Grettir the Outlaw

Thorgeir said to his brother, "Let us go now and try how Grettir will start, if I set upon him as he comes away from his bath."

"I do not like this," answered Thormod; "you will vex our host, and get no advantage over Grettir."

"I will try what I can do," said the elder; and he took his axe, hid it under his cloak, and went down towards the bathing-place.

When he had reached it he said, "Grettir, there is a talk that you have boasted that no man could make you take to your heels."

"I never said that," answered Grettir, "but anyhow you are not the man to make me run."

Then Thorgier swung up his axe and would have cut at Grettir; but Grettir suspected that the man meant mischief, and he was ready, so that the instant he drew out the axe and swung it, Grettir clashed forward at him, struck him in the chest and sent him staggering back, so that he sprawled his length on the ground.

Then Thorgeir shouted to his brother, "Why do you stand by and let this savage kill me?"

Thormod then laid hold of Grettir, and endeavoured to drag him away, but his strength was not sufficient to effect this.

At that moment up came Arison, the bonder, and he bade them be quiet and have nought to do with Grettir.

So the brothers stood up, and Thorgeir pretended it was all sport, that he had only proposed giving Grettir a fright; but the bonder hardly believed him. As for the younger of the brothers, it was well seen that he had been drawn into the matter against his will. So the winter passed, and peace was kept. This little struggle with Grettir had shown Thorgeir that it would be ill for him to have dealings with a man so prompt and strong as Grettir, and he controlled himself and did not seek to pick a quarrel with him any more. At the same time he did not like him any better. Thorgils Arison got great credit, when it was reported that throughout an entire winter he had maintained such turbulent men as the foster-brothers and Grettir under his roof without their having fought.4

But when spring came then they went away, all of them, away over the heaths and moors of the interior.

When we say that Grettir was on the heaths and moors, it must not be supposed that the region so called was at all like the moors of Scotland or England. The heaths and moors of Iceland are upland desert regions with only here and there a scanty growth of vegetation, a little whortleberry, no heath at all, but vast tracts of broken stone and mud and black sand, with perhaps here and there an occasional hill of yellow sandstone. Most of the rock is perfectly black, and breaks into pieces with sharp angles. What is called Icelandic moss is a black lichen that grows on the stones, and there is a very little gray moss to be seen. Where there is a burn or a stream a little grass may grow, but the amount is small indeed.

CHAPTER XXV

HOW GRETTIR WAS WELL-NIGH HUNG

The Law-man's Judgment – Snorri's Compromise – The Compromise Declined – Grettir Helps Himself – The Spy – Thirty to One – An Undesirable Prisoner – The Gallows for Grettir – Thorbiorg Saves Grettir – Grettir Conquers Himself

Now, after the slaying of Thorbiorn Oxmain, his kinsman Thorod took the matter up, and rode to the great assize with a large train of men.

The relatives of Grettir also appeared at the assize, and they took advice of Skapti, the law-man; and he said that Atli was slain a week before the sentence of outlawry was pronounced against Grettir, that Thorbiorn Oxmain was guilty of that, and his relatives must pay a heavy fine for the murder. But he said that Grettir was an outlaw when he slew Thorbiorn. Now being an outlaw he was outside the cognizance of the law, he was as one not a native of the country, as one over whom the law had no longer jurisdiction; that, therefore, his slaying of Thorbiorn could not count as expiation of the slaying of Atli; that, moreover, no suit against an outlawed man could stand – it was illegal: that the only way in which Grettir could be brought into court was by the removal of the sentence of outlawry, when at once he could be prosecuted.

Thorod was disconcerted at this; for he could not bring an action against Grettir, and the Biarg people did now bring an action against him for the slaying of Atli, and the court gave sentence that he should pay down two hundred ounces of silver as blood fine for Atli.

Now, at this court, Snorri the judge proposed a compromise. He suggested that the fine should be let drop, and that Grettir should be held scatheless, that the outlawry should be set aside, and the slaying of Thorbiorn be put against the slaying of Atli, and so reconciliation be made.

Thorod did not at all want to pay down two hundred ounces of silver, and the Biarg family were very willing to have the outlawry done away with; so both parties were quite willing to accept this compromise, but Thorir of Garth had to be reckoned with. Grettir was outlawed at his suit for the burning of his sons, and he must be brought to consent, or this arrangement could not take place.

