northward off the land. There they went ashore and looked about them,
the weather being fine, and they observed that there was dew upon the
grass, and it so happened that they touched the dew with their hands,
and touched their hands to their mouths, and it seemed to them that they
had never before tasted anything so sweet as this. They went aboard
their ship again and sailed into a certain sound, which lay between the
island and a cape, which jutted out from the land on the north, and they
stood in westering past the cape. At ebb-tide there were broad reaches
of shallow water there, and they ran their ship aground there, and it
was a long distance from the ship to the ocean; yet were they so anxious
to go ashore that they could not wait until the tide should rise under
their ship, but hastened to the land, where a certain river flows out
from a lake. As soon as the tide rose beneath their ship, however, they
took the boat and rowed to the ship, which they conveyed up the river,
and so into the lake, where they cast anchor and carried their hammocks
ashore from the ship, and built themselves booths there. They afterwards
determined to establish themselves there for the winter, and they
accordingly built a large house. There was no lack of salmon there
either in the river or in the lake, and larger salmon than they had ever
seen before. The country thereabouts seemed to be possessed of such
good qualities that cattle would need no fodder there during the
winters. There was no frost there in the winters, and the grass withered
but little. The days and nights there were of more nearly equal length
than in Greenland or Iceland. On the shortest day of winter the sun was
up between "eyktarstad" and "dagmalastad."[52-1] When they had completed
their house Leif said to his companions, "I propose now to divide our
company into two groups, and to set about an exploration of the country;
one half of our party shall remain at home at the house, while the other
half shall investigate the land, and they must not go beyond a point
from which they can return home the same evening, and are not to