VISIT TO THE GOVERNOR. 



49 



CHAPTER II. 



Land and Visit the Governor. — Brief History of Greenland. — The Holsteinborg Dis- 

 trict. — Esquimaux and European Population. — Protection and Care of the Na- 

 tives by the Danish Crown. — Plagues of Greenland. — Musquitoes. — Trade and 

 Barter. — A Yankee outwitted by an Esquimaux. — Dinner at the Governor's. — 

 M'Clintock's Work. — The Priest's Wife. — Visit the Government Buildings. — Ar- 

 rival of the Rescue. — Lars's Care for his Family. — Dance on Shore. — A Mountain 

 Excursion. — Rocks crumbling to pieces. — Action of Freezing Water in Crevices. 

 — Sundays' and Esquimaux Amusements. — Greenland Festival. — Schools and 

 Printing. — Dr. Rink. 



Immediately after we Had dropped anchor, great excitement 

 reigned on board. Some of us at once prepared for the shore, 

 dressed in accordance with our home fashion of forty days ago, 

 the captain and I intending to visit the governor. On landing, 

 my heart leaped with joy as I touched the firm earth, and I could 

 not help taking in my hands some of the rocky fragments on the 

 beach and say, " Thank God, I am at last on arctic land, where I 

 have so long wished to be ! Greenland's mountains, I greet 

 you!" 



As Captain Budington had met the governor before, my intro- 

 duction to him was easy. It was in the afternoon when our visit 

 took place, and Governor Elberg received us with much kindly 

 warmth. But the events that occurred during our stay were so 

 various, and have been so minutely narrated in my private diary 

 day by day, that I must try and introduce them as much together 

 as I possibly can, first giving a brief sketch of what relates to Hol- 

 steinborg and its vicinity. 



The early history of Greenland is generally well known, yet a 

 brief resume of it may not be uninteresting to the reader. In 

 many respects it borders upon romance, as indeed all the old 

 Scandinavian chronicles do, but well-attested facts state nearly as 

 follows : 



About the middle of the tenth century, one Gunbiorn, an in- 

 habitant of the previously-settled Iceland, discovered land to the 

 west, and, on returning, made a report of what he had seen. Soon 

 afterward, in the year 983, a person known as " Eric the Bed" 

 was sentenced by the Icelanders to banishment for the crime of 



D 



