Chapter X: Section VI: Education and Professions

§ 1. EDUCATION.

All Icelanders can read and write more or less, they learn the three R’s to say nothing of the fourth R(evolution); but this alphabetic state of society may consist, as in the Paraguayan Republic under Dr Francia and the two Presidents Lopez, with a profound state of barbarism. In Iceland, however, the press is not trammeled; and the newspaper, as will appear, holds its own. During the last generation it was otherwise. Education, a domestic growth, ignored modern science and especially mechanics; reading, indeed, was confined to Saga-history and theology, both equally detrimental to mental training and to intellectual progress. It is still of home manufacture: the high school exists but not the school, and in so thinly populated a country we can hardly expect the latter. At Reykjavik private tuition may be found; and throughout the country some clergymen prepare scholars. But the pursuit of knowledge is evidently carried on under difficulties; “their learning is like bread in a besieged town, every man gets a mouthful, but no man a bellyful.”

Christian III., the Reformer, ordered a school to be built near each cathedral church--a Moslem action which did him honour. Skálholt had forty, and Hólar thirty-four students when the high school, which, as in the United States, is called the “Latin school,” was removed to Reykjavik in 1801; in 1805 it was transferred to Bessastaðir, and in 1846 it again returned to the capital. Bishop Pètursson (p. 365, et seq.) gives the fullest account of the establishment till 1840. In 1834 Dillon found the whole number reduced to forty, of whom some received stipends of $33, and others of $60 per annum. In 1872 the total of scholars was sixty-three; the maximum being eighty-eight and the minimum fifty-eight; of these forty are distributed amongst the dormitories, and board with different families in the town; twenty-three are day scholars residing with their families or friends. The lads matriculate after confirmation, if from the country; and the usual ages are fourteen to seventeen. They are separated into four classes (Icel. Bekkur; Dan. Classe), but No. 3 is subdivided into A and B; thus making the total five. No. 4 also demands similar treatment, but room is wanted and also money to fee extra professors. No. 1, which is the junior class, studies Icelandic, Danish, Thýsku[192] (German), and Latin, as far as Cæsar and Phædrus; Bible history and theology, general history, geography, and zoology. No. 2 continues these items and introduces the student to mathematics, Greek, and English. No. 3 adds geology, mineralogy, and botany; and No. 4 French and general information. The course lasts six years, ending with the maximum age of twenty-three; after which the scholar is “demissus” and can become a “candidat” of theology, or devote himself to law or physic. The shorter holidays are from December 23 to January 3, and from Holy Wednesday to the Wednesday after Easter Sunday. The long vacation is that of our venerable universities, originally designed for allowing poor scholars to beg and to take part in the all-important labours of ingathering the harvest; between July 1 and October 1 being the busy time at home: moreover, the lads have a long and a hard way to travel. The high school year is thus of nine months.

The students are known by their “signums,” a lyre in circle borne upon the cap-band, but some appear to prefer the cross as a badge. In the college they rise at 6.30 A.M., and if not dressed and ready by 7 A.M. they are reprimanded. At that hour they drink coffee with sugar and milk, and fifty minutes afterwards they go to chapel, which lasts till 8 A.M. The morning lectures now begin, and at 10.45 A.M. they are dismissed to a breakfast of coffee, bread and butter, cold fish, and sometimes meat.[193] The pupils do not take their meals in the school building, but at the different houses where they board. No stimulants whatever are allowed, nor must the pupils smoke, snuff, nor chew in or about the buildings, but of course they can indulge outside it. The second lecture then continues from 11.15 to 2 P.M., after which two hours are given to recreation and dinner of hot fish or meat. Till 7 P.M. the studies for the next day are prepared; and supper, cold like the breakfast, leads to more private reading between 8 P.M. and 10 P.M., at which time all boarders must be in college. The day ends in the chapel, hymns accompanying the prayers; and all are in bed at 10.45, or 11 P.M. on Sundays and festivals. Thus there are five and a half hours of lectures; five of preparation for the next day, and seven hours thirty minutes for sleep. Punishments are confined to degradation in the class and, in extreme cases, to expulsion; of course there is no flogging, and the prison and unsalutary semi-starvation of the French college are equally unknown. Fasts are not kept, even after the fashion of Oxford, which, in the author’s day, noted “abstinence” by the addition of fish.

Public examinations take place every year about mid-June; they are held in the first-floor front hall of the building where the Althing meets. They begin with writing, a professor walking about to prevent “cribbing,” and they end in _vivâ voce_. These determine the students’ claims to the stipendia, of which there are three grades. There are twenty-six Heil-Ölmusa[194] (whole scholarships), each of $100 per annum; twenty-four Hálf-Ölmusa of $50, and four Quarter-Ölmusa, the latter often not distributed. Moreover, those who proceed for study to the University of Copenhagen are entitled to $15 per mensem.

