Mímir. Icelandic institutions with adresses - 15.12.1903, Blaðsíða 63

NOTES ON ICELANDIC MATTERS
S3
Denmark. The boats are fairly comfortable, the table and ser-
vice very good, and the rates most reasonable. There is still
another line of steamers, making regular trips between Copen-
hagen and various Icelandic ports, known as the Thore line,
belonging to the Icelandic-Danish mercantile house of Thor E.
Tulinius, the head of which is a native of Iceland, and the
chief seat of which in Iceland is at EskifjorSur, in the south-
east. The fares on this line are somewhat lower, but these
boats touch less often in Great Britain, although they frequently
call at Norwegian ports. Schedules obtainable of Thor E.
Tulinius, Havnegade 43, Copenhagen. Besides these, there are
one or two other lines, and occasional excursion steamers.
Iceland as a Summer Sanatorium.— Those who are best
acquainted with the great northern island most fully appreciate
the remarkable union of natural qualities and influences which
make its climate, in the year’s warmest months, absolutely the
best attainable (taking ease of access into account) by the in-
habitants of the overcrowded cities and districts of north-western
Europe for the purposes of a sanitary or restorative sojourn.
To enumerate or dwell on the features of Iceland, which make
this statement true, is not possible in the restricted space at
the command of the writer. A few of the more salient can
alone be passed in review. The foremost are the extraordinary
purity, clearness and, in summer, general dryness of the atmos-
phere — pure by reason of its freedom from the taint of dust
and the other contaminations of civic communities, and because
°f its clarification, every eight or ten days, even in the warm-
est season, by a strong wind; clear to such an extent that,
through it, mountains are visible and recognizable a hundred
miles away; and dry because it is permeated, often for long
Periods, by twenty hours of sunshine in every twenty-four, the
effect of which even light showers,, or a succession of light
showers, or an occasional mountain-born storm, do not essen-
! tally modify, since, as has been said, it takes much rain to