DESCUIPTTON OF OHEKNT.AN O. 223 



from liis own in a storm, so that he was ah)n(' when he came 

 to the ice. The king of" Denmark accepted his excuses and 

 the impossibilities he alleged. 



You will now ask me what became of the nine savages 

 who remained after the two first voyages. I will here give 

 you a short account of them. The king of Denmark ap- 

 pointed persons, who had the particular charge of feeding 

 and keeping them, but in such a manner, however, that they 

 should be free to go wherever they wished. They fed them 

 with milk, butter, cheese, raw flesh, and uncooked fish, in 

 the same mauner as they lived in their own country, because 

 they could not get accustomed to our bread and meat, still 

 less to our wines ; they enjoyed nothing so much as large 

 draughts of oil, or of the fat of whales. They often looked 

 towards the north, and sighed with so much regret after their 

 own country that their guards, being lenient, those who could 

 seized their little boats and oars and put out to sea to try the 

 passage. But a storm wdiich surprised them at ten or twelve 

 leagues from the Sound, cast them on the coasts of Schonen, 

 where the country people took them and sent them back 

 again to Copenhagen. This obliged the guards to watch 

 them wdth more care, and give them less liberty. They fell 

 ill, how^ever, and died. There were still five living and in 

 good health at the time the Spanish ambassador came to 

 Denmark. The king of Norway, wishing to amuse him dur- 

 ing his visit, showed him these savages, and allowed them to 

 exercise with their little boats on the water. To understand 

 the shape and style of these boats, picture to yourself, sir, a 

 weaver's shuttle ten or twelve feet long, made of whalebone, 

 broad, and about the thickness of a finger, covered over and 

 made like the sticks of a parasol with skins of seals or Aval- 

 ruses, sewn with sinew. This machine has a round opening 

 in the middle about the size of a man round the flanks, going 

 to a point at each end in proportion to its thickness in the 

 middle. The strength and neatness of the structure depend on 



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