The Latin school (Latínuskóli i Reykjaviki) publishes yearly transactions, in a short yellow pamphlet, Icelandic and Danish (Skýrsla um hinn Lærðaskóla Reykj. Einar Thorðarson). In that of 1871 we find the following names:

The Rector is the only official who lives in the college, and he receives a salary of $1816 per annum. The actual tenant (1872)[195] is Hr Jens Sigurðsson, brother to Jón, the O’Connell of Iceland, and he has made himself eminent by his historical studies.

The Yfirkennari, or head-master, lectures the fourth, or highest class, in Greek, Latin, and French, with a salary of $1192. The present occupant is Hr Jón Thorkelsson.

Of the following professors (Skólakennari, Dan. Adjunct), three receive a total of $3756 per annum = $1192, including house-rent; the theological lecturer (Prestaskólakennari, Dan. Docent) about the same sum; while the two assistants receive something more than half ($612). Their names and duties are:

1. Haldór Kr. Friðriksson, who lectures all the classes in Icelandic, Danish, German, English, and geography.

2. Gísli Magnússon, in Latin, Greek, and Hebrew; the Hebrew, formerly so much affected, is now become almost obsolete; there are only eighteen pupils at the priests’ seminary, and a single Oriental student on the island, Rev. Thorwaldr Björnsson, whom we shall presently meet. It is curious how those who hold to “the Bible and nothing but the Bible,” neglect the Oriental text for translations, which are so far from being correct that the best often utterly pervert the meaning; and, stranger still, that the vast stores of exegetical and hermeneutical learning should still lie locked up in the forbidden Talmud,[196] and in the pages of Jewish commentators.

3. Jónas Guðmundsson, in Latin, Danish, and theology.

4. Haldór Guðmundsson, in arithmetic, physics, mathematics, and botany.

5. Hannes Árnason, in geology and minerology.

The three extra professors are:

1. Procurator P. Melsteð, in Danish history and geography; he is a Tímakennari (Dan. Timelærer) paid by the hour, 40 skillings.

2. Saungkennari (Dan. Musiklærer), the organist, P. Guðjónsson, who receives annually $250, without house-rent.

3. Kennari i leikfimi (Dan. Gymnastiklærer), C. P. Stunberg, said to be a retired officer in the Danish Army; his salary is the same as No. 3.

And, finally, there is the inspector with a pay of $220 per annum.

The only unequivocal success of an Iceland education appears to be the hand-writing; it is caligraphic as in the Brazil and Paraguay; probably for the same reason, namely, that time is not money. As will appear in the Journal, a smattering of modern languages has been allowed gradually to usurp the place of Latin, which few even of the priests now speak fluently--the traveller frequently regrets the change. The Rob Roy canoeist finds the classical tongue a meagre vehicle for intercourse; he would not do so if he knew the neo-Latin languages, and would give an hour per day for a few weeks to the colloquies of Erasmus, pronounced Italianistically, and to conversation with a foreign priest. Professor Blackie proposes Greek as the language of the future; we shall next expect to see Sanskrit or Chinese[197] advocated: the difficulties of the ancient dialect, with its duals and middles, are enormous, and no such thing as modern Greek yet exists.[198]

The Icelandic pronunciation of the Latin vowels is Italian rather than French, _e.g._, _Dominum_ (like “room,” not Dominom) and _náútá_, a sailor, not nota: _j_, after vernacular fashion, is equivalent to _y_ (ejus = eyus); and _g_ in _gener_, _regio_, and _gymnast_ are hard (_get_, not _George_). The stranger must carefully conform to these peculiarities or he will not be understood.

Icelanders have two grievances connected with the Latin school, one not unreasonable, the other urgent. They complain that youths learn bad habits at the capital, and parents prefer the days of the “schola Bessestadensis.” Moreover, they declare that the suppression of the northern school has caused loss of time and money--families being obliged to send their children from the eastern quarter almost round the island viâ the north to Reykjavik. The Danish Government could hardly do better than to restore the northern centre of learning, and, perhaps, transferring the southern to Thingvellir would improve the present state of things.

