Lissotriches

Sheaves from Sagaland

PART II.-THE NATIVES

The Icelanders are human

`They are not so robust and hardy that nothing can hurt them; for they are human beings and experience the sensations common to mankind.'-Horrebow.

Concerning their hair

`The hair which belongs to the class Lissotriches, subdivision Euplokamo, seldom shows the darker shades of brown. The colour ranges from carroty red to turnip yellow, from barley-sugar to the blond-cendre so expensive in the civilised markets. We find all the gradations of Parisian art here natural; the corn golden, the blonde fulvide, the incandescent (carroty), the florescent or sulphurhued, the beurre frais, the fulvastre or lion's mane, and the rubide or mahogany, Raphael's favourite tint.' -Burton.

Concerning their eyes

`A very characteristic feature of the race is the eye, dure and cold as a pebble - the mesmerist would despair at the first sight.'-Ibid.

Concerning their mouths

`The oral region is often coarse and unpleasant.' -Ibid.

Concerning their temperament

`The Icelander's temperament is nervoso-lymphatic and at best nervoso-sanguineous.' -Ibid.

Concerning their appearance

`The Icelanders are of a good, honest disposition, but they are at the same time so serious and sullen that I hardly remember to have seen any of them laugh.' -Van Troll.

Concerning their character

`This poor but highly respectable people.' -McKenzie.

Letters from Iceland - W.H. Auden and Louis MacNeice (1937)