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Un des symboles suivants apparaftra sur la derniire image de cheque microfiche, selon le cas: le symbols — ► signifie "A SUIVRE", le symbols V signifie "FIN". iVIaps, plates, charts, etc.. may be filmed at different reduction ratios. Those too large to be entirely included in one exposure are filmed beginning in the upper left hand corner, left to right and top to bottom, as many frames as required. The following diagrams illustrate the method: ■■ ■ Les cartes, planches, tableaux, etc., peuvent Atre filmfo A des taux de reduction diff^rents. Lorsque le document est trop grand pour Atre reproduit en un seul cliche, 11 est fiimt A partir de Tangle sup^rieur gauche, de gauche A droite, et de haut en bas, en prenant le nombre d'images n6cessaire. Les diagrammes suivants illustrent la mithode. 1 2 3 1 2 3 ; 4 5 6 AD" f* THE ICELANDIC DISCOVERERS OF AMERICA OR HONOR TO WHOM HONOR IS DUE BY MRS. JOHN B. SHIPLEY (MARIE A. BROWN) ADTBOB OF "THE SUWNT NORTH; OB, SWEDEN OP THE PAST AND OF THE PBESBMT;'^ "NOBWA? as it is;" and translator of 'the SURQBON'S STORIES," "KADE8CHDA," TEE " SCHWARTZ" NOVELS, ETC. "•ITicy called the country Vinland.^ * We know it,' said I. 'J am a Vinlander. ^ " — Batabd Tatlob. ', i" "t NEW YORK JOHN B. ALDEN, PUBLISHER 1891 V W-vJCtV.:. KlMAJaOl joimuk 3Q HO V u .1'^ iq.ai,>IOi/I^'")H MOH/ '1, r I // \!4 I V i V,.' » . V.' .• T3[j'ni]-^ ! ff" i-,-f.n .ifrf jy ,f. .: ':!}!>- 7A^<. a,( IC'V^J :.:)i©wV0D,«;sA ^a3H»yai(:l »«jioTi5 CONTENTS. - CHAPTER I PAOB Thu Immediate Neoessity of EaTABLisniNO the Troth 1 CHAPTER 11. The Manifest Duty of the United States in this ' Question 35 CHAPTER III. t^^^ ;, The Evidenob that the Icelanders X)isootered Am& m^^ l^ ™ ^"^^" Century. ^;|^^c #r,0i*BaA3i ^^ CHAPTER rV. Roman Catholic Cognizance op the Fact at the Time OF the Icelandic Discovery 70 CHAPTER V. .^ All the Motives fob the Concealment and Fraud . 77 CHAPTER VL Columbus' Visit to Iceland. . 100 CHAPTER VII. • The Scandinavian H^orth anp Spain Contrastup ,111 v! Contents. CHAPTER Vin. »A«a Thb Norsb Disoovebers and Columbus Contbasthd . 147 .Cii TER IX. •x ,'■. ' .1 -^ The Beneficial Besul'^ > the Present Aob and POSTBRITI >P Att INO THIS MOMENTOUS DIS- COVERY TO - ^ Persons . • • . 165 ""' CHAPTER X. The Celebration of it in 1985! . 185 CHAPTER XL , ^ The Righted Position of the Scandinayun North after this Justice has been accorded to it .196 Biblioorapht of the important Books confirming ,. the Icelandic Discovery of America, from the TEARS 1076-1883 209 ^ vj.-.' :■ I I *••■■, !' ; •( ;;; ! U ' t Oi^''^Hi■•' \ • K'-'t :\ >:^H .u>T ; ADin:nrJx -^o ?. vhKI r,t(WAjT: ::f ,- i fei ;.'iir.ii ii: ir-''- THS ICELANDIC DISCOVERERS OF AMERICA; HONOUR TO WHOM HONOUR IS DUB. AJ !i .1: ^ r ^>#X»^^^^^M»W '::)■■■: yih ;k:.iK' CHAPTER L ''10' ■r.j't' 0(i1 lii iv'iiiJiil'it) DOIBDIATB NBOESSITT OF BSTA^LISHINO THB TBUTH* lf,rft f And why the immediate necessity, it may be asked, of esta- blishing a truth that has been hidden for a thousand years f The Norse discovery has been buried in antiquity for a mil- lenary ; admitting that it was an actual discovery, it was made by men of an ancient race that are now extinct ; they turned it to no practical account and it led to no practical results. More- over, the accounts of it are too vague and unauthentic to have been made a matter of veritable history; we have all been taught that Columbus discovered America, and it is very hard to disabuse our minds of that idea. These are the current remarks and objections that greet the nnlooked-for assertion that the Norsemen discovered Amerfoa. They are also followed by the assumption that it is a matter of no importance either way, and may be left to antiquarians, if they chse to occupy themselves with this obscure question. Following out this conclusion, if it is indeed a matter of no importance whether the Norsemen discovered America or not, li becomes equally unimportant whether Columbus discovered ; ov,,iii'.',.'ti n,\ «'j jii' iV.»lI 2 The Icelandic Discoverers of America ; America or not, and the discovery of the western continent ceases to be one of the greatest of events. That it has not been considered a trifling incident, or a mere matter of accident that posterity could not be expected to bear in mind, is proven by the extreme attention history has devoted to it, and the fame that the world, at the bidding of the imperative mandate of liistorj, lias accorded to Columbus, as a man who has accom- plished an unparalleled achievement. If this fame is rightfully due to Columbus, on the assumption that he discovered America, if the magnitude of the achievement is not exaggerated, if it was an herculean undertaking to cross the ocean on such a ilMent in those days, if Columbus should enjoy the homage of centuned in the past and of centuries to come, then the same fame is rightfully due to the Norsemen, on the assumption that they discovered America, the magnitude of the achievemeiit heinsi greater in their case, inasmuch as it was accomplished ivo iiu their part, for the settlement and colonization of new and far-off lands, if not their discovery, was an every-day affair with them. The lofty pride of the Norsemen, even more than humility, would for ever have prevented them from boasting of the discovery as did Columbus : " But our Redeemer hath granted this victory to our illustrious king and queen and their kingdoms, which have acquired great fame by an event of such high importance in which all Christendom ought to rejoice, and which it ought to celebrate with great festivals and the offering of solemn thanks to the Holy Trinity with many solemn prayers, both for the great exaltation which may accrue to them in turning so many nations to onr holy faith, and also for the temporal benefits which will bring great refreshment and gain, not only to Spain, but to all Christians." He wrote besides: I .^' , •■".•>>; OR, Honour to whom Honour is Due. **! gave to the subject six or seven years of great anxiety, explaining to the best of my ability, how great e'^rvice might be done to our Lord, by this undertaking, in promulgating His sacred name and our holy faith among so m»ny nations ; an enterprise so exalted in itself, and so calculated to enhance the glory and immortalize the renown of great sovereigns." And one who edited an edition of Columbus' lett-Ci-s, says in his introduction : " The entire histo-y of civilization presents us with no event, with the exception perhaps of the art of printing, so momentous as the discovery of the western world." But to a race who had founded the empire of Bussia, the republics of Switzerland and Iceland, who had conquered Normandy and Great Britain, keeping a line of kings on the thrones of England and France, as they kept their czars on the throne of Russia, who " revived Hannibal's exploits in Italy," and shaped the confines of that land, — to such a race the discovery even of America was not an achievement so ^auch more dazzling than the rest of their mighty deeds, while to CJolumbus it was the only thing he ever did. The scope of the Norse undertakings can best be judged by a perusal of the words of the Swedish historian, Strinmholm, on the subject : " It seems wonderful how the fleets and hosts of the Nortii could be sufficient to embrace the whole stretch of coast from the Elbe clear to the Pyrenese peninsula, and for a whole generation not only keep the lands lying along the whole coast in a constant state of siege, but also to extend their expeditions to the Meditenanean, clear to the coast of Italy, and yet during the same time the British Isles, England, Ireland and Scotland, continued to be hard pressed by the hosts from the North." Columbus' estimate, however, of the value of the discovery of the " New World," was not extravagant j none know so well the value of a thing as the one who appropriates it wrongfully, and the usurper is a good juilge of the territory he invades B 2 mm 4 The Icelandic Discoverers of America; ** A practised slave-dealer/' as Arthur Helps styles him, the commercial faculty was largely developed in him, much more largely than respect for the rights of property ; he possessed himself of the coveted acquisition of the Northmen, robbed them of their discovery, with the same ease and with as little compunction as he kidnaped slaves. Note a little sug- gestion of his to their " highnesses " in Spain, this likewise for the enhancement of their greatness and the glory of the Lord : "Considering what great need we have of cattle and of beasts of burthen, both for food and to assist the settlers on this and all these islands, both for peopling the land and for cultivating the soil, their Highnesses might authorize a suit'tb^c number of caravels to come here every year to bring over the said cattle, and provisions and other articles ; these cattle, &c., might bo sold at moderate prices for account of the bearers, and the latter might be paid with slaves, taken from among the Carribees, who are a wild people, fit for any work, well proportioned and very intelligent, and who, when they have got rid of the cruel habits to wliich they have become accustomed, will be better than any other kind of slaves." Commenting upon this, Arthur Helps says : " At the same time that we must do Columbus the justice to believe that his motives were right in his own eyts, it must be admitted that a more distinct suggestion for the esta- blishing of a slave-trade was never proposed." These slaves which he stole were to be exchanged for cattle and other necessaries j the discovery that he stole was to be converted into honours, wealth, distinction, an undying fame and saintship for himself ! He wielded a lucid and persuasive, as well as pious pen, one that secured spiritual and temporal ends with equal facility, and he represented adequately anil explicitly the valup of this va£t territorial acquisition, which he claimed as his dis- covery, to both Church and Throne. His own words yield the best testimony. After reading this self-laudation, what an unconscious satire appear the words of William Robertson, in ©fc, ffoNOtfR td WttOM Hoitduft IS tyxjtJ i his " History of Ameritja," when describing this man : " Co- luiubuf)^^ in whose character the modeety and diffidence of true genius was united with the ardent enthusiasm of a projector." But Columbus has a modem admirer and biographer who has struck his own key and inflection, and who both revives and perpetuates the fame of the long-suffering exile from pre- destined bliss, by building his " Life of Columbus " on the eminently pious one of Boselly de Lorgues, from which it is compiled ; this Catholic author, J. J. Barry, extols, with the rhapsody of the faithful, " the immortal discoverer of America, who, it is to be hoped, will ere long be solemnly enrolled on the glorious catalogue of the canonized saints." That Columbus' words were entirely convincing to the Church, is proven by the fact that "Pope Alexander VI. (Boderigo Borgia) deeded the continent of America to Spain, solely on the statement of Columbus," as quoted by Aaron Qoodrich in his work " History of the Character and Achieve- ments of the sO'Called Christopher Columbus." This trenchant author, who dissects Columbus' character in the most unsparing way, also cites Count Koselly de Lorgues on the above point : " The pope has faith in Columbus. He yields full credence to him and justifies his calculations. It is solely on Columhus thai he depends ; it is relying on Columbus that he engager in the vast partition of the unexplored worlds between the crowns of Spain and Portugal. Everything the messenger of the cross proposes is granted in full, as a thing that is indicated by Providence." " To attack the latter was, therefore," comments Goodriffh, " to attack the justice of the pope's bull, and an indirect imputation on papal infallibility. ... In Spain it be- came necessary for all who would write a history of the New World to extol Columbus and the Church." In the " Memorials of Columbus," a collection of authentic documents, whose value is glowingly stated by the one who ediUkL them and wrote the historical memoix^ D. Qia Batista 6 The Icelandic Discoverers of America ; .Spotoi'no, as "a trensure which contains the diplomatic history o{ the discovery of Ameiica, and of Christopher Columbus ; that is, of the most memorable event which had occurred for ages, and of a hero who I'eflects the highest honour on Genoa, on Italy, and on Europe," — in this book will be found the famous Bull, of which the following is an extract : " And in order that you may undertake more freely and boldly the charge of so great an affair, given to you with the liberality of apostolic .grace, We of our own motion, and not at your solicitation, nor upon petition presented to us upon this subject by other persons .in your name, but of our pure will and certain knowledge, and with the plenitude of apostolic power, by the authority of God ■omnipotent granted to Us through blessed Peter, and of the ▼icarship of Jesus Christ, which we exercise upon earth, by the tenor of the presents, give, concede and assign for ever to you, ,and to the kings of Castile and Leon, your successors, all the islands and .mainlands discovered and which may hereafter be .discovered, towards the west and south, with all their •dominions, cities, castles, places and towns, and with all their rights, jurisdictions, and appurtenances, whether the lands and islands found, or that shall be found, be situated towards India, or towards any other part whatsoever; and we make, constitute and depute yoa, and your aforesaid heirs and successors, lords of them, with full, free and absolute power and authority and jurisdiction: drawing, however, and fixing a line from the 'Arctic pole, viz., ftom the north, to the antarctic pole, viz., to the south ; which line must be distant from any one of the islands whatsoever, vulgarly called the Azores and Cape de Verde islands, a hundred leagues towards the west and south — " It will be gratifying to Americans to see the disposition that was made of their country ; a disposition that the Roman Catholic power evidently regards as final and irrevocable. The author before quoted, Barry, may, I think, be said to interpret the views of the Bomisb hierarchy, when he reasons that " the question ia OR, Honour to whom Honour is Due. not concerning an international interest, or of an affair to regulate for Castile, but about interests of vital importance to Catholicity, to the salvation of souls, and to the extension of the kingdom of Jesus Christ . . . And here we see visibly," he continues, ** the participation of the Church in the discovery, and where we perceive her agency, in the benediction given by Innocent HI. to the enterprise of his countryman. . . . Kome comprehended Columbus. Now to comprehend is, in a certain sense, to become equal to. All the sympathies of the Holy Father and of the Sacred College, were in favour of Columbus." That these '* sympathies " remain \inchanged, is shown by his further words, as well as by a mass of outside evidence : " When lately in Home we rendered homage to the moral and religious purity of Columbus, and declared his grandeur, our voice received, in the places of the pontificate, only friendliness and encourage- ment." Without substantial support from head-quarters, unless he was acting with a warrant, he could scarcely proceed with so much confidence and affirm : "Evidently God chose Columbus as a messenger of salvation ; " and " The time for his historic rehabilitation has come at last," removing' all uncertainty and suspense on this head by declaring at once : " The necessity of a new, full and complete history of the New World has been much felt ; this necessity, which so much resembles a duty, has been deeply felt in the Eternal City ; and we proceed to respond to it." Not content with saying that " it is too much forgotten that the work effected by Columbus is unequaled in history," he reaches a Roman Catholic climax by exclaiming: "We declare before God, who knows it, and before men, who do not know it, that Christopher Columbus was a Saint." In the words that the late King Alfonso is reported to have uttered in course of conversation with Clarence Winthrop Bowen, we see that the modem estimate of an occupant of the Spanish throne coincides perfectly wHh the joint estimate of Spain and Borne in the past, in regard to the immense value of » ■)! 