The Norwegians brought with them their language and idolatry, their customs and historical records, which the other colonists, but few in numbers, were compelled to adopt. At first the udal, or free land-hold system of their own country, was in vigor, but every leader of a band of emigrants being chosen, by force of circumstances, as the acknowledged chief of the district occupied by himself and companions, speedily paved the way for a demi-feudal system of vassalage and subservience. As the arrival of new settlers rendered the possession of the land more valuable, endless contests between these petty chiefs arose for the better pastures and fisheries. To put an end to this state of anarchy, so injurious to the common weal, Ulfliot the Wise was commissioned to frame a code of laws, which the Icelanders, by a single simultaneous and peaceful effort, accepted as their future constitution. The island was now divided into four provinces and twelve districts. Each district had its own judge, and its own popular “Thing,” or assembly; but the national will was embodied and represented by the “Althing,” or supreme parliament of Iceland, which annually met at Thingvalla, under an elective president, or “Logmathurman,” the chief magistrate of this northern republic. On the banks of the river Oxeraa, where the rapid stream, after forming a magnificent cascade, rushes into the lake of Thingvalla, lies the spot where, for many a century, freemen met to debate, while despotic barbarians still reigned over the milder regions of Europe. Isolated on all sides by deep volcanic chasms, which some great revolution of nature has rent in the vast lava-field around, and embosomed in a wide circle of black precipitous hills, the situation of Thingvalla is extremely romantic, but the naked dark-colored rocks, and the traces of subterranean fire visible on every side, impart a stern melancholy to the scene. The lake, the largest sheet of water in the island, is about thirty miles in circumference; its boundaries have undergone many changes, especially during the earthquakes of the past century, when its northern margin collapsed, while the opposite one was raised. The depth of its crystal waters is very great, and in its centre rise two small crater-islands, the result of some unknown eruption. The mountains on its south bank have a picturesque appearance, and large volumes of steam issuing from several hot sources on their sides prove that, though all be tranquil now, the volcanic fires are not extinct. Only a few traces of the ancient Althing are left--three small mounds, where sat in state the chiefs and judges of the land--for as the assembly used to pitch their tents on the borders of the stream, and the deliberations were held in the open air, there are no imposing ruins to bear witness to a glorious past. But though all architectural pomp be absent, the scene hallowed by the recollections of a thousand years is one of deep interest to the traveller.