PART IV 



NEWFOUNDLAND 



CHAPTER I 



INTEBNATIONAL DISCOVERIES 



NEWFOUNDLAND our earliest existing colony became Icelanders 

 known at the earliest dawn of modern history, and those j^^ e f f 

 people who lived nearest to it were the first to find it. colonize 



In A.D. 874 Norsemen discovered Iceland, which is on ^ . 

 the way between arctic Europe and arctic America ; and including 

 a century later Eric the Red went from Iceland with his ^/ ound " 

 family and his retainers to the south-west coast of the arctic 1 000-6, 

 continent of Greenland, and traces of where they dwelt may 

 still be seen. 1 Eric's son Leiv, while returning from Norway 

 to Greenland in A.D. 1000, was driven by the wind southward 

 to a land where self-sown corn, vines, and maples 2 grew, 

 but reached Greenland in the same year. The new land 

 was called Vineland (Vinland), and was sought by Leiv's 

 brother in A.D. 1001 without being found. In 1003 an 

 Icelander, Karlsevne by name, with his wife, who was Eric's 

 daughter-in-law, Karlsevne's friend Bjarni, Eric's son Thorvald, 

 Eric's son-in-law Thorvard, with his wife Freydis, and Eric's 

 hunter Thorhallr, sailed from the Greenland colony with 

 three ships, 160 men 3 , and some cattle, to 'colonize' the 

 new land. The north wind blew, and wafted them in two 

 days or so to barren lands, haunted with white foxes, and 

 strewn with slabs of stone twenty-four feet long; and this 

 they called Slabland (Helluland). A few days' further sail to 



1 Near Julianehaab. 2 Masur trees. 



3 ' Alls 40 manna ok hundrad 1 .' 



B 2 



