Any one not aware of the fact can hardly explain this appearance to himself, nor understand the noise and surging of the stream.

The little bridge in the centre would be taken for the ruins of a fallen bridge, and the chasm is not seen from the shore, because the foaming waves overtop it.

An indescribable fear would seize upon the traveller when he beheld the venturous guide ride into the stream, and was obliged to follow without pity or mercy.
The priest of Thingvalla had prepared me for the scene, and had advised me to _walk_ over the bridge; but as the water at this season stood so high that the waves from both sides dashed two feet above the bridge, I could not descend from my horse, and was obliged to ride across.
The whole passage through the stream is so peculiar, that it must be seen, and can scarcely be described.

The water gushes and plays on all sides with fearful force; it rushes into the chasm with impetuous violence, forms waterfalls on both sides, and breaks itself on the projecting rocks.

Not far from the bridge the cleft terminates; and the whole breadth of the waters falls over rocks thirty to forty feet high.
The nearer we approached the centre, the deeper, more violent, and impetuous grew the stream, and the more deafening was the noise.