Page:Curiosities of Olden Times.djvu/242

Curiosities of Olden Times Jónsson rode all the way over the glacier, and on its northern side ascended a strip of rubble as far as they could. Then they pushed the horses down on a snowdrift, above the course of the river and the ravine through which it flowed. This snow-bed extended over the glacier an almost interminable way due south, or perhaps a little south-west. The crust was sufficiently hard to bear up the horses. Where the glacier began to rise again, it was entirely free from snow and ice, full of drifts and chasms in a direction from north to south, and as they were bearing to the east they had to cross every one of them. Most were filled with water which overflowed the glacier, and disappeared in the snowdrift, and in some places they rode through the water on the ice. None of these rifts were too broad to be crossed in one place or another, either higher up the glacier towards the south, or at its lower and north end. If they had met with a rift which they could not pass, they intended to have made a snow-bridge over it, rather than return. In this way they crossed the ice of the glacier. Next came another bed of snow, over which they rode for some while; but it was very heavy, as the day was exceedingly warm and mild.

"When they were within a short distance of what seemed to them to be the highest point of the glacier on the east, a mist set in on both sides from the north and south, leaving a clear space towards the east, so that they could see the bright sky exactly 230