STRONG EMOTIONS ARE SUCCEEDED BY SUPPER, AND FOLLOWED BY DISCUSSIONS ON
DISCOVERY, WHICH END IN A WILD ALARM!
When Karlsefin had been introduced to Leif Ericsson, the former turned
round and presented to him and Biarne his friend Thorward, the captain
of the other ship. Thorward was not a tall man, but was very broad and
stout, and had a firm yet pleasing cast of countenance. Both Thorward
and Karlsefin were men of about thirty-five years of age.
"Are you not on viking-cruise?" asked Leif as they walked up to the
house together, while the male members of his household and the men of
the settlement assisted the crews to moor the ships.
"No; my friend Thorward and I are not men of war. We prefer the
peaceful occupation of the merchant, and, to say truth, it is not
unprofitable."
"I would that more were of your way of thinking," said Leif. "I do not
love the bloody game of war, and glad am I that we have got into a quiet
corner here in Greenland, where there is small occasion for it. Biarne,
too, is of our way of thinking, as no doubt you already know."
"He has often told me so, and, if I mistake not, has feathered his nest
well by merchanting."
"He has," answered Biarne for himself, with a laugh.
While they thus advanced, talking, little Olaf had kept walking in front
of the tall stranger, looking up into his face with unbounded
admiration. He had never before seen any man so magnificent. His
father and Biarne, whom he had hitherto regarded as perfect specimens of
mankind, were quite eclipsed. Looking backward and walking forward is
an unsafe process at any time. So Olaf found it on the present
occasion, for he tripped over a stone and in falling hit his little nose
with such violence that it soon became a big nose, and bled profusely.
Karlsefin picked him up and set him on his legs. "My poor boy, don't
cry," he said.
"No fear of _him_ crying," observed Leif; "he never cries,--save when
his feelings are hurt. When you touch these he _is_ addicted to
blubbering.--Run, lad, and Gudrid will wash you."
Olaf bounded into the house, where he was carried off to a sleeping-room
and there carefully sponged by the sympathetic Gudrid. "Oh!--" he
exclaimed, while his face was being washed.
"Does it pain you much, dear?" said the pretty aunt, interrupting him.
"Oh!" he continued, enthusiastically, "I never did see such a splendid
man before."
"What splendid man, child?"
"Why, Karlsefin."
"And who is Karlsefin?"
"The stranger who has come across the sea from Norway."
"Indeed," said Gudrid.
Whether it was the sound of the stranger's voice in the adjoining room,
or anxiety to complete her hospitable preparations, that caused Gudrid
to bring her operations on Olaf to an abrupt termination, we cannot
tell, but certain it is that she dried him rather quickly and hastened
into the outer hall, where she was introduced to the two strangers in
due form as widow Gudrid.
She had no difficulty in distinguishing which was Olaf's "splendid man!"
She looked at Karlsefin and fell in love with him on the spot, but
Gudrid was modest, and not sentimental. It is only your mawkishly
sentimental people who are perpetually tumbling into love, and out of
it, and can't help showing it. Cupid shot her right through the heart
with one powerful dart, and took her unawares too, but she did not show
the smallest symptom of having been even grazed. She neither blushed
nor stammered, nor looked conscious, nor affected to look unconscious.
She was charmingly natural!
But this was not all: Karlsefin also fell in love on the spot,--over
head and ears and hair, and hat to boot; neither did he show sign of it!
After the trifling ceremonies usual on an introduction were over, he
turned to continue his conversation with Leif and paid no further
attention to Gudrid, while she busied herself in preparing supper. It
is true that he looked at her now and then, but of course he looked at
everybody, now and then, in the course of the evening. Besides, it is
well-known what is said about the rights of the feline species in
reference to royalty. At supper Gudrid waited on the guests, Karlsefin
therefore, necessarily paid her somewhat more attention in accepting her
civilities, but Thorward was quite as attentive as he, so that the most
sharp-witted match-maker in the world would have failed to note any
symptom of anything whatever in regard to either of them.
Gudrid felt this a little, for she was accustomed to admiration from the
young men of Ericsfiord and Heriulfness, and, you know, people don't
like to want what they are accustomed to. What Karlsefin thought, he
did not show and never mentioned, therefore we cannot tell.
Now, good reader, pray do not run away with the notion that this love
affair is the plot on which the story is to hinge! Nothing of the kind.
It ran its course much more rapidly, and terminated much more abruptly,
than you probably suppose--as the sequel will show.
During supper there was not much conversation, for all were hungry, but
afterwards, when cans of home-brewed ale were handed round, the tongues
began to move. Leif soon observed that Karlsefin merely sipped his
beer, but never once drank.
"You do not drink," he said, pushing a large silver tankard towards him;
"come, fill up."
