20 SMITHSONIAN MISCELLANEOUS COLLECTIONS VOL. I07 



The Saga story of Karlsefni's voyage now continues as follows: 



Then they sailed with northerly winds two "doegr," and land then lay before 

 them, and upon it was a great wood and many wild beasts; an island lay off 

 to the southeast, and there they found a bear, and they called this Blarney 

 (Bear Island), while the land where the wood was they called Markland 

 (Forest-land). 



Biarni found the second land to which he came "flat and wooded," 

 and the chronicler evidently intends to identify with it the second 

 land he reports to have been discovered by Leif, which the latter 

 named Markland. Leif, according to this writer, found it to be "a 

 level wooded land, and there were broad stretches of white sand 

 where they went, and the land was level by the sea." The narratives 

 thus agree as to the woods, but the Saga does not add that the land 

 was level. On the other hand it notes the offshore island to the south- 

 east which they called Bear Island. Islands so named seem to have 

 been very common, since, besides the two of this narrative, Graah 

 tells us that the name was applied to Disko. It is evident that our 

 chroniclers did not collaborate in their descriptions of Markland, 

 since they agree in only one feature and that closely associated with 

 the name by which that region came to be widely known. 



The two versions of the Saga differ somewhat in their accounts 

 of the next landfall. One says : 



Thence they sailed southward along the land for a long time, and came to a 

 cape ; the land lay upon tlie starboard ; there were long strands and sandy banks 

 there. They rowed to the land and found upon the cape there the keel of a ship, 

 and they called it there Kiarlarnes (Keelness) ; they also called the strands 

 Furdustrandir (Wonder-strands), because they were so long to sail by. 



The other runs as follows: 



When two doegr had elapsed, they descried land, and they sailed off this land; 

 there was a cape to which they came. They beat into the wind along this coast, 

 having the land on the starboard side. This was a bleak coast, with long and 

 sandy shores. They went ashore in boats, and found the keel of a ship, so they 

 called it Keelness there; they likewise gave a name to the strands and called 

 them Wonder-strands, because they were so long to sail by. 



The first version seems to regard Keelness and the Wonder-strands 

 as attached to Markland, while the second implies that it was sepa- 

 rated by another stretch of sea. There is no mention of these Won- 

 der-strands in the Biarni narrative, but it is possible that the "broad 

 stretches of white sand" connected with Markland in the Flat Island 

 Book story of Leif's voyage may refer to them if the first version of 



