Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1926-06-24

| According to Morse history and ira
| dition. nearly a thousand years ago
Left Erikson built a house-perhaps
more than one-in Labrador, and
| thereby became the first white cltiZer
| of America. A fellow American, capt
Donald Baxter Macmillan. is about TO
inspect whatever remains of the
| Erikson homestead. If he finds the
walls still standing, that will prove
the truth of the Icelandic sagas, which
declare that Left made the voyage his
Morse descendants and countrymen sc
| jealously contend. 1t will show, too,
that Americas Vespueius had no right
| to name this half-world after himself
| for ii was Erickson who first put the
Eric" into America.
| That Is no flippant claim: it is serl
ously upheld by every true Norseman
| It originated in an article written by
Prof. Jules Maroon and published in
| the Smithsonian report of 1888, show
| ing that the word America" was de
| rived from a tribe of Indians called
! "Amerriques," inhabiting the noun
tains of Sierra Amerrique. which form
the cordillera between Lake Nicaragua
| and the Mosquito coast in Nicaragua
| Another learned man named HorS
| ford explains:
."The utterance Of Morse forms OF
| the name, as Eirikr. Aerikr, Eyrikur
suggests to the listener 'Erika, whlon
| needs only the prefix m, one of the
features of speech due to imperfect
vocal development, remarked amonS
American aboriginal races, and espe
cially among the Indian tribes of the
region of Norumbega lVfneland), to be-
| come m-erika,' or not remotely
| America the name which the CONT
nent, as I conceive, has not inappro'
priately borne"
After that feat in philology, it is a
simple task to construe the origin and
| meaning of "Norumbega," as com
ing from Norway"
An iconoclastic Scotchman, j. p.
MacLean, a life member of the Gae-
lie Society of Glasgow, comments on
this America" as follows:
I'm order to sustain the Morse dis
coyery of America, the Eskimo must
| be brought down from their high
northern latitude to Cape God IN
Massachusetts and a tribe of In
dams dwelling in the mountains OF
Nicaragua must be transplanted to
| the same point. that due notice and
reverence might be given to Left
Erikson! It is a beautiful theory.
= A candid view Of the mat
err would lead an intelligent mind TO
| the conclusion that the Morse adVo-
| Gates. in their great zeal, have
| trif1ed entirely too much with the
| subject, in placing stress on these
so called American evidences. How
ever, they are acute enough TO know
that if the Morse had been in Amer
| lea, made settlements and continued
for period of 300 years. as has been
claimed, corroborative proof would be
| forthcoming. Greenland affords 1t
and America must not be deficient.
If it fails to yield evidence. then the
| whole theory must be changed. In
| lieu of better testimony, that which
has been seized upon must continue
| to do service"
But now what will the canny
Scotchman say If his Macmillan
scout proves the Erik" in America?
When Mac meets Mac then comes
the tug of Gaelic.
X X u X
OF course, the English and Scotch
concede that the Cabots really. dis
covered America. but what of the
great Irish discovery which antedated
Left Erikson as far as Left preceded
the Cabots or Christopher Columbus !?
Shall the Irish not come into their
| own? Erin ga bragh!
It was the Irish, and no other. who
| first found "Great Ireland" which
ia now understood to be not New
York with it's Irish police, but Vir-
ginia and North Carolina. st. Pat
rick is said to have sent missionaries
to Great Ireland in the fifth century.
In the preface of his book entitled
"Norroena," discussing America dis
covered by Morse, the author, J. w.
Buel. says: