At last, the day of our departure arrived.
The evening before we left, the good Mr. Thompson brought us several warm letters of introduction. They were addressed to Baron Trampe, the Governor of Iceland; M. Pictursson, assistant to the bishop; and M. Finsen, the mayor of Reykjavik.
My uncle thanked him so enthusiastically that he nearly crushed the poor man’s hands.
At two o’clock in the morning on the second day of the month, our luggage was carried aboard the Valkyrie. We followed soon afterward.
The captain politely showed us to a tiny cabin with two narrow beds. It was poorly ventilated and hardly comfortable at all.
But, as my uncle always said, a little suffering was nothing when science was at stake.
“Well, Captain, do we have a good wind?” my uncle asked cheerfully.
“An excellent wind!” Captain Bjarne replied. “We’ll leave the Sound with every sail open.”
A few minutes later, the schooner moved swiftly before the wind and entered the channel.
About an hour later, Copenhagen seemed to disappear into the mist behind us. We were already close to Elsinore.
My uncle was delighted.
I was much less enthusiastic. I found myself almost expecting to see the ghost of Hamlet.
“Poor mad prince,” I thought. “You would probably approve of what we are doing. Perhaps you might even come with us to the center of the earth and finally settle all those eternal questions that troubled you.”
But no ghost appeared on the old walls.
In fact, the castle was built long after the time of Hamlet. It had become the residence of the official responsible for guarding the Sound, through which more than fifteen thousand ships from all over the world passed every year.
Soon Kronborg Castle disappeared into the gloomy mist, as did the tower of Helsingborg on the Swedish coast.
Then the Valkyrie began to feel the strong winds of the Kattegat.
Our schooner was fast, but sailing ships could never be completely trusted. The cargo included coal, furniture, pottery, woolen clothes, and grain. There were only five Danish sailors aboard, and they had to handle all the work themselves.
“How long do you think the voyage will take?” my uncle asked.
“About ten days,” Captain Bjarne answered. “Unless we run into strong northeast winds near the Faroe Islands.”
“Then there should be no serious delay,” my uncle said impatiently.
“No, Professor Hardwigg,” the captain replied. “You needn’t worry. We’ll get there eventually.”
Toward evening, we passed Cape Skagen, the northernmost point of Denmark.
During the night, we crossed the Skagerrak. Then we passed the southern tip of Norway near Cape Lindesnes and entered the Northern Seas.
Two days later, we were sailing not far from the coast of Scotland, somewhere near a place Danish sailors called Peterhead.
From there, the Valkyrie headed straight toward the Faroe Islands, between the Orkney and Shetland Islands.
The sea became rougher, and the wind changed direction. We had great difficulty reaching the Faroe Islands.
On the eighth day, Captain Bjarne spotted Myganness, the westernmost of the Faroe Islands.
From that point, he turned the ship directly toward Cape Portland on the southern coast of Iceland, our destination.
The voyage itself was uneventful.
I handled the sea surprisingly well.
My uncle did not.
To his great embarrassment—and even greater irritation—he became terribly seasick.
This was especially frustrating for him because he could no longer question Captain Bjarne about Sneffels, transportation, or how we would travel across Iceland.
All those questions had to wait until we arrived.
Meanwhile, my uncle spent most of his time lying in bed, groaning and anxiously counting the hours until the voyage ended.
I felt no sympathy for him.
On the eleventh day, we finally saw Cape Portland.
Above it rose Mount Myrdals Yokul, its snowy peak clearly visible in the fine weather.
Cape Portland itself was nothing more than a huge, bare mass of granite standing alone against the Atlantic waves.
The Valkyrie stayed close to the coast and sailed westward.
Everywhere we looked, we could see enormous groups of whales and sharks moving through the water.
After several hours, we saw a lonely rock rising from the sea. It looked like a gigantic archway, with waves crashing violently through it.
The Westman Islands seemed to leap straight out of the ocean. They were so low that we could hardly see them until we were almost upon them.
The captain then turned the schooner farther west so that we could round Cape Reykjanes, the westernmost point of Iceland.
My uncle was so badly affected by the rough sea that he could not even crawl onto the deck.
He therefore missed his first sight of the land he had dreamed about for so long.
Forty-eight hours later, a violent storm drove us far out to sea with almost no sail raised.
Eventually, however, we saw land again.
A pilot came aboard and guided us through three dangerous hours of navigation.
At last, the Valkyrie dropped anchor safely in Faxa Bay, just outside Reykjavik.
My uncle finally emerged from his cabin.
He was pale, exhausted, and much thinner than before.
But his eyes were shining with excitement.
He looked happier than I had ever seen him.
Almost the entire population of Reykjavik had come down to the shore to watch us arrive.
The reason was simple. The people were accustomed to waiting for the regular ship to bring them supplies and goods.
My uncle was desperate to escape his “prison,” as he called the cabin, or rather his “hospital.”
But before leaving the ship, he suddenly grabbed my hand and pulled me toward the quarterdeck.
He took my arm with his left hand and pointed inland with his right.
Across the northern part of the bay stood a magnificent mountain with two peaks, both covered in everlasting snow.
He stared at it in awe.
“Look,” he whispered.
I looked.
“Look, Harry. That is Mount Sneffels!”
He said nothing more.
