Robert Michael Ballantyne
The Norsemen in the West
Chapter Fifteen.
Greenland Again—Flatface Turns up, Also Thorward, who Becomes Eloquent and Secures Recruits for Vinland
Who has not heard of that solitary step which lies between the sublime and the ridiculous? The very question may seem ridiculous. And who has not, at one period or another of life, been led to make comparisons to that step? Why then should we hesitate to confess that the step in question has been suggested by the brevity of that other step which lies between the beautiful and the plain, the luxuriant and the barren, the fruitful and the sterile—which step we now call upon the reader to take, by accompanying us from Vinland’s shady groves to Greenland’s rocky shores.
Leif Ericsson is there, standing on the end of the wharf at Brattalid—bold, stalwart, and upright, as he was when, some years before, he opened up the way to Vinland. Flatface the Skraelinger is there too—stout, hairy, and as suggestive of a frying-pan as he was when, on murderous deeds intent, not very long before, he had led his hairy friends on tiptoe to the confines of Brattalid, and was made almost to leap out of his oily skin with terror.
But his terror by this time was gone. He and the Norsemen had been reconciled, very much to the advantage of both, and his tribe was, just then, encamped on the other side of the ridge.
Leif had learned a little of the Skraelinger tongue; Flatface had acquired a little less of the Norse language—and a pretty mess they made of it between them! As we are under the necessity of rendering both into English, we beg the reader’s forbearance and consideration.
“So you are going off on a sealing expedition, are you?” said Leif, turning from the contemplation of the horizon, and regarding the Skraelinger with a comical smile.
“Yis, yo, ha, hooroo!” said Flatface, waving his arms violently to add force to his reply.
“And when do you go?” asked Leif.
“W’en? E go skrumch en cracker smorrow.”
“Just so,” replied Leif, “only I can’t quite make that cracker out unless you mean to-morrow.”
“Yis, yo, ha!” exclaimed the hairy man. “Kite right, kite right, smorrow, yis, to-morrow.”
“You’re a wonderful man,” remarked Leif, with a smile. “You’ll speak Norse like a Norseman if you live long enough.”
“Eh!” exclaimed the Skraelinger, with a perplexed look.
“When are you to be back?” asked Leif.
Flatface immediately pointed to the moon, which, although it was broad daylight at the time, showed a remarkably white face in the blue sky, and, doubling his fist, hit himself four blows on the bridge of his nose, or rather on the spot where the bridge of that feature should have been, but where, as it happened, there was only a hollow in the frying-pan, with a little blob below it.
“Ha, four months. Very good. It will be a good riddance; for, to say truth, I’m tired of you and your noisy relations.”
Leif said this more as a soliloquy than a remark, for he had no intention of hurting the feelings of the poor savage, who, he was aware, could not understand him. Turning again to him, he said— “You know the kitchen, Flatface?” Flatface said nothing, but rolled his eyes, nodded violently, and rubbed that region which is chiefly concerned with food.
“Go,” said Leif, “tell Anders to give you food – food—food!”
At each mention of the word Flatface retreated a step and nodded. When Leif stopped he turned about, and with an exclamation of delight, trundled off to the kitchen like a good-natured polar bear.
For full half an hour after that Leif walked up and down the wharf with his eyes cast down; evidently he was brooding over something. Presently Anders came towards him.
Anders was a burly middle-aged Norseman, with a happy-looking countenance; he was also cook, steward, valet, and general factotum to Leif.
“Well, Anders, hast had a visit from Flatface?” asked Leif.
“Ay—he is in the kitchen now.”
“Hast fed him?”
“Ay, gorged him,” replied Anders, with a grin.
“Good,” said Leif, laughing; “he goes off to-morrow, it seems, for four months, which I’m right glad to hear, for we have had him and his kindred long enough beside us for this time. I am sorry on account of the Christian teachers, however, because they were making some progress with the language, and this will throw them back.”
