Little Folks of North America

CHAPTER I
Little Folks of Iceland

In the far northeast corner of North America lies the island of Iceland where little Danish children live far from the rest of the world. It is very cold in that northern country, yet the presence of volcanoes there and the lava that spreads over much of the country tell the story that ages ago the island was slowly built up from the lava that flowed from volcanoes rising up out of the bed of the ocean.

However that may be, the boys and girls of Iceland are happy little people who laugh and sing, dance and play as merrily as children who live where the sun shines all the year round and the seasons chase each other so rapidly that Mother Nature is constantly preparing new delights for them.

Away back in the ninth century a great chief called Nadodd left Europe in search of adventure. When he had sailed for a long time he came in sight of a land covered with snow. It seemed a cold, bleak place, but he landed, nevertheless, and gave the country the name of Snowland.

After Nadodd came two Norse chiefs who had quarreled with their king and left Norway to seek a new home. Although they found Snowland or rather Iceland, as it is now called, cold and desolate as Nadodd had done, they decided to settle there and other people from Norway followed them and built homes for themselves and their families along the coast.

These things and many more are written down in a big book treasured by the Icelanders to-day,—how little children were born to the settlers, how they were ruled by their chiefs, and how, after a while, one of their people went back to Europe and listened to the teachings of the Christian religion. He gave up his belief in heathen gods, and when he came back to Iceland he converted the settlers. From that time they, too, were Christians and had Christian ministers among them who taught and helped their little ones and themselves.

As time went by Norway, and with it Iceland, came under the rule of Denmark. Afterwards it became separate again, but Iceland did not, and is to this day looked upon as belonging to the Danes. Most of the children, however, by reading in the famous old book of their people, can trace their families back to the two Norwegian chiefs and their followers who were the first settlers in Iceland.

The children of Iceland live so far north that they know only a short summer. The days then are very long and there is scarcely any night. In the month of June there is really no night at all and there is no way of telling, except by the clock and their own sleepiness, when it is time to go to bed. The winters are quite the opposite. They are very long and bitter cold. Scarcely any of the time does the sun shine, yet the long nights are beautiful, for the moon and stars shine brightly and the northern lights, or aurora borealis, flash over the heavens in a wonderful way not seen in warmer lands.

On the long winter evenings the boys and girls are never happier than when listening to the stories that have been handed down from father to son for hundreds of years. They call these stories sagas. Some of them are legends, and others tell about the lives of people who lived in Iceland from the beginning of its history. There are many poems, too, which the little Icelanders learn “by heart,” and which they repeat in a half-singing tone, after the way of their people. These were written in the long-ago by warriors called “skalds.” They tell of battles and brave deeds and lovely ladies, and the children of to-day think them so beautiful that many of them try to write little poems themselves. This pleases their parents greatly and makes them feel quite proud that their own little ones are following in the steps of their ancestors.

Geysers and Glaciers.

Iceland is never without snow and ice. On the warmest summer day the children can look on glaciers, or rivers of ice, that flow so slowly toward the sea from the inland country that one does not see them moving at all.

These glaciers look like broad fields of broken ice, piled up in strange, rough shapes. The summer sun melts the ice ever so little, and those who venture near the edge find rills of water flowing down the sides of the great cakes and boulders. As the glaciers enter the sea masses of ice sometimes break away, and turning over and over in the deep water, right themselves at last and sail out to sea as the icebergs that are often met by sailors on their way across the ocean.

“We have geysers as well as glaciers,” the children of Iceland will tell you, and they are glad to show their knowledge of them to the travelers who visit that distant land. A geyser is a boiling spring which bursts up out of the ground like a fountain, sometimes with such force that the water rises into the air higher than the tallest building you have ever seen.

There are other kinds of hot springs, too, in the country, where the water simply bubbles up. There is one large town in Iceland called Reikjavik, which is the capital of the island, and about a mile and a half away there is a hot spring where the washing is done for the people of the town.

Almost every day women go there from Reikjavik with hand-carts filled with soiled clothing. When they reach the spring they roll up their sleeves, tuck up their skirts, and begin the scrubbing and rinsing, the boiling and wringing that end in making the clothes as white as snow. From time to time they stop to drink coffee and have a friendly chat, but all the washing is done in the open air, without need of stove or fire to help the workers.

Sheds have been built near the spring where the ironing is afterwards done. Then the clothes are neatly packed in the little carts and taken back to the town to be returned to the owners.

The little Icelanders are very fond of their waterfalls, some of which are very beautiful. The country is so rough and rocky that the streams often plunge over steep lava cliffs and fall with a loud roar to the depths below.

There are so few sounds to be heard, because there are no railroads or large factories in the whole country, that the children like to visit these waterfalls and listen to the water as it plunges downwards over the cliffs. Then they return to the quiet farmhouses to play with their lambs and dogs, and to dream of the children of other lands far away where life is so different.

In the Homes.

The fathers of the little Icelanders support their families by fishing, by raising cattle and sheep, and by hunting the birds that make their homes on the island during the summer.

Few trees grow in that cold land, so the homes are generally built of turf and lava, neatly painted red and thatched with sod. Small gardens are planted as soon as the long winter is over, and there the boys help in planting cabbages and lettuce, radishes and parsley, flax and turnips. A few potatoes are sometimes raised, too, but only those vegetables that will grow fast ripen in that cold northern land. Short, thick grass grows near the little homes, which are usually built in the valleys protected from the cold winds by the hills around them. There the men tend their flocks of sheep and herds of cattle which graze on the grass in summer and in winter eat the hay which their masters have gathered for them.

The children of Iceland are rather small, but they are quite strong for their size. They have yellow hair and blue eyes and are brought up to be gentle and polite. On week-days they