AMERICAN LITERARY FORGERIES. 143 



of A. D. 1117, of Arnas Magneas." Then followa a fine version of the 

 whole story of " the White-Sark or Shirt inscription." The editor 

 very acutely draws attention to the word samfethra, "same father;" 

 and puts the case with refined delicacy in this fashion. It ''alludes to a 

 laxity of morals probably prevalent, unless it is to be referred to a com- 

 mon descent from some more remote ancestor." Halfthritgr is explained 

 as meaning half-thirty, a peculiarly Icelandic way of expressing '^ twenty- 

 five years of age." The date, we are told, " is given in runic characters, 

 as in many other inscriptions." Where they are to be seen is not stated. 

 The MS. is merely said to have been found in the ruins ; not " exhumed." 

 Sir Thomas Murray and the Skalholt Saga are referred to in passing, as 

 though everybody knew all about the distinguished scholar and his 

 translation. "The White Shirt Falls were identified by Sir Thomas 

 Murray," the reader is informed, " with the Great Falls above Wash- 

 ington, on the Potomac River, although the last-named gentleman" — 

 Mr. Philip Marsh, no doubt of equally great European reputation, 

 being the well-known exhumer of the Skalholt MS. ; — " put forth his 

 identification as a mere hypothesis at the time. That it was, however, 

 exact, the discovery of the grave of the daughter of Snorri, and of some 

 of her remains, has proved." 



Who shall venture to laugh hereafter at Dean Milles or Bryant, with 

 their old Rowleys; or even at Boswell on his knees before the 

 " Vortigern and Rowena" MS., or the Shakesperian love letter to Anne 

 Hathaway, with its veritable lock of the poet's hair ? And yet this date 

 of A.D., 1051, is a very modern one, considering the sort of antiquity 

 with which archaic anthropologists have been wont to sport familiarly 

 of late years. It is indeed a recent afiair, compared even with Mr. 

 David Wyrick's discovery of the grave of Moses, and its new version 

 of the Ten Commandments. It is to be regretted that the latter should 

 have escaped the notice of European savans. It would have been in- 

 teresting to learn if it had any chance of a better reception in some 

 quarters than the old Hebrew documents have of late beon favoured 

 with. 



But American Runic Inscriptions are by no means exhausted. The 

 mythic regions of the unexplored west furnish the most promising 

 localization for such marvels. At present they are only effecting the 

 passage of the Mississippi. Early in the present year, a sensational 

 column in the St. Louis Republican invited American Archaeology to 

 concentrate all its acumen in that quarter, before modern progress 



