3

a monument of Scandinavian origin. Thus Payne,1 Farnum, Ruge, and the careful specialist De Costa, who says that whoever examines this ancient structure must be impressed by its modern aspect, so especially apparent in the mortar, which has been analyzed and found to be substantially the same as the mortar used in some other early structures of Newport.*

995

The ruin is first distinctly mentioned in the year 1678, in the will of Governor Benedict Arnold of Newport, where it is called "My stone-built wind-mill." It is known that during the eighteenth century it served as a mill and as a powder magazine. Edward Pelham, who married Governor Arnold's granddaughter in the year 1740, also called it "an old stone mill." Peter Easton, who early went to live in Newport, wrote in 1663 that "this year we built the first wind-mill,” and on August 28, 1675, he says, "A storm blew down our wind-mill." It is not unreasonable to suppose that on this occasion Governor Arnold built something more substantial. If some find it strange that Peter Easton did not speak of the erection of the second wind-mill of Newport, it would be infinitely more strange yet that he should overlook it, if for its construction use had been made of a solid, bold monument, the solitary witness of past civilization in the midst of a savage country.

The family of the governor is said to have come from Warwickshire, England. One of his farms was called the Leamington farm, and it happens that three miles from Leamington, at Chesterton, there is an old wind

1 P. 85.

2 P. 39.

3 Entdeckungsgeschichte, Bd. i. S. 1.

4 Precolumbian

America, p. 68.

very misleading interpolation: "Benedict Arnold, gouverneur de l'île, le mentionne dans son testament, sous le nom de Moulin de Discovery of pierre, et comme remontant à une haute antiquité."

5 Gravier here makes a short but

mill, similar in construction to that of Newport. If the English mill should have existed at the time of Arnold's departure, it would seem likely that he copied it in New England. The structure is, however, so primitive and simple that no model was needed by the Yankees' ancestors.1

We have granted considerable space to the discussion of the Dighton Writing-rock and of the Newport Old Stone Mill because it is our wish that a series of great historic events, otherwise sufficiently established, should not be called into question by reason of doubtful arguments set forth in behalf of their reality.

As a last proof of the colonization of the New England States by the Northmen, a proof to which some readers will attach no very great importance, we may relate a remark made by Gaffarel,' namely, that the Indians of those districts were found by the latest discoverers to make use of some words and expressions evidently of Scandinavian origin. Thus was the name of "Norumbega" the corruption of "Nordhman bygdh," Northman settlement; or of "Nordhan vik," northern bay. The whole country once occupied by the Northmen was designated by that name; but it seems to have been divided into provinces, one of which was called the southern domain, "Sudhr Rike," the "Souriké" of the French, inhabited by the "Souriquois" Indians. The chiefs of the native tribes of Norumbega who were invited to the general assembly bore the title, very singular to the French discoverers, of " Ricmanen," equivalent to the northern "Rika Menn,"-the rich men of the country. The Souriquois "Varchim" is the Icelandic "Vargrinn," the Swedish "Varg," the wolf; Histoire, t. i. p. 413.

1 Cf. De Costa, Precolumbian Discovery of America, p. 69, n.; Rafn, Mémoire, pp. 42, 43.

and "two," "twa" in Swedish, "twa" in Swedish, "tvan" in Icelandic, corresponds fairly well to the Souriquois "tabo." Lescarbot relates1 that after Poitrincourt had regaled the Indians they repeatedly sang "Epigico iaton edico." The Souriquois had forgotten the meaning of those words, he says; but it is likely that they did not understand the very defective repetition of them by the French, while knowing perfectly well the sense of their own words: "Oefligu gàtum etingu," or perhaps more correctly, "Vi hafva gód áten," we have eaten well.

Brasseur de Bourbourg has found many words in the languages of Central America which bear, he thinks, marked Scandinavian traces, and he augurs that the Northmen ran all over America long before the time indicated by the Icelandic sagas.

This evidently is exaggeration, and more definite evidence is required to determine the countries of our hemisphere to which the Northmen have extended their colonies or occasional visits.

After closely examining the particulars mentioned in the sagas, the learned have come to the conclusion that the Greenlanders' settlements were scattered all along the Atlantic coast between the forty-first and the fiftieth parallels,-that is, from New York to Newfoundland. The most remarkable places were:

Helluland it Mikla or Labrador.

Litla Helluland or Newfoundland.

Markland or Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, and Lower Canada.

Vinland proper or the New England States.

1 Liv. vii. ¶ 7.

'Von Humboldt, Examen, t. ii.

* Nouvelles annales des Voyages,

t. clx. pp. 261-292, ap. Bancroft, vol. v. p. 115.

p. 99.

Krossanes or Gurnet Point.

Kjalarnes or Cape Cod.

Furdustrandir or Nauset, Chatam, and Monomoy Beaches. Egg Islands, still the same.

Straumfjördhr or Buzzards Bay.

Straumsey or Martha's Vineyard.

Hóp or Mont Haup1 Bay and vicinity.

Leifsbudhir, on Mont Haup Bay, probably on its eastern

shore.

Thorfinnsbudhir, also on Mont Haup Bay, on its western shore, just north of Bristolneck.2

1 Sometimes spelt "Hope."

2 Cf. Rafn, Antiq. Amer., pp. 419-435.

CHAPTER XV.

OTHER SCANDINAVIAN AND WELSH COLONIES.

WE have noticed that in the year 1003 Thorvald Ericsson sent forth towards more southern coasts an exploring party, which, we may presume from a subsequent fact, sailed up the Potomac River.

In the year 1863 a Latin manuscript was discovered near the church of Skalholt in Iceland by Ph. Marsh, and was called the Skalholt Saga. In it is related the story of a Vinland colonist who, likely in consequence of the favorable report of Thorvald's expedition or of other voyages not mentioned, undertook in 1051 to plant another colony on the beautiful banks of the Potomac. His name was Hervador. With his men and some women on board he sailed into Chesapeake Bay and up the river; but about two miles below the falls he was assaulted by a band of natives; and one of the women, Syasi, fell struck by an arrow. She was buried on the bank near by, under a protecting cliff.

Thomas Murray, who translated into English the ancient document, clearly indicated Hervador's route and the place of the combat. The learned Raffinson, the geologist Lequeureux, Professor Brand, of Washington, and Dr. Boyce, of Boston, set out in search of some relic that might testify to the truth of the narrative; and succeeded on June 28, 1867, in finding, on the northeast side of the rock called "Arrow-head," an inscription which, translated from the old Scandinavian, reads as follows: "Here rests Syasi the Blonde from eastern Iceland, Koldr's widow, Thorger's sister by her father's side. . Aged twenty-five years. May God

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