Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1902-09-06
FROST AND FIRE LAND
The Charm: Of a Compare
lively Unknown Country.
III T,
SAILING An. MIDNIGHT
FIRST GLIMPSE OF ''THE FARoEs
AND PEOPLE"
Wonders of Volcanoes, Geysers and
Boiling Springs Seen in Per-
petual Daylight.
Copyright. 1902, by F. E. Clark

| Written for The Evening Star by Francis E. Clark
REYKNAVIK, Iceland, July -. 1902
| A terra incognita to most Americans is
| Iceland the land of perpetual summer day
| light; the land of the Saga and Edda of
| song and story, of Mortimer bold and dar-
| ing adyenturer the land of the explorer and
| pioneer; the land of the discoveries of
| America and her first settlers; the home Of
| the salmon and trout, of the grouse and
| wild swan; the land of glorious scenery and
| magnificent distances, of mountains and
volcano and geyser and boiling springs. In
| fact, when one begins to enumerate the at
| fractions Of Iceland he is liable to be drawn
| into sentences so long and involved to
| defy the rules of grammar and prosody.
| Yet this great round island of the arctic
| seas, though containing within its rocky
| wave-washed walls an epitome of all that
| the sportsman and tourist most prize is
| about as little known as Central Africa and
| more seldom visited by Americans than the
| heart of China.
| Is no direct communication between Amer
| lea and its parent island, as Iceland may
| be considered; for the occasional American
| fishing smack, whaler or storm bound
| schooner cannot be deemed direct in
| these days of steam.
| Those of us who wish to reach Iceland
! within a reasonable time limit, must cross
| to Liverpool or Glasgow and wait at I.eith
| for the little Danish steamer that once a
| fortnight. or therea bouts, at Irregular inter-
walls connects Iceland with the outer world
| Whoever undertakes the journey expect
| ing to enjoy it must love a spice Of adyen-
| ture, be willing to endure hardships with
| out grumbling, and be a tolerabiy good sail
| or, for the seas are rough the winds bos-
| ferrous and shrewd, and until you reach
| your journeys end mist and fog and rain
| are the order of the day.
But. provided one has learned how to put
| up with discomforts and to extract a rea-
! sonable amount of. sunshine from the Gu
! cumbers Of wet. slippery decks, impenetra-
| Bile fogs, permeating Scotch mists that
| drench one as surely If more slowly than d
| western cloudburSt; IL he Is an enthusiast
| for natural scenery in its sterner wilder
and grander forms; If he Is tired of the
monotonous round Of polished European wa
tering places andaclean-shaven Alpine pas
| lures, let him tufn his face northward to
| the land of forest and fire.
For my own part, L will gladly confess
| that l was not at5all sorry when my duties
| in connection with the Christian Endeavor
| movement called me to this remote and
unique island for few days and gave me
an opportunity to, see, these fresh fields and
| pastures new.
On a gray and drizzly day In July the
! little Laura, from Copenhagen, Of thou
SAND tons burden, cast off her hawsers
! from one, of the substantial piers of Leith
| and was soon feeling her way between the
| DOCKS. whose bridges swung wide open to
let her through, until at last she was Dob
| ping and curtseyingren the uneasy Firth
| or Forth. When she had passed the mouth
| or the Forth she turned north up the coast
| Of Scotland along the Aberdeenshire shore
The next morning the Laura passed the
Orkneys to the west ward and later in the
| DAY the Shetland Islands to the east, thus
| leaving the last of King Edwards domin-
! ions behind her sailing straight away Tor
| the dom aims of King Christian of Denmark
" oh onl,n
sailed into the harbOr of Trangisvaag the
| port of the most southerly of the Farce
Islands, forty-two hours after leaving
| Leith.
First Glimpse Of the Faroes
| Even less known than Iceland are The
| Faroes, the halfway islands to their big
| brother of the north, but they are well
| worth knowing For wilder and more TO-
mantle scenery or for more primitive I'M
| spoiled people one would search the world
| in vain. There are twenty-seven islands
In the Farce group, of which seventeen are
! inhabited by man and the rest only by wild
| sheep or goats, curlews, terms, gulis and
DUCKS. In all these islands there are per-
| haps 1909 inhabitants, the largest town
| being Thorshavn, with as many hundreds
| of people perhaps as there are thousands
In the whole group.
For the most part the Farce Islands
strlKe one as barren and inhospftable rocks
| iiSdseu up from Inc QepLnS OF a reluctant
| ocean, which still beats and batters them
| Gay and night with ceaseless surf and with
| frequent storms tries to submerge them and
| clalm them for its own again. ..
In many places the hills seemed to be
made OF the same curious basahic rocks
| that abound in Staffa and Iona, and, as
| they are piled up In straight and regular
| columns, look like the pipes Of a huge
| organ.
In all the islands not a tree is to be seen
| except few hardy and stunted naples in
| a sheltered garden in Thorshavn. The
| otner flora is very scarce. consisting. be-
sides few grasses and Iichens, of some
| scanty buttercups, dandellons, violets and
| daisies and few very minute varieties of
| the orchid family.
| doubtless the skilled botanist would find
| hundred other varieties of flowers. but
| to the layman the fgaunt hills Of the Faroes
seem inexpressibly barren.
1 70 be sure short and stunted grass
which the sheep can nibbIe give the hills
greenish tinge often to their tops but there
| IS no such lush exuberance Of Alpine vege-
tatlon and boundless variety of Alpine fow-
| ers as clothe the mountains Of Switzerland,
| even beyond the snow line.
sun the Faroes have a solemn beauty
ana grandeur all=their own, which make
them we'll worth visiting on their own &c
| count. even were they not the halfway
mouse to Iceland. They are far larger than
most people who have never visited them
imagine Little dots on the map though
they appear, they expand as you approach
into very stable islands, with many
mountain peaks from one to two thousand
feet high rfsihgirsheer from the sea. with
not enough Of level shore at their base to
give beach Room. to- dory In other
places the sea p}erees' long ways into the
interior Of The. Islands, and cuts them al-
most in twain inuaking deep and narrow
f1ords with black, preriHi{ous walls of lock
on either side. scarcely Inferior for gram
deur and sublit8itylrto the most famous
fjords of Norway. 100
It gives one pscuihar sensation q will not
use the overwofked word weird" though
IT would not be inappropriate) to sail at
msanisht. as wel tfidTen one occasion. into
the jaws of one 'ef these frowning fjords
The mountains,D lowered above our little
snip. and in the midnight twilight seemed
to topple over her as she turned first TO
the right and then to- the left. and at times
seemed Sc. 10 makesssrasght for a tremendous
cliff against which the white breakers were
dashing. Then, when things seemed the
most desperate, and when few more turns
OF the screw would have hurled us against
the wall of rock. passage opened between
the cliffs and we gl!ded into the smooth
waters of the beautiful: little harbor tf
klaksvig so
Sudero sando, Stromo and Ostero are the
largest of these Islands, and the two lat