"Thanks, I drink but sparingly," said Karlsefin, taking up the large
tankard and admiring the workmanship.
"In good sooth ye do," cried Biarne, with a laugh; "a mouse could hardly
slake his thirst with all that you have yet imbibed."
"I have been so long at sea," rejoined Karlsefin, smiling, "that I have
lost my relish for beer. We had nothing but water with us. Where got
you this tankard, Leif, it is very massive and the workmanship such as
one seldom meets with save in kings' houses?"
"It belonged to a king!" replied Leif, with a look of pride. "Good King
Olaf Tryggvisson gave it to me on an occasion when I chanced to do him
some small service. Many winters have passed since then."
"Indeed, Leif! then you must be a favourite with King Olaf," exclaimed
Karlsefin, "for I am the bearer of another gift to you from his royal
hand."
"To me?"
"Ay. Hearing that I meant to sail over to Greenland this summer, he
asked me to bear you his remembrances, and gave me two slaves to present
to you in token of his continued friendship."
Leif's face beamed with satisfaction, and he immediately filled and
quaffed a bumper of ale to King Olaf's health, which example was
followed by Biarne and the guests, as well as by the house-carls who sat
on benches in various parts of the hall drinking their ale and listening
to the conversation. Even little Olaf--who had been named after the
king of Norway--filled his tankard to the brim with milk, and quaffed it
off with a swagger that was worthy of a descendant of a long line of
sea-kings, who could trace their lineage back to Odin himself.
"The slaves," continued Karlsefin, "are from the land of the Scots.
Wouldst like to see a Scotsman, Gudrid?" he added, turning to the widow
who sat near him.
"I should like it much. I have heard of the Scots in Iceland. 'Tis
said they are a well-favoured race, stout warriors, and somewhat fond of
trading."
Leif and Biarne both laughed loud and long at this.
"In good truth they are a stout race, and fight like very wild-cats, as
Biarne and I can testify; as to their being well-favoured, there can be
no question about that; though they are rather more rugged than the
people farther south, and--yes, they _are_ good traders, and exceedingly
cautious men. They think well before they speak, and they speak
slowly--sometimes they won't speak at all. Ha! ha! Here, I drink to
the land of the Scot. It is a grand good land, like our own dear old
Norway."
"Brother-in-law," exclaimed Gudrid, reproachfully, "do you forget that
you are an Icelander?"
"Forget!" exclaimed Leif, tossing back his yellow locks, and raising the
tankard again to pledge his native land; "no, I shall only forget
Iceland when I forget to live; but I don't forget, also, that it is only
about 130 years since my great-grandfather and his companions came over
from Norway to Iceland. Before that it was an unpeopled rock in the
Northern Sea, without name or history. [Iceland was colonised by
Norsemen about the year 874.] 'Twas as little known then as Vinland is
known now."
"By the way, Biarne," said Karlsefin, turning to his friend, "the
mention of Vinland reminds me that, when you and I met last, you did not
give me a full account of that discovery, seeing that you omitted to
mention your own share in it. Tell me how was it, and when and where
was it? Nay, have I unintentionally touched on a sore point?" he added,
on observing a slight shade of annoyance pass over Biarne's usually
cheerful countenance.
"He _is_ a little sore about it," said Leif, laughing. "Come, Biarne,
don't be thin-skinned. You know the saying, A dutiful son makes a glad
father. You had the best of reasons for acting as you did."
"Ay, but people don't believe in these best of reasons," retorted
Biarne, still annoyed, though somewhat mollified by Leif's remarks.
"Never mind, 'tis long past now. Come, give us the saga. 'Tis a good
one, and will bear re-telling."
"Oh yes," exclaimed Olaf, with sparkling eyes, for the boy dearly loved
anything that bore the faintest resemblance to a saga or story, "tell
it, Biarne."
"Not I," said Biarne; "Leif can tell it as well as I, if he chooses."
"Well, I'll try," said Leif, laying his huge hand on the table and
looking earnestly at Karlsefin and Thorward. The latter was a very
silent man, and had scarcely uttered a word all the evening, but he
appeared to take peculiar interest in Vinland, and backed up the request
that Leif would give an account of its discovery.
"About twenty summers ago," said Leif, "my father, Eric the Red, and his
friend Heriulf, Biarne's father, came over here from Iceland. [A.D.
986.] Biarne was a very young man at the time--little more than a boy--
but he was a man of enterprise, and fond of going abroad, and possessed
a merchant-ship of his own with which he gathered wealth, and, I will
say it, reputation also--though perhaps I should not say that to his
face.
