It is bounded on the east by the North Atlantic, the Norwegian and Greenland Seas-Jan Mayen, Iceland, the Faeroe Islands and the Shetlands being the only lands between it and Norway.
These vessels have a wide range of operations, pursuing their work as far as the Faeroe Islands and Iceland on the one hand, and the Bay of Biscay and the Portuguese coast on the other.
The trade of the Faeroe Islands was for some time a monopoly in the hands of a mercantile house at Copenhagen, and this monopoly was afterwards assumed by the Danish government, but by the law of the 21st of March 1855 all restrictions were removed.
The hills of the north-east are mainly the crests of lavaplateaux, which carry the mind towards Skye and the volcanic province of the Faeroe Islands.