DESCRIPTION OF GREEXLAND. 247 



day in this port, and with such fury that they had never 

 been in such peril of being lost. Fortunately they were 

 saved in a place where others perish, for they found a shelter 

 among the rocks, from which they gained the land and re- 

 freshed themselves, and some days after arrived in Denmark 

 in their frigate. Captain Munck related the circumstances 

 of his voyage to the king his master, who received him as 

 one does a person who has been thought lost. 



It seemed as if this ought to have been the end of the 

 captain's misfortunes ; but his history is a chequered one, 

 and deserves to be known. He remained some years in 

 Denmark, where, after having long pondered upon the 

 defects he had made in his former voyage from ignorance 

 of the places and things, and on the po.ssibility of finding 

 the passage that he sought for in the east, he became seized 

 with the desire of undertaking this voyage again. And not 

 being able to undertake it alone, he engaged in this party 

 gentlemen of distinction and able citizens of Denmark, who 

 formed a distinguished company and ecj^uipped two vessels 

 for this long expedition, under the conduct of this captain. 

 He had provided against all the inconveniences and defects 

 from which he had suffered on the first voyage, and he was, 

 as it were, on the point of embarking for the second, when 

 the king of Denmark asked liim the day of his departure, 

 and, passing from one subject to another, reproached him 

 with having lost by his bad management the equipment that 

 he had given him ; to which the captain answered rather 

 sharply : this made the king angry, and he pushed him in 

 the stomach with the end of a stick he held in his hand. The 

 captain, enraged at this affront, w^ent home, and took to his 

 bed, where he died ten days after of displeasure and hunger. 



To return to the subject for which, principally, I have 

 given you this long account ; it results from what I have 

 written to you, that there is a long and broad strait and a 

 wide sea at the end between America and Greenland ; and 



