A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels — Volume 01 - Arranged in Systematic Order: Forming a Complete History of the Origin and Progress of Navigation, Discovery, and Commerce, by Sea and Land, from the Earliest Ages to the Present Time by Robert Kerr
page 94 of 703 (13%)
page 94 of 703 (13%)
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language of the Abenaki, on account of their eating raw fish; in the same
manner as the Russians, in their official state papers, call the Samojeds Sirojed'zi, because they also eat raw and frozen fish and flesh. In the same year Thorstein, the third son of Eric-raude, set sail for Winland, taking with him his wife, Gudridthe daughter of Thorbern, with his children and servants, amounting in all to twenty-five persons; but they were forced by a storm on the western coast of Greenland, where they were obliged to spend the winter, and where Thorstein died, with a large proportion of his retinue, probably of the scurvy. Next spring Gudrid took the dead body of her husband home; and Thorfin, surnamed Kallsefner, an Icelander of some consequence, descended from King Regner-Lodbrok, married the widow of Thorstein, from which he considered himself entitled to the possession of the newly discovered country. He accordingly sailed for Winland with a vast quantity of household furniture, implements of all kinds, and several cattle, and accompanied by sixty-five men and five women, with whom he began to establish a regular colony. He was immediately visited by the Skraellingers, who bartered with him, giving the most valuable furs for such wares as the Icelanders had to give in exchange. The natives would willingly have purchased the weapons of the Icelanders, but this was expressly and judiciously forbidden by Thorfin. Yet one of them found means to steal a battle-ax, of which he immediately made a trial on one of his countrymen, whom he killed with one blow; on which a third person seized the mischievous weapon and threw it into the sea. During a stay of three years, Thorfin acquired a large stock of rich furs and other merchandize, with which he returned to Greenland; and at length removing to Iceland, he purchased an estate in the northern part of Syssel, and built a very elegant house which he called Glaumba. After his death, his widow Gudrid made a pilgrimage to Rome, whence she returned, and ended her days |
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