Art simply does not exist in Iceland, and, to judge from the little museum of Reykjavik, it was always rude as that of Central Africa: the only attempt appears to be on the part of the goldsmith. There is a single painter at Reykjavik, and his career has been cramped by inability to study in lands where the sun shines. The sculptor and the architect have no business here. Even music and dancing, especially the latter, which reminds us of that “accursed thing,” the dancing-master lately denounced in Argyleshire, have hardly passed, except at Reykjavik, from the savage to the barbarous stage. We read of the Fidla or violin, and of a Lang Spil like that of the Scoto-Scandinavian islands, an oblong box about two feet three inches wide, and ending in a “fiddle-head;” the three steel wires were either scraped with a bow, or were scratched with the forefinger, the instrument being placed upon a table. But local colour has departed and we hear only that piano which civilised men just prefer to the guillotine, an occasional flute, and some form of “musical bellows,” harmonium, or accordion. The traveller’s ears are never regaled with the Norwegian Ranz des Vaches, nor the plaintive airs which have struck earlier visitors. And the people appear to be deficient both in time and tune; their lullabies are horrible; “Hieland Laddie” is painfully distorted, and the snatches of song are in the true “rum-ti-tiddy” style, grateful, perhaps, to Dan Dinmont, but assuredly to none but he.

A little volume of 180 pages published by the Icelandic Literary Society, at Copenhagen (Islenzk Sálmasaungs og Messubók), and costing $1, suggested that there might be some remnants of music handed down from the past. But it proved to be merely a collection of old German hymns well-known throughout the Lutheran world; and the only specimens worth reproducing were these.

_No. I. (82b in original)._

Túnga mín &c. (Sá krossfesti Kristur lifir).

Sá kross-fest-i Krist-ur lif-ir, krist-inn eng-an skalthví mann dauðans fall-a ott-i yf-ir, eng-in gröfhann skelf-a kann;]

_No. II. (in Book No. 83)._

Um dauðann gef thú, drottinn, mèr.

Um dauð-ann gef thú, drott-inn, mèr dag-leg’ að hugs-a og að mín æf’ á end-a fer, eg víst thvígleym-i]

meg-i, upp-lýs mitt hjart-a, herr-a minn! að hræð-ast eig-i;]

kynn’ eg dóm-inn thinn, á efsta’ er upp kveðst deg-i.]

_No. III. (in Book No. 90)._

Thèr thakkir gjörum.

Ljós ljóm-ar dag-ur, lífs kæt-ist hag-ur, sjá, ljós sveít]

vek-ur, sól nótt burt hrek-ur. Enn föð-ur aid ald-]

a ei-líf-um gjald-a thökk skal thre-fald-a.]

§ 2. PROFESSIONS.

The army and navy being unknown to Iceland, the liberal professions are confined to three--Church, Law, and Physic.

The Church is a favourite profession, and we shall soon see the reason why. “Magnam, quæ in templa eorumque ministros ante viguerat,” says Bishop Pètursson, “munificentiam post Reformationem evanuisse et ex eo inde tempore conditionem sacerdotum Islandicorum miserrimam fuise constat.” The ecclesiastical division was formerly into two bishoprics--Skálholt, established in A.D. 1057; and Hólar, in A.D. 1107.[199] The dignitaries were originally under the jurisdiction of the Archbishop of Bremen-cum-Hamburg. In A.D. 1103-4 they became subject to Azerus (Aussur or Össur), first Archbishop of Lund; and, lastly, in A.D. 1152, they were made suffragans of the Bishop of Throndhjem. In A.D. 1797 the sees were united; a single bishop appointed by the Crown was stationed, as now, at Reykjavik; and the cathedral lacked, as it still lacks, a chapter. Since Norway was divided from Denmark, the chief dignitary was placed under the ecclesiastical jurisdiction of the Seeland Bishopric, but this authority is sometimes questioned. It was proposed by a pragmatical innovator of late years that the present bishop should be consecrated by the Archbishop of Canterbury, but the attempt failed before the indignation of the clergy and laity; it aimed, in fact, at yielding the question of apostolic succession. The machinator took refuge in England.

The clergy are also appointed by the bishop, subject to the confirmation of the Crown. They were divided into Hèraðsprófastr (Dan. Stiftprovest), or archdeacons (now obsolete); Prófastur (præpositus), provosts or deacons, ranking between rector and bishop; Prestar, rectors or curés; and Aðstoðarprestur, alias Kapellán, corresponding with our curates. There is no expression equivalent to “vicar,” and it must be coined for purposes of translating him of Wakefield.

