Paradise Reclaimed (5 page)

Steinar was one of the uninvited guests at Þingvellir, representing no one in particular—scarcely even himself, and certainly not his pony; representing, at the very most, perhaps, just his riding-crop. Accordingly, no arrangements had been made to receive him; there was no reserved bed for him at this great national festival except the moss that covered the sacred lava, and no other refreshment than the breeze that the guardian-spirits of the country breathed. After entrusting his pony to the ostlers earlier in the evening, he had found himself alone with only his riding-crop for company; and since he now happened to be in Brennugjá with nowhere else to go, he began to look around for a spot where the moss grew thickly enough to blunt the sharp edges of the rocks.

And while he was busy with these thoughts, after all the people who had got so excited about the Mormon had left, he suddenly noticed that the speaker had returned to Brennugjá. He had never gone farther than just out of sight round the first curve of the cliff after all, while tempers in Brennugjá were cooling down. Now he was peering about in the late-summer twilight as if he had lost something, and did not take the trouble to greet Steinar even when he walked right past him.

“Good evening, friend,” said Steinar of Hlíðar.

“Are you going to use that riding-crop on me?” asked the Mormon.

“I have never made much of a habit of beating people with riding-crops,” said Steinar. “I am looking for a spot where I can bed down for the night.”

“I don’t suppose you’ve seen my hat, have you?” asked the Mormon.

“I fear not,” said Steinar. “As far as I could see, you were hatless when you were making your speech.”

“I stuck it in a hole before I started,” said the Mormon. “I always hide my hat before I make a speech. You never know what they’ll do to your hat.”

Steinar of Hlíðar readily offered his help in looking for the hat, and for a long time they searched the moss-grown scree at the foot of the cliff. The light was now failing fast. At last Steinar happened to catch a glimpse of some monstrosity glistening among the rocks. It was the hat; it had been wrapped in transparent paper.

“I don’t suppose this is your hat, is it?” said Steinar.

“A thousand thanks,” said the Mormon. “You’re a man of luck. This hat and a change of underclothing is all I have left since they took my pamphlets away from me. And if I lost it, it would show that I’m not man enough for my hat.”

“And you keep it wrapped in grease-proof paper,” said Steinar.

“Yes, that’s what is always done in America when they are good hats. It’s to keep them from getting wet if it rains. Grease-proof paper repels water. The hat is always as good as new.”

“Really?” said Steinar. “But what I find most remarkable is all that excellent land you said there was over in your part of the world.”

“Yes, you people in Iceland can beat me and kick me just as you please,” said the Mormon. “My land is good.”

“You must be used to most things by now,” said Steinar.

“Oh, this affair tonight was nothing,” said the Mormon. “I have seldom escaped so lightly. I have three times had a thorough beating, several times a black eye—and one of my teeth is loose. I have travelled through whole counties where I have nowhere been offered so much as a bite of food or a sip of water, never mind a roof over my head. Orders had gone out from the sheriffs and pastors.”

Steinar of Hlíðar was not in the habit of criticizing others, but now he could not restrain himself from repeating an old saying which is normally used when little fellows get uppish with their betters: “Wipe my arse, Mr. Lawman!”

“But that was nothing at all compared with taking my poor little pamphlets off me,” said the Mormon. “I travelled 2,000 miles across America, most of them on foot, all the way from Salt Lake Valley to Dakota, until I finally found the one and only printing-press in the Western hemisphere that possessed the letters þ and ð so that I could get my pamphlets set up in type; if you search there long enough you will find some paupers like me from Iceland living on a riverbank behind the forests. When my pamphlets had been printed out there in Dakota I set off with them for Iceland. And now there is none left.”

“Excuse me,” said Steinar, “but what did these misguided people do with the pamphlets?”

“That’s easy,” said the Mormon. “They sent them to Denmark—Iceland’s brain has always been in Copenhagen. They told me that the Danish ministries would have to decide. So now I have come to Þingvellir to waylay the king. I have heard he is a German peasant, and I have met many of them in Salt Lake Valley: Denmark’s brain has always been in Germany. But Germans don’t belittle Icelanders, on the other hand, and for that reason I can expect more of a German than a Dane. I am going to ask him why I cannot have books just like anyone else in this kingdom.”

“That is sensible of you,” said Steinar of Hlíðar. “He is said to be a good king.”

6

The millennial celebrations.
Icelanders reap justice

This book does not profess to give the history of the festivities which were held at Þingvellir to commemorate the thousandth anniversary of the settlement of Iceland* and to welcome the Danish king. Detailed accounts of these events were compiled at the time, and later some excellent books were written. But there were one or two not entirely irrelevant incidents, in the judgement of some, which never received attention in those worthy publications. This is the story of one such incident, only to be found in some of the less significant books, which are none the less true for all that.