But Thorir was not to be moved. In vain did the law-man Snorri urge him, and represent to him that Grettir, at large, an outlaw, was a danger menacing the country, that he was driven to desperation, Thorir absolutely refused to allow the sentence to be withdrawn. Not only so, but he said he would set a higher price on his head than had been set on the head of any outlaw before, and that was three marks of silver. Then Thorod, not to be behind with him, offered three more.

Grettir resolved to get as much out of the way of his enemies as he could, so he went into that strange excrescence, like a hand joined on by a narrow wrist to Iceland, that extends to the north-west. In this peninsula are two great masses of snow and glacier mountain, called Glam-jokull and Drang-jokull. They do not rise to any great height, hardly three thousand feet, but they are vast domes of snow, with glaciers sliding from them to the firths, and these fall over the edges of the precipitous cliffs in huge blocks of ice that float away on the tide as icebergs. The largest of all the fiords that penetrates this region is called the Ice-firth, and it runs between these great mountains of snow and glaciers. At the extremity of the estuary the valleys are well-wooded – that is to say, well-wooded for Iceland – with birch-trees, for their valleys are very sheltered, and the sea-water that roll in bears with it a certain amount of heat, for it has been affected by the Gulf-stream.

One of these valleys is called Waterdale, and at the time of our story there lived there a man named Vermund the Slim, and his wife's name was Thorbiorg; she was a big, fine woman. Another valley is Lang-dale. Grettir went to Lang-dale – there he demanded of the farmers whatever he wanted, food and clothing, and if they would not give him what he asked, he took it. This was not to their taste at all, and they wished that they were rid of Grettir. He could not remain long in one place, so he rode along the side of the Ice-firth demanding food, and sleeping and concealing himself in the woods. So in his course he came to the upland pastures and dairy that belonged to Vermund Slim, and he slept there many nights, and hid about in the woods.

The shepherds on the moors were afraid of him, and they ran down into the valleys and told the farmers everywhere that there was a big strange man on the heights, who took from them their curd and milk, and dried fish, and that they were afraid to resist his demands. They did not quite know what he was, whether a man or a mountain spirit.

So the farmers gathered together and took advice, and there were about thirty of them. They set a shepherd to watch Grettir's movements, and let them know when he could be fallen upon. Now, it fell out one warm day that Grettir threw himself down in a sunny spot to sleep. The glistening beech leaves were flickering behind him, the rocks were covered with the pale lemon flowers of the dry as, and between the clefts of the stones masses of large purple-flowered geranium stood up and made a glow of colour deep into the wood.

It is a mistake to suppose that Iceland is bare of flowers; on the contrary, there are more flowers there than grass. Beneath Grettir the turf was full of tiny deep-blue gentianellas, just as if the turf were green velvet, with a thread of blue in it coming through here and there.

The shepherd stole near enough to see that Grettir really was fast asleep, and then he ran and told the bonders, who came noiselessly to the spot. It was arranged among them that ten men should fling themselves on him, whilst the others fastened his feet with strong cords.

They made a noose, and cautiously without waking him managed to get it about his legs; then, all at once, ten of them threw themselves on his body, and tried to pin down his arms. Grettir started from his sleep, and with one toss sent the men rolling off him, and he even managed to get to his knees. Then they pulled the noose tighter and brought him down, he, however, kicked out at two, whom he tumbled head over heels, and they lay stunned on the earth. Then one after another rushed at him, some from behind. He could not get at his weapons, which they had removed, and though he made a long and hard fight, and struggled furiously, they were too many for him, and they overcame him in the end, and bound his hands.

Now, as he lay on the grass, powerless, they held a council over him what should be done. The chief man of that district was Vermund Slim, but he was from home. So it was settled that a farmer named Helgi should take Grettir and keep him in ward till Vermund came home.

"Thank you gratefully," said Helgi; "but I have other business to attend to than to keep sentinel over this man. My hands are fully occupied without this. Not if I know it shall he cross my threshold."

So the farmers considered, and decided that another man who lived at Giorvidale should have the custody of Grettir.

"You are most obliging," said he; "but I have only my old woman with me at home, and how can we two manage him? Lay on a man only such a burden as he can bear."

