32 The Catskill Fairtes.

Biorn did? He just drifted around the promontory, looked
at it, and, without setting foot on the shore, spread his sails
before a fresh west wind, the storm having abated, and re-
turned to Greenland, where he found his father Heriolf safely
harbored.

“«That is the way Biorn discovered America, quite ignorant
that he was the first European to touch the strand of a won-
derful New World. This happened long before Christopher
Columbus saw the tropical palm-trees and crystal waters of
the West Indies. Biorn went back, and told the story at least.
Eief, a son of Eric the Red, set sail with thirty-five men, reach-
ed the American coast, and steered along it until he found an
inviting anchorage. The region was delightful: fruits and
berries were ripe, and there was salmon in the river. The
Northmen landed, built huts, and called the spot Vinland,
because of the quantities of grapes they found. Lief spent
a winter in Vinland, then sold his vessel to his brother Thor-
wald in the spring, who stayed another year, exploring the
land. The natives came in canoes to oppose him, and Thor-
wald was killed. The other Northmen remained a third win-
ter. The natives were like the Esquimaux, already known in
Greenland.

«Tn 1007 a rich Greenlander, Thorfin, emigrated to Vinland
with sixty followers and his wife Gudrida. The ships carried
all kinds of animals and food. Gudrida was the first Euro-
pean woman to see the New World, and her son Snorro, born
at Vinland, was the first child of foreign parents in America.
Thorfin’s expedition prospered. The native tribes came in

great numbers to trade in furs, yet Thorfin went home again.