DESCRIPTION OF GREENLAND. 185 



another man in Iceland, and not knowing whither to flee to 

 escape the severity of the judges who pursued him, resolved 

 to seek a land which a man named Gundebiurne told him he 

 had seen to the west of Iceland. Eric found this country 

 and landed thereon at an opening formed by two promon- 

 tories, one of which was at the end of an island facing the 

 continent of Greenland, and the other on the continent itself. 

 The promontory on the island is called Huidserken ; that 

 on the continent, Huarf ; and between the two there is a 

 good roadstead, called Sandstafin, where vessels may ride in 

 great safety in bad weather. Huidserken is a prodigiovisly 

 high mountain, beyond all comparison higher than Huarf ; 

 Eric the Red called it at first " Mukla Jokel", that is to 

 say, the great icicle. It has since been called " Bloscrken", 

 which is as much as to say, blue shirt. And, again, " Huid- 

 serken", which signifies white shirt. The reason for these 

 two last changes of name is probably this, that the snow, by 

 melting and freezing at the same time, composes at first an 

 ice, which is the colour of moss or grass, or of the little trees 

 which grow upon these rocks ; but as after repeated falls 

 of snow, heaping themselves in layers one upon the other, 

 the ice becomes extraordinarily thick, it resumes its pristine 

 colour and the whiteness which is natural to it. This ob- 

 servation is based upon my experience of what occurs in 

 Sweden, where I have seen rocks which from the same cause 

 appeared first a pale blue and afterwards white. I can posi- 

 tively assure you, and the ambassador will confirm the truth 

 of what I say, that in returning this very winter from Swe- 

 den to Denmark, and passing in a sledge over the sea be- 

 tween Elsinore and Copenhagen, we saw large blocks of ice 

 heaped up in different places, Avhole piles of which appeared 

 to us, some very white, others as if tinted with the most 

 beautiful azure that could be seen. We could find no ex- 

 planation for this phenomenon, for they were all formed 

 from the same water, and we saw them all from a point of 



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