But first, a few words on a topic that people now are apt to overlook: there was a time once when Icelanders, despite the fact that they were the most indigent nation in Europe, all traced their ancestry back to kings. Indeed, in their literature they have given life to many kings whom other nations had made little effort to remember and who would otherwise have been consigned to oblivion in this world and the next. Most people in Iceland traced their lineage back to the kings who were written about in the sagas; some only claimed descent from warrior-kings or sea-kings, others to remote petty kings in the valleys of Norway and elsewhere in Scandinavia, or to the leaders of the Norse warriors who served in the Varangian Guard under the emperor in Constantinople;* but a few claimed descent from kings who, it can be proved, were actually crowned. No farmer was considered worth his salt if he could not trace his genealogy back to Harald hárfagri (Fine-Hair)* or his namesake Harald hilditönn (War-Tooth).* All Icelandic genealogies can be traced back to the Ynglings and the Scyldings*—if there happens to be anyone left in the world who knows who these folk were. It was child’s play for most of the Icelanders to prove kinship with Sigurd the Dragon-Killer, King Gautrekur of Gotaland,* and Ganger-Hrolf;* but those of yet more recondite erudition could claim connection with Charlemagne and Frederick Barbarossa, or could work their way right back to Agamemnon, noblest of the Greeks, the conqueror of Troy. Learned foreigners called the Icelanders the greatest genealogists in Europe after royal pedigrees had been denounced as pomp and vanity as a result of the French Revolution.

Many people had ridden to Þingvellir just to see with their own eyes what manner of man it was to whom the saga-writers of old had given life in their books. Many of them claimed kinship with much greater princes than King Kristian Wilhelmsson; and although the farmers gave due respect to the high rank and royal title that the Danes had conferred on this foreigner, it is unlikely King Kristian ever in his whole life found himself in a company of people who considered him so inferior to themselves in pedigree as did those stunted rickety peasants tramping around in their crumpled cowhide shoes. It has never been forgotten in Iceland that it was only with the help of Icelandic genealogies that this offspring of German cottage-nobility, reared as a foster-child in Denmark, could trace his ancestry back to King Gormur gamli (the Old)* of Denmark—who, according to some, never existed at all. But it is a measure of King Kristian Wilhelmsson’s qualities that, despite his humble origins, the Icelanders have always esteemed him more highly than most other Danish kings; and it goes to show that even in a nation of fanatical genealogists there are people who at a pinch can value some things more highly then the ancestral seed which flowed a thousand years ago. Kristian Wilhelmsson had one outstanding attribute which, despite his lowly antecedents, won him the Icelanders’ regard and even their admiration, and that was his horsemanship. It is an Icelandic dogma that kings should be able to ride well; indeed, a man on a good mount is respected above all others. White horses have always been considered one of Iceland’s greatest glories, and farmers competed to supply them when royalty was riding through their district. Also, in those days most Icelanders took tobacco through the nose from wooden flasks or horn receptacles; this tobacco is called
snuss
in Low German, and Icelanders respect any man who accepts a pinch from them. It is said that King Kristian Wilhelmsson, too, liked his snuff.

It is not to be denied that the Icelanders were glad to receive their new constitution from the Danish king—but not exuberantly so. In fact, they completely forgot to thank him for it during the festivities. There was only one man there who had the presence of mind to thank the king for the gift on the Icelanders’ behalf—albeit uninvited and unauthorized; and this was the Danish baron who had drafted the constitution for the king. Perhaps too many Icelanders felt that the gift merely represented something which was already theirs by right and did not go far enough, at that. The king, for his part, quite forgot to thank the Icelanders for what they thought the most significant thing they gave him in return, which was the poetry composed in his honour. Some poets composed as many as eight poems about him. It is not the custom in Germany to compose poetry in honour of county governors, Electors, or even the Kaiser, and Kristian Wilhelmsson was left wide-eyed and open-mouthed as a procession of poets stepped forward one after the other and recited verse at him; he had never heard verse before, and did not know what it was.

