of the language is well illustrated by the new metres as compared with the old Icelandic Drott-kvædi in its varied forms. Most of the older Rimur and Diktur are as yet unprinted. Many of the fornkvædi are printed in a volume of the old Nordiske Literatur-Samfund.
Reformation period. The effects of the Reformation was deeply felt in Icelandic literature, both prose and verse. The name of Hallgrim Petersen, whose Passion-hymns, “the flower of all Icelandic poetry,” have been the most popular composition in the language, is foremost of all writers since the Second Change of Faith. The gentle sweetness of thought, and the exquisite harmony of wording in his poems, more than justify the popular verdict. His Hymns were finished in 1660, and published in 1666, two great Protestant poets thus being contemporaries. A collection of Reformation hymns, adapted, many of them, from the German, the Holar-book, had preceded them in 1619. There was a good deal of verse-writing of a secular kind, far inferior in every way, during this period. In spite of the many physical distresses that weighed upon the island, ballads (fornkvædi) were still written, ceasing about 1750, Rimur composed, and more elaborate compositions published.
The most notable names are those of the improvisatore Stephen the Blind; Thorlak Gudbrandsson, author of Ulfar-Rimur, d. 1707; John Maguusson, who wrote Hristafla, a didactic poem; Stefan Olafsson, composer of Psalms, Rimur, &c., d. 1688; Gunnar Palsson, the author of Gunnarslag, often printed with the Eddic poems, c. 1791; and the famous Eggert Olafsson, traveller, naturalist, and patriot, whose untimely death in 1768 was a great loss to his country, which his energy and talents might have roused from its torpor. His Bunadar-balkr, a Georgic written, like Tusser's Points, with a practical view of raising the state of agriculture, has always been much prized. Paul Widalin's ditties are very naive and clever.
Modern poetry. The Reformation had produced a real poet, but the material rise of Iceland has not yet done so. Many have written, but few have shown any great talent; perhaps the best has been Sigurd of Broadfirth, many of whose prettiest poems were composed in Greenland, like those of Jon Biarnisson before him, c. 1750; John Thorlaksson's translation of Milton's great epic into Eddic verse is praiseworthy in intention, but, as may be imagined, falls far short of its aim. He also turned Pope's Essay on Man and Klopstock's Messiah into Icelandic. Benedikt Grondal tried the same experiment with Homer in his Ilion's Kvædi, c. 1825. There is a fine prose translation of the Odyssey by Sweinbiorn Egillson, the lexicographer, both faithful and poetic in high degree. Many poems of varying but little merit will be found in the periodicals of this and last century, the serious verse being pseudo-classic for the most part and falsetto in tone. The satiric verse, such as John Thorlaksson's on Magnus Stephenson's projects and “reforms,” and the ditties on all kinds of sujets d'occasion, are better, but much of their meaning is lost to a stranger. With the latest school of poets who have begun to imitate foreign metres (unalliterative) and to translate foreign poets, it is hardly worth while to linger. A translation of Shakespeare and of several of Byron's poems may be noticed as curiosities. Of minor poetry there is still an abundant crop; even in Gimli, the far-off Canadian colony, “In Memoriam” verses and wedding-hymns of irreproachable form, but wooden thought, are printed and admired. That Iceland, most idyllic of modern lands, is capable of supplying subject and material for something higher than all this there is no doubt; but, before any thing of real worth can be written, the old stock-in-trade of worn-out mythology and pseudo-patriotism must be thrown aside for ever.
The Saga. History and Biography.—The real strength of Icelandic literature is shown in its most indigenous growth, the “Saga.” This is, in its purest form, the life of a hero, composed in regular form, governed by fixed rules, and intended for oral recitation. It bears the strongest likeness to the epic in all save its unversified form; in both are found, as fixed essentials, simplicity of plot, chronological order of events, set phrases used even in describing the restless play of emotion or the changeful fortunes of a fight or a storm, while in both the absence of digression, comment, or intrusion of the narrator's person is invariably maintained. The saga grew up in the quieter days which followed the Change of Faith (1002), when the deeds of the great families' heroes were still cherished by their descendants, and the exploits of the great kings of Norway and Denmark handed down with reverence from the mouths of those that had fought and sung by their side. Telling of stories was a recognized form of entertainment at all feasts and gatherings, and it was the necessity of the reciter which gradually worked them into a regular form, by which the memory was relieved and the artistic features of the story allowed to be more carefully elaborated. That this form was so perfect must be attributed to Irish influence, without which indeed there would have been a saga, but not the same saga. It is to the west that the best sagas belong; it is to the west that nearly every classic writer whose name we know belongs; and it is precisely in the west that the admixture of Irish blood is greatest. In comparing the Irish tales with the saga, there will be felt deep divergencies in matter, style, and taste, the richness of one contrasting with the chastened simplicity of the other; the one's half-comic half-earnest bombast is wholly unlike the other's grim humour; the marvellous, so unearthly in the one, is almost credible in the other; but in both are the keen grasp of character, the biting phrase, the love of action, and the delight in blood which almost assumes the garb of a religious passion.
