Its lower part is built of rude stones to about the height of four feet, and between each row layers of turf are placed with great regularity, to serve instead of mortar, and keep out the wind. A roof of such wood as can be procured rests upon these walls, and is covered with turf and sods. On one side (generally facing the south) are several gable ends and doors, each surmounted with a weather-cock. These are the entrances to the dwelling-house proper, to the smithy, store-room, cow-shed, etc. A long narrow passage, dark as pitch, and redolent of unsavory odors, leads to the several apartments, which are separated from each other by thick walls of turf, each having also its own roof, so that the peasant’s dwelling is in fact a conglomeration of low huts, which sometimes receive their light through small windows in the front, but more frequently through holes in the roof, covered with a piece of glass or skin. The floors are of stamped earth; the hearth is made of a few stones clumsily piled together; a cask or barrel, with the two ends knocked out, answers the purpose of a chimney, or else the smoke is allowed to escape through a mere hole in the roof. [Illustration: 56. ICELANDIC HOUSES.] The thick turf walls, the dirty floor, the personal uncleanliness of the inhabitants, all contribute to the pollution of the atmosphere. No piece of furniture seems ever to have been cleaned since it was first put into use; all is disorder and confusion. Ventilation is utterly impossible, and the whole family, frequently consisting of twenty persons or more, sleep in the same dormitory, as well as any strangers who may happen to drop in. On either side of this apartment are bunks three or four feet in width, on which the sleepers range themselves. Such are in general the dwellings of the farmers and clergy, for but very few of the more wealthy inhabitants live in any way according to our notions of comfort, while the cots of the poor fisherman are so wretched that one can hardly believe them to be tenanted by human beings. The farm-houses are frequently isolated, and, on account of their grass-covered roofs and their low construction, are not easily distinguished from the neighboring pasture-grounds; where four or five of them are congregated in a grassy plain, they are dignified with the name of a village, and become the residence of a Hrepstior, or parish constable.