KINGS OF NORWAY. 355 great wealth, and was in Brattalid with Leif Ericsson. Soon appendix. he fell in love with Gudrid and courted her, and she referred land; and of to Leif to answer for her. Afterwards she was betrothed to the Skra;iin- him, and their wedding was held the same winter. At this ^^^^' time, as before, much was spoken about a Vinland voyage ; and both Gudrid and others persuaded Karlsefne much to that expedition. Now his expedition was resolved upon, and he got ready a crew of sixty men and five women ; and then they made the agreement, Karlsefne and his people, that each of them should have equal share in what they made of gain. They had with them all kinds of cattle*, having the
- The most surprising circumstance in this saga, and which throws
a shade over the credibiHty of the whole of it, is the account of the cattle which Karlsefne and Gudrid took with them. That they would take live cattle with them, whether they intended to settle in Vinland or not, — as where salt was scarce it would be the easiest way of car- rying meat for a short time, — is not improbable, provided they had the cattle to take. But that cattle could have been kept in the old colony of Greenland, is the improbable circumstance. De Fries, Mr. Arne, Mr. Kielsen, and all who describe the remains of the buildings and set- tlements of the ancient colonists along the fiords, concur in observing, that there is little or no grass — that the ground is either a bare thin layer of peat-mould upon sand, and totally barren ; or is covered with naked stones, small or great, without any vegetation ; or is overgrown with dwarf willow (vidiekrat), and a brush of low juniper and berry- bearing shrubs ; and all about the ruins of the houses nothing but this brush- wood is found. They are careful in telling of every appearance of grass they meet with. In the present settlements it is understood that very few cattle can be kept for want of provender. A few were kept at Igalikko fiord by a retired merchant in 1830, but it is a soli- tary case. In that latitude, with a winter of nine months, a large stock of provender is required to keep cattle ; and from the nature of the soil and country, grass for pasture and hay does not appear to exist — although in Iceland it is produced in some abundance. In the month of August even the missionaries (see Nordisk Tidskrift for Oldkyn- dighed, 1834) seem never to have met with so much grass, even where there were remains of twelve or fourteen houses together, as would have kept a cow for a couple of days. How could Karlsefne have taken " cattle of all kinds" with him, and provender for them, at the end of a long winter, from any locality in Greenland } No bones of cattle have ever been discovered in the country, although human bones, fish bones, and ruins of houses have been found. This is a very awkward discrepancy between the saga account and the actual nature of the country. It looks as if the saga-relator was applying his ideas formed on Iceland, where cattle and food for them are not scarce, to a country by nature so totally different as Greenland, and that he did not know of the difference. AA 2
