The customary Icelandic ceremony of saluting
each individual, not even excluding
the servants, was here a matter of some time,
but this being at length gone through, we
entered the house, and, after a few cups of
coffee, soon found ourselves seated before
a dinner of roasted meat, sago-jelly, and
waffels. The country round Hvamore,
which is flat and swampy, produces but
little that is interesting to the botanist. A
Carex, however, which grows here in the
greatest profusion, deserves particular notice,
on account of its utility to the Icelandic
farmer. During the course of our ride in
the morning, the Etatsroed had pointed out
the foliage of the plant in many places, and
assured me that it was found the most useful
of all the indigenous gramineous tribe; for
that it made excellent hay, and the sheep
and cows afforded a more copious supply
of milk from being fed in pastures where it
was abundant. At Hvamore, acres of ground
were uninterruptedly covered with it, and I
was here enabled to collect many specimens
in flower, and to satisfy myself that it was
a species with which I was unacquainted,
though approaching very nearly in habit to
C. stricta, from which it differs essentially
in being much smaller in all its parts, and
in having the spikes remarkably drooping.
I had before observed the same plant near
Reikevig, and in the neighborhood of Skal-
holt, but in neither of these places did it
flourish so luxuriantly or abound so much as
here, where, as just mentioned, the pastures
were almost entirely composed of it, and
a number of people were now employed
in cutting it, and converting it into hay.
Another meal nearly similar to the preceding
ones concluded the feasting of the day: a
thing that would scarcely deserve to be
noticed, but for the sake of observing that
it was the fourth time in the course of the
twelve hours that I sat down to a hot roasted
joint of meat: first, when we breakfasted at
Inderholme, then at the Sysselman’s house
at Leera, and now twice at Hvamore. Each
repast, too, was preceded by a glass of rum,
and concluded by coffee and chocolate, as
well as often by tea.
Thursday, After breakfast, the Amptman
August 3. anc|i Etatsroed, with their two
sons and myself, set out for Reykholt, taking
VOL. I X