Leif here referred to men who had recently been sent to Greenland by King Olaf Tryggvisson of Norway, with the design of planting Christianity there, and some of whom appeared to be very anxious to acquire the language of the natives. Leif himself had kept somewhat aloof from these teachers of the new faith. He had indeed suffered himself to be baptized, when on a visit to Norway, in order to please the King; but he was a very reserved man, and no one knew exactly what opinions he held in regard to religion. Of course he had been originally trained in the Odin-worship of his forefathers, but he was a remarkably shrewd man, and people said that he did not hold by it very strongly. No one ever ventured to ask him what he held until the teachers above mentioned came. When they tried to find out his opinions he quietly, and with much urbanity, asked to be informed as to some of the details of that which they had come to teach, and so managed the conversation that, without hurting their feelings, he sent them away from him as wise as they came. But although Leif was silent he was very observant, and people said that he noted what was going on keenly—which was indeed the case.
“I know not what the teachers think,” said Anders, with a careless air, “but it is my opinion that they won’t make much of the Skraelingers, and the Skraelingers are not worth making much of.”
“There thou art wrong, Anders,” said Leif, with much gravity; “does not Flatface love his wife and children as much as you love yours?”
“I suppose he does.”
“Is not his flesh and blood the same as thine, his body as well knit together as thine, and as well suited to its purposes?”
“Doubtless it is, though somewhat uglier.”
“Does he not support his family as well as thou dost, and labour more severely than thou for that purpose? Is he not a better hunter, too, and a faster walker, and fully as much thought of and prized by his kindred?”
“All that may be very true,” replied Anders carelessly.
“Then,” pursued Leif, “if the Skraelingers be apparently as good as thou art, how can ye say that they are not worth making much of?”
“Truly, on the same ground that I say that I myself am not worth making much of. I neither know nor care anything about the matter. Only this am I sure of, that the Skraelingers do not serve you, master, as well as I do.”
“Anders, thou art incorrigible!” said Leif, smiling; “but I admit the truth of your last remark; so now, if ye will come up to the house and do for me, to some extent, what ye have just done to Flatface, ye will add greatly to the service of which thou hast spoken.”
“I follow, master,” said Anders; “but would it not be well, first, to wait and see which of our people are returning to us, for, if I mistake not, yonder is a boat’s sail coming round the ness.”
“A boat’s sail!” exclaimed Leif eagerly, as he gazed at the sail in question; “why, man, if your eyes were as good as those of Flatface, ye would have seen that yonder sail belongs to a ship. My own eyes have been turned inward the last half hour, else must I have observed it sooner.”
“It seems to me but a boat,” said Anders.
“I tell thee it is a ship!” cried Leif; “ay, and if my eyes do not deceive, it is the ship of Karlsefin. Go, call out the people quickly, and see that they come armed. There is no saying who may be in possession of the ship now.”
Anders hastened away, and Leif, after gazing at the approaching vessel a little longer, walked up to the house, where some of his house-carls were hastily arming, and where he received from the hands of an old female servant his sword, helmet, and shield.
The people of Brattalid were soon all assembled on the shore, anxiously awaiting the arrival of the ship, and an active boy was sent round to Heriulfness, to convey the news to the people there—for in Greenland the arrival of a ship was of rare occurrence in those days.
As the ship drew near, all doubt as to her being Karlsefin’s vessel was removed, and, when she came close to land, great was the anxiety of the people to make out the faces that appeared above the bulwarks.
“That is Karlsefin,” said one. “I know his form of face well.”
“No, it is Biarne,” cried another. “Karlsefin is taller by half a foot.”
“’Tis Thorward,” said a third. “I’d know his face among a thousand.”
“There seem to be no women with them,” observed Anders, who stood at the end of the wharf near his master.
“Does any one see Olaf?” asked Leif.
“No—no,” replied several voices.
When the ship was near enough Leif shouted— “Is Olaf on board?”
“No!” replied Thorward, in a stentorian voice.
Leif’s countenance fell.
“Is all well in Vinland?” he shouted.
“All is well,” was the reply.
Leif’s countenance brightened, and in a few minutes he was shaking Thorward heartily by the hand.
“Why did ye not bring my son?” said Leif, somewhat reproachfully, as they went up to the house together.
“We thought it best to try to induce you to go to him rather than bring him to you,” answered Thorward, smiling. “You must come back with me, Leif. You cannot conceive what a splendid country it is. It far surpasses Iceland and Norway. As to Greenland, it should not be named in the same breath.”
