A Journey into the Interior of the Earth | Jules Verne | Chapter 10

In Iceland, during June and July, the sun never sets. The narrator, Axel, is cold and ravenous as he and his uncle, Professor Lidenbrock, arrive at a peasant’s hut near the start of their expedition toward the volcano Snæfellsjökull. The hut is humble—beams roughly squared by an axe, a floor of hard earth, windows made from sheep intestine parchment—but the hospitality is overwhelming. The host kisses both men on the cheek and pronounces the word “Vertu,” meaning “be happy.” His wife does the same. Then their guide, Hans the eiderduck hunter, arrives, kisses the entire family of twenty-one with the mechanical expression of an automaton, and supper begins.

The Texture of Icelandic Life

The meal is a precise inventory of local fare: lichen soup made from Iceland moss, an enormous lump of fish floating in sour butter, skier (curds and whey) with biscuits and juniper berry juice, and blonda—skimmed milk cut with water. Axel, famished, finishes with a basin of thick oat porridge. The chimney is an antique model: a large stone in the middle of the room, a hole in the roof for smoke. The wife offers to pull off the travelers’ stockings and trousers according to custom, which they politely decline. They sleep on dry hay in red wooden boxes painted with Icelandic sentences. The only objection is the powerful odor of dried fish, macerated meat, and sour milk—three fragrances