They considered again, and came to the conclusion that one Therolf of Ere should have the charge of Grettir.

But he replied, "No, thank you, I am short of provisions, there is hardly food enough at my house for my own party."

Then they appointed that he should be put with another farmer; but he said, "If he had been taken in my land, well and good, but as he has not, I won't be encumbered with him."

Then every farmer was tried, and all had excuses why they should not have the care of Grettir; and consequently, as no one would have him, they resolved to hang him. So they set to work and constructed a rude gallows there in the wood, and a mighty clatter they made over it.

Whilst thus engaged, it happened that Thorbiorg, Vermund's wife, was riding up to her mountain dairy, attended by five servants. She was a stirring, clever woman, and when she saw so many men gathered together and making such a noise, she rode towards them to inquire what they were about.

"Who is that lying in bonds there?" she asked.

Then Grettir answered and gave his name.

"Why, now, is it, Grettir," she said, "that you have given so much trouble in this neighbourhood?"

"I must needs be somewhere," he answered. "And wherever I am, there I must have food."

"It is a piece of ill-luck that you should have fallen into the hands of these bumpkins," said she. Then turning to the farmers she asked what they purposed doing with Grettir.

"Hang him," answered they.

"I do not deny that Grettir may have deserved the rope," said Thorbiorg; "but I doubt if you are doing wisely in taking his life. He belongs to a great family, and his death will not be to your quietness and content if you kill him." Then she said to Grettir, "What will you do if your life be given you?"

"You propose the conditions," said he.

"Very well, then you must swear not to revenge on these men what they have done to you to-day, and not to do any violence more in the Ice-firth."

Grettir took the required oath, and so he was loosed from his bonds. He said afterwards that never had he a harder thing to do than to control his temper, when set free, and not to knock the farmers' heads together like nuts and crack them, for what they had done to him.

Then Thorbiorg invited him to her house, and he went with her to the Water-firth, and there abode till her husband returned, and when Vermund heard all, then he was well pleased; and deemed that his wife had acted with great prudence and kindness. He asked Grettir to remain there as long as was consistent with his safety, and Grettir accepted his hospitality, and continued there as his guest till late in the autumn, when he went south to Learwood, where was Kuggson, with whom he purposed spending the winter. However, he was not able to stay there, for it soon became known where he was, and his enemies prepared to take him. He accordingly left and went to a friend in another fiord, and remained a short while with him, but was obliged for the same reason to fly thence also; and so he spent the winter dodging about from place to place, never able to remain long anywhere, because his enemies were so resolved on his death, and were on the alert to fall on him wherever they heard he was sheltering.

CHAPTER XXVI

IN THE DESERT

The Center of the Island – Ice, Desert, and Volcanoes – The Bubble-Caves – A Dweller in the Desert – Grettir Stops the Rider – Hall-mund Stronger than Grettir – Grettir Seeks Skapti's Advice – Grettir's Night Fears – Grettir Builds a House

The island of Iceland is one-third larger than Ireland, but then the population is entirely confined to the coast. All the centre of the island is desert and mountain. One mighty mass of mountain covered with eternal snow and ice occupies the south of the island and approaches the sea very closely in the south-east. Much of this is unexplored; it has of recent years been traversed once, across the great Vatna-jokull, but there are passes west of the Vatna. The mountain masses are broken into three main masses. The vast Vatna-jokull is to the east, then comes a pass, and next the circular Arnafells-jokull, then another pass, and lastly the jumble of snow mountains that form the Ball-jokull and the Lang-jokull, the Goatland and the Erick's-jokull. North of the Vatna-jokull is a vast region, as large as a big county, covered with lava broken up into bristling spikes and deep clefts of glass-like rock, which no one can possibly get across. In the midst of it, inaccessible, rise the cones of volcanoes that have poured forth this sea of molten rock. East and west of this mighty tract of broken-up lava come extensive moors also quite desert, covered with inky-black sand which has been erupted by volcanoes, burying and destroying what vegetation there was. The extent of desert may be understood when you learn that there are twenty thousand square miles of country perfectly barren and uninhabitable, and only partially explored. There are but four thousand square miles in Iceland that are inhabited; the rest of the country is a chaos of ice, desert, and volcanoes. The great lava region mentioned north of the Vatna covers one thousand one hundred and sixty square miles, and the Vatna envelopes three thousand five hundred square miles in ice. Now, here and there in this vast region there are certain sheltered spots where some grass grows, valleys that have escaped the overflow of the molten rock, or the thrust of the glacier; and during the ninety years that Iceland had been inhabited, every now and then a churl who got tired of service, or a murderer afraid of his life, ran away into the centre of the island, and lived a precarious existence on the wild birds, their eggs, and on the fish that abounded in the countless lakes. Probably also they stole sheep, and carried them away to the mysterious recesses of the desert where they had made for themselves homes. They lived chiefly in caverns, of which there are plenty thus formed: – When the lava poured as a fiery stream out of the volcanoes, in cooling great bubbles were formed in it, sometimes these bubbles exploded, blew the fragments into the air, which fell back and made a mass of broken bits of rock like an exploded soda-water bottle; but all the bubbles did not burst, and such hardened when the rock became cool. These bubbles remain as great domed halls, and some of them run deep underground, forming a succession of chambers. I have explored one where a band of outlaws once lived, and found numbers of sheep-bones frozen up in ice in the place where, after they had eaten the mutton, they threw away what they could not devour. At the end of the cave they had erected a wall so as to inclose a space as a store chamber.