In 1772 the island had 189 parishes (Presta-köll), namely, 127 under the see of Skálholt, and 62 under Hólar; in 1834 there were 194 livings or parochial churches; and in 1872 the number had fallen to 171. A yearly report, published at Copenhagen (Anglýsing um Endurskoðað brauðamat á Íslandi), gives a sufficiency of details. According to the last issue (1872), the island contained 171 ecclesiastics, or 1:456, a strong contrast with the 7000 priests at Rome; there were 301 churches and chapels (Annexja = Annexe) to 305 in 1818; consequently 130 were not filled, and service was confined to about once in three weeks.[200] The revenues, however, are appropriated to the incumbents of other livings.

There are twenty Profástdæmid (deaconries), viz.:

Parishes.
Norðurmúla, numbering 9
Suðurmúla, ” 11
Austurskaptarfells, ” 5
Vesturskaptarfells, ” 7
5. Rangárvalla, including
the Vestmannaeyjar, ” 12
Árnes, ” 14
Gullbringu[201] and Kjósar, ” 8
Borgarfjarðar, including
Reykholt, ” 6
Mýra, ” 7
10. Snæfells, ” 7
Dala, ” 5
Barðastrandar, ” 8
Vesturísafjarðar ” 6
Norðurísafjarðar, ” 7
15. Stranda, ” 4
Húnavatns, ” 13
Skagafjarðar, ” 13
Eyjafjarðar, ” 13
Suðurthingeyjar, including
Myvatn’s
Thing, ” 11
20. Norðurthingeyjar, ” 5
---
Total, 171

The smallest living is that of Sandfell í Öræfum = $111·89; the highest that of Hof í Vopnafirði = $1545·33: in Dillon’s day, “Breiðabólstaðr” was the most lucrative benefice. The bishop’s salary is now $3416; and the rector of Reykjavik draws $1524·77. Seven livings pass $1000 per annum; three, $900; six, $800; six, $700; eleven, $600; twenty-four, $500; twenty-seven, $400; thirty-three, $300 (below which sum pay is considered poor); thirty-nine, $200; and twelve, $100. Mr Vice-Consul Crowe (Report, 1865-66) makes the priest’s honorarium average about 300 rixdollars annually, or £34. When Henderson travelled (1818), the richest living, if he be correct, which is open to doubt, was of $200; many were of $36, and some of $5 per annum. Other old travellers speak of $33, and even $30. They justly term these incomes “miserably limited,” but they neglect to add rent-free manse and glebe-land, often some of the best in the county, besides various minor sources of gain. It became the fashion to pity the Icelandic clergy, who were compelled to be farmers, fishermen, and craftsmen after the fashion of St Dunstan. The latter in 1834 are represented to have been especially numerous; but as every man in Iceland is more or less a blacksmith and a carpenter, we may again suspect involuntary misrepresentation. This life of labour is still the case with the Maronites, whose Church is far from being a _refugium, peccatorum_. The “Prestr,” who had an industrious wife, and no taste for fine wines and tobacco, was better placed than his kinsman the Bóndi,[202] who had to pay, instead of receiving, tithes. And considering the relative value of money, we may doubt if he was ever so severely pressed by the wolf Poverty as many an English ecclesiastic, a scandal which is only now being removed.[203] In 1810 the bishop received, with the contributions of the school-fund, $1800 per annum; this £200 was fully equal in those days to £2000 in modern England. The author, when in Iceland, never saw a parson shoe a horse or take money for his hospitality.

The bishoprics of Skálholt and Hólar at first followed the ecclesiastical regulations drawn up by St Ólafr of Norway. In A.D. 1097 they adopted the tithe laws, which Sæmund the Wise had compiled, which were sanctioned by Bishop Gizur Isleifsson, and which were proclaimed by the President of the Icelandic Republic (Lögsögumaður), Markus Skeggjason. An order of the Althing (A.D. 1100-1275) divided this Tíund into four quarters, paid respectively to the bishop (Biskups-tíund), the priest (Prests-tíund), the church (repairs, etc., Kirkju-tíund), and the poor (Fátækra-tíund); and this division still obtains in the case of tithes from properties exceeding a certain value. After April 16, 1556, the bishop’s portion was appropriated by the sovereign under the name of “Crown tithes.” This form of tax is obsolete in Europe, but it can hardly be altered for the better in a sparsely populated country like Iceland, attached to the _mos majorum_, where the state of society differs little from that which originated the impost.[204]

In 1810, the Tíund of twelve head of fish, or an equivalent of 27 skillings, then = 1 shilling, was required from every person possessing more than five hundreds,[205] and it increased in uniform ratio with property. The subject of tithes has become a mass of intricacies, and only the outlines of the system can find room. The Tíund (Teind of the Shetlands) is now an impost of one per cent. on the value of all assessable property, viz., on land, boats, horses, cows, and sheep. The tithes of properties not exceeding five “hundreds,” or about $150, are applied undivided to supporting paupers; above that sum, they are quartered, as before mentioned.

