Viking Tales Part 21

"I long to see what is back of that mountain."

So they all climbed it. When they stood on the top they could see far over the country.

"There is a lake that we must see," Thorfinn said.

"I should like to sail around that bay," said Biarni, pointing.

"I am going to walk up that valley yonder," one of the men said.

And everyone saw some place where he would like to go. So for all that summer they camped in that spot and went about the country seeing new things. They hunted in the woods and caught rabbits and birds and sometimes bears and deer. Every day some men rowed out to sea and fished. There was an island in the bay where thousands of birds had their nests. The men gathered eggs here.

"We have more to eat than we had in Greenland or Iceland," Thorfinn said, "and need not work at all. It is all play."

Near the end of summer Thorfinn spoke to his comrades.

"Have we not seen everything here? Let us go to a new place. We have not yet found grapes."

Thorfinn and Biarni and all their men sailed south again. But some of Eric's men went off in their boat another way. Years afterward the Greenlanders heard that they were shipwrecked and made slaves in Ireland.

After Thorfinn and Biarni had sailed for many days they landed on a low, green place. There were hills around it. A little lake was there.

"What is growing on those hillsides?" Thorfinn said, shading his eyes with his hand.

He and some others ran up there. The people on sh.o.r.e heard them shout.

Soon they came running back with their hands full of something.

"Grapes! Grapes!" they were shouting.

All those people sat down and ate the grapes and then went to the hillside and picked more.

"Now we are indeed in Wineland," they said. "It is as wonderful as Leif's stories. Surely we must stay here for a long time."

The very next day they went into the woods and began to cut out lumber.

The huts that they built were little things. They had no windows, and in the doorways the men hung their cloaks instead of doors.

"We can be out in the air so much in this warm country," said Gudrid, "that we do not need fine houses."

The huts were scattered all about, some on the side of the lake, some at the sh.o.r.e of the harbor, some on the hillside. Gudrid had said:

"I want to live by the lake where I can look into the green woods and hear sweet bird-noises."

So Thorfinn built his hut there.

As they sat about the campfire one night, Biarni said:

"It is strange that so good a land should be empty. I suppose that these are the first houses that were ever built in Wineland. It is wonderful to think that we are alone here in this great land."

All that winter no snow fell. The cattle pastured on the gra.s.s.

"To think of the cold, frozen winters in Greenland!" Gudrid said. "Oh!

this is the sun's own land."

In the beginning of that winter a little son was born to Gudrid and Thorfinn.

"A health to the first Winelander!" the men shouted and drank down their wine; for they had made some from Wineland grapes.

"Will he be the father of a great country, as Ingolf was?" Biarni mused.

Gudrid looked at her baby and smiled.

"You will be as sunny as this good land, I hope," she said.

They named him Snorri. He grew fast and soon crept along the yellow sand, and toddled among the grapevines, and climbed into the boats and learned to talk. The men called him the "Wineland king."

"I never knew a baby before," one of the men said.

"No," said another. "Swords are jealous. But when they are in their scabbards, we can do other things, even play with babies."

"I wonder whether I have forgotten how to swing my sword in this quiet land," another man said.

One spring morning when the men got up and went out from their huts to the fires to cook they saw a great many canoes in the harbor. Men were in them paddling toward sh.o.r.e.

"What is this?" cried the Nors.e.m.e.n to one another. "Where did they come from? Are they foes? Who ever saw such boats before? The men's faces are brown."

"Let every man have his sword ready," cried Thorfinn. "But do not draw until I command. Let us go to meet them."

So they went and stood on the sh.o.r.e. Soon the men from the canoes landed and stood looking at the Nors.e.m.e.n. The strangers' skin was brown. Their faces were broad. Their hair was black. Their bodies were short. They wore leather clothes. One man among them seemed to be chief. He spread out his open hands to the Nors.e.m.e.n.

"He is showing us that he has no weapons," Biarni said. "He comes in peace."

Then Thorfinn showed his empty hands and asked:

"What do you want?"

The stranger said something, but the Nors.e.m.e.n could not understand. It was some new language. Then the chief pointed to one of the huts and walked toward it. He and his men walked all around it and felt of the timber and went into it and looked at all the things there--spades and cloaks and drinking-horns. As they looked they talked together. They went to all the other huts and looked at everything there. One of them found a red cloak. He spread it out and showed it to the others. They all stood about it and looked at it and felt of it and talked fast.

"They seem to like my cloak," Biarni said.

One of the strangers went down to their canoes and soon came back with an armload of furs--fox-skins, otter-skins, beaver-skins. The chief took some and held them out to Thorfinn and hugged the cloak to him.

[Ill.u.s.tration: "_The chief held them out to Thorfinn and hugged the cloak to him_"]

"He wants to trade," Thorfinn said. "Will you do it, Biarni?"

"Yes," Biarni answered, and took the furs.

"If they want red stuff, I have a whole roll of red cloth that I will trade," one of the other men said.

He went and got it. When the strangers saw it they quickly held out more furs and seemed eager to trade. So Thorfinn cut the cloth into pieces and sold every sc.r.a.p. When the strangers got it they tied it about their heads and seemed much pleased.