The primitive Republican. (Columbus, Miss.) 18??-1852, 1852-11-11
Editor & Proprietor,


Meantime our friend Barn had seen, and WA
the first of Europeans to see America; but
Heriolf, and his son, thrifty traders both,
had ever found the oceans and the shores
their fathers had known quite vast enough
for them, and were therefore well content to
ship cargo for homeward voyage. Lief,
however, an Iceland noble, and son to the
Red Eric, resolved to pursue the adventure,
His father, Earl Eric, 90 years before, had
been driven from the peaceful colony in Ice
land because of his bloody hand. Collect.
ing his sons and bis liegemen, he sailed bold
ly away to the West, eight hundred miles
and more, and entered at last deep bay
which he called Eric's Ford, and named the
land around him Greenland. Finding the
new region as good as Iceland, be sent his
son Lief to Norway with messages to King
Olaf, describing the magnifcence of Green
land. The King, who was already Chris
tian, having received from Lief the promise
of his fathers and of his own conversion,
sent them forth with assistance-men, pro-
visions, missionaries, and finally bishop
so that churches and converts were built in
Greenland In word, the Greenland col.
ony was quite able to take up the unfinished
adventures of Barn, and Lief was the cham
pion. His aged father himself would have
I headed the Enterprise, but his horse stumbled
as he rode to the ship, and the Norman 800
years ago was warned by the omen. Lief,
however, bestrode surer-footed steed, and
J embarked all undaunted. His ship, manned
by a crew of thirty-fve fearless rovers, sail
ed away through the maiden waves of the
West, and BARNS land of promise rose to
the sight. It was Newfoundland, but the
Mortimer called it Helleland; and, unsatis9
e fed with its fat aspect, turned Southwark to
pleasanter coasts, and landed in Nova Scotia,
naming it MARYLAND, the land of the plains.
The favored ship, speeding with the breeze,
coasted along beautiful and shady regions
with corn and fruit growing wild in the fields
"a Paradise land to the Mortimer. Rivers
u and lakes teeming with fish, and an atmos-
phere soft and balmy in the Skoredemanad,
(the harvest moon of the year, filed the
= measure of temptation, and the Mortimer
/ built their cabins for the winter.
i The shig was moored and all hands busy
# on shore. One day German sailor, named
t Tyrker, from Rhinland, wandered off in the
If charming fields, and came upon tall cluster
h ing vines bending with rich clusters of grapes;
If he seized an arm-full of the ripest, and has
m tened to teach the Mortimer how, on the
g hillsides of his native river, men made the
bo sparkling vine. tVinland p' cried Lief q
n deep Skoal for Vinland p and thenceforward
he was the Narthmen's name for our modern isle
in of Rhode Island. The old authors thought
as the baptism unfortunate, spite of groves and
a. the halcyon verdure of the field; the old au-
thors we're right, for the wild grape broke
.lv the promises of Tyrker.
M Lief returned in the spring to Greenland;
RS, the winter had been far milder than his men
ur had even known before, and so rapturous was
nd the general report that ThOrWald, Lief's bro
. ther, embarked the same year. He passed
ed his winter in the cabins of Lief and in the
us summer made excursions into the country,
m discovering an archipelago of little islands
in with leafy groves along the white shelving
of beaches, but nowhere TRACES of man or beast,
ad excepting a single strange ood-pile, in form
like pyramid. A second winter was COM
in Portable in the old quarters, and when
he spring came again the ship was found to be
m so much disabled that half of the summer
cir was required for repairing; new keel was
it needed, and the place of the sturdy ship.
ell wrights was named Kiellarnaes cape
en of the keel.
to At length all was aeady, and the helm was
he put up for a cruise to the eastward. They
his sailed along shore in calm summer seas, anC
Tas attracted one day by the beauty of deeI
tn ford, the ship was brought to and anchored
en- Thorwald pulled ashore with boats crew
lie, and was amazed to discover, moored in sha
9ri- dy spot three birchen canoes, with a red maj
lit sleeping in each. Imprudently and barbar
let ously, he gave instant orders for their death
hat One however, dashed with swift paddlestrOke
do across the ford, sWifter than the fight o
md Thorwald' S javelin; and when the Mortimer
the reposed, in their turn, fleets of the red mel
us, covered the little bay-the cliff echoes rang
hat startled with war songs, barbed arrows ant
eSs darts hurled through the air. but fell harmless
up and blunted. The Mortimer braved thestorr
tell with their stout bucklers of hide.
n The savages whom Thorwald contemptJ
dis ously names Skrslingues, (puny men, an
an who are thus known in all the Norwegian ba
lads and chronicles, believed it vain to COZ
gen tend against invulnerable strangers, and afte
2 in an hours conflict were seized with panic an
ish- fed. They had done more mischief, howe1
md er, than was ever knoYn to themselves. On
ode fatal arrow reyepged their murdered con
ned rades, and struck doyn Thorwald himse
has with mortal wound. Let the cross" sal
can the dying rover, (the chroniclers thus NAL
love him christian let the cross of the Sa
lent Jour be laid on my grave;" and his tom
IT, was built on the headland Kors-naes, the cal
s Of of the cross.
ting The survivors bore home the sad news
A. Greenland, wheFeupon ThorYald's son, Tho
stem, (both names are from the Scandinavia
"a god of war; resolved to recover the body
and his father. He embarked early in the We
lips, 1006, and took with him his wife, the bea
was teOus Gudrida, who was destined, but n
han with your Thorsten, to be the first of Eul
col pean females to cross the ocean, and to be
bis upon its farther shore Christian child.
we're With Thorsten, however, all was unfortuna
By Tempest tossed and driven irrecoVeraL
and northward, bis ship was thrown far back
iarn, Bafhn's Bay, upon coast so far remote Il
wan he vas forced to winter in fatal climate.
ID at Thorsten himself, and more than half Of
lWay crew, fell victims to exposure; but happ
crop Gudrida returned and laid her husband s DO
such in the Christians tomb in Greenland.
,ould Next year the most considerable expo
fifty ton Of all was undertaken by q wealthy
allied lander, Thorfn, whose genealogy is caref
torn ly preserved By the ehronielers. BE aFFil