Following my trip to Iceland, here is an extract from poem by William Morris. Morris loved Iceland and found the old Viking sagas "a good corrective to the maundering side of medievallism"!
"Ah! what came we forth to see
that our hearts are so hot with desire!
Is it enough for our rest,
The site of this desolate strand,
And the mountain-waste voiceless as death
but for winds that may sleep not nor tire?
Why do we long to wend forth
through the length and breadth of a land,
Dreadful with grinding of ice,
and a record of scarce hidden fire,
But that there 'mid the grey grassy dales,
sore scared by the ruining streams,
Lives the tale of the Northlands of old,
And the undying glory of dreams?"
"
