course was carried on between that country and Denmark, or Norway. In the year 1406, the last bishop was sent over to Greenland. Since then the colony has not been heard of; and its loss is attributed to the wars which took place at that time between the Danes and Swedes, which prevented the trading-vessels from putting to sea, and to the accumulation of vast shoals of ice around the coasts, by which they have been rendered totally inaccessible.

*

Different attempts have been made by order of the Danish government, to penetrate to the colony, but they have all proved unsuccessful; and some are of opinion, that no such colony ever existed on East Greenland, but that it was situate in the vicinity of the present Danish settlements on the western coast. Egede, however, is of the contrary opinion, and he had the best opportunities of forming a judgment on the subject. Of late, this impenetrable barrier of ice appears to have been broken, and vast masses have been carried away to the southward. The consequence has been, that the vessels which navigate the arctic seas, have penetrated much farther than usual, and have seen the ocean perfectly void of ice, between the 74 and 80 degrees of north latitude. † It would certainly prove highly interesting, both to the friends of humanity and of literature, were the expedition now fitting out from this country for those seas, to discover this ancient colony; and give us an account of the state of religion and science among them, after they have been shut out for so long a period of time from all intercourse with the rest of the world. That the descendants of the ancient colonists may still exist, although cut off from any supplies from Denmark, is rendered probable, by the circumstance, that in Egede's time, the barrier of ice, as far as he explored it, did not connect with the shore, but left a space of open water, in which the inhabitants might catch a sufficient quantity of fish for their support.

The fact that America also was first discovered by the

Icelanders, though less generally known, is perfectly well authenticated by the northern historians. Biarni Heriulfson, on a voyage from Iceland to Greenland, to visit his father, in the year 1001, was driven by a violent easterly gale into the Atlantic; and, after sailing several days, he discovered a fine woody country, in general flat, and only diversified by small heights, which rose into view upon the coast. Not being able to persuade his men to land, he proceeded with a south-west wind for Greenland, which he reached after a voyage of six days. The description which he gave of the country, some time after, excited the curiosity of Leif Eirikson, whose father had first taken possession of Greenland. This adventurer left Norway in a vessel navigated by thirtyfive men, and made first a country to the south-west of Greenland, which, from the description given of its icemountains, appears to have been Labrador. Leaving this inauspicious region, they proceeded southwards, till they came to the flat woody country discovered by Biarni; but as they wished to explore the coasts to a greater distance, they again set sail with a north-east wind, and came in two days to an island, separated by a strait from the continent. Having proceeded up this strait, they came to a fine fresh water lake, on the shore of which they built a habitation for their winter residence. The lake abounded with the finest salmon, and the grass retained its verdure, in a great mea sure, the whole winter. The days were more of an equal length than in Greenland or Iceland, the sun being nine hours above the horizon at the shortest day. One of his men, who was from the south of Germany, having discovered that grapes grew there spontaneously, Leif gave to the country the appropriate name of Vinland, or Vineland, and returned the following spring to Greenland.

The American Continent was afterwards visited by Thovald, a brother of Eirik's, who was killed in an engagement with the natives; and a colony of Norwegians was settled there in the course of time, and continued to trade with the natives for the period of nearly two centuries, after the country had been discovered.

The population of Iceland is supposed to have been much greater in former times than it is at present. Numbers of the inhabitants were carried off by the plague in the year 1402; and in the years 1707 and 1708, not fewer than 16,000 persons were cut off by the small-pox. * In the year 1801, at which time the last census was taken, the population amounted to 47,207; but is supposed since that time to have received an addition of at least 3000.

With respect to the personal appearance of the Icelanders, they are rather tall, of a frank open countenance, a florid complexion, and yellow flaxen hair. The women are shorter in proportion, and more inclined to corpulency than the men; but many of them would look handsome in a modern European dress. In youth, both sexes are generally of a very weakly habit of body, which is the necessary consequence of their want of proper exercise, and the poorness of their living; yet it is surprising what great hardships they are capable of enduring in after life. It is seldom any of them attain to a very advanced age: however, the females commonly live longer than the men. Owing to the nature of their food, their want of personal cleanliness, and their being often obliged to sit long in wet woollen clothes, they are greatly exposed to cutaneous diseases. They are also frequently attacked with obstinate coughs and pulmonary complaints, by which perhaps more are carried off annually than by any other disease.