Leif made no reply at that time, but seemed to ponder the proposal.
“Now we shall feast, Thorward,” said Leif, as he entered the hall. “Ho! lay the tables, good woman.—Come, Anders, see that ye load it well. Have all the house-carls gathered; I will go fetch in our neighbours, and we shall hear what Thorward has to say of this Vinland that we have heard so much about of late.”
Leif’s instructions were promptly and energetically carried out. The tables were spread with all the delicacies of the season that Greenland had to boast of, which consisted chiefly of fish and wild-fowl, with seal’s flesh instead of beef, for nearly all the cattle had been carried off by the emigrants, as we have seen, and the few that were left behind had died for want of proper food. The banquet was largely improved by Thorward, who loaded the table with smoked salmon. After the dishes had been removed and the tankards of beer sent round, Thorward began to relate his story to greedy ears.
He was very graphic in his descriptions, and possessed the power of detailing even commonplace conversations in such a way that they became interesting. He had a great deal of quiet humour, too, which frequently convulsed his hearers with laughter. In short, he gave such a fascinating account of the new land, that when the people retired to rest that night, there was scarcely a man, woman, or child among them who did not long to emigrate without delay. This was just what Thorward desired.
Next day he unloaded the ship, and the sight of her cargo fully confirmed many parts of his story. The upshot of it was that Leif agreed to go and spend the winter in Vinland, and a considerable number of married men made up their minds to emigrate with their wives and families.
Having discharged cargo and taken in a large supply of such goods as were most needed at the new colony, Thorward prepared for sea. Leif placed Anders in charge of his establishment, and, about grey dawn of a beautiful morning, the Snake once again shook out her square sail to the breeze and set sail for Vinland.
Chapter Sixteen.
Joyful Meetings and Hearty Greetings
Need we attempt to describe the joy of our friends in Vinland, when, one afternoon towards the end of autumn, they saw their old ship sweep into the lake under oars and sail, and cast anchor in the bay? We think not.
The reader must possess but a small power of fancy who cannot, without the aid of description, call up vividly the gladsome faces of men and women when they saw the familiar vessel appear, and beheld the bulwarks crowded with well-known faces. Besides, words cannot paint Olaf’s sparkling eyes, and the scream of delight when he recognised his father standing in sedate gravity on the poop.
Suffice it to say that the joy culminated at night, as human joys not unfrequently do, in a feast, at which, as a matter of course, the whole story of the arrival and settlement in Vinland was told over again to the newcomers, as if it had never been told before. But there was this advantage in the telling, that instead of all being told by Thorward, each man gave his own version of his own doings, or, at all events, delegated the telling to a friend who was likely to do him justice. Sometimes one or another undertook that friendly act, without having it laid upon him. Thus, Krake undertook to relate the discovery of the grapes by Tyrker, and Tyrker retaliated by giving an account of the accident in connexion with a mud-hole that had happened to Krake. This brought out Biarne, who went into a still more minute account of that event with reference to its bearing on Freydissa, and that gentle woman revenged herself by giving an account of the manner in which Hake had robbed Biarne of the honour of killing a brown bear, the mention of which ferocious animal naturally suggested to Olaf the brave deed of his dear pet the black bull, to a narrative of which he craved and obtained attention. From the black bull to the baby was an easy and natural transition—more so perhaps than may appear at first sight—for the bull suggested the cows, and the cows the milk, which last naturally led to thoughts of the great consumer thereof.
It is right to say here, however, that the baby was among the first objects presented to Leif and his friends after their arrival; and great was the interest with which they viewed this first-born of the American land. The wrinkles, by the way, were gone by that time. They had been filled up so completely that the place where they once were resembled a fair and smooth round ball of fresh butter, with two bright blue holes in it, a knob below them, and a ripe cherry underneath that.
Snorro happened to be particularly amiable when first presented to his new friends. Of course he had not at that time reached the crowing or smiling age. His goodness as yet was negative. He did not squall; he did not screw up his face into inconceivable formations; he did not grow alarmingly red in the face; he did not insist on having milk, seeing that he had already had as much as he could possibly hold—no, he did none of these things, but lay in Gudrid’s arms, the very embodiment of stolid and expressionless indifference to all earthly things—those who loved him best included.