8 The Icelandic Discoverers of America ; !'l :^:'l this discovery. The two persons mentioned were speaking about the four hundredth anniversary of the discovery of America by Columbus, and the king thought that nine years was a long time to spend in arranging for the celebration, but perhaps not too long considering its importance. " It is an event," he said, " in which all the world would be interested, and in which the leading nations might unite. I would do all in my power to make it a brilliant festival ; but, considering the pre-eminent part that Spain took in the discovery of America, I claim that she should certainly be allowed to have the celebration within her own borders. Italy gave birth to C!olumbu8, it is true. Other countries considered his ideas only visionary schemes. But it was Spain alone that furnished the means for carrying into practical effect what would otherwise have been only a dream. To Spain alone, therefore, belongs the credit of the discovery." A few panegyrics of Columbus by modem authors and historians may appropriately be culled and laid before the reader, as further evidence of the value ascribed to this discovery, for it is obvious that Columbus is extolled solely for that, and that his elevation from obscurity is due to that one achievement alone. In Bancroft's "History of the United States*' stand the words : '* The enterprise of Columbus, the most memorable maritime enterprise in the history of the world, formed between Europe and America the communication that will never cease " Arthur Helps, in his " Life of Columbus," says that " perhaps there are few of the great personages in history who have bofin more talked about and written about than Christopher Columbus, the discoverer of America." To quote another passage of his : " Modem familiarity with navigation renders it difficult for us to appreciate adequately the greatness of the enterprise which was undertaken by the discoverers of the Now I World." But the wr.ter obviously fails to see that the ancient OR, Honour to whom Honour is Dub. familiarity with navigation, as evinced by the Norsemen, rendered it surprising and well-nigh incomprehensible that Columbus could have encountered so much difficulty in finding ships, crews, the necessary outfit for a voyage, and in managing the undertaking. The accounts read as if this might have been the first voyage on record, from any port ; as risky, altogether, as the first balloon ascension. "Washington Irving, in his " Life of Columbus," in describing Columbus' state, after land had been descried, on that first voyage, remarks : ** He had secured himself a glory which must be as durable as the world itself," but it is not quite plain whether this is the author's reflection or Columbus', or a blending of the two. But for Christopher Columbus substitute the Norsemen ; for Spain substitute the Scandinavian North ; for the date 1492 substitute the dates 982-85 ; for San Salvador and San Domingo substitute Greenland, Labrador^ Nova Scotia, Ehode Island, and Massachusetts ; for a discoverer of two islands, who did not explore the mainland to any extent, substitute the discoverers who traversed the eastern coast of America from Labrador to Florida, just as their forefathers had traversed the western coast of Europe from the Hebrides to Africa ; for a discoverer who stole his information, thus buying himself name and repute at the Spanish court, and who went to America in search of gold and slaves, also to appropriate new territory for the preaching of the Gospel, substitute the genuine discoverers, who were adepts in the art of navigation, \\ho had already established so many colonies and formed so many governments that this had become an old story to them, and who being above the incentives of lucre and Papal patronage, devoted themselves to industry, commerce between the newly discovered continent, Greenland, Iceland, and Scandinavia, and such a thorough and intelligent exploration of it as to rouse the cupidity of southtrn Europe, tive hundred years after their 10 The Icelandic Discoverers of America; mi \m discovery^ when an opportunity offered in the penon of Columbus^ for its states to avail themselves of it^ and to confirm , the fact of their prior discovery^ in documents so reliable and authentic as to convince the modem worlds after three hundred years of systematic concealment, of garbled history and fraud on the part of the Roman Catholic Church and its adherents ; and when these substitutions are made, does the value of the discovery become less f Does it not rather become greater as showing how deeply those wearing the mantle of holiness, as well as the royal purple, have been willing to perjure themselves for the gains) And these men have intoned for ages: " Beware of covetousness 1 " Is it the duty of all " the leading nations to unite/' to use King Alfonso's words, to celebrate this fraud of half a millenary's duration, and by publicly recognizing the claim of Columbus' discovery gratify the covetousness of the Mother Church by turning the American Bepublic over to it, as its spiritual and temporal property 1 A moment's attention to another reading of this fact in history, from a northern instead of a southern standpoint, will show that the discovery in itself loses nothing by a change of characters. In the first part of the latest history of Sweden, under the joint authorship of Drs. Montelius and Hildebrand, Professors WeibuU, Alin, Boethius, and others, there occurs this passage, from the pen of .Dr. Oscar Montelius : " We have seen how the Northerners, during the Viking period, carried their victorious arms to most of the countries of Europe. All the intercourse between the North and the rest of the world during this time, however, was not warlike, for peaceful com- merce was even then of an importance, which one has been but too much inclined to under-estimate. Foremost among peaceful voyages during the Viking period must we remember the bold voyages of discovery which the Norsemen then made. Already have we mentioned how they settled Iceland; from there they found first Greenland and afterwards Vinland, or the OR, Honour to whom Honour is Due. ii north-eafitem part of what we now call the United States uf Aaierica. To the Northmen is due the great glory, so far as history knows, of having first, among all the people of Europe, discovered America, and it was half a millenary before the inhabitants of southern Europe found their way to the new world, possibly led there by the eagor of the Norsemen's , voyages." Another Swedish historian, A. E. Holmberg, in his " Norse- men during the Pagan Period," ascribes the same glory to the discovery : " The treatise on the naval operations of our fore- fathers we can scarcely end more suitably than with the mention of their most daring naval exploit — an event, which not only in and of itself, but also through its results, shrewdly concealed until our time, is of world-historic importance, I mean the discovery of America by the Iforsemen toward the close of 900. The matter, it is true, was some years ago explained and made known ; the details of it, however, may in general be less known. From childhood we have all heard that the discovery of the piew world was exclusively Columbus' exploit. His glory in defying prejudices and overcoming the difficulties and obstacles that rose against such an undertaking no people and no age can diminish ; but nevertheless, the discovery of this world was never his; the glory of this belongs to the Norsemen alone." Or if we turn to English authors, Wheaton, Laing, Pigott, Beamish, the Howitts, Carlyle, all credit the fact of the Norse discovery, and several of them, together with Scandinavian writers and historians of note, give so much testimony with regard to Columbus' visit to Iceland, that I reserve the im- portant passages relating to this secret visit of the ambitious and unscrupulous southerner, so pregnant with results, for the cha[)ter that is to treat of it exclusively. The third chapter contains the evidence of the Norse discovery, taken from as many authors as has been found practicaljle, and giving the i 12 TpE Icelandic Discoverers of America j li;,: I 'i iiii opinions that are of the most value on this important subject. For the sources of all the knowledge that has as yet been derived, the reader is referred to the bibliography at the end of this book. ' u^/ ,;>ur^, The American author, Aaron Goodrich, traces the sequence between the greatness of the true discoverers and the greatness of their discovery, showing that one was attributable to the other : '* While the greater part of Europe was plunged in the intellectual darkness which pervaded the middle ages, while the monk in his cloister toiled laboriously during a life-time to perpetuate some one work of saiintly or classic lore, and the masses were ignorant, superstitious, the slaves of feudal lords and barons scarcely less ignorant than themselves, a people flourished in the extreme north, with whom enterprise and freedom were neither dead nor stagnant, who possessed scien- tific knowledge and applied the same to practical purposes ; a people simple, fearless and energetic, republicans in practice if not in name, with whom chieftains were the fathers and pro- tectors of their followers, sharing their perils and respecting their rights ; a pagan people indeed, worshippers of Odin and Thor, believers in the joys of Walhalla, yet doers of deeds so noble as to be worthy the most enlightened Christian : such were the Northmen ; such their simple records, which bear every im- press of truth, prove them to have been. Issuing from an Asiatic hive, they early overran Norway and Sweden ; their language, the old Danish or Ddnsk iunga, is now preserved only in Ice- land, which they colonized in the year 875; in 985 they re- discovered and colonized Greenland ; the same year the American continent proper was discovered by them, and, during the first years of the eleventh century, they made thither frequent voyages, residing, for periods of several years, at different times, in what is now called New England." The Norwegian-American writer, Professor R. B. Anderson, iu his stirring book " America not Discovored by Columbus, ' 1 OR. Honour to whom Honour is Due. 13 traces this sequence still further, namely, to the result that has now become the modem point of issue, the Columbian oi bogus discovery, which was based upon the Norse one : •' It was the first settlement of Iceland by the Norsemen, and the constant voyages between this island and Norway, that led to the discovery, first of Greenland and then of America ; and it is due to the high intellectual standing and fine historical taste of the Icelanders that records of these voyages were kept, first to instruct Columbus how to find America, and afterward to solve for us the mysteries concerning the discovery of this continent." It is indisputably true that the value of the discovery is sufficient to command the attention of all ages ; the truth as to the discoverer remains to be demonstrated, and that is the proud task of the present age, nay, of this coming year, for the American people should not let 1887, the year of the National Exhibition on English soil, draw to a close, without a national declaration of the truth of the discovery of their country by the Norsemen, a public acknowledgment of the debt of gratitude in which they stand to the Scandinavian North, for which they are indebted for the principles of liberty, " for the hardiest elements of progress in the United States," according to Ben- jamin Lossing, and an equally public repudiation of the false claim of Columbus, throwing oflT, with the same indignant scorn as once the Mother country-, when it attemjited oppres- sion, the clutch of the Mother Church and its obedient vassal Spain, to whom the Republic can charge the slavery that blackened its annals as a nation for so many years, the terrible war arising from that pernicious system introduced by Spain and largely kept alive by the Boman Catholic democratic party, North and South, all this evil in the past, and to whom, in the future, it would inevitably owe its destruction as a nation, the subversion of its free Constitution, and its transformation into a huge benighted territory indistinguishable in its mental and 14 The Icelandic Discoverers Of America: i .moral attributes from South America.^ the Bouthcrn half of what the Church of Rome fondly looks forward to as the Roman Catholic hemisphere, — if the claim that Columbus dis- covered America should be admitted by it, as a nation. This is the reason why it is necessary for the truth, as to the discovery of America, to be established immediately. The near approach of the four hundredth anniversary of the landing and alleged discovery of Columbus, has revived the subject in the public mind and the floating rumours, occasion- ally taking a concrete form in the American newspapers, of a grand commemoration of the event, convert \^ into a subject that must soon be decided one way or the other, and the approaching date, October 12th, 1892, into the date of a most momentous decision, one that will fairly shake the world with its reverberation I This approaching anniversary of a fraudu- ' lent discovery, the resolution of the United States with regard to it, their celebration of it, or their refusal to celebrate it, ' ■will test the sincerity and earnestness of the work of which the year 1876 was the glorious centennial; it will decide whether the date 1892 is to obliterate the date 1776, whether the Government, claiming to be purely secular, which has from the hour the Constitution was framed refused to admit the word " God " into it, will then be willing to insert both God and Pope in it ; whether the country that indignantly threw off all allegiance in 1776 will then yield allegiance to the foulest tyrant the world has ever had, the Roman Catholic power ! As straws show which way the wind blows, it is worth while to note these newspaper bits : " It is proposed to have a World's Fair in Chicago in 1892, in commemoration of the four hundredth anniversary of the landing of Columbus in America." Another scrap indicated that the matter of a cele- bration, of some kind, of this event was under consideration, in , Washington. Another ran thus : ** The Spaniards have not yot made np their minds how to celebrate the four hundredth .iiii 1 ' OR, Honour to whom Honour is Dub. 15 anniversary of the sailing of Columbus ;" which was contro- verted by the following programme: " It is proposed in Spain to start a fleet of ships, representing all maritime nations, from the little port of Palos, in Spain, on August 3rd, 1892, the four hundredth anniversary of the sailing of Columbus, and to have the fleet sail to San Salvador over the route taken by the great discoverer." Another significant scrap made its appearance in an editorial column : " As an inducement to celebrate the fourth cente.nary of Columbus' landing, Americans are offered a chance to gaze upon the identical chains with which Bobadella loaded the wrists of Columbus when the great seaman was sent back to Spain a prisoner in 1500. It is an Italian chevalier who owns these dumb but eloquent articles, and to secure them he made costly journeys to Spain and America. For twenty years he has kept the matter a profound sectet, having personal reasons for this reticence. But now they will be shown, and managers of dime museums who know their business will take the hint." But here is something that intimates the absolute destruction of the plans mentioned : " Just as we are talking about a cele- bration of the four hundredth anniversary of Columbus* discovery of land on the western hemisphere, some Danish ethnologists are trying to prove that the Genoese navigator had borrowed all he knew from an old Iceland manuscript of the seventh century,^ in which this continent was fully described." The phrase "are trying to prove" hardly fits the case; the in- contestable fact is that the "old Iceland manuscript" referred to is in the possession of the Danish Government, and that the Royal Society of Northern Antiquaries, in Copenhagen, have placed its contents before the modern world, in the splendid work " Antiquitates Auiericanae," by Professor Rafn, in which the narratives of the Norse voyages to America, besides being reproduced in the old Icelandic, are rendered into the Latin and Danish languages. An English translation having been <« , ' The wrong date. „ ^ • ' • i6 The Tcelandic Discoverers of America ; "I 'ill made of those by North Ludlow Beamish, this in turn has been reprodaced by the Prince Society in Boston, under the title : "Voyages of the Northmeii to America," published in 1877. This is only one of <" jveral translations into English, so that the contents of that portion of the " Codex Flatoiensis " relating to the discovery of America is in reality accessible to alL In Samuel Laing's preliminary dissertation to his translation of the " Heimskringla," the famous chronicle of the kings of Norway written by Snorre Sturleson, which also contains, in the saga of Olaf Tryggvason, historical testimony of the discovery of America by the Northmen, is to be found an account of this priceless volume : ' The Flateyar Annall, or Codex Flatoiensis,' by far the most important of Icelandic manuscripts, takes its name from the island Flato, in Bredetiord in Iceland, where it had been long preserved, and where Bishop Swendson of Skalholt purchased it, about 1650, from the owner Jonas Torfeson, for King Frederick III., giving in exchange for it the perpetual exemption from land-tax of a small estate of the owner. The manuscript is in large folio, beautifully written on parchment. On the fii-st page stands : ' This book is owned by Ion Hakonson. Here are first songs; then how Norway was inhabited or settled ; then of Eric Vidforla (the far-traveled); thereafter of Olaf Tryggvason, and all his deeds ; then next the saga of King Olaf the Saint, with all his deeds and therewith the sagas of the Orkney Earls ; then the saga of Swerrer and thereafter the saga of Hakon the Old, with the sagas of King Miignus his son ; then are deeds of Einer Sokkeson of Green- Icind, thereafter of Helge and Ulf the Bad ; then begin annals from the time the world was made, showing all to the present time that is come. The priest Ion Thordarson has written from Eric Vidforla, and the two sagas of the Olafs ; and priest Magnus