Commentary:        According to Jónas's itineraries from the summer of 1840, he and Japetus Steenstrup spent 6-7 July in the neighborhood of the river Sog and the two small lakes through which it flows, Úlfljótsvatn (Úlfljótur's Lake) and Álftavatn (Swan Lake). The farmer at Úlfljótsvatn, where the party rested on 6 July, was Þórður Gíslason, and he is no doubt the unhappy individual described in the third stanza.

Although the events described in "The Sog" lie farther back in time than the incidents underlying most of the items in this cycle of topographical poems, manuscript evidence suggests that it is likely to have been one of the very last composed.

The Sog (Sogið) is the outlet river of Lake Þingvellir, located at its southeast corner. Here this huge, largely spring-fed lake discharges about 100 cubic meters of water per second, which in Jónas's day tumbled noisily down rapids in a gorge between steep slopes. An account from 1703 refers to it as

the mighty river Sog, which gets its name from its roaring [súgur] or turbulent dashing along the bottom of the gorge. . . . Later, when the Sog calms down a little, it widens out to form a not inconsiderable lake known as Úlfljótsvatn. . . . From the waters of this lake, in spring, heaps of tiny pods drift ashore all round its edge: the source, men think, of the blackflies that later — in summer, when the weather is warm and moist — fill the air around the lake so thickly that the sun can hardly be seen, even on a clear day. (ÁSs248)

There are over 100 species of biting midges (Nematocera) in Iceland and during July and August they haunt the country's freshwater lakes in bloodthirsty swarms.

Throughout the entire length and breadth of the land, biting midges are regarded as the worst imaginable plague of man and beast. Two regions suffer particularly from this pest, Grafningur [i.e., the area west of the Sog] in Árnessýsla and the Mývatn [Midge Lake] area in Þingeyjarsýsla (and also the districts near them, when wind wafts the midges in their direction). . . . In both places the sky grows so dark from these wolflike insects that the sun can hardly be seen, even on a clear day, or else seems to be obscured by clouds. . . . In both places you see men and animals bleeding from these savage creatures, who cannot be prevented from flying into eyes, ears, and nostrils, with the result that blood soon comes dripping from them. These nasty insects have impressed people as such a terrible nuisance that they have found it hard to believe they were created by God. Instead they must have been generated in the Devil's beard. And that is why biting midges are known as "Old Nick's beard-lice" [skegglýsnar skrattans]. (1Íþs623-4)

In Icelandic folklore, midges are often associated with the demonic and the Devil as "lord of the flies" (see for example 3Íþs513).

The particular type of Nematocera that is tormenting Þórður, in Jónas's poem, is the American blackfly (Simulium vittatum Zett.). Until quite recently the larvae of this insect were extremely abundant in the Sog rapids, where they filtered the rich organic material streaming out of Lake Þingvellir. Indeed, the grass along the slopes of the Sog gorge was almost preternaturally green and lush, manured by the bodies of countless adult blackflies. In 1959, however, a dam was constructed at the mouth of the Sog, a hydroelectric power plant was built there, and most of the water was rerouted through it. Since that time, with the drying up of the rapids, the blackfly population has almost entirely disappeared.

It is always fascinating to look over a poet's shoulder as he engages in the process of revision — to watch a poem that is only half-alive struggling for full life — and the three surviving autograph drafts of "Sogið" provide us with an unsually good opportunity to do this in Jónas's case. The first two drafts are written in pencil and are heavily corrected and very hard to decipher. What seem to be the final states of Drafts 1 and 2, and both initial and final states of Draft 3, are printed below. In each draft, words altered from the previous draft are printed in boldface.

As the development of these drafts shows, Jónas unfailingly puts his finger on weaknesses in the poem and systematically removes them. He prunes away empty repetitions ("margt dýrið fyrir ber"), lines concocted merely for the sake of rhyme ("með yndi og fegurð og kurt"), and statements that make little sense in the context ("Þórði sýnist það sanngjarnt"). In the course of revision the poem moves outdoors (how could blackflies pester people sitting indoors, anyway?). The difference between Draft 1 and Draft 3 (final state) is enormous — though it is interesting to note that the real "quantum leap" in quality occurs between Drafts 2 and 3. There is every likelihood that additional minor changes would have been made in this text, had Jónas lived to publish it himself.