Instead, he put a finger to his lips, frowned mysteriously, and climbed into the small boat waiting to take us ashore.
I followed him.
A few minutes later, we were standing on the soil of mysterious Iceland.
We had barely stepped onto the shore when a distinguished-looking man approached us.
He was dressed like a military officer.
In fact, he was a civilian official—a magistrate and the governor of Iceland, Baron Trampe.
My uncle immediately recognized him.
He handed over the letters of introduction from Copenhagen.
The two men then began speaking Danish.
Naturally, I understood nothing.
I didn’t know a word of the language.
I later learned that Baron Trampe had offered Professor Hardwigg his full assistance.
My uncle was also warmly welcomed by M. Finsen, the mayor of Reykjavik.
The mayor dressed almost as formally as the governor, although his personality and profession were far more peaceful.
As for M. Pictursson, the bishop’s assistant, he was away on a religious visit to the northern part of the diocese.
We would therefore have to wait before meeting him.
Fortunately, another important man was there to welcome us: M. Fridriksson, a professor of natural science at the college in Reykjavik.
He was an exceptionally capable scholar.
He spoke only Icelandic and Latin.
When he spoke to me in Latin, using the language of Horace, we immediately understood one another.
In fact, during my entire stay in Iceland, he was the only person I could communicate with properly.
His house contained only three rooms, but he generously gave two of them to us.
Within a few hours, we had moved in with all our luggage.
The enormous amount of baggage amazed the simple people of Reykjavik.
My uncle rubbed his hands together with satisfaction.
“Well, Harry, everything is going perfectly. The hardest part is over.”
“The hardest part is over?” I cried.
“Of course. We are in Iceland now. All that remains is to descend into the earth.”
“Perhaps you’re right, sir. But that’s not what worries me.”
“What does?”
“I want to know how we’re going to get back up.”
My uncle waved his hand dismissively.
“That’s the easiest part. It doesn’t concern me at all.”
Then he suddenly became serious.
“There’s no time to waste. I’m going to the public library. I may find some manuscripts written by Saknussemm. I want to examine them.”
“Then I’ll take a walk around the town,” I said. “Why don’t you come with me?”
“I have no interest in that.”
“Why not?”
“Because what interests me about Iceland isn’t what’s above the ground. It’s what’s underneath it.”
I had nothing to say to that.
I put on my hat and fur-lined cloak and went outside.
It was almost impossible to get lost in Reykjavik because the town had only two main streets.
The town stood on a flat, marshy plain between two hills.
On one side was a vast field of lava that descended toward the sea in a series of terraces.
On the other side lay the great bay of Faxa.
Far to the north rose the enormous glacier-covered mountain of Sneffels.
At that time, the Valkyrie was the only ship anchored in the bay.
Usually, one or two English or French gunboats stayed there to protect the fishing grounds, but they were away on duty when we arrived.
The longest street in Reykjavik ran parallel to the shore.
Merchants and shopkeepers lived along this street in small wooden houses made of beams and painted red.
They looked like simple log cabins in the wilderness of America.
The other street lay farther west.
It led toward a small lake surrounded by the houses of the bishop and other important residents who had nothing to do with trade.
I quickly saw everything worth seeing.
The streets were dull and depressing.
Here and there, I found patches of faded grass that looked like pieces of an old, worn-out wool carpet.
There were also a few tiny gardens where potatoes, cabbage, and lettuce grew.
The vegetables were so small that they reminded me of something from Lilliput.
In the middle of the newer commercial street, I came across the public cemetery.
It was surrounded by a simple earthen wall.
It was not large, but it seemed unlikely to become crowded for centuries.
From there, I went to the governor’s residence.
Compared with the grand Mansion House in Hamburg, it was nothing more than a hut.
But beside the other houses of Iceland, it looked like a palace.
Between the lake and the town stood the church.
It was a simple Protestant building made from stones hardened and thrown up by volcanic activity.
I could easily imagine the strong winds blowing its red roof tiles away and causing endless trouble for the pastor and his congregation.
On a nearby hill stood the national school.
The students there were taught Hebrew, English, French, and Danish.
After three hours, I had finished my tour.
My overall impression was one of deep sadness.
There were almost no trees and hardly any vegetation.
Volcanic mountains surrounded the town.
Many of the houses were little more than roofs made of earth and turf.
Because the houses were kept warm inside, grass grew on their roofs.
The people carefully cut this grass and stored it as hay.
I saw very few inhabitants during my walk.
But on the shore, I found a large crowd of people working with codfish.
They were drying it, salting it, and loading it onto ships.
Cod was Iceland’s main export.
The men looked strong but slow-moving.
They had fair hair like Germans, but their faces were serious and thoughtful.
They seemed to me like people living far above the Eskimos on the ladder of civilization, yet perhaps even less fortunate.
They possessed greater awareness and understanding, but they were forced to live so far north, within the harsh world of the Arctic.
Sometimes I heard one of them give a sudden, strange laugh.
But I never saw a real smile.
The men wore coarse black woolen coats called vadmel, wide-brimmed hats, red wool trousers, and rough leather shoes tied together with strings, much like simple moccasins.
The women also looked serious and sorrowful, although many had pleasant features.
They wore dark vadmel bodices and skirts.
Unmarried women wore small brown knitted caps over their braided hair.
Married women covered their heads with colored scarves and tied a white scarf over them.