These men, living in the desert and rarely seen, were the subject of many tales, and it was not clearly known who and what they really were, whether altogether human, or half mountain-spirits. Imagination invested them with supernatural powers.

When spring came and the snows melted, then Grettir left the farmhouse where he had been last in hiding, and went into the desert, to find food and shelter for himself.

One day he saw a man on horseback alone riding over a ridge of hill. He was a very big man, and he led another horse that had bags of goods on his back. The man wore a slouched hat so that his face could not clearly be seen.

Grettir looked hard at the horse and the goods on the pack-saddle, and thought he would probably find some of these latter serviceable to him, and in his need he was not particular how he got those things which he wanted. So he went up to the rider and peremptorily ordered him to stand and deliver.

"Why should I give you things that are my own?" asked the stranger. "I will sell some of my wares if you can pay for them."

"I have no money," answered Grettir, "what I want I take. You must have heard that by report."

"Then I know with whom I have to deal; you are Grettir the outlaw, the son of Asmund of Biarg." Thereat he struck spurs into his horse and tried to ride past.

"Nay, nay! We part not like this," said Grettir, and he laid his hands on the reins of the horse the stranger rode.

"You had better let go," said the mounted man.

"Nay, that I will not," answered Grettir.

Then the rider stooped and put his hands to the reins above those of Grettir, between them and the bit, and he dragged them along, forcing Grettir's hands along the bridle to the end and then wrenched them out of his grasp.

Grettir looked at his palms and saw that the skin had been torn in the struggle. Then he found out that he had met with a man who was stronger than himself.

"Give me your name," said he. "For, good faith! I have not encountered a man like you."

Then the horseman laughed and sang:

"By the Caldron's sideAway I ride,Where the waters rush and fallAdown the crystal glacier wallThere you will find a stoneJoined to a hand – alone."

This was a puzzling answer. The meaning was that he lived near a waterfall that poured out of the Ice mountain, and that his name was Hall-mund, hall is a stone and mund is the hand.

Grettir and he parted good friends; and as he rode away Hall-mund called out to Grettir that he would remember this meeting, and as it ended in friendliness he hoped to do him a good turn yet, – that when every other place of refuge failed he was to seek him "by the Caldron's side, where the waters rush and fall, adown the crystal glacier wall" under Ball-jokull, and there he would give him shelter.

After this Grettir went to the house of his friend the law-man Skapti, and asked his advice, and whether he would house him for the ensuing winter.

"No, friend," answered Skapti, "you have been acting somewhat lawlessly, laying hands on other men's goods, and this ill becomes a well-born man such as you. Now, it would be better for you not to rob and reive, but get your living in other fashion, even though it were poorer fare you got, and sometimes you had to go without food. I cannot house you, for I am a law-man, and it would not be proper for me who lay down the law to shelter such a notorious law-breaker as yourself. But I will give you my advice what to do. To the north of the Erick's-jokull is a tangle of lakes and streams. The lakes have never been counted they are in such quantities, and no one knows how to find his way among them. These lakes are full of fish, and swarm with birds in summer. There is also a little creeping willow growing in the sand, and some scanty grass. It is only one hard day's ride over the waste to Biarg, so that your mother can supply you thence with those things of which you stand in absolute need, as clothing, and you can fish and kill birds for your subsistence, and will have no need to rob folk and exact food from the bonders, thereby making yourself a common object of terror and dislike. One more piece of advice I give you – Beware how you trust anyone to be with you."

