﻿NO. 19 NORSE VISITS TO NORTH AMERICA — BABCOCK lOQ 



given, Cabot * probably misunderstood Avalon as did Thorfinn, 

 calling it the isle of St. John ; and Cartier, 2 after sailing into the Gulf, 

 could only say that Newfoundland was probably an island. Some of 

 the early maps also show Avalon as insular. 



The Skrellings (or savages) encountered on their return may have 

 been Beothuk. Dr. Rink 3 thought the man's name was probably 

 Eskimo, a corruption of the word for " her husband," but Thalbitzer 4 

 holds otherwise (see p. 105 ante and note 9, p. 177). The under- 

 ground dwellings 5 remind one of the Eskimo legends concerning 

 " inlanders," presumably northern Indians, Nascopie or Tinne. 

 The " beard " of the escaping man was possibly a mask or some 

 misunderstood garment, though the practice of plucking out hairs 

 proves that a beard might grow on Amerinds, and other early 

 bearded individuals are reported along our coast. It is true that the 

 Labrador Eskimo were contending for foothold on the upper New- 

 foundland coast early in the sixteenth century, and may have been 

 thus engaged in the eleventh, but their presence in wooded regions 

 seems unlikely. We can make little of these Marklanders, perhaps 

 because the Icelanders tell us so little that is trustworthy about them, 

 and the English and French so little, trustworthy or not, about the 

 Beothuk. 6 When we first really see the latter, they are an interior 

 tribe hiding from the encompassing peoples, " altogether in the north 

 and west part" says Whitbourne. Cartwright 7 (1770) says that 

 summers often passed without one being seen; and they kept this 

 over-prudent habit till the end, which was probably a good deal later 

 than the last known death (of a captive in 1829). One corpse was 

 found aboveground in 1886; but it can hardly have lasted fifty years. 

 Cormack, 8 who reached their home on Red Indian Lake in 1828, 

 thought the remnant of them hidden, not dead. Their arts, stature, 

 and prowess may indicate some infusion of Norse blood. 



In this identification of Newfoundland with Markland, Packard, 

 Nansen, and Storm and other authorities all agree ; and there are 



*M. F. Howley: The Ecclesiastical History of Newfoundland. 



2 Cartier's Voyages : Orig. Narr. Amer. Hist. ; also J. Winsor : Fi om Cartier 

 to Frontenac. 



3 H. J. Rink: Tales and Traditions of the Eskimo, p. 74. 



4 W. Thalbitzer: The Eskimo Language, p. 20. 



5 H. J. Rink: Tales and Traditions of the Eskimo, pp. 262, 298. 



6 Alan MacDougall: The Beothuk Indians. Trans. Royal Inst, of Canada, 

 1890-1891, p. 8. 



7 Capt. Cartwright's Journal, republished 1911, first 20 pages. 



8 Cormack: Journey in Search of the Red Indians in Newfoundland. 

 Edinb. Pbilos. Journ., vol. 6, 1828-1829, p. 327. 