Tithes may also be divided into two classes--the first, taken upon all the hundreds of immovable property, land, and houses; the second, levied after the fifth hundred, upon movable goods, money, horses, cattle, and fishing boats with their gear. Formerly every fisherman contributed one share of one day’s fishing to the hospitals; now he pays ½ ell, or 12 skillings, of every 120 heads of fish, and 1 ell, or 24 skillings, for every barrel of shark liver oil (Law 12, Feb. 1872). Church and Crown estates are exempt. Hospital lands, like the property of the governor, the bishop, the amtmenn, and the priests, pay only the “few-taking,” quarter-tithe or poor-tax.

The clergyman also adds to his temporalities by fees for baptisms, marriages, and burials. Each farmer is bound to feed an ecclesiastical mutton from mid-October to mid-May. This is a relic of Catholicism, when the “lamb of SS. Mary and Joseph” was intended as a feast, given by the priest to his parishioners after they had communicated. Now the latter graze the mutton, but do not eat it. The Prestr can also command a _corvée_ of the poorer peasantry for at least one day to get in his hay-crop. And what distinguish his position in Iceland are the high proportion and the comparative value of Church property.

In 1695 the distribution of the 4059 farms upon the island was as follows:

Crown lands, 718} Church lands, 1494} 2212 Freehold lands, 1847

Uno Von Troil (1772), quoting the Liber Villarium, or Land-book of 1695, thus distributes the Church property:

Bishopric of Skálholt, 304 farms. ” Hólar, 345 “ Church glebes, 640 “ Clergy glebes, 140 “ Glebes of superannuated clergymen, 45 “ For the poor, 16 “ For hospitals, 4 “ ---- Total, 1494 “

Here, out of a total of 4059, the sovereign, the clergy, and the poor whom they represented, monopolised a total of 2212. And in the present day the whole number of farms being 4357,[206] the clergy still hold the best properties. The total of 87,860 hundreds may now be divided as follows:

Crown hundreds, 8,886⅓ Priest hundreds, 15,309-5/12 Hospitals and poor hundreds, 1,099½ Farmers’ hundreds, 62,363

The proportion has declined from half to little more than a third, but it is still abnormal.

The power of landed property, combined with superior education and the facility of evicting tenantry, makes the Iceland parson a “squarson” of purest type, as the witty compounder of the word understood it. He inherits, moreover, not only the respect, but even the political power of the old pagan Goði. He commands elections as a rule,[207] and can return himself, as well as his friends, to the Althing. Indeed, nothing in Iceland struck the author more than the despotism of the Lutheran Church. It is like the state of Bavaria, where the priests manage the polling by threatening the well-known “Fire of Heaven.”

Nothing need be said of legal studies in Iceland, as the course is relegated to Copenhagen.

The island being divided into medical districts, gives a certain impulse to aspirants. The head physician, or surgeon-general (Land-physicus) of Iceland, who, after being passed by the Faculty of Copenhagen, lectures at Reykjavik, is Dr Jón Jónsson Hjáltalín: his publications are well known throughout Europe, and he will often be mentioned in the following pages. His salary is $1766 a year, and he supervises the eight, formerly seven, district Doctores Medicinæ. These at present are:

1. Dr Thorgrímr Ássmundsson Johnsen, stationed in the eastern part of the Southern Quarter.

2. Dr Thorsteinn Jónsson, in the Vestmannaeyjar, where his treatment has been most successful.

3. Dr Hjörtur Jónsson, in the southern part of the Western Quadrant.

4. Dr Thórvaldur Jónsson, in the northern part of do.

5. Dr Jósep Skaptason, in the Húnavatn and Skagafjörð Sýslas.

6. Dr Thórdur Tómásson, in the Eyjafjörð and Thíngey Sýslas.

7. Dr Fritz Zeuthen, in the eastern districts.

8. The Candid. Medic. Ólafr Stephánsson Thórarensen, in the north-east, Hofi and Eyjafjörð Sýslas.

These gentlemen must prescribe gratis, but they are allowed to sell drugs. Their salaries are about $900 per annum, and under the most favourable circumstances their incomes do not exceed $1000 to $1200. The only apothecary on the island is M. Randrŭp, a Dane, who is also Consul de France. He distributes medicines without taking fees, and draws an annual salary of $350.

The number of midwives[208] (Icel. Yfirsetu-konur, oversitting wives) is about a score. That devotion to homœopathy recorded by travellers in the early nineteenth century, appears to be going the way of all systems, after a short but not a wholly useless career.