It has been said, that, in general, the Icelanders are of a sullen and melancholy disposition; but, after paying the strictest attention to their appearance and habits, I must pronounce the statement inaccurate, and one which could only have been made by those who have had little or no intercourse with that people. On the contrary, I have been surprised at the degree of cheerfulness and vivacity which I found to prevail among them, and that not unfrequently under circumstances of considerable external depression and want. Their predominant character is that of unsuspecting

• Von Troil.

!

frankness, pious contentment, and a steady liveliness of temperament, combined with a strength of intellect and acuteness of mind seldom to be met with in other parts of the world. They have also been noted for the almost unconquerable attachment which they feel to their native island. With all their privations, and exposed, as they are, to numerous dangers from the operation of physical causes, they live under the practical influence of one of their common proverbs: Island er hinn besta land sem solinn skinnar uppá; "Iceland is the best land on which the sun shines."

In the persons, habits, and customs of the present inhabitants of Iceland, we are furnished with a faithful picture of those exhibited by their Scandinavian ancestors. They adhere most rigidly to whatever has once been adopted as a national custom, and the few innovations that have been introduced by foreigners are scarcely visible beyond the immediate vicinity of their factories. Their language, dress, and mode of life, have been invariably the same during a period of nine centuries; whilst those of other nations have been subjected to numerous vicissitudes, according to the diversity of external circumstances, and the caprices of certain leading individuals, whose influence has been sufficiently powerful to impart a new tone to the society in which they moved. Habituated from their earliest years to hear of the character of their ancestors, and the asylum which their native island afforded to the sciences, when the rest of Europe was immersed in ignorance and barbarism, the Icelanders naturally possess a high degree of national feeling, and there is a certain dignity and boldness of carriage observable in numbers of the peasants, which at once indicates a strong sense of propriety and independence.

The Icelandic is justly regarded as the standard of the grand northern dialect of the Gothic language. While the Swedish and Danish, and even the Norwegian, which is a kind of middle dialect, have been more or less subject to the influence of the Teutonic or German branch, that, originally spoken in Scandinavia, has been preserved in all its purity in Iceland. In the middle ages, it was known by the

name of Dönsk Tunga, or the Danish Tongue; the Icelanders at first called it Norrana, because they had brought it along with them from Norway, which name pretty much resembles that of Norns, or Norse, by which the corrupt dialect, spoken till within these few years in some parts of Orkney, has been designated; and, it was not till after it had ceased to be spoken on the continent, that it assumed the name of Icelandic. The remoteness of the island, and the little intercourse which its inhabitants have maintained with the rest of the world, have effectually secured the purity and originality of this ancient language; and it is a curious. fact, that while our ablest antiquaries are often puzzled, in endeavouring to decipher certain words and phrases in writings which date their origin only a few centuries back; there is not a peasant, nor indeed scarcely a servant girl in Iceland, who is not capable of reading with ease the most ancient documents extant on the island.

The early and successful application of the Icelanders to the study of the sciences, forms a perfect anomaly in the history of literature. At a period when the darkest gloom was spread over the European horizon, the inhabitants of this comparatively barren island, near the north pole, were cultivating the arts of poetry and history; and laying up stores of knowledge, which were not merely to supply posterity with data respecting the domestic and political affairs of their native country, but were also destined to furnish very ample and satisfactory information on a great multiplicity of important points connected with the history of other nations. To this a wonderful combination of circumstances proved favourable. The Norwegians, who first went over to Iceland, were sprung from some of the most distinguished families in the land of their nativity. They had been accustomed from their infancy to listen to the traditionary tale of the deeds of other years; they had frequented the public assemblies, where they saw the value and importance of knowledge; and, in the course of their numerous piratical expeditions and invasions, they had obtained an intimate acquaintance with the situation, politics, history, &c. of the