IN NORTHERN MISTS 



connected with the idea mentioned later in the saga, that Wine- 

 land became broader towards the south, and the coast turned 

 eastward, which was evidently due to the assumption that it 

 was connected with Africa (cf. Vol. I, p. 326). 



The oldest and most original part of Eric's Saga, as of 

 most other sagas, is probably the lays. Of special interest 

 are the lays attributed to Thorhall the Hunter; they give an 

 impression of genuineness and do not harmonize well with 

 the prose text, which was evidently composed much later. 

 One of the lays, which describes the poet's disappointment 

 at not getitng wine to drink in the new country instead of 

 water, shows that a notion was current that wine was 

 abundant there, and this notion must have come from 



Felling trees. [Marginal decoration of the Jonsbok (fifteenth century)] 



the myth of the Fortunate Land, or Wineland; for, if we 

 confine ourselves to this one saga, the notion cannot have 

 been derived from the single earlier voyage thither that is 

 there mentioned — namely, Leif's: during his short visit he 

 cannot possibly have had time to make wine, even if he had 

 known how to do so. The lay seems therefore to show that 

 men had really reached a country which was taken to be 

 the Wineland, or Fortunate Isles, of legend, but which 

 turned out not to answer to the ideas which had been formed 

 of it. The second lay attributed to Thorhall (cf. Vol. I, p. 326) 

 may also point to the country they had arrived at not being so 

 excessively rich, for they had to cook whale's flesh on FurcSu- 

 strandir (and consequently, were obliged to support themselves 

 by whaling). This gives us an altogether more sober picture 

 than the prose version of the saga; the latter, moreover, says 

 nothing of whales except the one that made them ill and was 

 thrown out. 

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