the same volcanic action. These vary from 20 feet

across, to a few inches. The larger ones are often perpendicular and of great depth, and at the bottom is seen clear blue water, the product of some distant jökull. The Parliament of Iceland met for several hundred years at Thingvellir, on an oval raised space called the Logberg or Hill of Laws, surrounded on all sides by deep volcanic crevasses containing water.

Saturday, August 17th. Got up at half-past five, a warm sunny morning, walked towards the S.E. as far as the Thingvellir Lake, the largest mass of water in the Island, 15 miles long by 6 wide. The volcanic rifts could in many instances be traced as far as the lake, and the lava could be seen at the edges of the lake and beneath its surface in a crudely columnar form. It is believed by some writers that the sunk and fissured Thing Valley was produced by a great stream of lava from Skaldbreid, which hardened on the surface, while it continued to flow as in a kind of tunnel beneath, until a quantity of it found its way into the lake, and that afterwards when the supply from the Volcano ceased, the upper layers of the stream fell in and formed the present gigantic valley.

The

Here

We breakfasted at 8.30, and started for the Geysirs at 9.40 a.m. rest of the valley was very rough and our progress was slow. We crossed the middle crevasse called Háflagjá, and later on the eastern crevasse, the Hrafnagyá. Then we passed over a quantity of old lava, and at length at 12 15 p.m. halted in the Laugarvatn valley to rest the horses; after a short halt we again started, and reached a large farm on the shores of the Langarvatn at 1.30 p.m. Several boiling alkaline geysirs were visible just below the farm house, at the edge of the lake, and dense clouds of steam arose from them. Hot springs were also visible on the other side of the lake. After luncheon, and a short rest, we made our way across a stream which flows into the Laugarvatn, and at 4 20 we reached the Bruárá River. we found a sort of rapids: the water was swiftly rushing over a bed of lava, and pouring down a deep volcanic crevasse in the middle of the river. Having crossed the shallow portion of the rapids we found a narrow bridge of wet planks, across the crevasse, over which the ponies readily passed. Hekla soon after came into view, and the western snow fonds were distinctly visible. Then we passed through some very bare country, between black volcanic hills devoid of vegetation, and after some very rapid riding we sighted Laugarfjall, then a tract of low spongy morass was traversed, a rivalet crossed, and the Lang Farm was directly above us. A few minutes later (6 p.m) we saw the steaming geysir fields, and the welcome sight of our tent with the Union Jack flying in the evening breeze. The total distance from Thingvellir as the crow flies is 261 geographical miles, and by the necessary route no less than 40 statute miles,-a hard day's work over this rough country.