NO. 12 THE WINELAND VOYAGES SWANTON I3 



Saga leaves something out, and that the discovery v^as actually due to 

 an independent voyage inspired by Biarni's accidental discovery. In 

 either case we may still regard Leif as the discoverer of Wineland. I 

 think, too, that the writer of the narrative in the Flat Island Book 

 has confused the stories of Leif's and Karlsefni's visits to Wineland. 



These points are raised, not to destroy faith in the Saga as our 

 most reliable source of information regarding the Wineland voyages, 

 but in order to light up a tendency to allow a belief, however well 

 founded, to become a dogma and warp one's critical faculty. Thus 

 Leif's voyage across the entire width of the North Atlantic is said to 

 be "probable" because incorporated into the narrative of a preferred 

 authority, while Biarni's is "improbable" or even "impossible" because 

 the document containing it has been condemned. 



But why did not the Greenlanders take more interest in Biarni's 

 discoveries until Leif's return from Norway 14 years later? How- 

 ever, one might have asked. Why did not the Icelanders take more 

 interest in Gunnbiorn's Rocks until more than 60 years had passed? 

 Probably for the same reason. When Gunnbiorn made his discovery, 

 Iceland had not been completely occupied and the population had 

 not begun to press upon the available supply of land. When Biarni 

 discovered America — if he did — all that he observed of the country 

 was that toward the south it was wooded and the wooded land 

 lay at a distance with a region of desolation (Helluland) in between. 

 Greenland was just being settled, the good sites were not all taken 

 up, and the more readily available supplies of wood had not been 

 exhausted. 



But, according to the Saga, this lack of enterprise was shared in 

 even greater degree by Leif, for after having landed in Wineland, and 

 having obtained samples of "self-sown wheat," vines, and "mausur" 

 wood, he returned with them to Greenland without displaying the least 

 personal ambition to visit that land of riches again. Thus, in six lines, 

 the Saga tells us that Leif made one of the greatest discoveries of 

 all time, and noted and sampled the principal riches of the country as 

 described by all later visitors. On his way back he rescued some 

 people from a wreck, took them home with him, and procured quar- 

 ters for them during the winter, "In this wise," the narrative 

 proceeds, "he showed his nobleness and goodness, since he intro- 

 duced Christianity into the country, and saved the men from the 

 wreck; and he was called Leif the Lucky ever after" — "Lucky," not 

 because he discovered a continent more than four times as big as Eu- 

 rope, but because he rescued some men at sea and introduced a new 



