82 SMITHSONIAN MISCELLANEOUS COLLECTIONS VOL. 59 



lute certainty, however. Judging by other sagas 1 dealing with the 

 colony, it was the point most often first reached by all newcomers, 

 working up toward Ericsfirth or Gardar, and sometimes they had 

 to remain there literally for a season. Presumably it was also the 

 chief point of departure of the little Greenland fishing fleet, and any 

 disaster to it, or any ill success, would be felt there most quickly and 

 severely. One Thorkel was then in possession at Heriolfsness, accord- 

 ing to the saga. 



The misfortunes of the emigrants were not yet quite ended. The 

 storms which had quite roughly used them were unfriendly to their 

 entertainers also, for most fishermen had come back with light catches 

 " and some had not returned." The infant Greenland colony suffered 

 and was stinted. As the winter drew on, Thorkel and his neighbors 

 grew anxious and depressed. Pagan still, though with a slippery grasp 

 on the old belief, they decided to call in the aid of a seeress or 

 prophetess having occult powers ; who shows us what Scott's Norna 

 might have been in the palmy days of her craft and in cheerier vigor 

 of life. It was her custom to visit on invitation various homes, where 

 the people gathered in the hope of good words for the future as the 

 spirits might give her light. Thorbiorg was her name and she was the 

 youngest of nine sisters, all with this gift of prophecy, a truly formid- 

 able array. Says the saga 2 : 



When she came in the evening, with the man who had been sent to meet her, 

 she was clad in a dark-blue coat, fastened with a strap and set with stones 

 quite down to the hem. She wore glass beads around her neck, and upon 

 her head a black lamb-skin hood, lined with white cat-skin. In her hands 

 she carried a staff, upon which there was a knob, which was ornamented with 

 brass, and set with stones up about the knob. Circling her waist she wore a 

 girdle of touch-wood, and attached to it a great skin pouch, in which she kept 



the charms She wore upon her feet shaggy calf-skin shoes, with long, 



tough latchets, upon the ends of which there were large brass buttons. She 

 had cat-skin gloves upon her hands, which were white inside and lined with 

 fur. When she entered all of the folk felt it to be their duty to offer becoming 

 greetings. 



She was provided as usual with a sort of throne on a dais and with 

 special food, a leading feature being the hearts of every animal which 

 could be procured in that region. She would not prophesy the first 

 night, but slept in the house ; and the next day had a circle of 

 participants formed before her. Then she called for some woman to 

 sing a certain " spell " of subtle power ; but there was none to be 

 found who knew the song until Gudrid owned that it had been taught 



1 E. g. The Saga of Thorgisl. Origines Islandicae, Vigfusson and Powell. 

 2 A. M. Reeves: The Finding of Wineland the Good, p. 33. 



