66 THE VINLAND VOYAGES 



It proved to be too great a task for Thorfinn to 

 establish a colony in the New World. He himself 

 was neither a Viking nor a warrior king. He was not 

 in a position to seek aid from either earls or kings for 

 his project. The Faeroes, Iceland, and Greenland 

 were unsettled and undefended countries when 

 Grim Kamban, Ingolf Arnarson, and Eric the Red 

 established themselves there. In contrast, Vinland 

 was inhabited by a multitude of armed tribes, unques- 

 tionably accustomed to internal warfare. The nations 

 that stood behind Thorfinn were small and, relatively 

 speaking, poor. They had more land at their disposal 

 than they could handle. The new land could be 

 reached only by a long voyage over a wide expanse 

 of open sea, fraught with hardships and difficulties. 

 The Danes and the Swedes had established colonies in 

 countries that were difficult to settle ; but they did not 

 have to cross a vast ocean, and great wealth and varied 

 products were to be had near at hand. In Vinland, on 

 the other hand, everything had to be taken out of a 

 virgin soil. The natives were savage nomads, who 

 lived by fishing and hunting. Many centuries later the 

 Europeans had to fight hard before they could form 

 permanent settlements in the New World. It was 

 not until the last century that some of the descendants 

 of Thorfinn and his companions established colonies 

 in that hemisphere to which Vinland the Good belongs. 