Thorhallsson has written from thence, and also what is written before, and has illuminated the whole. God Almighty and the Holy Virgin bless those who wrote, and him who ilii OR, Honour to whom Honour is Dub. 17 dictated.' . . . The Codex Flatoiensis is not an original work by one author, but a collection of sagas transcribed from older luannscripts, and arranged in so far chronologically that the accounts are placed under the reign in which the events th»'y tell of happened, although not connected with it or with each other. Under the saga of Olaf Tryggvason are comprehended the sagos of the Feroe Islands ; of the Vikings of Jomsburg ; of Erik Red and Leif his son, the discoverers of Greenland and Vinland ; and the voyages of Karlsefne to Vinland, and all the circumstances, true or false, of their adventures." As for Columbus having " borrowed all he knew " from this old Icelandic manuscript, the same author, Laing, to whom the world is deeply indebted for enlightenment on this hidden history, has important testimony to give. " The discovery of America or Vinland, in the 11th century, by the same race of enduring, enterprising seamen, is not less satisfactorily established by documentary evidence than the discovery and colonization of Greenland ; but it rests entirely upon documentary evidence, which cannot, as in the case of Greenland, be substantiated by anything to be discovered in America. . . . All that can be proved, or that is required to be proved, for establishing the priority of the discovery of America by the Northmen, is that the saga or traditional account of these voyages in the 1 1 th century was committed to writing at a known date, viz. between 1387 and 1395, in a manuscript of unquestioned authenticity, of which these particular sagas or accounts relative to Vinland form but a small portion ; and that this known date was eighty years before Columbus visiteil Iceland to obtain nautical infor- mation, viz. in 1477, when he must have heard of this written account of Vinland ; and it was not till 1492 that he discovered I America. This sini])le fact established on documents altogether incontrovertible, is sufficient to prove all that is wanted to be [proved, or can be proved, and is much more clearly and ably Btated by Thormod Torfseus, the great antiquary of the last 1 8 The Icelandic Discoverers of America; li ; ! m century, than it hap been since, in his very rare little tract| 'Historia Vinlandite Antiqute,' 1707." A credibility is thus given to this one manuscript from the North, not only by Laing, but by Alexander von Humboldt and hosts of others, that the collective testimony of the south lacks : whole libraries of lives of Columbus and histories of the New World weigh as nothing against it. The intrinsic truth of its written words gjiin an absolute authority from the integrity of the race from which it issued. Iceland has been the island refuge of this truth ; Iceland has preserved it sacredly, and now transmits it to the Republic that she, in her own palmiest days as a Republic, conduced to found. American honour is at stake ! It is a national obligation for the American Republic to proclaim this truth and to do it quickly. The freest country cannot obey the behest of the mos^ slavish one I America and Spain cannot be linked together in eternal union 1 the land that is the synonym of progress bound to the. land that is the synonym of decay ! The germ of republicanism, of libv.*ty, was planted in America by the North, tho germ of ;l«,very by the South, by Spain and the Church of Rome. Which germ shall be allowed to grow 1 Both oannct ." e on American soil ! The history of Europe is the history of this conflict between the North and the South, between free-minded Scandinavia and the arch-tyrant Rome. In Europe R"me has virtually conquered, for it succeeded in converting or Chrisl^ianizing all the nations that comprise Europe, including the Scantlinavian.^, who ofl'ered the most stubborn resistance, but were finally obliged to succumb, idbeit five hundred years after all the others had bowed under the yoke of Rome. Tlie struggle is now to be continued in the United States. The double discovery ot America is symbolical of this, and is also the signal for contention. The true discovery was by men from the North, and of that portion of the land lying in the north , the alleged or false discovery was by men from OR, Honour to whom Honour is Due. 19 Spain, and of islands south even of the continent. In the one case no appropriation, in the other an immediate deed of the land, nay, of the whole hemisphere, by the Pope to the Sovereigns of Spain. The Norsemen named the land after its good qualities, Vinland ; the Spaniards, according to the base use they meant to make of it : " The Land of fhe Holy CroaSf , I or New World." The Spaniards intended America to be the empire of the Pope in a sense in which Europe had failed to be it, the perfection of the original design, matured in the second and third centuries, having been impaired by the pagana fof the North. But the Norsemen were in their graves; the [wholesale Christianizing of Scandinavia had put their very Upirit, soul, in the grave. What a divine retribution it would |be upon this impious race, according to the Catholic way of reasoning, to steal their discovery, appropriate the land that they had found and convert it into what Europe should have sn, toould have been, if Ferdinand and Isabella, Philip II., ]!harlemagne and a few others could have completed the work )f exterminating heretics I The Roman Catholic, J. J. Barry, unwraps the motive, the {Forced tendency, from all disguise, and says plainly : " The first )biect of the Discovery, disengaged from every human consider- bicn, was, therefore, the glorification of the Eedeemer and the [xiiension of His Church. Historians have hitherto left this |ircumstance unnoticed, or in a state of vague confusion." The *rotestant, Arthur Gilnian, in his "History of the American 'eople," poetizes on a well-worn theme, the expression of the lets of the case having been given by the other, for no one m l^now so well as a Roman Catholic what the intentions of Le Holy See are with regard to tlie United States. To quote filman's "words: "Among the great events that marked the ^orld's revival from the sleep of the Dark Ages, none was more ^markable than the revelation of the American continent. JUL the moment when the ship of Columbus was sighted o^T 02 1 im: 20 The Icelandic Discoverers of America; the coast of Spain, bearing the proofs of his discovery, the name America became the synonym of wealth, of adventure, of freedom." '•'[''■-i- "'"'■ . .■ '■■■'■ •■■•--■' v''.!- ,■■;.- .r;!^.:. There is not the slightest warrant for coupling the words wealth, adventure (in the good sense) and freedom with the name of Columbua Sterility, poverty, slavery have invariably followed in the wake of Bome and of Spain. They would have done so in this instance, the United States would have displayed the features of Spanish civilization, had it not been for the principles of freedom the Norsemen infused into English blood and which found their fullest expression in the American colonists, leading them to declare independence. But the American Bepublio has always been divided against itself : the northern states respected freedom, defended it for themselves and others; the southern states advocated slavery and fought for its preservation; we have the freedom-loving North and slavery-worshipping Spain again typiSed in Boston and New Orleans. Samuel Laing sees clearly that these are the only two forces that have been at work in Europe, for spiritual and temponal supremacy, and he embodies one, the enslaving force, in the Romans, and the other, the freeing force, in the Scandinavians. His words convey the whole truth of the situation as regards the past : " Two nations only have left permanent impressions of their laws, civil polity, social arrangements, spirit, and character on the civilized communities of modem times — the Bomans, and the handful of Northern people from the countries beyond the Elbe, which had never submitted to the Roman yoke, who, issuing in small, piratical bands from the 5th to the 10th century, under the names of Saxons, Danes, Northmen, plundered, conquered and settled on every European coast from the White Sea to Sicily." What impression was left he describes in a way that leaves no doubt : " Wheresoever these people from be^ . >ud' the pale and influence of the old Roman empire, and liiM; OR, Honour to whom Honour is Due. 2t of the later church empire of Rome, either settled, mingled or marauded, they have left permanent traces in society, of their laws, institutions, character, and spirit. Pagan and harbariau as they were, they seem to have carried with them something more natural, something more suitable to the social wants of man, than the laws and institutions formed under the Roman power. What traces have we in Britain of the Romans 1 A few military roads, and doubtful sites of camps, posts, and towns— a few traces of public works, and all indicating a despotic military occupation of the country, and none a civilized condition of the mass of the inhabitants— alone remain in England to tell the world that here the Roman power flourished during 4GC years." There was thus a despotic military occupation of the country ; [that there was a despotic spiritual occupation of the mind follows as a matter of course : " The history of modern civi- lization resolves itself, in reality, into the history of the moral [influence of these two nations. All would have been Roman [in Europe at this day in principle and social arrangement — ilurope would have been, like Russia or Turkey, one vast den [of slaves, with a few rows in its amphitheatre of kingp, ndbles, md churchmen, raised above the dark mass of humanity beneath them, if three boats from the north of the Elbe had not landed ^n Ebbsfleet, in the Isle of Thanet, 1400 years ago, and been followed by a succession of similar boat expeditions of the same jeople, marauding, conquering, and settling, during 600 years, Tiz. from 449 to 1066. All that men hope for of good govem- lent and future improvement in their physical and moral con- lition — all that civilized men enjoy at this day of civil, religious, ^nd political liberty — the British constitution, representative sgislature, the trial by jury, security of property, freedom df lind and person, the influence of public opinion over the con- [uct of public aflUirs, the Reformation, the liberty of the press, le spirit of the age — all that is or has been of value to man in lodern times as a member of society either in Europe or in 32 The Icelandic Discoverers of America; "I I »" America, may be traced to the spark left 'burning npon oar shorea by these Northern barbarians." A strong and eloquent statement this, which should be written in letters of fire in every American heart, to inspire them with deep gratitude to their true ancestors — ancestors which England, as a nation, has never honoured properly, wherefore the duty has devolved upon Americans, who, being more nearly allied to the Norsemen in soul-qualities, can alone understand them and appreciate them as they deserve. That they were the first Europeans who landed on American shores was pregnant with good to us ; this made "the name America the synonym of wealth, of adventure, of freedom," and not the false tidings borne by Columbus to Spain of a discovery of which he would have been incapable but for stolen infor- mation. And the other force, which we can best recognize under th^ name, Momet what had it accomplished t Let Dr. Felix Oswald tell : " A thousand years' interregnum of science, Faith usurping the throne of Reason, every branch of human knowledge withered by the poison of supematuralism, literary activity limited to the production of homilies and miracle-legends^ education devoted to the suppression of all natural instincts, and the substitution of submissive belief for the love of truth i^d free inquiry. Decadence of the fine arts, natural science merged in a deluge of superstition." I doubt if in the whole range of literature could be found a more accurate summing- up of the work wrought by these two forces than that pre- sented by these authors. Dr. Oswald insists, and with right, that "the misery of the Middle Ages was due, not to the supernatural, but to the anii-natural, tendency of the Christian religion," affirming, most truly, that "the pagan gods were the deified powers of nature, the patrons of mariners, shepherds, and husbandmen," while " the Christian gods were the deified enemiea of nature." The evil| as he OR, Honour to whom Honour is Due. 23 shows, reached appalling proportions, for " on the altar of her anti-natural idol, the Christian Church has sacrificed the lives of eighteen millions of the noblest and bravest of our fellow- His great work, " The Secret of the East," is a complete men revelation of the hideous results of this rule of darkness falsely called " the light of Christianity." " Has the rule of the Church," he asks, " furthered the moral progress of the forty generations whose wisest, manliest, noblest, and bravest men were systematically weeded out, to enforce the survival of idiots and hypocrites? For thirteen centuries, the rack, the stake, and the cross were leagued against nature and mankind.' Hallam more than condrms Oswald's assertions : " A cloud of ignorance overspread the whole face of the Church, hardly broken by a few glimmering lights, who owe almost the whole of their distinction to the surrounding darkness. ... I cannot conceive of any state of society more adverse to the intellectual improvement of mankind than one which admitted no middle line between dissoluteness and fanatical mortifications. . . . No original'writer of any merit arose ; and learning may be said to have languished in a region of twilight for the greater part of a thousand years. ... In 992, it was asserted that scarcely a single person was to be found, in Eome itself, who knew the first elements of letters. Not one priest of a thousand in Spain, about the age of Charlemagne, could address a common letter of salutation to another." '>^::r, , .ii;: Nor was this all ; not content with debasing and enfeebling the mind, the Romish religionists changed the very face of nature ; this was to be made as arid and barren as the soul — the Christian revision of the Creator's work, for, as Oswald says, "the dogmas of the Christian Church have cost the world three million square miles of lands, which once were the garden spots of this earth, but which have been turned into deserts by the neglect of rational agriculture and the influence of a creed which laboured to withdraw the attention of mankind from V'i Mi i n ^1 S4 The 'Icelandic Discoverers of America ; i/'ii ■ecular to post-mortem concernments." In support of this statement he cites Professor Marsh: "The fairest and fruit- fullest portions of the Boman Empire, precisely that portion of terrestrial surface, in short, which about the commencement of the Christian era, was endowed with the greatest superiority of soil, climate and position, which had been carried to the liighest pitch of physical improvement — is now completely exhausted of its fertility. A territory larger than all Europe, the abun- dance of which sustained in bygone centuries a population scarcely inferior to that of the whole Christian world at the present day, has been entirely withdrawn from human use, or, at best, is thinly inhabited. . . . There are regions where the operation of causes, set in action by man, has brought the iao^ df the earth to a desolation almost as complete as that of the moon; and though within that brief space of time which we call 'the ^historical period,' they are known to have been covered with luxuriant woods, verdant pastures and fertile meadows, they •are now too far deteriorated to be reclaimable by man, nor can they become again fitted for his use except through grel&t geolo- 'gical changes, or other agencies, over which we have no control • . . Another era of equal improvidence would reduce this earth to such a condition of impoverished productiveness as to threaten the depravation, barbarism, and, perhaps, even the •extinction of the human species." But, reply many Americans, with "that sublime trust in the grand destiny of the American people" for which they are 'noted, this could never happen in the United States ; Boman Catholics here are not what they are in Italy or Spain ; the Bomish Church itself is becoming permeated with the spirit of >our American institutions, of freedom. This pleasant illusion, which, carried one degree farther, would invite the contagion of the spiritual Black Death that ravaged Europe for a thousand years, and left the taint of the foul disease in the mental •organism of all descendants — has blinded American eyes to the OR, Honour to whom Honour is Due. 25 in the jy are faot that Eoman Catholicism has already made terrible strides in the Eepablic, that the freedom of American institutions has incalculably favoured its advance, saving it the trouble of forcing its way with the sword, as it was compelled to do in Europe ; it is securing a bloodless victory, and its exultation, although perhaps premature, is not altogether unfouaded. This insolent power has certainly met with no rebuke from the people or Government of the United States, not the slightest check ; its Jesuits have