the Norsemen first began to settle there, in the year 874, until 

 in the sixth decade of the nineteenth century, when two or 

 three small parties emigrated to South America (Brazils). In 

 saying this I, of course leave out the emigration to Greenland 

 towards the close of the tenth century — whence it is claimed 

 that the Icelandic colonists made several expeditions to the 

 east coast of Canada in the beginning of the eleventh century. 

 I am, of course, only referring to modern times. 



Thus it will be seen that the great emigration-wave of 

 Europe did not strike the historical island, bordering on the 

 Arctic circle, until after the middle of the nineteenth century. 



In the spring of 1870 four young men left Iceland for 

 North America, landing in Quebec on the 19th day of June. 

 They, however, went through to the United States, to Wis- 

 consin, and settled there. They are considered the first real 

 Icelandic immigrants to North America, although it is known 

 that a few persons from the Westman Islands (a short dis- 

 tance off the south coast of Iceland) had been proselyted b)' 

 Mormon missionaries and gone to Utah some years earlier. 



The next year (1871) a small party left Iceland and went 

 through to Wisconsin, and in 1872 another small party (a 

 little over a dozen persons) also went to Wisconsin. These 

 few who had so far emigrated were, however, both from the 

 southern and northern districts of Iceland, and some of them 

 wrote letters to their friends at home, describing this redis- 

 covered country in rather glowing terms, so that the news 

 spread among the people on both sides of the island at the 

 same time. Some of these letters were published in a fort- 

 nightly newspaper, issued in the chief town in the north of 

 Iceland, during the winter of 1872-3, and then people in that 

 part of the island began to talk in earnest about emigrating on 

 a considerable scale, and to gather up whatever information 

 they could about the different parts of the North American 

 continent. 



The writer, then a young man of twenty, followed this 

 movement with great interest from the very first, and in the 

 summer of 1872 started on a voyage of discovery all by him- 

 self, landing in Quebec in September, 1872. 



When the writer left home, he had not made up his mind 