But this state of “goodness” did not last long. He soon began to display what may be styled the old-Adamic part of his nature, and induced Leif, after much long-suffering, to suggest that “that would do,” and that “he had better be taken away!”
The effervescence of the colony caused by this infusion of new elements ere long settled down. The immigrants took part in the general labour and duties. Timber-cutting, grape-gathering, hay-making, fishing, hunting, exploring, eating, drinking, and sleeping, went on with unabated vigour, and thus, gradually, autumn merged into winter.
But winter did not bring in its train the total change that these Norsemen had been accustomed to in their more northern homes. The season was to them comparatively mild. True, there was a good deal of snow, and it frequently gave to the branches of the trees that silvery coating which, in sunshine, converts the winter forest into the very realms of fairyland; but the snow did not lie deep on the ground, or prevent the cattle from remaining out and finding food all the winter. There was ice, also, on the lake, thick enough to admit of walking on it, and sledging with ponies, but not thick enough to prevent them cutting easily through it, and fishing with lines and hooks, made of bone and baited with bits of fat, with which they caught enormous trout, little short of salmon in size, and quite as good for food.
Daring the winter there was plenty of occupation for every one in the colony. For one thing, it cost a large number of the best men constant and hard labour merely to supply the colonists with firewood and food. Then the felling of timber for export was carried on during winter as easily as in summer, and the trapping of wild animals for their furs was a prolific branch of industry. Sometimes the men changed their work for the sake of variety. The hunters occasionally took to fishing, the fishers to timber felling and squaring, the timber-cutters to trapping; the trappers undertook the work of the firewood-cutters, and these latter relieved the men who performed the duties of furniture-making, repairing, general home-work and guarding the settlement. Thus the work went on, and circled round.
Of course all this implied a vast deal of tear and wear. Buttons had not at that time been invented, but tags could burst off as well as buttons, and loops were not warranted to last for ever, any more than button-holes. Socks were unknown to those hardy pioneers, but soft leather shoes, not unlike mocassins, and boots resembling those of the Esquimaux of the present day, were constantly wearing out, and needed to be replaced or repaired; hence the women of the colony had their hands full, for, besides these renovating duties which devolved on them, they had also the housekeeping—a duty in itself calling for an amount of constant labour, anxiety, and attention which that ridiculous creature man never can or will understand or appreciate—at least so the women say, but, being a man, we incline to differ from them as to that!
Then, when each day’s work was over, the men returned to their several abodes tired and hungry. Arrangements had been made that so many men should dwell and mess together, and the women were so appointed that each mess was properly looked after. Thus the men found cheerful fires, clean hearths, spread tables, smoking viands, and a pleasant welcome on their return home; and, after supper, were wont to spend the evenings in recounting their day’s experiences, telling sagas, singing songs, or discussing general principles—a species of discussion, by the way, which must certainly have originated in Eden after the Fall!
In Karlsefin’s large hall the largest number of men and women were nightly assembled, and there the time was spent much in the same way, but with this difference, that the heads of the settlement were naturally appealed to in disputed matters, and conversation frequently merged into something like orations from Leif and Biarne Karlsefin and Thorward, all of whom were far-travelled, well-informed, and capable of sustaining the interest of their audiences for a prolonged period.
In those days the art of writing was unknown among the Norsemen, and it was their custom to fix the history of their great achievements, as well as much of their more domestic doings, in their memories by means of song and story. Men gifted with powers of composition in prose and verse undertook to enshrine deeds and incidents in appropriate language at the time of their occurrence, and these scalds or poets, and saga-men or chroniclers, although they might perhaps have coloured their narratives and poems slightly, were not likely to have falsified them, because they were at first related and sung in the presence of actors and eye-witnesses, to attempt imposition on whom would have been useless as well as ridiculous. Hence those old songs and sagas had their foundation in truth. After they were once launched into the memories of men, the form of words, doubtless, tended to protect them to some extent from adulteration, and even when all allowance is made for man’s well-known tendency to invent and exaggerate, it still remains likely that all the truth would be retained, although surrounded more or less with fiction. To distinguish the true from the false in such cases is not so difficult a process as one at first sight might suppose. Men with penetrating minds and retentive memories, who are trained to such work, are swift to detect the chaff amongst the wheat, and although in their winnowing operations they may frequently blow away a few grains of wheat, they seldom or never accept any of the chaff as good grain.
