when we quitted the strange but desert
scenery of this place. To myself, indeed,
the regret was no more than the
being deprived of the power of beholding
one of the most awfully impressive scenes
that the world can furnish, or even imaeina-
tion can conceive; but not so with my companion,
who had hoped that it might have
been possible to have met in the sulphur-
springs with an article of commerce that
might at once have been highly advantageous
to himself, and beneficial to his country,
but who now found to his extreme vexation
that, small as is the distance of Kreise-
vig from the sea, the obstacles interposed
by the nature of the intervening country
were Such as forbade the idea of a commercial
speculation. To have collected it in a
place where the population is so thinly scattered,
would have been attended with verv
great expence; and to have conveyed it
on horseback over so rocky a tract as lies
between Kreisevig and the nearest harbor*
would have been almost impossible; and I
therefore read with surprise, in Horrebow,
that early in the last century the gathering
and exporting of it were objects of considerable
advantage to the natives. Myvatn, in
the more northern part of the island, is said
to be almost the only place, except Kreisevig,
where this mineral is produced in any
considerable quantity. We were the more
vexed at being obliged to return, because the
incessant rain prevented our bringing away
any sketch of a spot, of which words can
give but a very inadequate idea, and which
is in itself alone a sufficient recompence to
a mind even the most incurious, for the fa--
tigues and privations necessarily attendant
upon the travelling about Iceland. On our
way back to Havnfiord, by the same route
as we went in the morning, the most interesting
occurrence to me was the meeting
with Parmelia sarmentosa on the rocks of
lava in some abundance. A little after midnight,
wet and weary, we reached Mr. Si vert-
Friday, sen’s house, and on the following
July 28- morning returned to Reikevig, with
our horses no less exhausted than ourselves,
and mine so lamed by the beds of Hraun,
that I was never after able to make use of
him.
Saturday, Having been informed that when
July 29. travelling, as I purposed to do,