Lögberg-Heimskringla - 26.09.1963, Blaðsíða 6

6
LÖGBERG-HEIMSKRINGLA, FIMMTUDAGINN 26. SEPTEMBER 1963
HJÖRTUR HALLDÓRSSON (1908- )
His Own Master
Translaíed by Axel Eyberg and John Watkins
History of lceland in a Nutshell
(Continued from last week)
The black coat with which
the merchant had presented
him on the occasion of the sad
event was, of course, a little
too big, but it gave him nev-
ertheless a new and strange
appearance suggestive of dig-
nity. Petur walked more slow-
ly too, and he leaned a little
more heavily on his cane than
was his habit. But that, of
course, was his rheumatism.
It was a constant reminder
that he could now have a little
regard for his ,hip, which
whined and screeched like an
old door on broken hinges,
that now he was his own
master, and that now there
was no one to prod him along
and say: “And hurry up there,
you old wretch!”
He knocked on the kitchen
door at Jonki Jakk’s. Petur
always came to the back door.
They were at the table.
“Hello, everybody,” said
Petur taking off his hat.
“Hello, yourself,” answered
Jonki with his mouth full.
“Sit down and have a bite to
eat.”
Petur took off the mer-
chant’s overcoat, and they
made a plaee for him at the
end of the table. He sat on the
edge of the chair and stroked
his beard a little. He was old
and wizened, a harassed and
weather-beaten bird, standing
on one leg on the furtherftiost
point.
Jonki looked at him out of
the corner of his eye.
“Well, I’ve been thinking
things over,” he said cheer-
fully, “and I’ve come to the
conclusion that the best plan
will be for me to take the cow
and you to come and live with
me in return.”
Petur seemed to stiffen. He
opened his eyes wide, his
mouth agape. His expression
revealed both surprise and
horror.
“What? Sell the cow . . . ?”
To be sure, he knew that
Jonki was not in the habit of
beating about the bush, but
yet such lack of feeling took
him by surprise. Joka would
certainly tum over in her
grave. And the thought of
Joka’s attitude toward such
foolishness filled Petur’s mind
so completely that there was
no room left for just and
proper decisions.
“You must be joking, my
dear Jonki,” he said almost
shyly. “You see yourself that
it’s impossible . . . Joka would
never hear of such a thing.”
The last part he o n 1 y
thought—but loud enough for
Jonki to hear it.
“Rubbish! The devil take
Jo . . . I mean, you must be
reasonable, old boy! What do
you want with a cow, all by
yourself in your old age! You
doh’t even know how to milk
her, and what would you do
with all that milk? And now
it’s almost haying time, think
of that! Although you and
Joka could scrape together
enough hay for one cow dur-
ing the summer, it’s quite a
different m a 11 e r now that
you’ve nothing to fall back on
but the cat and your rheu-
matism. No, it’s different with
me and the likes of me, with
kids in every corner. Then it
seems as if you could never
have enough of the blessed
milk. Besides it would save
you the bother of cooking and
kitchen work, that you don’t
know anything about anyway,
you old shark-murderer!”
Silence.
“In the fall you’ll get your
old age pension,” continued
Jonki eagerly, “and it seems to
me the best thing you could
do would be to sell all your
scrawny old sheep to the mer-
chant—every last one of them.
Then you’ll get spiced mutton
and ready cash, on account at
the store and . . . well, what
more do you want?”
Yes, once more Petur had to
admit that Jonki was a smart
man, sure of himself and ex-
ceptionally eloquent. On
closer consideration it could
not be denied that wisdom
flowed from his lips like
honey. So what could Petur
say? He wasn’t used to putting
up an argument. Joka had not
encouraged that. Contradic-
tion was not Petur’s strong
point, and besides he knew
very well that Jonki had only
the best of intentions.
The result was that Jonki
had his way, without a mur-
mur.
Now began a new life for
Petur. He associated with
other people as an equal in
full liberty, talked about the
weather and his rheumatism,
and didn’t go home till he was
good and ready. And when he
came home he wove nets and
read instructive articles in
magazines, old a n d n e w ,
which he borrowed from the
reading circle.
Petur had always been fond
of reading, but it was as if
literary pursuits did n o t
thrive in Joka’s proximity.
What had to be read, she read
herself aloud from books of
sermons on S u n d a y s. But
times had changed. Gradually
Jonki managed to persuade
Petur to sell at auction var-
ious pieces of furniture and
other utensils for which he
had no use in his single state—
dippers and ladles, pots and
pans. Joka’s Sunday dress and
knitting machine went too.
And lo and behold! It now
appeared that the late Joka’s
grasp on Petur’s inner man
diminished almost in direct
proportion to these posses-
sions, all of which, each in its
own way, bound mind and
heart to the daily life at Efsta-
hus in the time of the dictator-
ship.
One drowsy evening in the
autumn Petur invited Jonki
up for a drop of coffee and
brandy. The rain beat drearily
on the window-panes, but the
fire bumed brightly in the
little stove- in the living room
at Efstahus and a sense of
security and well-being filled
the atmosphere. They were
extremely comfortable. They
had talked about life—life be-
fore this and life hereafter
and human life. And Petur
poured out more coffee and
brandy.
