an axe lay beside him. One of their number picked up the axe, and struck
at a tree with it, and one after another [they tested it], and it seemed
to them to be a treasure, and to cut well; then one of their number
seized it, and hewed at a stone with it, so that the axe broke, whereat
they concluded that it could be of no use, since it would not withstand
stone, and they cast it away.

It now seemed clear to Karlsefni and his people, that although the
country thereabouts was attractive, their life would be one of constant
dread and turmoil by reason of the [hostility of the] inhabitants of the
country, so they forthwith prepared to leave, and determined to return to
their own country. They sailed to the northward off the coast, and found
five Skrellings, clad in skin-doublets, lying asleep near the sea. There
were vessels beside them, containing animal marrow, mixed with blood.
Karlsefni and his company concluded that they must have been banished
from their own land. They put them to death. They afterwards found a
cape, upon which there was a great number of animals, and this cape
looked as if it were one cake of dung, by reason of the animals which lay
there at night. They now arrived again at Streamfirth, where they found
great abundance of all those things of which they stood in need. Some men
say, that Biarni and Freydis remained behind here with a hundred men, and
went no further; while Karlsefni and Snorri proceeded to the southward
with forty men, tarrying at Hop barely two months, and returning again
the same summer. Karlsefni then set out with one ship, in search of
Thorhall the Huntsman, but the greater part of the company remained
behind. They sailed to the northward around Keelness, and then bore to
the westward, having land to the larboard.[40-1] The country there was a
wooded wilderness, as far as they could see, with scarcely an open space;
and when they had journeyed a considerable distance, a river flowed down
from the east toward the west. They sailed into the mouth of the river,