It is said that on the morning after the main ceremonies at Þingvellir some of the grooms were trying out the horses which the king was to ride on his way back to the capital. A crowd of farmers had gathered round to see how good the horses were and how they performed. Among them was Steinar of Hlíðar, holding by the bridle his aforementioned white horse, Krapi. When he had watched the royal grooms putting the horses through their paces for a while and seen what they could do, he led his own mount away and headed for the huge marquee where the king was at table with his courtiers and the sheriffs of Iceland. Steinar greeted the sentries and asked to see the king. They were reluctant to pay any heed to this stranger’s request, but finally it was brought to the attention of one of the officials in attendance to the king. This man asked Steinar why he wanted to see the king; Steinar replied that he had urgent business with him—he had a gift to present to him. After a while the courtier returned to say that the king never accepted gifts from individual commoners, but that Steinar was to be permitted to come inside and pay his respects to the king while he was at table.

Inside the marquee sat a crowd of gold-braided men of rank, some of them drinking beer. There was a rich aroma of cigars, which the gentry held glowing between their teeth, emitting thick plumes of smoke. There were Icelandic as well as Danish notables there, and it was only to be expected that some of them should look askance when a plain farmer without official recognition came walking in.

Steinar of Hlíðar doffed his battered cap at the entrance to the marquee, and smoothed down what little was left of his hair. He made no attempt to straighten his shoulders or stick out his chest; his walk was a clumsy trundle, like that of all farmers, but there was no suggestion from his bearing that he thought himself more humble than anyone present. He looked as if nothing came more naturally to him than meeting kings; nor was he there on any commonplace mission.

He made straight for the king. Then he bowed to him courteously, but not too low. The famous men who sat nearby forgot to carry food to their lips. A sudden silence descended on the marquee. And now when Steinar of Hlíðar stood facing royalty, he once again smoothed his hair down across his brow; then he began to speak, addressing the king as befitted a good Icelandic farmer in the sagas:

“My name is Steinar Steinsson, from Hlíðar in Steinahlíðar,” he said. “I bid the king welcome to Iceland. We are of the same kin, according to the genealogy which Bjarni Guðmundsson of Fuglavík prepared for my grandfather. I am of Jutland origin, descended from King Harald hilditönn, who fought the battle of Brávellir.”*

“I beg your Majesty’s indulgence,” said one of the notables in Danish, edging his way in front of Steinar and bowing to the king. “I am this man’s sheriff,” he said, “and it is not with my consent that he comes barging in on you like this, sire.”

“We are pleased to hear what this man has to say,” said the king, “if you would interpret for us.”

Sheriff Benediktsson spoke up at once and said that this man had bidden the king welcome, with the observation that they were distant kinsmen. “I crave your Majesty’s pardon that our farmers all speak like this,” he said. “They cannot help it. The sagas are their lifeblood.”

King Kristian replied, “This has just about convinced me that most kings would find it does not pay to argue genealogies with farmers here in Iceland. Has this gentleman anything else to say to us?”

Steinar Steinsson continued his address:

“Since I have heard, my dear and excellent king, that we have much in common as regards lineage and standing (for you, I understand, are a farmer from down south in Gotaland), I wish to proffer you the thanks of my district for giving us what is already ours, namely, permission to walk upright here in Iceland. No one can receive a better gift from those in power over him than permission to be what he is and not something else. And now for my part I wish to return your generosity in my own modest way. In my family we have always had good horses; and I myself am said to have a not unhandy colt, as my sheriff can confirm better than anyone else, for he is one of the eminent men who have offered to buy him in exchange for gold and gratitude. And now, since you have brought us justice to this country, I am going to hand over the reins of this nag as a token gift in return. The beast is now in the care of their lordships at the door; but I would be grateful if I could have the bridle back at your earliest convenience.”

Kristian Wilhelmsson first had this speech translated into Danish; but he was still not fully clear about the meaning of it, and so he called upon his page to translate it into his mother-tongue, German. The more interpretations he was given of it, the more remarkable a speech he thought it.

“Let us go and see this animal,” he said at last.

They walked to the entrance to the marquee, where a groom was holding the pony by the reins and a crowd of people had gathered from all sides to have a look at so admirable a mount. The pony was trembling slightly at the withers; he did not like being handled and stared at by so many people. The king saw at once that this was a handsome creature; he went over to the pony and patted him gently but firmly, as all good horsemen should, and the pony calmed down. He turned to some baron who was standing nearby and said to him in German, “Perhaps I am after all the right sort of barbarian chieftain to be king over the Icelanders. But I shall not accept anything for nothing from these farmers. Let it be paid for in full from my exchequer, through the proper authorities.”

Then the king took leave of Steinar of Hlíðar with a hand-clasp, and said that he would never forget such a gift. He also said that Steinar should just mention his name if ever he found himself in any difficulties, for Steinar would always have the king for a friend.

Steinar of Hlíðar thanked him for the kind reception and walked away out of sight of his king and his pony, away from the great millennial festivities.