not been expelled, its monasteries and ecclesiastical establishments have not been forbidden, nor its parochial schools closed ; it enjoys the absolute freedom of the press, and its editors can boast openly of their speedy appro- priation of the American Bepublic for the seat of Bomish despotism ; the ancient Greeks, the Moors, the Albigenses, the Saxons, the Scandinavians, all made resistance, the citizens of the United States make none. How shall the Roman Catholics construe this, if not favourably to their plans 1 Freedom to them is valueless from the American point of view, as the atmosphere that will alone admit of the growth of a great and powerful nation, founded in the highest principles of human right and justice, but inestimable as affording them the fullest opportunity to undermine this nation, and blast not only its hopes, but the hopes of the world. Seizing the United States, the Church of Rome can mock and defy all the states of Europe that have always prevented its complete temporal sovereignty. The progress it has already made is by no means to be despised ; as a writer in the "Boston Transcript" laments : *' We look with dismay upon the appearance in our streets of fat, heavy-eyed priests and coifed nuns;" from having had, at the end of the last century — to quote some statistics given by an orthodox Russian author in his book entitled " Roman Catholicism in the United States"— 1950 churches for 3,500,000 people, or one church for every 1 700 persons, in 1870 there were over 72,000 churches for 38,000,000, or one church for every 629 26 xftE Icelandic Discoverers of America; ;,,,|l|! '■f, -' persons; "so while the population increased eleven times the number of churches increased thirty-seven times;" he says with satisfaction, and Americans must admit, though with horror, that "the growth of Catholicism in the United States for the last hundred years, has been, indeed, bewildering ; in 17,76 there were in that country about 25,000 Catholics all told, or 1-1 20th part of all the inhabitants, and now there are over 7,000,000 of them, or one-seventh of the whole population." The words of Froude should be read by those who are not afraid to risk a further experiment : " The New World was first offered to the holders of the old traditions. They were the husbandmen first chosen for the new vineyard, and blood and desolation were the only fruits which they reared upon it. In their hands it was becoming a kingdom, not of God, but of the devil, and a sentence of blight went out against them and against their works. How fatally it has worked, let modern Spain and Spanish America bear witness." But Roman Catholicism undergoes a change on American soil, still persist those who have unlimited faith in the passive influence of American ideas; an Asiatic serpent, fostered in Indian Buddhism, the source of religious or Christian pessimism, as Oswald affirms, will have all his venom extracted, his pro- pensity to coil and crush, by simply basking in a well-cultivated American garden or twining around its fruit-trees. But " it has long been the proud but most unholy boast of the Roman Church that she never changes," writes H. F. Barnard in the " Index," and then goes to the case in point : " Papa] indulgence was the rock on which the Christian Church split three hundred and fifty years ago ; yet on this same question of indulgence, Rome has not altered one jot or tittle of her pretensions," which he demonstrates by extracts from the "Messenger of St. Joseph's Union," to all the members of which Papal indulgence has been granted by Pope Leo XIIL, and which advertises the sale of masses at one dollar each, thereby doing a thriving i^ .il; asm, pro- bated "it )man the tence Idred mce, [hich St. tence the Iving OR. Honour to whom Honour is Due. 27 trade. A few extracts taken from the pastoral published at the fourth Provincial Council at Cincinnati, March 19th, 1882, will show in how far the Eomish Church has changed its tenets or adopted American habits of thought. " A systematic and combined effort, both in Europe and America, is being made to secularize religion, and to substitute for God and religion science and material progress. It is claimed that all men are 'free and equal,' and under that cry religion and law are assailed. . . . Nor are all men equal. . . . This is in the nature of things and must be, as it is ordained by God that some shall rule and some shall be ruled. Those who are appointed to rule have certain rights that subjects have not. Hence kings and magistrates, and bishops and priests, are appointed to rule ; if to rule, then they are above those whom they rule. . . . With the popular doctrine that all men are equal, there is steadily growing the doctrine that ' all power is from the people,' and that they who exercise authority in the state do not exercise it as their own, but as intrusted to them by the people, and upon this condition — that it may be recalled by the will of the same people by whom it was confided to them. This is not Catholic doctrine, nor is it the doctrine of the Scriptures, which teach : ' By me kings reign ... by me princes rule, and the mighty decree justice.' ' Give ear, you that rule the people, ... for power is given to you by God, and strength by the Most High.* * Let every soul be subject to the higher powers, for there is no power but from God; and those that are, are ordained of God.' . . . There is also a growing disposition among a class of Catholics to teach that in some things the priest receives his power from the people. There is also a disposition to draw lines and to confine the priest within limits that neither God nor religion can permit. The priest is not appointed by the people, nor does he receive his power from the people. He receives his power from God, and the people are commanded to seek the law from his lips, * for the priest's lips should keep knowledge.' % i' " I II ' I ( 28 The Icelandic Discoverers op America; i Sill' >i * He that hears you hears me,' says Christ, speaking of His priests, * and he that despises you despises me.' ' Go teach ' are words that leave no doubt as to the right of priests to teach, or the duty of the people to listen. . . . Governments and States and peoples are alike subject to the law of God equally as the humblest. Governments have no more right to do wrong than individuals. * All power comes from God,' and the Church is the witness and guardian of revelation, as well as the inter- preter thereof. From her the world must learn the law of God, and the law of man must ever bo subordinated to the law of God. It is untrue to assert that * all power comes from the people.' * All power com ep from God,' by whom princes rule, and the mighty decree justice." It will not do to leave these tedious injunctions that have been reiterated since the second century, unchanged and un- amended, without including those relative to the school-question, the most serious annoyance the Roman Catholics have to con- tend with in the United States : " Religion must form a part of the education of the child. Education without religion may have the glitter of science, but it will not have the essence of virtue. Virtue must be the foundation of education, but religion is the foundation of virtue; hence we liold religion must form a part of the daily education of the child, and must be taught co-ordinately with science and the cognate branches. Deeply impressed with the necessity of training Catholic children in the faith of their fathers, whilst waiting a change in the public-school system, in which our just rights as citizens shall be recognized and conceded, there remains to us but to appeal to the generosity of our ever faithful people to continue to support our Catholic schools. We know too well how heavy the burden is, and how unjust it is that Catholics are forced to sujjport their own schools and at the same time be taxed to support a public-school system from which, for conscience sake, they can receive no benefit. Wherever, therefore, throughout m Iigion )izens ut to itinue heavy ed to ed to sake, ghout OR, Honour to whom Honour is Due. 29 the province, Catholic schools are not yet established, pastors will use all diligence that they be established, being ever mindful of the instructions sent by the Holy See to the American bishops to see that Catholic schools be everywhere established, and that in them not only science and profane knowledge be taught, but also religion, the queen of all sciences. It is, therefore, our wish, that the church and school go hand in hand ; that where the one is, there also shall the other be." The tendency of all this is as plain as its meaning. There is the denial that the principles embodied in the American Con- stitution are right ; the people are not free and equal ; power is not from the people ; there should not be self-rule, but " kings and magistrates, and bishops and priests are appointed to rule ; " secular government and secular education are utterly obnoxious to the Romish Church, and it is bound by all the laws of its own organization to eradicate them. The members of this Church are consequently the only class of emigrants to the United States who are not loyal to the institutions of the country they livb in, w^ho do not in any sense assimilate with the principles of these institutions; under the guise of American citizens they are actually traitors, only waiting for the moment when they can deal a death-blow to the government and rulers their mediaeval super- stition has taught them to abhor. Their arrogance inflated and buoyed up by the remembrance of the historical fact that the power to which alone they yield allegiance was able to destroy the eivilization of ancient Greece, that of the Moors, to sap the strength of Scandinavia and cause its decline, to reduce all Europe to a state of misery and barbansm that lasted for a thousand years, they regard the repetition of this atrocious work in the United States as an easy task, and set about it years ago with the confidence and precision that distinguished their European efforts. Conscious as Americans are of their own strength, the power of their own nation, they should not under- estimate the\ strength of their insidious foe, nor foiget that thit il] n- ■ f- ■ r 1: , ' m it t'l I 30 The Icelandic Discoverers of America ; mi foe vanquished the Greeks, the Saxons, the Moon, the Alhi- genses, the French Protestants, the Scandinavians, getting the better through their craft and hellish devices — never through legitimate or honest means — of whole communities and nations "who cherished advanced thoughts, republican principles, who were free-minded, enlightened and cultivated. The history of Europe does not show an even and harmonioiis development, Christianity orBomanism succeeding a state of greater barbarism and gradually amelioratinghuman conditions, butavioleutsubstitution of barbar- ism for the civilization and enlightenment it ruthlessly quenched. All of these highly civilized races struggled manfully for their existence, and in the case of the Scandinavians, offered five hundred years of determined opposition to the demoniac legions of the Church ; but Americans make no resistance whatsoever ; they even praise the vampyre that has fastened upon them, as manifest from an editorial in the " Boston Transcript," headed "A Boston Cardinal," in which these words appear: "None the less should our fathers, brought up as they had been to abominate the Scarlet Woman, be credited with tolerance in aiding the little flock of Catholics to find shelter and comfort and to wax strong. The history of the Church in this city is one of the most interesting chapters in our annals. It is interesting, not only as all religious experiences must l)e to all thinking men, but as showing a great social change which has been working on our people. The Roman Catholic Church to- day is great, powerful, flourishing, and perfectly organized in our midst, and yet it is but little over eighty years since the old cathedral was dedicated, and it is but seventy-five since the first Bishop of Boston received his consecration." In the nature of things the Romish power will work thus quietly and peaceably only for a limited space of time. The period of gentle and persuasive measures has obviously been protracted in the United States by reason of the unprecedented success that attended the manoeuvres of the Mother Church, so £'''l'!i. m ^; , Albi- ag the [irough lations 10 were Europe itianity idually barTaar- jnched. ir their ed five legions soever ; hem, as headed " None een to livnce in lomfort city is It is to all Lch has rch to- ized in the old he first (k thus The been (dented rch, so • OR, Honour to whom Honour is Due. 31 strangely facilitated by the un8U8f)ecting attitude of Americans. Were they really so republican-minded,when they thus permitted the advance of the most monarchical of dominions 1 But Mr. Gladstone, in his " Rome and the Newest Fashions in Religion/' draws attention to the fact that another policy, the one that has proved so efficacious heretofore, is contemplated, in Europe, if not in America : *' My propositions then, as they stood, are these: " 1. That Rome has substituted for the proud boast of i temper eadem, a policy of violence and change in faith. "2. That she has refurbished and paraded anew every rusty tool she was fondly thought to have disused. ; "3. That no one can now become her convert without renouncing his moral and mental freedom, and placing his ■ ! civil loyalty and duty at the mercy of another. " 4. That she (Rome) has equally repudiated modem thought and ancient history." Furthermore he says : " It leads many to the painful and revolting conclusion that there is a fixed purpose among the secret inspirers of Roman joiicy to pursue, by the road of force, upon the arrival of any favourable opportunity, the favourite project of re- erecting the terrestrial throne of the Popedom, even if it can only be re-erected on the ashes of the city and amidst the whitening bones of the people." In confirmation of this horrible probability, the author cites the words of Cardinal Manning, in which the intention stands plainly revealed, at the League of St. Sebastian, on the 20th of January, 1874 : " Now, when the nations of Europe have revolted, and when they have dethroned, as far as men can dethrone, the Vicar of Jesus Christ, and when they have made the usurpation of the Holy City a part of international law — when all this has been done, there is only one solution of the difficulty — a solution, I fear, impending —and that is the terrible scourge of continental war : a war, which will exceed the horrors of any of the wars of iho ^"^( li 32 The Icelandic Discoverers of America; 1 51' ^t 11 empire. I do not see how this can be averted. And it is my firm conviction, that, in spite of all obstacles, the Vicar of Jesus Chris-twill be put again in his own rightful place." Nor is this all. "The Catholic Church," bo says, "cannot be silent^ it cannot hold its peace ; it cannot cease to preach the doctrines of Revelation, not only of the Trinity and of the Incarnation, but likewise of the Seven Sacraments, and of the Infallibility of the Church of God, and of the necessity of Unity, and of the Sovereignty, both spiritual and temporal, of the Holy See." Th^re is still another threat, couched in the following words : " If Christian princes and their laws deviate from the law of Gol, the Church has authority from God to judge of that devia- tion, and by all its paioera to enforce the correction of that departuio from justice. It is more than apparent that the sins of the American Ee- public must far outweigh those of any Christian prince in Europe ; there is not a point in which the Republican and the Roman Catholic code coincide; what then is the retribution that the Holy See will mete out to Americans, when the time comes 9 And why is the hour of retribution delayed 1 Coming events hinge on the stand taken by the United States on the Columbus question. J. J. Barry may be considered to interpret literally the views of his Church when he says that *' the first object of the Discovery, disengaged from every human consideration, was, therefore, the glorification of the Redeemer and the extension of His Church." I have quoted these words before, but they cannot be too forcibly impressed upon the mind. The object was not impeded by any uncertainty with regard to the disGC Tery, for it was not +0 be a discovery, it was simply to be the claiming of lands before discovered and to which the route had been marked out. The Church as usual had chosen an infallible method. It leaves experimenting to scientists. "Washington Irving describee the precipitate haste with which Pope and sovereigns took possessjou of the now territory, pro« OR, Honour to whom Honour is Due. 33 destined for Papal rule : " In the midst of f-eir rejoicings, the Spanish sovereigns lost no time in caking every measure neces- sary to secure their new acquisitions . . . took the immediate precaution to secure the sanction of the Pope (Alexander VI.) , . a pontiff whom some historians have stigmatized with every vice and crime that could disgrace humanity," The records of his crimes are too revolting to read ; debauchery, incest, murder, robbery, and assassination for the end of robbery, distinguish this monster's life, until by drinking, by mistake, some of the poisoned wire intended for nine wealthy cardinals and some