“Now, this is what I’ve been
racking my brains about late-
ly,” he said, a little puzzled,
“ . . . this meeting with our
loved ones on the other side.
Hm . . . do you think it will
be some sort of direct contin-
uation of this earthly order?”
“Well . . . there are those
who hold .that opinion,” an-
swered Jonki. Then he pond-
ered for a little while, ob-
serving Petur slyly.
“But how was it anyhow,”
he continued. “Wasn’t it so
that Joka had been married
before?”
Petur nodded his head with
a questioning expression.
“Well, I was just thinking
that in that case you’ll pro-
bably have to remain a wid-
ower in heaven too, since her
former h u s b a n d must of
course hold the first mortgage
on her, and she can hardly
have two husbands there any
more than here!”
Petur of Efstahus prick^d
up his ears. This was, indeed,
a new outlook on eternity. He
ruminated silently for a few
minutes, then leaned forward,
and fairly hissed in Jonki’s
face:
“Of course! Of course! That
it should never have occurred
to me!” And he had to smile
broadly at his own foolish-
ness.
He suddenly rose to his feet^
snatched an old garment from
a nail behind the door, rolled
it up carefully, and shoved it
into the glowing red stove.
Jonki Jakk laughed up his
sleeve. He thought he recog-
nized the late Joka’s old red
rag of a petticoat. But he
quickly recovered himself and
put on his most elaborately
ceremonious expression, as he
stood up and addressed Petur
with his þrandy cup raised
high
“Your health, Mr. Petur
Jonsson of Efstahus!” Because
now it was perfectly clear to
him that Petur had at last be-
come his own master.
Iceland’s history as a nation
may be said to begin with a
pushing young lady of Nor-
way. Gyda, wooed by Harald
Fairhair, scomed to wed a
petty kinglet—let him master
the whole land. He vowed not
to cut hair or beard till he
had; and won at last both
kingdom and maiden (not that
he made her a very good hus-
band). So Norway was uni-
fied (c. A.D. 872). Progress!
But Vikings were individual-
ists. Many of them, preferring
freedom, sullenly set sail from
Norway, from Ireland, from
Scotland and the Isles, for the
wastes of new-found Iceland.
By A.D. 930 its settlers num-
bered perhaps 25,000. An am-
azing feat of transportation—
women, children, horses,
cattle—for the tiny vessels of
the time.
In the year 930 this strange
medieval republic founded
the first of modern parlia-
ments, the Althing; which
met two weeks each summer
by the gaunt lava-rifts of
Thingvellir, thirty miles east
of Reykjavik. Perhaps it was
history’s nearest approach to
Ibsen’s dream of a true demo-
cracy, all of whose members
should be in temper aristo-
crats. But the Althing had one
dangerous weakness. It legis-
lated; it judged; but it could
not enforce its will. By 1262
the resulting anarchy com-
pelled submission to the mon-
archy of Norway. Icelandic
history is tragically simple—
nearly f o u r centuries of
stormy freedom; six of mis-
government, by Norway, then
by Denmark; and a final cen-
tury of amazing recovery. In
1874 Denmark restored legis-
lative powers to the Althing,
which had been abolished in
1800; in 1918 Iceland gained
full self-government, remain-
“Yes,” answered Petur, with
a cunning glint in his eyes,
“you see, it just suddenly oc-
curred to me that she might
perhaps have use for it up
yonder.”
☆
Please Nole: In the first
part of this story the word
conlribulion in the last line
of the f o u r t h paragraph,
should have been conirition.
ing bound to Denmark only by
the link of the Danish crown;
in 1944 this last link was sev-
ered and the island became,
by plebiscite, a wholly in-
dependent republic. Iceland,
like Ireland, though crushed
for long generations, had
never broken.
From “The Lonely Beauty
of Iceland” by E. L. Lucas
By E. L. LUCAS
"Holiday" Magazine
The Sogas
Above all, Iceland is for
those who love the ghosts of
the past. Its human past, in-
deed, is exceptionally brief.
It has been inhabited for a
little over a thousand years.
There must still be many spots
among its solitudes where no
human foot has ever trod. It
has few ancient ruins. For the
climate has beén too fierce;
the materials too frail. Even
the spacious Reykjavik Mus-
eum shows few relics of the
past whose merit is more than
merely curious. But what Ice-
land does keep is the memory
of a unique race of men. One
goes there above all for the
sake of the sagas, those first
masterpieces of Western
prose-narrative since the fall
of Greece and Rome.
Better know the sagas with-
out going to Iceland than go to
Iceland without knowing the
sagas—as the Icelanders, in-
telligent race, know them still.
Lonely farmers keep them on
their shelves. When I first
went to Iceland in 1934, the
engineer on my ship was said
to know many of them by
heart. On a recent trip I re-
called to the serving-maid at
a little farm, nestling among
its waterfalls opposite the
snows of Eyjafjall, the words
of Gunnar when he chose the
risk of death rather than exile
from the home he loved: “Fair
is the Lithe—it never looked
so fair. The fields are yellow,
and the home-mead mown. I
will ride back home, and not
fare abroad at all.” And at
once the girl of sixteen capped
my English with the Icelandic
original of seven centuries
ago.
F. L. LUCAS
Holiday" Magazine
NÆRFÖT - SOKKAR - T-SKYRTUR