"He was a good son, and used to be by turns a year abroad and a year
with his father. He chanced to be away in Norway when Heriulf and my
father Eric came over to Greenland. On returning to Iceland he was so
much disappointed to hear of his father's departure that he would not
unload his ship, but resolved to follow his old custom and take up his
winter abode with his father. `Who will go with me to Greenland?' said
he to his men. `We will all go,' replied the men. `Our expedition,'
said Biarne, `will be thought foolish, as none of us have ever been on
the Greenland sea before.' `We mind not that,' said the men--so away
they sailed for three days and lost sight of Iceland. Then the wind
failed; after that a north wind and a fog set in, and they knew not
where they were sailing to; and this lasted many days. At length the
sun appeared. Then they knew the quarters of the sky, and, after
sailing a day and a night, made the land.
"They saw that it was without mountains, was covered with wood, and that
there were small hills inland. Biarne saw that this did not answer to
the description of Greenland; he knew he was too far south, so he left
the land on the larboard side, and sailed two days and nights before
they got sight of land again. The men asked Biarne if this was
Greenland, but he said it was not, `For on Greenland,' he says, `there
are great snowy mountains, but this is flat and covered with trees.'
Here the wind fell and the men wanted to go ashore, `Because,' said
they, `we have need of wood and water.' Biarne replied, `Ye are not in
want of either;' and the men blamed him for this,--but the season was
far spent, he knew not how long it might take him to find Greenland, so
he had no time to spare.--Was it not so?" said Leif, appealing to his
friend.
"It was so," replied Biarne, nodding gravely.
"Well then," continued Leif, "it must be told that he ordered them to
hoist the sail, which they did, and, turning the bow from the land, kept
the sea for three days and nights, with a fine breeze from the
south-west, when a third time land was seen, with high snowy mountains.
Still Biarne would not land, for it was not like what had been reported
of Greenland. They soon found it to be an island, and, turning from it,
stood out to sea, when the breeze increased to a gale, forcing them to
take in a reef; so they sailed for three days and nights more, and made
land the fourth time. This turned out to be Greenland, and quite close
to Heriulf's dwelling at Heriulfness. Biarne then gave up seafaring,
and dwelt with his old father as long as he lived; but since his death
he has been sometimes at sea and sometimes at home. Now, these lands
which Biarne discovered, were what I have since called Vinland."
"Yes," exclaimed Biarne, with a look of indignation; "and when I
afterwards fared to Norway they blamed me for not going on shore and
exploring these lands--as if I, at the end of autumn, could afford to
put off time in explorations, when it was all I could do to make my port
before the winter set in!" He finished off by striking the table with
his fist, seizing his tankard, and draining it to the bottom.
"I have often observed," said Karlsefin, quietly, "that people who sit
by their firesides at home, and do nothing, are usually very severe and
noisy in their remarks on those who fare abroad and do great things; but
that arises not so much from ill-will as ignorance."
"But what of your own doings, Leif?" said Thorward, breaking in here
impatiently.
"Well, I didn't do much," replied Leif. "I only took possession, and
didn't keep it. This was the way of it. Fourteen years after this
voyage of Biarne, [about the year A.D. 1000] I was seized with a desire
to see these new lands. I bought Biarne's ship from him, set sail with
a good crew, and found the lands, just as Biarne had described them, far
away to the south of Greenland. I landed and gave names to some places.
At the farthest south point we built huts and spent the winter, but
returned home in spring. I called this part Vinland, and this is the
reason why: We had a German with us named Tyrker, who is with me here
still. One day Tyrker was lost; I was very anxious about him, fearing
that he had been killed by wild beasts or Skraelingers, [Esquimaux or
savages, probably Indians,] so I sent out parties to search. In the
evening we found him coming home in a state of great excitement, having
found fruit which, he said, was grapes. The sight and taste of the
fruit, to which he was used in his own land, had excited him to such an
extent that we thought he was drunk, and for some time he would do
nothing but laugh and devour grapes, and talk German, which none of us
understood. At last he spoke Norse, and told us that he had found vines
and grapes in great abundance. We found that this was true--at least we
found a berry which was quite new to us. We went off next day, and,
gathering enough to load our boat, brought them away with us. From this
circumstance I called it Vinland. Two years after that my brother
Thorwald went to Vinland, wintered three years there, was killed by the
Skraelingers, and his men returned to Greenland. Then my youngest
brother, Thorstein, who was Gudrid's husband, went off to Vinland to
fetch home the body of our brother Thorwald, but was driven back by
stress of weather. He was taken ill soon after that, and died. Since
then Gudrid has dwelt with my household, and glad we are to have her.
This is the whole story of Vinland; so if you want to know more about it
you must e'en go on a voyage of discovery for yourself."
"I should like nothing better," replied Karlsefin, "if I could only--"
At that moment the door was burst violently open, and a man with
bloodshot eyes and labouring breath rushed in exclaiming, "The
Skraelinger! the Skraelinger are upon us!"