other opu- lent persons whom he had invited to a banquet, the career of the infamous wretch was closed. "The present discovery," continues Irving, " was a still greater achievement " (than the con'^uest of Gvanada) ; "it was the fulfilment of one of the sublime promises to the Church ; it was giving to it the heathen for an inh^itance and the uttermost parts of the earth for f, possession." A Bull was iss'^ed, dated May 2nd, 1493, " ceding to the Spanish sovereigns the same rights, privileges, and in- dulgences in respect to the newly discovered region, as had been accorded to the Portuguese, with regard to their African dis- coveries, under the same condition of planting and propagating the Catholic faith." sthe American Republic disposed to consider itself tributary to Spain and to allow these Spanish plans to be carried out to the letter 1 If so, it has but to accept the Spanish and Roman Catholic version of the discovery and suffei- these schemes to blot out the Norse discovery of America. It must then endow Columbus with all his prerogatives, saintship included, and worship his memory. It would be such a glorious thing for the United States to be under the charge of a tutelar saint, to have its St. Christopher, as Norway had its St. Olaf Jind l?weden its St. Birgitta, after they became Christianized or Romanized ! But as this response to Spanish demands does not lie within the range of human probability, what is the alteniAtivet Xo m% I Am. 34 The IcfiLAiiDic Discoverers of America; proclaim the fact of tiie Norse discovery and denounce the Golumbian one as a deliberate fraud of the Church, devised for proselyting purposes. The true tendency of America was given M'hen the Norsemen landed on its shores ; it was a good augury for the future nation, for these were brave, free, high-minded men, men of a race who had planted the seeds of liberty in many a state of Europe, and who did it in ♦' 's case unwittingly, from the mere force of their splendid nationality. ' ' ' '" Columbus, the bigoted Boman Catholic adventurer, who fed his ambition and greed on the narratives of the Norse voyagep to America, read secretly in Iceland, strove to give the New World the opposite tendency, the downward tendency. Which shall prevail? J., .) «-%■- % i? 1 OR, Honour to whom Honour is Due. 35 j^i.l 1 .» ; '1 ') CHAPTER n. » ,r y\ ' ^U ; 1 > (, ■,>■( .;j-;^ \ If THE MANIFEST DUTY OF THE UNITED STATES IN THIS QUESTION. That deeply interesting work by William and Mary Howitt, " The History and Romance of Northern Europe," opens with an exclamation, an indignant one : " Amongst the many wonders of this world, there is none greater than the blindness of the writers of this and other countries to the transcendent influence of the blood and spirit of ancient Scandinavia on the English character." In reading up on this subject, Mallet's " Northern Antiquities " is one of the first hooks likely to full into one's hands — a pioneer work in itself— and this paragraph but increases the amazement : " History has not recorded the annals of a people who have occasioned greater, more sudden, or more numerous revolutions in Europe than the Scandinavians, or whose antiquities, at the same time, are so little known." So little knnvm ! How is that 1 The Scandinavians have themselves formed the early history of nearly every nation in Europe, of France, Switzerland, Russia, England, Scotland, besides forming the entire history of their own countries, — how can one study English history, without learning all about these people, or French history, without the same result, 'or Scotch, or Swiss, or Russian ? Were their achievements really so great, as the world takes so little rote of them ? One reads a little farther in this French work, which Bishop Percy whs enterprising enough to put into English in 1847, and strikes upon the following passage : '• It is easy to see from this shoii D 2 7*8 .'if I'W Iff- J.v' IT 36 The Icelandic Discoverers of America; sketch, how greatly the nations of the North have influenced the ditferent fates of Europe ; and if it be worth while to trace its revolutions to their causes, if the illuf^tration of its institutions, of its police, of its customs, of its manners, of its laws, be a subject of useful and interesting inquiry ; it must be allowed, that the antiquities of the North, that is to say, everything which tends to make us acquainted with its ancient inhabitants, merits a share in the attention of thinking men. But to render this obvious by a particular example ; is it not well known iJ.at the most flourishing and celebrated states of Europe owe oiif 'V'/ to the Northern nations, whatever liberty they now enjo)*, jither in their constitution, or in the spirit of their government 1 " Such a race so little known? There must be some mystery under this ! What do English authors say about it ] How do they account for it 1 Grenville Pigott, in his " Scandinavian Mythology," says this : " The omission of any serious research into the religion ol Odin, bynien of such profound learning, as was possessed by many of our early antiquarians, may, not unnaturally, raipe a doubt in the minds of some of the degree of advantage 01 interest likely to result from an inquiry of this nature ; but a brief account of the circumstances which attendv^d the overthrow of heathenism and the introduction of Cliristianity in tliose countries, where the Scandinavian deities were cliietly wor- shipped, may otherwise explain the cause of this silence on a subject so likely to have invited earnest inquiry." This gives one an inkling of the cause, to be sure, but y<>t it remains aji incomprehensible enigma how the history of ihe most remarkable race that ever trod tlie earth could have been thus buried in oblivion ! And tiiat the English peoi)Ie know nothing about them, know nothing about their own ancestors, that is the strangest part of it ! But perhaps it is a mistake, the neglect of this subjiM-t ascribed to Great Britain as well *is France, only a casual remark by one or two authors not : 6ft, lt6N6tR to v^nou llo^othi is fiuit if ■ J coj:!:ni7,iint themselves of the extent of English or Fr nth rt'seuich. Let us Jock i'uiLher ; Henry Wheaton, in his " History of the Northmen, or Danes and Normans from the Earliest Times to the Conquest of England by William of Normandy," makes the same comment : " In the following attempt to illustrate the early annals of the North, it has been the writer's aim to seize the principal points in the progress of society and manners in this remote period, which havo .»cen either entirely pas-ed over, or barely glanced at by tho nationjil historians of France and England, but which throw a stron j: and clear light upon the affairs of Europe during the middle ages, and illustrate the formation of the great monarchies now constituting some of its leading states." Sa;muel Laing says : " The social condition, institutions, laws and literature of this vigorous, influential branch of the race, have been too much overlooked by our historians and political philosophers." In the preface to his translation of the " Heimskringla " he gravely reveals his intention of stepping in and repairing the serious omission of these historians and philosophers, of averting the consequences of their intentional neglect of certain phases and racial characteristics, the concomitants of early English history, without which there can be no intelligent reading of that history, and to do this he imposes upon himself the double work of clothing in English dress the noble work by Snorre Stiirleson, an historian, who, in his turn, has done for England what England has failed to do for itself, by writing hia '* Chronicle of the Kings of Norway," kings, many of them, who played an important r61e in England and Scotland, — and of composing the preliminary dissertation, a perusal of which comprises a thorough course of instruction for the reader in thig almost unknown subject. The Rev. Edmund F. Slufter, who edited Beamish's translation of " The Voyages of the Northmen to America," pays this earnest and enthusiastic author a just tribute when he says : *' Mr. Laing's dissertation ia ;.3S 3 } m li ' !*■ f. • !' 1 j;;: 'I ii in f ■1 il!. " ji:::;! Ilii l! il* fr»: 38 The Icelandic Discoverers of America ; a th 'rnngh discussion of the whole subject of Northern literature and history, and is rendered not the less interesting by the frank and bold manner in which the author expresses his opinions on some important questions." The words in the preface are these : *' It is of importance to English history to have, in the English language, the means of judging of the social and intellectual state — of the institutions and literature— of a people who during three hundred years bore an important, and for a great portion of that time a predominant part, not merely in the wars, but in the legislation of England ; who occupied a very large portion of the country, and were settled in its best lands in such numbers as to be governed by their own, not by Anglo- Saxon laws; and who undoubtedly must be the forefathers of as large a proportion of the present English nation as the Anglo- Saxons themselves, and of a iauch larger proportion than the Normans. These Northmen have not merely been the fore- fathers of the people, but of the institutions and character of the nation, to an extent not sufficiently considered by our historians. . . . They occupied one-third of all England for many generations, under their own Danish laws ; and for half a century nearly, immediately previous to the Norman Conquest, they held the supreme government of the country." Was the supremacy of these Northern people such a disgrace to England that the proud nation has not yet recovered from' the humiliation of it, and cannot endure to be reminded of those times ? Manifestly not. Did these Scandinavians so retard the progress of the nation that the people of modern England may justly hate them for the injury and banish them, so far as may be, from recollection? Every line of evidence refutes such an idea. But aside from the military prowess and warlike achievements of this race, which all must admit, did they have any prestige that entitles them to a place in English literature, in English history, in the grateful memory of the nation 1 In his words with regard to Snorre Sturlosou and the subject-matter of his i^Si"! OR, Honour to whom Honour is Due. 39 his remarkable book, Laing settles the question as to the right of this race to a place in English literature and history : " He gives, too, every now and then, very natural touches of character, and scenes of human action, and of the working of the human mind, wliich are in truth highly dramatic. In rapid narrative of the stirring events of the wild Viking life, — of its vicissitudes, adventures and exploits, — in extraordinary, yet not improbable incidents and changes in the career of individuals, — in touches true to nature, — and in the admirable management of his story, in which episodes apparently the most unconnected with hie subject, come in by and by at the right moment, as most essential parts of it, — Snorre Sturleson stands as far above Villa Hardouin, Joinville or Froissart, as they stand above the monkish chroniclers who preceded them. His true seat in the Valhalla of European literature is on the same bench — however great the distance between — on the same bench with Shakspeare, Carlyle, and Scott, as a dramatic historian ; for his Harold Ha;irfager, his Olaf Tryggvason, his Olaf the Saint, are in reality great historical dramas, in which these wild, energetic personages, their adherents and their opponents, are presented working, acting and speaking before you. . . . English readers . . . who would never discover from the pages of Hume, or of any other of our historical writers, that the Northern pagans who, in the ninth and tenth centuries, ravaged the coasts of Europe, sparing neither age, sex nor condition — respecting neither churches, monasteries nor their inmates — conquering Normandy, Northumberland (then reckoned with East Anglia, equal to one-third of all England), and, under Swein and Canute the Great, conquering and ruling over the whole of England, — were a people ])Ossessing any literature at all, or any laws, institutions, aits, or manners connecting them with civilized lile. Our historians have confined themselves for information entirely to the records and chronicles of the Anglo-Saxon monks . . . and who naturally represent them as the most ferocious and 1 ' : m: i m Hi 40 The Icelandic Discovereiis op Amemca; 1 I ,1!::,!. m ignorant of barbarians, and witbout any tincture of civi- lization." There we have it ; the monks, the natural enemies of the Scandinavians, have become their historians, and the testimony of those whose whole office has been to proiiagate such versions only of facts and events and personal action as pass Church censor- ship, has been universally accepted. Hume does indeed imiL.te the tone of these monks, whose rage will never cool toward the Northmen, for he uniformly speaks of them as " those swarms of robbers, which the fertile North thus incessantly poured forth against them," *' the piratical Danes," " those ravagers," Ac, &c. ; and makes one representation as egregiously false as if penned under monkish dictation : " When Alfred came to the throne he found the nation sunk into the grossest ignorance and barbarism, proceeding from the continued disorders in the government, and from the ravages of the Danes. The monasteries were destroyed, the monks butchered or dispersed, their libraries burnt ; and thus the only seats of erudition in those ages were totally subverted." It will be seen further on that there was one " seat of erudi- tion " in the world even then, that preserved the true history of those times so sacredly as to place it, intact, in the hands of posterity, for effective use in the hour when the records so skilfully manipulated by ecclesiastics and religious intriguers would be discredited and proofs of the fraud required. This true history was preserved in the heart and mind of the people of the North, ages before it was reduced to writing, and handed down in oral tradition. There was also an especial class of men to whose keeping all annals were confided, and Laing's description of them, here quoted, corresponds with that of many other writers on the subject : '* Before the introduction or geneml diffusion of writing, it is evident that a class of men whose sole occupation was to commit to memory and preserve the laws, usages, precedents and details of all those civil OR, Honour to whom Honour is Due. 41 ClVl- affairs and rights, and to whose fidelity in relating fonner trans- actions implicit confidence could be given, must of necessity have existed in society — must have been in every locality ; and from the vast number and variety of details in every district, and the great interests of every community, must have bei-n esteemed and recompensed in proportion to their importance in such a social state. This class were the Skalds." This paragraph, in itself, contradicts the following one by Hume : " He (Rollo) collected a body of troops, which like that of all those ravagers, was composed of Norwegians, Swedes, Frisians, Danes, and adventurers of all nations, who being accustomed to a roving, unsettled life, took delight in nothing but war and plunder." As well could one say of the French followers of Napoleon who accompanied him on his wars of conquest, that "they were accustomed to a roving, unsettled life." This same Rollo, or Rolf, achieved a conquest in France, that Napoleon himself need not have been ashamed of, and which perhaps conduced to make the French people worthy followers of the great general, who may have been inspired to heroic efl'orts by the accounts of his illustrious ])re- decessor, William the Conqueror. Rolf left Norway for the same reason as* did "the nobility and people of the highest civilization " who emigrated to Iceland, namely, to escape from the despotic sway of Haruld Hirfager, and neither ho and his followers nor they were men to " take delight in notliing but war and plunder." * On the accuracy of the old Icelandic annals must the thinkers and reformers of the present day rely, in their eflbrts to disentangle history from the almost hopeless confusion in which the aforesaid monkish chrouiclers have involved it, con- sequently it is extremely gratifying to find such ample corrobo- ration of the truthfulness of tlie Icelandic statements. It must never be lost Irom sight that these were o. free people, bound by uiiitlier priest uur king, and consequently not forced to extol $ ' 'I ii* m T - f 42 The Icelandic Discoverers of America; I I m. •'t J] «i 11,:;' "t* I i- the representatives of either ecclesiasticism or royalty; they expressed their honest opinion in every instance. Five hundred years of Roman Catholic rule had destroyed all manhood and independence in the Anglo-Saxons ; as Laing says, " the spirit, character and national vigour of the old Anglo-Saxon branch of this people, had 'evidently become extinct under Dhe influence and pressure of Ihe Church of Rome upon the energies of the human mind." But the Scandinavians were as yet exempt ; submission and all cringing to authority was unknown to them : there was no cowardice in their blood, and hence no propensity to lie. In tb») io^^roduction to his Heims- kringla, Snorre Sturleson, the celi^braled man " to ^hom," as Henry Wheaton declares, " his country's history and literature are most indebted, and whose groat historical work has justly earned for him the title of the Northern Herodotus," affirms with regard to the truthfulness of the Skalds : " For although it be the fashion with Scalds to praise most those in whose presence they are standing, yet no one would dare to relate to a chief wkat he and all those who heard it know to be false and imaginary, — not a true account of his deeds ; because that would bo mockery, not praise." • • In the twelfth century Iceland possessed considerable collec- tions of books, and for a long time one common language was spoken and written in England, Iceland, Norway, Sweden and Denmark. At least one-third of England was occupied by men from 'the North, the land was ruled by Northern laws, Northern customs and usages had been introduced. Why then have not modem English historians sought their own race, their own nationality, their own language, a? the right sources of historical knowledge of England, instead of the old Latin legends which are the nonsensical relics of Roman rule in this country 1 To which has their allegiance been due, to which has it spontaneously been given, to the Roman rule which has left traces on.