When the saga had been fixed by a generation or two of oral reciters, it was written down; and this stereotyped the form, so that afterwards when literary works were composed by learned men (such as Abbot Karl's Swerri's Saga and Sturla's Islendinga) the same style was adopted.
Icelandic sagas. Taking first the sagas relating to Icelanders, of which some thirty-five or forty remain out of thrice that number, we find that they were first written down between 1140 and 1220, in the generation which succeeded Ari and felt the impulse his books had given to writing, on separate scrolls, no doubt mainly for the reciter's convenience; that they then went through all the different phases which such popular compositions have to pass in all lands, editing and compounding (1220-1260), padding and amplifying (1260-1300), and finally collection in large MSS. (14th century). Sagas exist showing all these phases, some primitive and rough, some refined and beautified, some again diluted and weakened, according as their copyists have been faithful, artistic, or foolish; for the first generation of MSS. have all perished. We have also complex sagas put together in the 13th century out of the scrolls relating to a given locality, such a group as still exists untouched in Vapnfirdinga being fused into such a saga as Niala or Laxdæla. Of the authors nothing is known; we can only guess that some belong to the Sturlung school. According to subject they fall into two classes, those relating to the older generation before Christianity and those telling of St Olaf's contemporaries; only two fall into a third generation.
Of the west. Beginning with the sagas of the west, most perfect in style and form, the earliest in subject is that of Gold-Thori (c. 930), whose adventurous career it relates; Hen-Thori's Saga tells of the burning of Blund-Ketil, a noble chief, an event which led to Thord Gelli's reforms next year (c. 964); Gisli's Saga (960-80) tells of the career and death of that ill-fated outlaw; it is beautifully written, and the verses by the editor (13th century) are good and appropriate; it has been Englished by Sir G. Dasent; Hord's Saga (980) is the life of a band of outlaws on Whalesfirth, and especially of their leader Hord. Of later subject are the sagas of Havard and his revenge for his son, murdered by a neighbouring chief (997-1002); of the Heath Slaughter (990-1014), a typical tale of a great blood feud, written in the most primitive prose; of Gunnlaug and Hrafn (980-1008), the rival poets and their ill-starred love. The verse in this saga is important and interesting. It has been Englished by Messrs Morris and Magnusson. To the west also belong the three great complex sagas Egla, Eyrbyggia, and Laxdæla. The first (870-980), after noticing the migration of the father and grandfather of the hero poet Egill, and the origin of the feud between them and the kings of Norway, treats fully of Egill's career, his enmity with Eirik Bloodaxe, his service with Æthelstan, and finally, after many adventures abroad, of his latter days in Iceland at Borg, illustrating very clearly what manner of men those great settlers and their descendants were, and the feelings of pride and freedom which led them to Iceland. The style is that of Snorri, who had himself dwelt at Borg, and Dr Vigfusson is inclined to refer it to him. Eyrbyggia (890-1031) is the saga of Politics, the most loosely woven of all the compound stories. It includes a mass of information on the law, religion, traditions, &c., of the heathen days in Iceland, and the lives of Eirik, the real discoverer of Greenland, Biorn of Broadwick, a famous chief, and Snorri, the greatest statesman of his day. Dr Vigfusson would ascribe its editing and completion to Sturla the Lawman, c. 1250. It is known to many Englishmen from Sir Walter Scott's paraphrase. Laxdæla (910-1026) is the saga of Romance. Its heroine Gudrun is the most famous of all Icelandic ladies. Her love for Kiartan the poet, and his career abroad, his betrayal by his friend Bolli, the sad death of Kiartan at his hands, the revenge taken for him on Bolli, whose slayers are themselves afterwards put to death, and the end of Gudrun, who becomes an anchorite after her stormy life, make up the pith of the story. The contrast of the characters, the rich style and fine dialogue which are so remarkable in this saga, have much in common with the best works of the Sturlung school. Mr Morris's Lovers of Gudrun is founded upon it.
Of the north. Of the north there are the sagas of Kormak (930-60), most primitive of all, a tale of a wild poet's love and feuds, containing many notices of the heathen times; of Waterdale (890-980), relating to the settlement and the chief family in Waterdale; of Hallfred the Poet (996-1014), narrating his fortune at King Olaf's court, his love affairs in Iceland, and finally his death and burial at Iona; of Reck-dale (990), which preserves the lives of Askell and his son Viga-Skuti; of Swarf-dale (980-90), a cruel coarse story of the old days, with some good scenes in it, unfortunately imperfect, chapters 1-10 being forged; of Viga-Glum (970-90), a fine story of a heathen hero, brave, crafty, and cruel; it has been Englished by Sir Edmund Head. To the north also belong the sagas of Gretti the Strong (1010-31), the life and death of the most famous of Icelandic out-
