Identifier: ridpathsuniversa05ridp (find matches)
Title: Ridpath's Universal history : an account of the origin, primitive condition and ethnic development of the great races of mankind, and of the principal events in the evolution and progress of the civilized life among men and nations, from recent and authentic sources with a preliminary inquiry on the time, place and manner of the beginning
Year: 1897 (1890s)
Authors: Ridpath, John Clark, 1840-1900
Subjects: World history
Publisher: Cincinnati : Jones
Contributing Library: University of Pittsburgh Library System
Digitizing Sponsor: Lyrasis Members and Sloan Foundation

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on of theisland has been attributed in part tothis want of intellectual vocations. Itis more proper, however, to assign asthe cause of the smallness of the popu- THE XORSE. —ICELA NDERS. 41 lation the want of the eommercial spirit.At the beginning of the present eenturythe whole population of the country didnot exceed that at the beginning of thetwelfth. As we have said, the presentcensus does not show^ a population inexcess of seventy thousand. The state of society in general is ex-tremely simple. It is also law-abiding in luost unknown, and the force requiredto maintain authority is at a luinimum. As illustrative of the law-abiding; spirit of theIcelaiulers, an incident recorded by Bayard Tayloris worthy of repetition, not so much indeed from itshumorous quality, as in demonstration of the abso-lutely peaceable temper of the Icelanders. On theoccasion of the great Millennial Celebration in themidsummer of 1874, the King of Denmark cameover, in the height of the ceremonies, and was
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COD FISHING.—Drawn by Jules Noel, .^fter a sketch of NouRaret. la^w-abidingcharacter of theIcelanders. the last degree. There seems little dispo-SimpUcityand sition amoug the people—little ambition—to increasein numbers. The islandmight easily support a half million in-habitants. At the present time it hasabout one eighth of this number. But theislanders may claim with justice that theymake up in moral character what theylack in popular strength. Nor may werashly conclude—considering what mustbe the ultimate end of civilization—thatthe massing of population is to be weighedagainst human happiness. Crime is al- present one day during the session of the Althing,held in the picturesque mountain valley and un-der the open sky, after the manner of antiquity.Nearly the whole population of the island gatheredto the festivities. It was estimated that fewer th;nifive thousand of the inhabitants had failed to dohonor to the occasion by joining in the festival. Onthe evening before the

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