^ of " a despotic military occupation 1: llili"; OR, Honour to whom Honour is Due. 43 of the country," even this soon obliterated, or to the Scancli< navian rule, which has made England the proud nation that it is t There was no stint of historical records in Iceland, its literature was as rich and varied as it was copious, the Latin lore (1) of the monks could in no sense be compared with it, for, to cite Laing, "during the five centuries in which the Northmen were riding over the seas, and conquering wheresoever they landed, the literature of the people they overcame was locked up in a dead language, and within the walls of monasteries. But the Northmen had a literature of their own, rude as it was ; and the Anglo-Saxon race had none, none at least belong- ing to the people." One Icelandic collection, the Amse-Magnaean collection, "alone contains two thousand volumes of Icelandic and old Northern manuscripts. This collection was made by Arnas Magnussen, a distinguished antiquary, between 1702 and 1712, and is named in honour of him." (Vide the Earl of EUesmere's « Guide to Old Northern Archseology." London, 1848, p. 12S.) Did England seek to gain possession of these treasures 1 Evi- dently not, for the bulk of them found their way to Den- mark. The Earl of Ellesmere remarks : " But it is not merely for the Scandinavian North properly so called, that the lan- guage and literature possess a national significance, which, throughout a certain period, extends to Russia, as also to Ger- many and to France, . . . but doubtless in a still greater degree to the British Isles." True in theory, this is disproved in practice, for the English nation has not given the slightest evidence that it considers this language and literature to possess a national significance ; its learned men and antiquarians have disdained to pursue this line of rcseiirch, the people, said to be most proud of their ancestry, have buried all recollection of the only ancestors of theirs of whom they had reason to be proud ; a land, said to be enlightened, has purposely thrown a veil of obscurity over its own most brilliant epochs which little Den- f in I r ■ I; 'il i li-i 1^ 1: •nr 44 The Icelandic Discoverers of America; mark is obliged to lift, in order to give the world the informa- tion to which it is rightfully entitled and which it is hopeless to expect from England ! English tourists go to Norway tofiah and to hunt, not to search for historical links, nor to gain a better knowledge of their Viking ancestry ; the museums and fine antiquarian collections in Denmark possess as little at- tractions for the cultivated travelling public of England as the historical relics and associations of Sweden. But sixty hours by sea from that country, one that would naturally be sup- posed to possess an infinite charm for the English, what with its lovely scenery, its castles and manors, its Viking mounds and burial-places, its exhumed treasures, — a priceless illuminated scroll of English history as well as Swedish, — the English people have too liltle interest to go there ! In England Swedish literature, togetlier with Norwegian and Danish, is excluded; there is a deep-seated prejudice against translation?- even from the lanijutifie derived from the one that was o 'heir own nalinial toiKjue ; Swedish authors are scarcely k^^v. .. a even by name. Swedon itself is hold in downright contempt ; an ex- pression of surprise covers the listener's face if one speaks of any of the excellf their sainted brethren, as the most important events in history ; the facts being stated without exercise of judgment, or in<|uiry af r truth, the fictions with a dull credulity unenlivened - a single gleam of genius. ... It is not to be denied that an this con- nected series of Anglo-Saxon and Anglo-Norman history, from the dissolution of the Roman empire in Britain in the middle of the Hfth century down to the middle of the thirteenti utury, although composed by such writers of the Anglo-Saxon popula- tion as Bede and Matthew Paris, men the most eminent of their times for lofirning and literary attainments amongst the Anglo-Saxons and their doscendai^ts, is of the most unmitigated i' i::: ■Mil Rf^il 111' .1 '91 m ' Tliiip I 'f m 50 The Icelandic Discoverers of America ; dullness, considered as literary or intellectual production ; and that all the historical compositions of the old Anglo-Saxon branch during those eight centuries, either in England or in Germany, are, with few if any exceptions, of the same leaden character." These in England and France, distorting the characteristics of the Norsemen and Yikings, and concealing everything that was to their credit, and the monkish writers in Spain and Italy extolling Columbus a few centuries later, a man after their own heart, both sedulously hiding the fact of the Norse discovery of America, which the Fomish Church must of necessity have known at the date of its accomplishment, all these conspired to prepare a pitfall for the future American Republic, which it will be barely able to escape. ' . ■ c'- :'.;li vn ,, ji'- :;*v English predilections were obviously with the monks, with the Church ; not only did the English people accept and dis- seminate the garbled versions of these professional falsifiers relative to the deeds of their own ancestors and kinsmen, but they joined forces with them to subdue the nations of the North through the only means available — that is by converting them to Christianity. This was their last resort, a stratagem of war of those deficient in genuine military qualifications, and who could not overcome their enemy by legitimate means. English mis- sionaries and priests went to Norway, Sweden, and Denmark, and laboured indefatigably to convert the inhabitants. "It was from England" affirms the Earl of Ellesraere proudly, " that Norway received the first germ of Christianity. It was there tliat Hakon, the first Christian king of Norway, com- mence«l and finished his education, during the period from 937 to 963, though he failed in the elluit to i:st;iblish his own faith among his subjects. ... It was reserved for tlie insignificant islets of Scilly to kindle for Norway tiiat light, whii^h was thence to be ilirlut^ed over the remntrst North, The expntriated Norwegian prince and sea-king, Olui Tryggvason, known in the I, ' III' OR, Honour to whom Honour is Due. 51 history of England by the name of Anlaf, received baptism in these isles in 993." It is well known what atrocities Olaf Tryggvason perpetrated in forcing his subjects to adopt Christianity. English bishops also converted Olaf Ericson, king of Sweden, in 1008. Wheaton has something significant to relate about the Hakon referred to: Harald H&rfager's son, Hakon, who had been educated in the new religion at the court of King Athelstane, took with him from England some Christian priests and missionaries. He assembled a large conclave of people, where he tried to intro- duce this doctrine. A rich and popular landholder rose to oppose it, and made a fervent protest, in which he said : " But now we know not what to think, that thou who didst restore to us our lost freedom, shouldst desire to fasten upon us a new and more intolerable yoke of slavery." Wheaton gives us the whole speech, and a remarkable oratorical effort it is 1 The dis- tinguished Swedish novelist, Victor Rydberg, in "The lAst Athenian," puts into the mouth of one of his anti-Christian characters a similar objection: "The Christians, Hermione, hate the high expression of art, as much as the deep seriousness of investigation. They talk of poverty and plunder our temples — of humility and trample upon our necks. . . . They are a pack of malefactors, intriguers, hypocrites and asses. They tear in pieces the world and each other in disputes on words without meaning ; but that in which they all agree, is what I most despise ; all banish the freedom of reason, all teach that the power of rulers and the slavery of the people is from God. Freedotn has departed from real life, but these people deny it even in thought." .... , . •. The only way of depriving the formidable Northern lion of teeth and claws was to Christianize it. Freedom, freedom of life and action, freedom of thought, freedom in a vigour and exuberance of development never attained before, had made the Northern race dangerous, nay, absolutely fatal to the priest- (i! I IS aa ;■ ; $2 The Icelandic Discoverers of America; ridden, enslaved masses of southern and middle Europe. The mere sight or knowledge of these grovelling, craven, black- gowned, canting hordes, inflamed the Viking rage to frenzy, in- citing the utmost ferocity ; it was not honourable warfare be- tween equals, between men and men, but assault made by free, high-spirited, valiant men upon slaves, upon those whom they could not but consider their inferiors, and whom they deemed it meritorious to exterminate. The rage of the J»f orthmen was the unconscious fury of nature against the destroyers of nature, the antipathy of health toward disease, the efFort of nature to free itself from that which is inimical to it. With the instinct of self-preservation which evil has in common with good, and with the burning desire for temporal supremacy over the whole world which has over been its animating motive, the Romish power devised and used the only possible means of rendering the ^forthern destroyer harmless. Subdue these hosts by force of arms it could not. Strategy and priestly craft would avail where manly courage was not at command. It was not the good of their souls nor their eternal welfare, not the inculcation of divine truth that was aimed at, but the eradication of that principle and love of freedom that rendered all of Northern blood dangerous to the Church, whose sole mission was to compel subjection to its own baleful rule. This detestation of all things Scandinavian the Bomans and the Bomi&h Church were able to instil into the English, and the two worked in concert to enslave the people of the North. And how did they fuscomplish it 1 In the words of Wheaton : ** Under the impulse of this blind zeal, Olaf Tryggvason joined treachery to cruelty as one of the means of propagating the true faith." In the " Heimskringla" we are told that " Olaf Trygg- vason's short reign was in fact entirely devoted to the propaga- tion of the new faith, by means the most revolting to humanity," and the sagas abound in instances of the exercise of the blackest deeds of darkness in spreading the light of Christianity. Many It j:' OR, Honour to whom Honour is Due. 53 streams of noble Northern blood went to swell the tide that had been shed throughout Europe, to kill that pernicious germ of freedom that could only be destroyed through wholesale slaughter. In ''The History of Rationalism," Lecky affirms: *' That the Church of Rome has shed more innocent blood than any other institution that has ever existed among mankind, will be questioned by no Protestant who has a complete know- ledge of history." Among the measures used were also such as these : " Otho III., of the Saxon line, concluded a peace with Harold Blaatand, the principal condition of which was that the Danish people should embrace Christianity, and their king should endeavour to introduce the new religion in Norway." Wheaton quotes Charles the Simple's words, which so well show the disgraceful means employed : " My kingdom is laid waste," said the monarch to the prelate, "my subjects are destroyed or driven into exile; the fields are no longer ploughed or sown. Tell the Norman that I am well disposed to make a lasting peace with him, and that if he will become a Christian, I will give him broad lands and rich presents." Rolf readily consented to the proposal, as did many other leaders and generals to similar ones. There appeared to them no reason why they should not accept advan- tageous terms from a vanquished foe, and as for embracing Christianity, that seemed the idlest and emptiest of ceremonies to men whose religion sat so lightly upon them. To them belief in the gods was more a matter of poetry and ideality than of practical import j it served to kindle their enthusiasm, perhaps their valour, although this in the main was self-fed ; and with a religion that had no rites or ceremonies to speak of, no established priesthood, that exercised no tyranny over them, it was a moral impossibility for them to conceive of such a system as the Christian Church, or to imagine to what a horrible thraldom they were consigning themselves and their descendants. However, the mistake they made, and through no iault Qt '< if $4 The Icelandic Discoverers of America; theirs either — ^they were too nohle, too frank, too single-minded to fathom the dopih of perfidy in the Bomish Church, in the religious system called Christianity — this mistake the people of the United States can retrieve. The spirit of the Norsemen has dc ended into Americans. They, and not the English, as events have proven, are the true heirs of the glorious heritage bequeathed by the ancient Scandinavians. The colonists, who revolted against English oppression, and who threw off all alle- giance to the Crown, were totally unaware that there was that in the English past that had nourished and inspired their own spirit of independence, that they had ancestors who had possessed their own distinguishing traits, and who had laboured manfully to make these traits the prevailing ones in English character, and so they cut all the links that had bound them to England. If England had revered its own free-minded ancestors, if it had seconded the efforts of the North to spread liberty over all the nations of the earth, instead of the efforts of Rome to stifle liberty for ever by putting all nations, the Scandinavian included, under the perpetual rule of the Church, the conduct of America since the hour it became an independent Republic would have been very different and the present peril would have been averted. Precautions could then have been taken in time against the continual encroachments of the Roman Catholic power in the United States ; the full purpose and design of that power would have been apparent ; Americans, in a body, would have realized that while they were working, with one heart and one soul, for the formation of an ideal Republic, in which the principles of liberty, of right, of equity, of justice, would be fully embodied, there was an insidious force in their midst steadily using liberty to undermine liberty, a force that was pledged to tyranny, evil, and the subversion of right ; whose record was iniquity, and whose intent was iniquity I No waruing came through the watchful care of the Mother country; i M OR, Honour to whom Honour is Due. 55 it only gave the precedent of the frequent conversion of high persons from among the nobility to the Roman Catholic faith. No admonition was uttered by England to the less experienced sons and daughters of England across the water to the effect that " eternal vigilance was the price of safety." They were never told by England that they should honour their Norse ancestors, be true to the principles these held so dear, and perfect the Republic founded on a model that the Norsemen themselves had originated and outwrought in Iceland and Switzerland. The knowledge of the Norse discovery of America did not come to the people of the United States from England, but from Denmark. England took no interest in the matter, was indifferent as to whether it was true or false, felt no pride in a discovery so momentous, made by its own ancestors, saw no necessity of informing Americans of a fact of such vital importance as to prove their greatest safeguard against a deadly foe! ..>;■*■. .:■ V--.- :,.