20

VINLAND ABANDONED.

sionary in Iceland, went to Vinland for the purpose of converting the colonists to Christianity, where he was murdered by the heathens.

A bishop of Greenland, Eric, afterwards (1121) undertook the same voyage, for the same purpose, but his success is uncertain. The authenticity of the Icelandic accounts of the discovery and settlement of Vinland, were recognised in Denmark, shortly after this period, by King Svend Estrithson, Sweno II., in a conversation which Adam of Bremen had with this monarch.

In the latter part of the fourteenth century, two Venetian navigators, sailing in the service of a Norman prince of the Orçades, are said to have visited Vinland, and to have found traces of the colony left by the Northmen. From that time to the discovery of the New World by Columbus, there was no communication-none at least that is known-between it and the north of Europe.

This circumstance, says Dunham, has induced many to doubt of facts which have already been related. If, they contend, North America were really discovered and repeatedly visited by the Icelanders, how came a country so fertile in comparison with that island or with Greenland, or even Norway, to be so suddenly abandoned? This is certainly a difficulty, but a greater one in our opinion is involved in the rejection of all the evidence that has been adduced. The history is not founded upon one tradition or record, but upon many; and it is confirmed by a variety of collateral and incidental facts, as well established as any of the contemporary relations upon which historical inquirers are accustomed to rely.

For relations so numerous and so uniform, for circumstances so naturally and so graphically described, there must have been some foundation. Even fiction does not invent, it only exaggerates. There is nothing improbable in the alleged voyages. The Scandinavians were the best navigators in the world. From authentic and indubitable testimony, we know that their ships visited every sea, from the Mediterranean to

HISTORICAL EVIDENCE.

21

the Baltic, from the extremity of the Finland Gulf to the entrance of Davis's Straits.

Men thus familiar with distant seas must have made a greater progress in the science of navigation than we generally allow. The voyage from Reykiavik, in Iceland, to Cape Farewell, is not longer than that from the south-western extremity of Greenland, once well colonized, to the eastern coast of Labrador.

But does the latter country itself exhibit in modern times. any vestiges of a higher civilization than we should expect to find if no Europeans had ever visited it? So at least the Jesuit missionaries inform us. They found the cross, a knowledge of the stars, a superior kind of worship, a more ingenious mind, among the inhabitants of the coast which is thought to have been colonized from Greenland. They even assure us that many Norwegian words are to be found in the dialect of the people. The causes which led to the destruction of the settlement were probably similar to those which produced the same effect in Greenland.

A handful of colonists, cut off from all communication with the mother country, and consequently deprived of the means for repressing their savage neighbours, could not be expected to preserve always their original characteristics. They would either be exterminated by hostilities or driven to amalgamate with the natives: probably both causes led to the unfortunate result.

The only difficulty in this subject is that which we have before mentioned, viz.: the sudden and total cessation of all intercourse with Iceland or Greenland; and even this must diminish when we remember that in the fourteenth century the Norwegian colony in Greenland disappeared in the same manner, after a residence in the country of more than three hundred years.

On weighing the preceding circumstances and the simple and natural language in which they are recorded, few men not born in Italy or Spain will deny to the Scandinavians the claim of having been the original discoverers of the New

22

HISTORICAL EVIDENCE

World. Even Robertson, imperfectly acquainted as he was with the links in this chain of evidence, dared not wholly to reject it. Since his day, the researches of the northern antiquaries, and a more attentive consideration of the subject, have caused most writers to mention it with respect.

*Although the discovery above narrated is doubted by some respectable writers, the weight of American authority at present is decidedly in favour of the Northmen. Mr. Wheaton, in his "History of the Northmen" and his "Scandinavia," Dr. Belknap in his "American Biography," the New York Review, and the North American Review, (in an article attributed to Governor Everett,) all favour their claims. J. Reinhold Forster, in his "History of the Voyages and Discoveries made in the North," S. A. Dunham, in his "History of Denmark, Sweden, and Norway," and the leading British Reviews, concur in the same opinion. Our narrative is derived from Governor Everett's article, and the histories of Wheaton and Dunham. Messrs. Leslie, Jameson, and Murray, in the "Discovery and Adventures in the Polar Seas and Regions," reject the opinion of a visit to any part of our coast by the Northmen. They explain the Icelandic traditions on the supposition adopted by Mr. Bancroft, that the first discoveries of Greenland, made by the Northmen, were in a high northern latitude, and that Vinland. was another and a more southern portion of the same territory. M. de Humboldt rejects this opinion, which appears to have originated with Zurla, and adds that "the colonization of this peninsula did not proceed from north to south." In my school History of the United States, published before the appearance of the Antiquitates Americanæ, I followed the authority of Messrs. Leslie, Jameson, and Murray, and Mr. Bancroft.

ceived and executed an enterprise, the most important in its results, of any in the whole history of civilization, belongs exclusively to him. The discovery of the Northmen was an accident; that of Columbus was "with counsel aforethought, on well-weighed grounds, deliberately reasoned out and carried into execution, not under the smiles of patronizing greatness, and with the aid of power, but buffeting, toiling, begging his way to success and glory unmatched. The formation of

24

EDUCATION OF COLUMBUS.

such a character, and the march of such an understanding, in the conception and accomplishment of its great undertaking, are worthy subjects of inquiry. No tale of fiction equals in interest the simple narrative of the adventures of Columbus ; and if one wishes to go farther, and retrace the steps by which he was led to the illustrious vision of a voyage to the East Indies by a western route-the vision which resulted in the discovery of a new world,—he will find himself engaged in researches of the most curious and instructive character."*

Of the early life of Columbus† little is known. He was born in Genoa, in 1435 or 1436. He was sent by his father, Dominico Colombo, to Pavia, the chief seat of learning in Italy, to prosecute his studies; but these he soon broke off, to commence his naval career; not, however, before he had made extraordinary progress and imbibed a taste for literary cultivation which he preserved during his life. He surpassed his contemporaries in geometry, astronomy, and cosmography, studies which appear to have been peculiarly congenial to his enterprising character. He took part in a naval expedition, fitted out at Genoa, by John of Anjou, Duke of Calabria, in 1459, against Naples; and in 1474, was captain of several Genoese ships, in the service of Louis XI. of France. He subsequently went to Lisbon, where his brother Bartholomew found a profitable occupation in constructing sailing-charts for navigators. Portugal was at that time engaged in promoting geographical discovery; and Columbus soon embarked in an arduous voyage to the North, in which he reached the 73d degree of north latitude, or, as he expresses it, 100 degrees beyond the Thule of Ptolemy. He made several other voyages to England, and to the islands possessed by Spain and Portugal in the Western Ocean; he soon became, in consequence, the most experienced navigator of his time. By taking notes of everything he saw, comparing them with the

* Everett.

†The family name in Italian is Colombo; it was Latinized into Columbus by himself, in his earlier letters. He is better known, in Spanish history, as Christoval Colon, having altered his name when he removed to Spain.Irving's Life of Columbus.