DESCKIPTION OF GREENLAND. 227 



tliey were, as 1 have described the Laplanders to you, short 

 aud broad-shouklcred : J'orti pecloro et arniis : tawny, flat- 

 nosed, and, like them, they had thick and turncd-up lips. 

 The spoils of the boats, oars, their arrows and their bows, 

 their slings, and clothes^ are kept in Denmark. We saw in 

 Copenhagen two of these boats, with their oars ; one at the 

 house of M. Vormiusj and the other at that of the ambas- 

 sador. Their coats, made of seal and walrus-skins, their 

 shirts of the intestines of fish, and one of their under-shirts 

 made of the skins of birds, with their feathers of different 

 colours, are hung for curiosity in the cabinet of M. Vormins; 

 with their bows and arrows, slings, knives, swords, and the 

 javelins which they use in fishing, and which are pointed 

 in the same way as their arrows, with horn or teeth sharp- 

 ened down. We saw there a Greenland calendar, composed 

 of twenty-five or thirty little bones, fastened to a strap of 

 sheepskin, which is not used by any but the original Green- 

 landers. 



The king of Denmark was disheartened about Greenland^ 

 and did not send there any more ; but the merchants of 

 Copenhagen undertook this navigation, and formed a com- 

 pany, which still subsists, under the name of " the Company 

 of Greenland", in which were engaged persons of rank. This 

 company sent two vessels out in 1636, which proceeded 

 along Davis' Gvdf, and to that part of New Greenland 

 which is on the coast of this gulf. As soon as they had cast 

 anchor, eight savages put off" to them in their little boats. 

 They were on deck, and, on one side, the Danes had dis- 

 played their knives, looking-glasses, needles, etc., and the 

 savages, on the other, their skins of dogs, foxes, seals, 

 with a quantity of horn, which they call unicorn ; when, 

 with no other object than to celebrate some toast they Avere 

 drinking, a cannon was fired from the vessel. The savages, 

 terrified at the noise and the shock, rushed from the side of 

 the vessel and launched into the sea, from which they never 



