ERY BY OUR COUNTRY. CHAPTER I. THE EXTENT AND CHARACTER OF OUR COUNTRY-THE FORM OF ITS GOVERNMENT-ITS DISCOV NORWEGIANS-ICELANDIC NAVIGATORS THEIR ATTEMPTS ΤΟ FOUND A COLONY RESPECTING OTHER DISCOVERIES-THE NORTH AMERICAN INDIANS IN HERE-TRADITIONS THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY. UR COUNTRY occupies a large space on the Map of North America. It extends, in a broad irregular belt across the Continent, from the Atlantic Ocean on the East to the Pacific Ocean on the West. Its breadth is from far down each end of the Gulf of Mexico on the South to a line even with the northern shores of Lake Superior, with a large separate territory in the far northwest, on the confines of Asia. It comprises an area of more than three and a half million square miles; equal to over twenty-two million farms of one hundred acres each, if it were all land. It contains almost forty mil lion human beings, of whom more than twenty-seven million are natives of the land. The remainder are from almost every country on the globe. The latter, mixing with the native citizens, make us a strong people. Over all this vast domain, favored with every variety of climate, soil and productions, great lakes and rivers, and the grandest and most beautiful natural scenery, now divided into many States and several organized Territories (the germs of States), is felt the benign influence of a free and enlightened government. It is a model government which the older nations of the Earth are gradually copying as the wisest and most sturdy on the globe. It is a government by the people. How? The people, the true source of all power in government, choose a few of their number to make laws for the whole, and others are chosen to execute those laws. It is therefore a Representative Democracy, or a government exercised by the whole people through their chosen representatives. Its wisdom and strength have been tested by the most severe strains: and the superiority of such a government, with an educated people as its basis, has been demonstrated. In contemplating the majesty of our Republic, the question naturally arises in the mind, By what processes has this great and expanding nation been planted, nurtured, and strongly rooted here, where less than three hundred years ago brooded the darkness and solitude of a wilderness over the whole continent, peopled only by savage hunters or half civilized barbarians? The answer to this question will be the marvelous story which I am about to tell. ALMOST nine hundred years ago, a famous Norwegian sailor named Eric-called Eric the Red because he had red hair and florid complexionsettled in Iceland, the northern shores of which touch the Arctic Circle. Whilst he was on a voyage westward from that far north country, he discovered Greenland and made it his home. His son Lief, an ambitious young man, wished to become a discoverer, like his father. He bought a ship-one of those queer little Norwegian vessels which were moved sometimes by sails and sometimes by oars. They were used by those old Seakings, as they were called, of Northern Europe, who spread terror by their piracies over the British Islands and the coasts of Western Europe from the Rhine to the Straits of Gibraltar, more than a thousand years ago. Lief's ship was stout and tight. She had made many voyages safely. He furnished her with twenty-five strong men, and invited his father to go CHAP. I. DISCOVERIES BY NORTHMEN. 3 with him as the commander. Eric thought himself too old for such an undertaking, but was persuaded to go. Embracing his younger sons Thorwald and Thorstein, and his fiery daughter Freydisa, he bade them farewell, mounted his horse and rode toward the ship. The animal stumbled. Eric thought it was an omen of evil. "I do not believe it is given to me to discover any more lands, and here I will abide," said the old navigator, and he returned to his house. Lief and his companions sailed southwesterly. It was in the early summer of the year of our Lord 1002. They were soon fighting the storms and waves of the North Atlantic Ocean between Greenland and Labrador, and were sometimes chilled by slow-drifting icebergs. At length they saw land. It was flat and stony near the shore, with high snow-capped mountains a little back from the sea. They did not land, but sailing southward they soon came to another country, flat, and covered thickly with woods. It had a broad beach of white sand sloping gently to the sea. The adventurers anchored their little ship, went on shore, and fed themselves with sweet berries. A few hours later they sailed away southward. These bold seamen soon came in sight of another land. It was hilly— gently so—and mostly covered with trees. Its northerly shores were sheltered by an island. They found there an abundance of small fruits, delicious to the taste. No traces of human beings were found excepting some burnt wood and the bones of large fishes: and no sounds were heard but the songs of birds and the chirping of squirrels. Charmed by the soft climate, they |