We urge all this upon the reader, because the narratives and poems which were composed and related by Karlsefin and his friends that winter, doubtless contained those truths which were not taken out of the traditionary state, collected and committed to writing by the Icelandic saga-writers, until about one hundred years afterwards, at the end of the eleventh or beginning of the twelfth century.
On these winter evenings, too, Karlsefin sometimes broached the subject of the new religion, which had been so recently introduced into Greenland. He told them that he had not received much instruction in it, so that he could not presume to explain it all to them, but added that he had become acquainted with the name and some of the precepts of Jesus Christ, and these last, he said, seemed to him so good and so true that he now believed in Him who taught them, and would not exchange that belief for all the riches of this world, “for,” said he, “the world we dwell in is passing away—that to which we go shall never pass away.” His chief delight in the new religion was that Jesus Christ was described as a Saviour from sin, and he thought that to be delivered from wicked thoughts in the heart and wicked deeds of the body was the surest road to perfect happiness.
The Norsemen listened to all this with profound interest, for none of them were so much wedded to their old religion as to feel any jealousy of the new; but although they thought much about it, they spoke little, for all were aware that the two religions could not go together—the acceptance of the one implied the rejection of the other.
Frequently during the winter Karlsefin and Leif had earnest conversations about the prospects of the infant colony.
“Leif,” said Karlsefin, one day, “my mind is troubled.”
“That is bad,” replied Leif; “what troubles it?”
“The thoughts that crowd upon me in regard to this settlement.”
“I marvel not at that,” returned Leif, stopping and looking across the lake, on the margin of which they were walking; “your charge is a heavy one, calling for earnest thought and careful management. But what is the particular view that gives you uneasiness?”
“Why, the fact that it does not stand on a foundation which is likely to be permanent. A house may not be very large, but if its foundation be good it will stand. If, however, its foundation be bad, then the bigger and grander it is, so much the worse for the house.”
“That is true. Go on.”
“Well, it seems to me that the foundation of our settlement is not good. It is true that some of us have our wives here, and there is, besides, a sprinkling of young girls, who are being courted by some of the men; nevertheless it remains a stubborn truth that far the greater part of the men are those who came out with Thorward and me, and have left either wives or sweethearts in Norway and in Iceland. Now these may be pleased to remain here for a time, but it cannot be expected that they will sit down contentedly and make it their home.”
“There is truth in what you say, Karlsefin. Have any of your men spoken on that subject?”
“No, none as yet; but I have not failed to note that some of them are not so cheerful and hearty as they used to be.”
“What is to prevent you making a voyage to Iceland and Norway next spring,” said Leif, “and bringing out the wives and families, and, if you can, the sweethearts of these men?”
Karlsefin laughed heartily at this suggestion. “Why, Leif,” he said, “has your sojourn on the barren coast of Greenland so wrought on your good sense, or your feelings, that you should suppose thirty or forty families will agree at once to leave home and kindred to sail for and settle in a new land of the West that they have barely,—perhaps never—heard of; and think you that sweethearts have so few lovers at home that they will jump at those who are farthest away from them? It is one thing to take time and trouble to collect men and households that are willing to emigrate; it is another thing altogether to induce households to follow men who have already emigrated.”
“Nay, but I would counsel you to take the men home along with you, so that they might use their persuasions,” returned Leif; “but, as you say, it is not a likely course to take, even in that way. What, then, do you think, is wisest to be done?”
“I cannot yet reply to that, Leif. I see no course open.”
“Tell me, Karlsefin, how is it with yourself?” asked Leif, looking earnestly at his friend. “Are you content to dwell here?”
Karlsefin did not reply for a few seconds.
“Well, to tell you the truth,” he said at length, “I do not relish the notion of calling Vinland home. The sea is my home. I have dwelt on it the greater part of my life. I love its free breezes and surging waves. The very smell of its salt spray brings pleasant memories to my soul. I cannot brook the solid earth. While I walk I feel as if I were glued to it, and when I lie down I am too still. It is like death. On the sea, whether I stand, or walk, or lie, I am ever bounding on. Yes; the sea is my native home, and when old age constrains me to forsake it, and take to the land, my home must be in Iceland.”