■£' But Denmark came to the rescue ! Denmark performed the whole duty that England had evaded. The tidings so fraught with mighty consequences to the young Republic, were seized with avidity by A'-nericans, and responded to in the right spirit. No sooner was that great work of Professor Rafn's printed, than the Historical Society of Rhode Island opened corre- spondence with the Royal Society of Northern Antiquaries in Copenhagen, and several translations of the Norse voyages to .A.mfirica were put within reach of American readers. The Prince Society, in Boston, republished the translation oi these by N. L. Beamish, an English author, w^ho, like Laing, Pigott, the Howitts, and others, exerted himself to the utmost to rouse the English public into some sort of action, and numerous American works appeared on the subject. Gratitude was not wanting either to our Norse ancestors ; the appreciation so Ic.ng deferred, the tribute refused them by their English descendants, was yielded gladly by their American ones ! Benjamin Lossing : i >'t| z' M I i .: hi 56 The Icelandic Discoverers of America; wrote : " It is buck to the Northern Vikings we must look for the hardiest elements of progress in the United States." And B. F. De Costa : " We fable in a great measure when we spenk of our Saxon inheritance ; it is rather from the Northmen that we have derived our vital energy, our freedom of thought, and, in a measure that we do not yet suspect, our strength of speech." The accounts of the Norse voyages to America also seem to have met with full credence, Bancroft, the historian, forming the signal exception to the rule. Remarking this, Mr, Slafter, in his introduction to the " Voyages," says : " Mr. Bancroft, in the earliest of his " History of the United States," treats the alleged Icelandic voyages to this continent as a myth, and, in his last, has not in any degree modified his sweeping statements of distrust. We are not aware that any other distinguished historian has reached the same conclusion." Mr. Slafter him* self asserts : " Both of these documents are declared, by those qualified to -judge of the character of ancient writings, to be authentic, and were clearly regarded by their writers as narratives of historical truth." Edward Everett writes, quite as emphati- cally, in the North American Review: "These accounts are either founded on truth, or they are wholly false ; and those who hold to the latter opinion will, we think, find more diffi- culty in carrying out their hypothesis, than there is in admitting the substantial truth of the tradition." Ben. Franklin, Baldwin, Goodrich, T. W. Higgenson, J. Abbott, W. C. Bryant, and many other AmericaLS have written in confirmation of the truth of the Norse discovery of America, as founded on the Icelandic narratives. But the duty of Americans does not end with this acknow- ledgment of the truth. The Roman Catholics in their midst and in Europe have been diligently spreading a statement in direct refutation of all this, the consummation of their long- continued policy of at once concealing the discovery of the Norsemen and 8ub4itutiug that of Columbus lor it Their Or, Honour to whom Honour is Due. 57 j,Min, sliouM this subrstitution be allowed, need not bo described ; it is already apparent enough. The wish expressed for a general celebration of the discovery of America by Columbus, is the first wa y move of the Roman Catholi's Church to uproot freedom from American soil. It is the signal for the renewal of the old conflict with the Norsemen in nearly every country of Europe. Once the Norse discovery is thoroughly accredited, the United States, as a nation acting upon it, the true discoverers honoured, the false one execrated as he deserves, the Church that has aided and abetted him execrated as it deserves, the kinship and sympathy of Norsemen and Americans realized and ac- knowledged — once this comes about, the Romish band of con- spirators from Pope to canting, whining priest, have their old enemy bodily before them again, only refreshed by their long sleep of a thousand y^ars and eager to take up the old battle on soil that will not betray them as did Europe 1 Americans are to put on the Norse armour and seal the glorious work for universal liberty that their ancestors have bequeathed to them t . 1 i 4 :Sl •^l ■ ■ , i'ui ■ ^ 1 f ' 1 1 < S8 The Icelandic Discoverers of America j ■,r..Jr,:.- li 'l »., ' ■> *. iVf '.''■ -fj ■ '■* CHAPTER HL THB BVIDENOB THAT THB NORSBMBN DISOOVBRED AMERICA IN THE TENTH CENTURY. As has "been seen by the statement of S:,muel Laing quoted in the first chapter, the proof that the Norsemen discovered America, five hundred years before Columbus, rests entirely on documentary evidence, and this evidence is to be found in the two sagas contained in the " Codex Flatoiensis." Mr. Slafter's statement is substantially the same, as far as the manuscripts are concerned : " Among the vast number of Scandinavian manuscripts there are two historical sagas which describe western voyages, undertaken during the twenty-five years that intervened between 985 and 1011. One of them is known as the Saga of Erik the Red and the other as that of Thorfinn Karlsefne. On these two documents rests all the essential evidence wliicli we have relating to the voyages of the Northmen to America. Allusions are found in several other Scandinavian writings, which may corroborate and confirm the narratives of tl\G two important sagas to which we have just referred, but add nothing to them really essential or important. The S iga of Erik the Red is taken from the Codex Flateyensis, containing a number of sagas, which were collected and written out in their present form at some time between the years 1387 and 1395. The original saga, of which this is a copy, is not known to be now in existence, but is conjectured, from internal evidence drawn from its language and style, t(j have been originally composed in the twelfth century. The saga of Thorfinn Karlsefne in its present OR, Honour to whom Honour is Due. 59 form ia supposed to have been written, at least a part of it, by Hauk Erlendson, for many years governor of Iceland, who died in 1334. "Whether it had been committed to writing at an earlier period, and copied by him from a manuscript, or whether he took the narrative from oral tradition and reduced it himself to writing for the first time, is not known." In the translation of the voyages, a little light is thrown upon this point, for it is stated that "Karlsefne has accurately related to all men the occurrences on all these voyages, of which somewhat is now recited here." But to give Mr. Slafter's full opinion concerning their relia- bility : " While there is no corroborating evidence outside of Icelandic writings themselves, no monuments in this country confirming the truthfulness of the narratives, they have never- theless all the elements of truth contained in other sagas, which are clearly confirmed by monumental remains. Events occurring in Greenland, recorded in Icelandic sagas of equal antiquity, are established by the undoubted testimony of ancient monu- ments. This, together with the fact that there is no improba- bility that such voyages should have been made, render it easy to believe that the narratives contfiined in the sagas are true in their general outlines and important features." The proof thus being in such a compact shape, and authentic, it only remains for us to see how this has been regarded by minds whose conclusions are of value. Among these Baron von Humboldt must naturally take precedence. Before presenting his testimony, which would have great weight, even if unsup- ported by that of scores of other writers, I cite Mr. Slafter's words about this testimony : " In treating of the discovery of America the author (Alex, von Humboldt) refers to the voyages of the Northmen to this continent as a matter of settled history. He does not even ofier an apology, or suggest a doubt. The vast learn- ing, just discrimination, and sound sense of this distinguished scholar, give great weight to his opinions on any subject." il '''* ■; ^■;l I-' id ■ t ; .* ' mi 1 1 6o The Icelandic Discoverers of America; The following extract is taken from the sooond volume of the " Cosmos :" " Although the acquaintance of the nations of Europe with the western part of the earth is the main subject of our consideration in this section, and that around which the numerous relations of a more correct and a grander view of the universe are grouped, we must yet draw a strong line of separa- tion between the undoubted first discovery of America, in its northern portions, by the Northmen, and its subsequent re-dia- covery in its tropical regions. Whilst the Caliphate still flourished under the Abassides at Bagdad, and Persia was under the dominion of the Samanides, whose age was so favourable to poetry, America was discovered in the year 1000 by Leif, the son of Eric the Rod, by the northern route, and as far as 41** 30' north latitude." In a foot note, the author says : " Parts of America were seen, although no landing was made on them, fourteen years before Leif Eiricksson, in the voyage wliich Bjarne Herjulfsson undertook from Greenland toward the southward in 986. Leif first saw the land at the island of Nantucket, 1** south of Boston; then in Nova Scotia; and, lastly, in Newfoundland, which was subsequently called * Litla Hollulaud,' but never * Vinland.' The gulf which divides Newfoundland from the mouth of the great river St. Lawrence, was called by the Northmen, who had settled in Itelaud and Greenland, Markland's Gulf." (See Caroli Christiani Kiifn Antiquitates AmericansB, 1845, pp. 4, 421, 423 and 463.) liaion von Humboldt thus cites the same authority, the sole and incontrovertible one. He continues : '* The first, although acci- dental incitement towards this event emanated from Norway. Towards the close of the ninth century Naddod was driven by storms to Iceland whilst attempting to reach the Faroe Islands, which had already been visited by the Irish. The first pnttlement of the Northmen was made in 876 by Ingolf. Green- land, the eastern peninsula of a land wliich appears to be every- where separated by the sea from America proper, was early OR, Honour to whom Honour is Due. 6i seen " (quotes Eufn again), " although it was first peopled from Iceland a hundred years later (983). . . Notwithstanding the proximity of the opposite shores of Labrador (Helluland it mikla), 125 years elapsed from the first settlement of the North- men in Iceland to Leif's great discovery of America. So small were the means possessed by a noble, enterprising, but not wealthy race for furthering navigation in these remote and dreary regions of the earth. The littoral tracts of Vinland, so called by the German Tyrker from the wild grapes which were found there, delighted its discoverers by the fruitfulness of the soil, and the mildness of its climate, when compared with Ice- land and Greenland. This tract, which was named by Leif the •Good Vinland' (Vinland it goda), comprised the coast-line between Boston and New York, and consequently parts of the present States of Massachusetts, Rhode IsLmd, and Connecticut, between the parallels of latitude of Civita Vecchia and Terra- cina, which, however, correspond there only to mean annual temperatures of 47° 8' and 52" 1'. This was the prin- cipal settlement of the Northmen. The colonists had often to contend with a very warlike race of Esquimaux, who then extended further to the south under the name of the Skralinger. The first Bishop of Greenland, Eric Upsi, an Icelander, under- took, in 1121, a Christian mission to Vinland ; and the name of the colonized country has even been discovered in old national songs of the inhabitants of the Faroe Islands. " The activity and bold spirit of enterprise manifested by the Greenland and Icelandic adventurers are proved by the circum- stance that, after they had established settlements south of 41° 30' north latitude, they erected three boundary pillars on the eastern shores of Baffin's Bay, at the latitude of 72° 55', on one of the Woman's Islands, north-west of the present most northern Dunish colony of Upernavik. The Runic inscriptions, which were discovered in the autumn of the year 1824, contain, according to Bask and Finn Magnuseii, the : ;i ' ^ it; hi] m m 62 The Icelandic Discoverers of America ; ii date 1135. From this eastern coast of Baffin's Bay, more than six hundred years before the bold expeditions of Parry and Boss, the colonists very regularly visited Lancaster Sound and a part of Barrow's Straits for the purpose of fishing. The locality of the fishing-ground is very definitely described, and Greenland priests from the bishopric of Gardar conducted the first voyage of discovery (1266). This north-western summer station was called Kroksfjardar Heath. Mention is even made of the drift wood (undoubtedly from Siberia) collected there, and of the abundance of whales, seals, walruses, and sea-bears." '^ ' ■'Baron von Humboldt has asserted that the merit of first recognizing the discovery of America by the Northmen belongs indisputably to Ortelius. The work in which this credit is given the Northmen, the "Theatrum Orbis Terrarum," is a superb illuminated volume, of which the translation was printed in London in 1606; the author's preface is dated Antwerp^ 1570. Philip II. of Spain, as we are informed by the bio- grapher, graced Ortelius with the honour and title of the king's cosmographer. A few words from this biography will convey the scope of the author's ambition and ability: "There (at Antwerp) he began to apply himself to benefit succedent ages, to write of those countries by him viewed and seen, to set out in charts and maps divers places both of sea and land unknown to former ages, to describe the tracts and coasts of the east and west, south and north, never spoken of nor touched by Ptolemy, Pliny, Strabo, Mela, or any other historiographer whatsoever." The paragraph in question is this : " But to me it seems more probable, out of the history of the two Zeni, gentlemen of Venice (which I have put down before the table of the South Sea, and before that of Scandia) that this new world many ages past was entered upon by some islanders of Europe, as namely of Greenland, Iceland, and Friesland ; being much nearer there- unto than the Indians, nor disjoined thence (as appears out of the map) by an ocean so huge and to the Indians so unnavigable." lit?- OR, Honour to whom Honour is Due. 63 Au early printed allusion, some say the earliest, to the Norse discovery of America, occurs in Adam of Bremen's " Historia Ecclesiastica Hamburgensis et Bremensis," published at Copen- hagen, 1579. The passage referred to is the following, and Mr. Slafter asserts that it was written long before the sagas were reduced to writing : "The same king" (Swein Estrithson, of Denmark, a nephew of Canute the Great) " has besides told us of the discovery of still another island in the midst of the ocean, which is called Vinland, because the grapes grow there spontaneously and give the most glorious wine, also grain, with- out being sowed, grows there in abundance. This is no fabulous representation, but is founded on the reliable communications of the Danes." Another early account, and a correct one, of the discoveries of the Scandinavians in the west, was given by Thormod Torfaeus, in his " Historia Vinlandise Antiquse." E. H. Major, who has edited one edition of the letters of Columbus, gives a list of several other ancient authors, Vitalis, Mylius, Grotius, &c., who mention the Scandinavian voyages, and after giving quite a detailed account of them himself, says in conclusion that "no room is left for disputing the main fact of the dis- covery." In the Swedish work " Nordbon under Hednatiden " (Norse- men during the Pagan Period), by A. E. Holuiber^', there is a curious bit of information : "As late as the year 1347 history can mention a voyage undertaken from Greenland to Vinland. . . . This statement is to be found in the Skalholt annals, concluded in the year 1356. Finally we will, as a further proof of our forefathers' knowledge of America long before Columbus' time, mention a world's-chart that was prepared in 1300, where this land is to be found designated under the name Synribygd (southern district). It is to be found in the manuscript of the so-called Rymbegla, and is undoubtedly the oldest map of the globe on which the new world is indicated." m ' i^ i ill' '11 m 64 The Icelandic CiscoVErers of America; < One of the older Swi dish historians, Strinuholm, contributes . a valuable paragraph : " The whole power of the Northern Vikings was at that time chiefly directed to England, Ireland, Scotland, and other known lands. This, besides the length of the distance, diverted attention from the new discoveries, until finally with the ceasing of the Vising expeditions, all knowledge of the strange unknown land died out, so that only saga has preserved the recollection of it. But a vague report of the Norsemen's voyages of discovery penetrated to the Norsemen in France, and through them and their connection with Italy pro- bably also came to the great Italian seaports, and accidentally conduced to awaken and sustain a supposition of unknown lands lying far in the west. So much is certain, however, that the northerly portion of the new part of the world that some centuries afterwards was found by Columbus, had already, toward the olose of the tenth century, been discovered by the Scandinavian Vikings, and, as it appears, occupied by a lot of Scandinavian setUers as late as the twelfth century." The words of the celebrated Swedish historian, E. G. Geijer, must not be omitted in this connection ; they are from the great work " Svea rikes hafder " (The Annals of the Kingdom of Sweden) : "Viking expeditions, and, as these soon ceased, still more commerce, desire of knowledge, war and court service led them far around, and became to them the means of at once acquiring wealth and glory ; although neither royal favour, gifts, or any of the incentives and comforts other countries offered, could hinder them from finally returning to the rocky dales of their native land. But about one hundred years after the arrival of the first settlers on the island, others went over from there to Greenland, and established settlements both on its east and west coasts. They afterwards found, south of Greenland, other coasts, at first full of bare clitfs, farther down more flat and low, finally a good land on a sound, with an island in the north. There the streams were rich in salmooi a kind of grain I i OR, Honour to whom Honour is Due. 65 grew wild, and fiuit that resembled grapes, wherefore the first discoverer called the land Vinland det Goda. Those wlio after him sought it, also encountered natives, who bartered furs from them. No permanent connection arose for the rest with this liind, which, however, was visited by a Greenland bishop in the ytar 1121 ; but without doubt it is some part of the coast of North America wliich appears in these old Icelandic narratives, five hundred years before Columbus." All Scandinavian authors on this subject have naturally availed themselves of " the rolls and masses of parchments in the great public and private libraries of Copenhagen and Stockholm." Sometime the modern Scandinavians and the Knglish-apeaking race, on both sides of the Atlantic, will real ze what a detriment this lingual barrier, which has separated nations essentially one and who once possessed a common tongue, has been to them. Thomas Carlyle does not say much about the discovery, but it is to the point : " Towards the end of this Hakon's (Hakon Jarl) reign it was that the discovery of America took place (985). Actual discovery, it appears, by Eric the Red, an Ice- lander ; conceining which there has been abundant investigation and discussion in our time." The next reigning king in Norvv-ay, it will be seen, took a particular interest in the new colony in Greenland. " Some years afterwards (after colonizing Greenland) Leif, the son of Eric the Red, went to Norway, whore he was favourably received by the n igning king, Olaf Tryggveson, to whom ho described the country in such favourable terms that Olaf determined to sustain the now colony. Having been hims' If recently converteti to Christianity, the king was filled with great zeal for the ))ropagation of the laith. He persuaded Leif to be baptized, and sent him back to Greenland accompanied with a missionary, by whoso efforts his father Eric and the . other colonists were converted." 