In the months of June and July the diet improved materially. We
could often procure splendid salmon, sometimes roast lamb, and now
and then birds, among which latter dainties the snipes were
particularly good. In the evening came butter, cheese, cold fish,
smoked lamb, and eggs of eider-ducks, which are coarser than hen's
eggs. In time I became so accustomed to this kind of food, that I
no longer missed either soup or beef, and felt uncommonly well.
My drink was always clear fresh water; the gentlemen began their
dinner with a small glass of brandy, and during the meal all drank
beer of Herr Bernhoft's own brewing, which was very good. On
Sundays, a bottle of port or Bordeaux sometimes made its appearance
at our table; and as we fared at Herr Bernhoft's, so it was the
custom in the houses of all the merchants and officials.
At Reikjavik I had an opportunity of witnessing a great religious
ceremony. Three candidates of theology were raised to the
ministerial office. Though the whole community here is Lutheran,
the ceremonies differ in many respects from those of the continent
of Europe, and I will therefore give a short sketch of what I saw.
The solemnity began at noon, and lasted till four o'clock. I
noticed at once that all the people covered their faces for a moment
on entering the church, the men with their hats, and the women with
their handkerchiefs. Most of the congregation sat with their faces
turned towards the altar; but this rule had its exceptions. The
vestments of the priests were the same as those worn by our
clergymen, and the commencement of the service also closely
resembled the ritual of our own Church; but soon this resemblance
ceased. The bishop stepped up to the altar with the candidates, and
performed certain ceremonies; then one would mount the pulpit and
read part of a sermon, or sing a psalm, while the other clergymen
sat round on chairs, and appeared to listen; then a second and a
third ascended the pulpit, and afterwards another sermon was
preached from the altar, and another psalm sung; then a sermon was
again read from the pulpit. While ceremonies were performed at the
altar, the sacerdotal garments were often put on and taken off
again. I frequently thought the service was coming to a close, but
it always began afresh, and lasted, as I said before, until four
o'clock. The number of forms surprised me greatly, as the ritual of
the Lutheran Church is in general exceedingly simple.
On this occasion a considerable number of the country people were
assembled, and I had thus a good opportunity of noticing their
costumes. The dresses worn by the women and girls are all made of
coarse black woollen stuffs. The dress consists of a long skirt, a
spencer, and a coloured apron. On their heads they wear a man's
nightcap of black cloth, the point turned downwards, and terminating
in a large tassel of wool or silk, which hangs down to the shoulder.
Their hair is unbound, and reaches only to the shoulder: some of
the women wear it slightly curled. I involuntarily thought of the
poetical descriptions of the northern romancers, who grow
enthusiastic in praise of ideal "angels' heads with golden tresses."
The hair is certainly worn in this manner here, and our poets may
have borrowed their descriptions from the Scandinavians. But the
beautiful faces which are said to beam forth from among those golden
locks exist only in the poet's vivid imagination.
Ornamental additions to the costume are very rare. In the whole
assembly I only noticed four women who were dressed differently from
the others. The cords which fastened their spencers, and also their
girdles, were ornamented with a garland worked in silver thread.
Their skirts were of fine black cloth, and decorated with a border
of coloured silk a few inches broad. Round their necks they wore a
kind of stiff collar of black velvet with a border of silver thread,
and on their heads a black silk handkerchief with a very strange
addition. This appendage consisted of a half-moon fastened to the
back of the head, and extending five or six inches above the
forehead. It was covered with white lawn arranged in folds; its
breadth at the back of the head did not exceed an inch and a half,
but in front it widened to five or six inches.
The men, I found, were clothed almost like our peasants. They wore
small-clothes of dark cloth, jackets and waistcoats, felt hats, or
fur caps; and instead of boots a kind of shoe of ox-hide, sheep, or
seal-skin, bound to the feet by a leather strap. The women, and
even the children of the officials, all wear shoes of this
description.
It was very seldom that I met people so wretchedly and poorly clad
as we find them but too often in the large continental towns. I
never saw any one without good warm shoes and stockings.
The better classes, such as merchants, officials, &c. are dressed in
the French style, and rather fashionably. There is no lack of silk
and other costly stuffs. Some of these are brought from England,
but the greater part come from Denmark.
On the king's birthday, which is kept every year at the house of the
Stiftsamtmann, the festivities are said to be very grand; on this
occasion the matrons appear arrayed in silk, and the maidens in
white jaconet; the rooms are lighted with wax tapers.
Some speculative genius or other has also established a sort of club
in Reikjavik. He has, namely, hired a couple of rooms, where the
townspeople meet of an evening to discuss "tea-water," bread and
butter, and sometimes even a bottle of wine or a bowl of punch.