“Truly if that be your state of mind,” said Leif, laughing, “there is little hope of your finally coming to an anchor here.”
“But,” continued Karlsefin, less energetically, “it would not be right in me to forsake those whom I have led hither. I am bound to remain by and aid them as long as they are willing to stay—at least until they do not require my services.”
“That is well spoken, friend,” said Leif. “Thou art indeed so bound. Now, what I would counsel is this, that you should spend another year, or perhaps two more years, in Vinland, and at the end of that time it will be pretty plain either that the colony is going to flourish and can do without you, or that it is advisable to forsake it and return home. Meanwhile I would advise that you give the land a fair trial. Put a good face on it; keep the men busy—for that is the way to keep them cheerful and contented, always being careful not to overwork them—provide amusements for their leisure hours if possible, and keep them from thinking too much of absent wives and sweethearts—if you can.”
“If I can,” repeated Karlsefin, with a smile; “ay, but I don’t think I can. However, your advice seems good, so I will adopt it; and as I shall be able to follow it out all the better with your aid, I hope that you will spend next winter with us.”
“I agree to that,” said Leif; “but I must first visit Greenland in spring, and then return to you. And now, tell me what you think of the two thralls King Olaf sent me.”
Karlsefin’s brow clouded a little as he replied that they were excellent men in all respects—cheerful, willing, and brave.
“So should I have expected of men sent to me by the King,” said Leif, “but I have noticed that the elder is very sad. Does he pine for his native land, think ye?”
“Doubtless he does,” answered Karlsefin; “but I am tempted to think that he, like some others among us, pines for an absent sweetheart.”
“Not unlikely, not unlikely,” observed Leif, looking gravely at the ground. “And the younger lad, Hake, what of him? He, I think, seems well enough pleased to remain, if one may judge from his manner and countenance.”
“There is reason for that,” returned Karlsefin, with a recurrence of the troubled expression. “The truth is that Hake is in love with Bertha.”
“The thrall?” exclaimed Leif.
“Ay, and he has gone the length of speaking to her of love; I know it, for I heard him.”
“What! does Karlsefin condescend to turn eavesdropper?” said Leif, looking at his friend in surprise.
“Not so, but I chanced to come within earshot at the close of an interview they had, and heard a few words in spite of myself. It was in summer. I was walking through the woods, and suddenly heard voices near me in the heart of a copse through which I must needs pass. Thinking nothing about it I advanced and saw Hake and Bertha partially concealed by the bushes. Suddenly Hake cried passionately, ‘I cannot help it, Bertha. I must tell you that I love you if I should die for it;’ to which Bertha replied, ‘It is useless, Hake; neither Leif nor Karlsefin will consent, and I shall never oppose their will.’ Then Hake said, ‘You are right, Bertha, right—forgive me—.’ At this point I felt ashamed of standing still, and turned back lest I should overhear more.”
“He is a thrall—a thrall,” murmured Leif sternly, as if musing.
“And yet he is a Scottish earl’s son,” said Karlsefin. “It does seem a hard case to be a thrall. I wonder if the new religion teaches anything regarding thraldom.”
Leif looked up quickly into his friend’s face, but Karlsefin had turned his head aside as if in meditation, and no further allusion was made to that subject by either of them.
“Do you think that Bertha returns Hake’s love?” asked Leif, after a few minutes.
“There can be no doubt of that,” said Karlsefin, laughing; “the colour of her cheek, the glance of her eye, and the tones of her voice, are all tell-tale. But since the day I have mentioned they have evidently held more aloof from each other.”
“That is well,” said Leif, somewhat sternly. “Bertha is free-born. She shall not wed a thrall if he were the son of fifty Scottish earls.”
This speech was altogether so unlike what might have been expected from one of Leif’s kind and gentle nature that Karlsefin looked at him in some astonishment and seemed about to speak, but Leif kept his frowning eyes steadily on the ground, and the two friends walked the remainder of the road to the hamlet in perfect silence.
