It is supposed that the population of Iceland was once 100,000, but it subsequently diminished. Since 1840, when it amounted to 57.094, it gradual increase has taken place, until in 1870 it had reached 69,763. The people, who are of Scandinavian origin, are distinguished for honesty, purity of morals, and a. wonderful love of education. Not withstanding their poverty and other adverse eircumstanees, it is rare to find an Icelander who cannot read and write. They belong to the Protestant church. Tim. clergy are, like their parishioners, very poor; they are under one bishop. The Ice landers are strongly attached to their native country, and delight in the study of its history as set forth in ancient Ragas and poems. Their language is the old Norwegian, preserved in almost its pristine purity. See SCANDINAVIAN LANG1TAGES AND LITERA TURE. They are rather a small race, and seldom attain to a great age. Scurvy was a very common disease, and eases of elephantiasis were frequent, probably owing in a groat measure to the nature of their food, and still more to their miserably crowded and unventilated dwellings, which are mostly cottages of the humblest description, built of tad or of pieces of lava, the crevices stuffed with moss, and the roof formed of turf. The fornier of these diseases has now entirely disappeared, and the latter is becoming very rare. The knitting of stockings and gloves is a common kind of domestic industry, and with the sale of skins, wool, feathers, eider-down, fish-oil, etc., enables the peasantry to procure a few articles of foreign produce. The chief imports are rye, barley, flour, coffee, liquors, tobacco, sugar, coal, iron, etc. Upwards of 40,000 Danish barrels of grain (of all kinds) are annually imported: also about 427,000 lbs. of coffee, 448,000 qts. of various liquors, 109,000 lbs. of tobacco, 457.000 lbs. of sugar, and 32.000 chaldrons of coal. The annual exports are valued at about £400,000, and consist of dried fish, wool, hosiery, tallow, train-oil, lard, salt meat, feathers, skins, and horses. The destruction of meadows by volcanic eruptions, and the interruption of fishing by drift-ice, have sometimes caused great distress. Since 1855 free-trade has been in force; 32 authorized trading-places have been opened, of which Ileykinvik, with a pop. of 2,021, and situated at the head of a bay in the s.w. of the island, is the most important. Here the governor resides, and the althing, a kind of parliament, is held; here are a college, medical and theological schools, a public library of 10,000 volumes, a royal Icelandic. society, and an observatory; and newspapers and Icelandic books are printed. There is regular steam-communication during summer with Leith and Copenhagen.
The authentic history of Iceland begins with the latter half of the 9th c., when emigrants from Norway settled here. The Landnama Book, however, one of the
earliest of the records of the island, states that the Christian relics found here by the Norwegians on their arrival—as wooden crosses, etc.—had been erected previously by Irish settlers. However this may be, it is certain that the first authentic successful settlement of Iceland was made under Ingolf, a Norwegian, who, after a fruitless attempt on the s. coast in 870, succeeded in establishing himself at Reykiavik in 874. The changes introduced in Norway by Harald Haarfager caused many who could not endure them to betake themselves to other countries, and particularly to Iceland, all the habitable coast districts of which were occupied within sixty years, and the old Norwegian institutions were transferred to it unmodified. The government was at first, in the times of paganism, hierarchic and "aristocratic; it became afterwards a kind of aristocratic republic. The althing met every slimmer in the valley of Thiugvalla. Christianity was not established by taw till 1000 A.D., and then not without much opposition. Schools were then founded, and two bishoprics in Holar and Skalholt.
The Icelanders were enterprising sailors in the early periods of their history, and discovered Greenland about the year 982, and a part of the American coast, which they called Vineland, about 990. They made voyages also to the south, visiting the furthest parts of the Mediterranean. The most flourishing period of Icelandic litera ture and commerce was from the middle of the 12th to the beginning of the 13th c., \s•ime in consequence of domestic broils, •llaco V. of Norway succeeded in reducing the whole island under his sway in 1262, and a declension began, which continued till a new impulse was given to the minds of men, here as elsewhere, by the reformation. When Norway was united to Denmark in 1380, Iceland shared its fate, lint was not transferred along with Norway to a new allegiance in 1814. The Protestant religion was introduced in 1540, but not fully established till 1551. In the 17th c. the island suffered much from the ravages of Algerine pirates, who carried away ninny persons to slavery. In 1707 small-pox carried off 18,000 persons; in 1784-85 about 9,000 died of famine.—The althing, after it had subsisted for fully 000 years, was suppressed in the 10th c., but was reorganized in 1843. By the new constitution for Iceland of Jan., 1874, the :tithing has obtained legislative powers in all matters concerning Iceland. —See Von Troil, Letters on Iceland, 1772; sir George Mackenzie, Travels in Iceland. 1810; Henderson, Journal of a Resident in Iceland, 1818; C. S. Forbes, Iceland, its Vol canoes, Geysers, and Glaciers, 1860; S. Iceland, its Scenes and Sagas, 1863; rapt. Richard F. Burton, Ultima Thule: a Summer in Iceland, 1875.