THE GLACIAL MAN IN AMERICA. 39 



hands, after striking their breasts, refusing to trust themselves with the 

 English until the latter had done the same, through one of their num- 

 ber appointed for the purpose, " who strooke his breast and poynted 

 to the sunne after their order." Davis thus appears as dealing with 

 descendants of the glacial man. 



If we are correct iu supposing that there was a glacial man, and 

 that the SkroBllings were descendants of such a glacial man, it follows 

 that we have in the Sagas four of his words, which may be the old- 

 est known words of human speech: "Vathelldi," "Uvaege," "Avall- 

 dania," and "Valldida," the names of the parents of the Ski-aelling 

 boys and of the two kings. At least, in a recent note addressed to the 

 writer, Professor Max Miiller says that there is nothing in the lan- 

 guage of the Esquimaux to prevent us from assigning it to an antiq- 

 uity as high as that of the supposed glacial man. 



During the eleventh century the red-man lived upon the North 

 American Continent, while the eastern border of his territory could 

 not have been situated far away from the Atlantic coast. In New 

 England he must have succeeded the people known as Skrsellings. 

 Prior to that time, his hunting-grounds lay toward the interior of the 

 continent. In course of time, however, he came into collision with the 

 ruder people on the Atlantic coast, the descendants of an almost am- 

 phibious glacial man. Then the coast-dweller, unable to maintain his 

 position, retreated toward the far north. The northward movement, 

 however, may have been voluntary in part. During long ages passed 

 in the companionship of the glacier, the race must have acquired that 

 taste and fitness for boreal life which clings to the native of the north 

 to-day, and which makes the Greenlander feel that his country is the 

 most beautiful in the world. 



The advance guard of the Skraellings had reached Greenland be- 

 fore Eric the Red arrived in 985. He found there, as we have seen, 

 both houses and boats, but no inhabitants. It was inferred, at the 

 time the Saga was committed to writing, that the remains belonged to 

 a people of the same race as those seen in Vinland at the south. These 

 early Skroelling visitors had either perished or retired from Greenland. 

 The Icelanders do not appear to have met any Skraellings in Green- 

 land until a late period at least none are mentioned. But in the 

 twelfth and thirteenth centuries the Skraellings crowded into Labrador 

 and the regions bordering Baffin's Bay, preparatory to the movement 

 across to Greenland, though many of them may have crossed to North 

 Devon and entered at the northwest. It is probable that extreme 

 necessity was all the while urging them on, the red-man crowding 

 upon their rear with great energy. This is evident from the fact 

 that, when the French entered Canada, the region north of the St. 

 Lawrence was occupied by the Indians. The struggle between the 

 Indians and the Skraellings was long continued, and one evidence of 

 the contact may be found in the common use of a certain engine of 