Grettir thought this advice was good – only in one point was it hard for him to follow. He was haunted with these fearful dreams at night which followed the wrestle with Glam, and in the long darkness of winter the dreadful eyes stared at him from every quarter whither he turned his, so that it was unendurable for him to be alone in the dark.

Still – he went. He followed up the White River to the desert strewn with lakes from which that river flowed, and there found himself in utter solitude and desolation.

A good map of Iceland was made in 1844, and on that fifty-three lakes are marked, but the smaller tarns were not all set down. In such a tangle of water and moor Grettir might be in comparative security. He settled himself on a spot of land that runs out into the waters of the largest of the sheets of water, which goes by the name of the Great Eagle Lake, and thereon he built himself a hovel of stones and turf, the ruins of which remain to this day, and I have examined them.

CHAPTER XXVII

ON THE GREAT EAGLE LAKE

The Ruins of the Hut – Erick's-jokull – A Craving for Companionship – A Traitor – Grim Tries to Kill Grettir – Redbeard Undertakes the Task – Redbeard's Stratagem – A Base Fellow – Grettir sinks to the Bottom – Caught in his own Trap – Grettir attacked by Thorir – The Attack Baffled – The Guardian of Grettir's Back – A Summer with Hallmund

Grettir was settled now on the Great Eagle Lake. This lake is shaped like the figure 8, only that the spot of land between the upper and lower portion of the lake does not run quite across. On one side of this spot the rock falls away precipitously into the water, whereas it slopes on the other. If I had had a spade and pick, and if there had been more grass on the moor so as to allow of a longer stay, I would have dug about the foundations of Grettir's hut, and, who can tell! I might perhaps have found some relic of him. There is no record of anyone else having inhabited it since he was there, and in the middle of the 13th century, when the Saga of Grettir was committed to writing, there remained the ruins of his hut, but no one lived at the place. Now there is no human habitation for many miles; the lake was a day's journey on horseback from the nearest farm, where I had spent the night. You must get some idea of the place where now for some years Grettir was to live.

The moor is made up of rock split to fragments by the frost, and with wide tracts between the ridges of rock strewn with black volcanic ash and sand. It lies high; when I camped out there at the end of June, there was no grass visible, only angelica shoots, and a little trailing willow, so that my horses had to feed on these. The willow does not rise above the surface of the ground, but its roots trail long distances under the surface, groping for nutriment; and for fuel one has to dig out these roots with one's fingers, and employ those which are dryest. Every dip in the moor is filled with a lake, and every lake has in it a pair of swans; in addition there are abundance of other wild fowl, and on the moor are ptarmigan that live on the flowers of the whortle or blae-berry.

Above the rolling horizon of moor, to the south rises the great snowy dome of Erick's-jokull. This is in reality a huge volcano, with precipitous sides of black lava towering up like an immense giant's castle. The great crater has been choked up with the snow of centuries, and the snow in falling had piled up a vast cupola of snow and ice standing high above the black walls, and sliding and falling over the edges in a succession of avalanches. When, at eleven o'clock at night, I looked out of my tent at Erick's-jokull, the scene was sublime. The sun had just gone under the northern horizon of snow and hill, but shone on the great dome of Erick's-jokull, turning it to the purest and most delicate rose colour, and the walls of upright basalt that sustained the dome were of the purple of a plum. Grettir obtained nets and a boat from home, and such things as he wanted for his hut. One great advantage of his present situation was that three different roads or rather tracks led to it from Biarg, so that those who wanted to come to him from home could select their way and avoid observation, till they got among the lakes, when they were in a labyrinth in which anyone might easily be lost, and any one could escape a pursuer. It is true that it was a long and arduous day's ride from Biarg to the Eagle Lake, but the whole of the course along each of the ways lay through uninhabited land.