They may not be violated twice, those sacred fires. Once in a lifetime the very young and the pure in heart may see the shine of them and pluck a brand from the altar’s edge. But, once possessed, it must be watched with a greater vigilance than even that of the gods, for its light will live only for him who snatched it first. Only for him that shields it, even with his life, from the contact of the world does it burst into a burning and a shining light. Let once the touch of alien fingers disturb it, and there remains only a little heap of bitter ashes. _*Grettir at Drangey*_ *I* *HOW GRETTIR CAME TO THE ISLAND* A long slant of rain came from out the northwest, and much fog; and the sea, still swollen by the last of the winter gales—now two days gone—raced by the bows of their boat in great swells, quiet, huge. It was cold, and the wind, like a hound at fault, hunted along through the gorges between the wave heads, casting back and forth swiftly in bulging, sounding blasts that made an echo between the walls of water. At times the wind discovered the boat and leaped upon it suddenly with a gush of fierce noise, clutching at the sail and bearing it down as the dog bears down the young elk. The sky, a vast reach of broken grey, slid along close overhead, sometimes even dropping flat upon the sea, blotting the horizon and whirling about like geyser mist or the reek and smoke from the mouth of _jokuls_. Then, perhaps, out of the fog and out of the rain, suddenly great and fearful came towering and dipping a mighty berg, the waves breaking like surf about its base, spires of grey ice lifting skywards, all dripping and gashed and jagged; knobs and sharp ridges thrusting from under beneath the water, full of danger to ships. At such moments they must put the helm over quickly, sheering off from the colossus before it caught and trampled them. But no living thing did they see through all the day. Sea birds there were none; no porpoises played about the boat, no seals barked from surge to surge. There was nothing but the silent gallop of the waves, the flitting of the leaden sky, the uneven panting of the wind, and the rattle of the rain on the half-frozen sail. The sea was very lonely, barren, empty of all life.