49 
fused in the course of a century all over the settlements. There 
were on the eastern coast alone twelve parishes and two monasteries. 
Arngrim Jonas gives an account of seventeen bishops down to the 
year 1412. A short time previous to this period, the Esquimaux 
(Greenlanders) began to shew themselves on the west coast of 
Greenland. It is very difficult to say with certainty from what 
country they came. I am quite convinced that they came from 
the west coast of Davis’s Strait, around Baffin’s Bay, as the people 
in Terra Labrador are of the same nation: a nation, which is un- 
doubtedly very extensive, which inhabits Nootka Sound, William’s 
Sound, and probably emigrated from these distant residences by 
land, over the Copper-mine-river, and the lakes down to Hudson’s 
Bay. Every one who reads Cook’s and Clarke’s account of these 
people with attention will be surprised by the resemblance of 
these two distant families, as to their language and manner of 
living. 
The time of the extirpation of the Icelanders on the coast of 
Greenland is very uncertain, and there are very different opinions 
on this subject. 1 shall quote them briefly, and then submit my 
own opinion. 
Some attribute it to warlike attacks or battles between the Es- 
quimaux and Norwegians. I think it is quite ridiculous and ab- 
surd to suppose, that these timid, feeble, wretched creatures, who 
could not arrive in masses on the spot, who neither use nor know 
instruments of war, should attack and defeat a robust, valiant, 
brave set of men known through ages as heroes. 
Another opinion is, that the European settlers were exterminated 
by a kind of plague called the black death, which made dreadful 
devastations in the north of Europe in the year 1350. But, at that 
time, all intercourse had already ceased between the settlements and 
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