'Ihis occurs in Wheaton's " History iM I Ml 66 The Icelandic Discoverers of America; of the Northmen," and suffices to show how soon both royni and ecclesiastical recognition of the existence of a colony in Greenland followed upon the establishing of the colony. Tlie same is true of Vinland. As many of the Greeks and Romans, Pythias of Marseilles, Plin>' the Elder, Tacitus, Procopius, knew of Scandinavia, all Scandinavian events were likely to be carried by lively rumour to the south of E.urope, and as Tacitus, the great Roman historian, had already represented the Sviones (Swedes) as "a rich and powerful maritime nation," the people of Southern Europe were prepared to hear of any great naval achievement on their part, whether of conquest or discovery, and must have been constantly on the qui-vive, Snorre Sturlesou was another early writer who, soon after Adam of Bremen, corroborated the testimony of the Sagas relative to the Icelandic voyages to America. As the former was a very prominent man and the latter a canon of Bremen, both of these works must have been known in Rome. As a matter of course, the Howitts confirm the discovery in their "History and Romance of Northern Europe:" "But Europe did not set bounds to their voyages and enterprises. In 861 they discovered Iceland, and soon after peopled it. Thence thoy stretched still farther west, and discovered Greenland, to which they origin;dly gave the name of Gunbjornskar, from Gunbjorn, the discoverer. Spite of its wretched climate they colonized it, and proceeding still southward, they struck upon the coast of North America, as it would appear, about the State of Massachusetts. This was towards the end of the tenth century, that is, five hundred years before Columbus reached that country." Grenville Pigott's testimony corresponds with the rest : " The Norwegians and their descendants discovered and made settlo- nients in Iceland, Greenland, the Orkneys, and, as has beeii maintained with great semblance of truth, even in America itself." OR, Honour to whom Honour is Due. 6"; The American author, Aarun Gooanch, seems to be impatient of any further discussion on the point, regarding it as altogether superfluous, for he says : ' The mjneral reader has been con* vinced of the fact, which is now no longer disputed, that the Northmen were the first modern discoverers of this continent ;" while Tuulmin Smith is indignant that the claim of Columbus should ever have been considered at all, declaring : " He was not the discoverer of America in any sense of the term ; he did not explore the American continent,^* Referring to Torfoeus, this author says that he, Torfoeus. derived his information from the original authentic sources, and that "the parch- ment manuscripts that contain them are, at this moment, in a state of high preservation." This fact is again made known by Prof. Rasmus B. Anderson, in his " America not discovered by Columbus," whose very title is an indignant denial of the claim of the Italian adventurer ; he, too, says : " The manuscripts in which we have the Sagas relating to America are found in the celebrated ' Codex Flatoiensis,' a skin-book that was finished in the year 1387. This work, written with great care, and executed in the highest style of art. is now preserved in its integrity in the archives of Copenhaj;en, and a carefully printed copy of it is to be found in Mimer's Library at the University of Wisconsin." This information is of the greatest importance, for it may be necessary further on. should the advocates of Columbus's claim attempt to force an acknowledgment of it from the people of the United States, tor this book to be produced, as irrefragable testimony to the fact of the Norse discovery of America. All translations, reprints, abstracts, may be doubted by the hypercritical, by the class, far too large, who are credulous where the^ suouid ii^yt oeiieve, and sceptical where they should — there is always more faith than reason in the Christian world — hut the original document cannot he dnuhted. "Washington Irving, it appeals, did not investigate the sub- ject; if he had done this before commencing his "Life of F 2 fit f fi ;l !,ii n « >'A{ 68 The Icelandic Discoverers of America; Columbus," this work would probably not have been written ; to have investigated it afterwards would have exposed him to very uncomfortable feelings, and he was far from foreseeing that the admission of the Columbian discovery would be fraught with unmixed evil for the American people. He is candid enough, however, to confess that he did not look into the matter: "There is no great improbability, however, that such enterprising and i-oving voyagers as the Scandinavians may have wandered to the northern shores of America, &c., and if the Icelandic manuscripts, said to be of the thirteenth century, can be relied upon as genuine, free from modem interpolation ^nd correctly quoted, they would appear to prove the fact." It is thought that the lands discovered by Bjarni Herjulfson, the actual first discoverer, gathered from the details and minute description of the voyages, were Connecticut, Long Island, Rhode Island, Massachusetts, Nova Scotia, and Newfoundland "It may, perhaps, be urged in disparagement of these dis- coveries," writes Beamish, ** that they were accidental^ that Bjarni Herjulfson set out in search of Greenland and fell in with the eastern coast of North America, but so it was also with . Columbus. The sanguine and skilful Genoese navigator set sail in qtiest of ^.sia and discovered the "West Indies ; even when in his last voynge he did reach the eastern shore of Central America, he still believed it to be Asia, and continued under that impression till the day of his death." "Washington Irving dwells much upon this curious misconception of Columbus, and the bewilderment and confusion evinced in the *' skilful navigator's " own letters is amusing in the extreme. Another American author, Arthur Oilman, gives expression to a common objection urged by unthinking people against the Norse discovery, namely, that it led to nothing, produced no results. Unfortunately, he is not trying to combat this view; he only presents it as his own : " "We have nothing to do here with the expeditions of the Northmen, who are said to have the Col OR, Honour to whom Honour is Due. 69 visited America in the eleventh century, for admitting that the records found in the Sagas are true statements of historic facts, their visits did not lead to settlements of lasting importance. To Columbus belongs the undivided honour of first making real the grand idea of the Western World. His discovery led to all that has since been achieved on our continent. . . . The legends of the Northmen, whom the Sagas tell ns came to these shores five hundred years before Columbus, belong rather to the domain of the antiquary or the poet than to that of the historian." To render this assertion true, that " their visits did not lead to settlements of lasting importance," i* is necessary to blot out of the past the written statements of Adam of Bremen, of Snorre Sturleson, and of Ion Thordarson, who wrote the Sagas of Eric the Eed and of Thorfinn Karlsefne, in the " Codex Flatoiensis f the fact that the rumours of these vast discoveries in the West reached every seaport in southern Europe, as well as the Eternal City ; the fact that Gudrid, the wife of Karlsefne, visited Rome after her three years' sojourn in Vinland ; the fact that she narrated these experiences at length to the holy fathers ; the fact that Rome had appoiated bishops to both Greenland and Vinland ; the fact that Columbus, an Italian by biith, and naturally aware of all these important events, went to Iceland, in order to pursue the investigations to which all this had given him the clue. After his visit to Iceland he made out to find America, as any one else could have found it, after obtaining definite directions. That there was an interval of five hundred years between the first colonization and the subsequent one does not alter the fact that the first one led to the last, was the direct cause of it, and that this was brought about by a close and unbroken sequence of events, every link of which is pre- served, that posterity may demonstrate just what grand results have ensued from the discovery and intelligent explorations of the Norsemen, and the full accounts that they recrrd^d of these ftchievement^ in Icelaod. ... . , , i ' » f. ■ ■ ' i i m If fife 70 The Icelandic Discoverers ok America ; m:a f* ■ .. .;• V'^^'i.'.'i -'■'' ' : • ■.' •••■ ■- ■ {I,: ;,! I. :.•■ "l :.- .1 < ;.) ; , : t-_ ;• ';'•* t^s ■• !• «!Sr '•■:l' '...'■ • ,_^.';...., •' ..' ':■..■ / r ' ■ .;- ! , • •.. i'-. ■ .■,. :., 1.' ■.» t .!. .. ! • .-■•■,. .'I- ■;■■ ' ,,'.■ i"(' >- . ■. J ' :■ 1- i.,;.. »^-'.'.- ' ' '-. .: ■ ' f , . ■■-., ,, ■• ■> ■' . ■ •; > . , .. • ' ■ ' '..-, '.. ; ■ ^ 1 CHAPTER IV. BOMAir OATHOUO OOONIZANOE OF THE FACT AT THE TIUB Of '' THE NORSE DISOOVBRY. It will not be difficult to prove that the wise-heads in the Eternal City were aware, almop^ g soon as the Icelanders them- selves, that some of the adv turous sons of that race had pushed their explorations clear to remote lands across the ocean, and founded colonies there ; it would be far more difficult to prove that they did not know it. Fear, envy, hatred, a deep- seated animosity, made them observant of every move of the Norsemen ; these were the only obstacle to the sacerdotal plan of universal • sovereignty, of th« subjection of all mankind to the rule of the Cross, all Europe was Christianized with the exception of the pagan North ; the circle was gradually narrow- ing around these, and escape from the Papal decree and dominion was impossible. Any discovery made by the Norse- men of new lands, in whatever quarter of the globe, meant the establishing of a new stronghold of paganism, if this discovery should be made unbeknown to Rome. It does not require any knowledge of Jesuitical operations, or of the history of the Inquisition, or of heretic- hunts in general, to show one how skilful the Roman Catholic mind is in ferreting out things, what a meddlesome, prying, inquisitive, impertinent, well- trained spy it is, and how quick it is to scent out possible mischief for the Church. Olaf Tryggveson had already been drawn into the fold o| ': I OR, Honour to whom Honour is Due. 71 this Church, tlianks to English zeal, when Eric the Red dis- covered Greenland ; consequently when Leif went to Norway with full reports of the new colony and its flourishing condition, King Olaf promptly made up his mind, doubtless with the entire concordance of the Pope, to sustain the colony and — establish Christianity there. An extract, from the original narrative in the " Heimskringla " best cieGcribes this : " The same winter, 999 — 1000, was Leif, the son of Eric the Red, with King Olaf, in good repute, and embraced Christianity. But the summer that Gissur went to Iceland, King Olaf sent Leif to Greenland, in order to make known Christianity there ; he sailed the same summer to Greenland. He found, in the sea, some people on a wreck, and helped them ; the same time discovered he Vinland the Good, and came in harvest to Greenland. He had with him a priest, and other clerks, and went to dwell at Brattahlid with Eric, his father. Men called him afterwards Leif the Lucky ; but Eric, his father, said that these two things went one against the other, inasmuch as Leif had saved the crew of the ship, but brought evil men to Greenland, nnmely the priests." In another version, from the history of Olaf Tryggveson, is added : " But still after the counsel and instigation of Leif, was Eric baptized, and all the people in Greenland." The domestic economy of the Church of Rome was not such that there could have been a new dis- covery, a colony formed, and a wholesale conversion of the settlers without the Pope and his whole establishment knowing of it, still less when the "l^'orthern barbarians" had made the discovery, formed the colony, and been converted to the true faith. This was occasion enough for a public thanksgiving and when this successful proselyting had been due to a power- ful monarch, fired with a holy zeal, and who did not stick at trifles nor call anything a crime that was done in the name of religion, this felicitous conjunction of events was not a thing to pass unnoticed. > !" ;■ 1 1*1 ■ffii m: f2 The Icelandic Discoverers of America; II ;i I The reader will remember the little statement by Baron von Humboldt that " the first ;6ishop of (Jreeiiland, Eric Upsi, an Icelander, undertook, in 1121, a Christian mission to Vinland." Samuel Laing gives details of the spiritual supervision over Greenland, a supervision scarcely compatible with complete Papal ignorance of the existence of a colony there : ** Tlio discovery of Greenland by the Icelanders about the year 98 1 , and the establishment of considerable colonies on one or on both sides of that vast peninsula which terminates at Cape Fare- well, — in which Christianity and Christian establishments, parishes, churches, and even monasteries were flourisliing, or at at least existing to such an extent th:it from 1124 to 1387 there was a regular succession of bishops, of whom seventeen are named, for their superintendence, — are facts which no longer admit of any reasonable doubt. The documentary evidence of the Sagas, — which gave not merely va - ' There was, in short, a regular succession nf bishops in Greenland for two hundred and fifty years. We h:«ve already seen that mention is made of a voyage from Greenland to Vin- la?id as late as the year 1347. The next link in this most remarkable chain of events is the voyage of Gudrid, Karl- sefne's wife, from Vinland to Rome, via Iceland. Her visit to the holy fathers is described by the French author, Gabriel Gravier, in his work "Decouverte de FAm^rique par les Normands:" "Quand elle eut marie Snorre, Gudrida fit un pelerinage ^ Rome. Elle fut bien reQue et raconta certaine- ment ses voyages dans les contrees ultia oc^auiques. Rome 1 1 III .1* *V 1 mi 1 1 'IB m it! If 74 The Icelandic Discoverers of America; ii p IP ^tait ties attentive aux decouvertes geographiques, collectionnait avec soin les cartes et les r^cits qui lui parvenaieiit. Toute decouverte semblait un agrandissement du domaine papal, un champ nouveau pour la predication evangelique. De ce qu'ils n'ont laisse dans I'histoire ecrite aucune trace appreciable, les recits de Gudrida n'en exercerent pas moiiis sans doute une certaine influence sur les decouvertes posterieures." Thus the part that a woman plays in bringing about the plagiar-stic discovery of America is a very important one, and Gudrid, Karlsefne's high-born and intelligent wife, was only excusable in that she did not realize what she was doing, nor the momentous consequences of her act, when she carried such valua})lo tidings to Eome ! The Sagas relate that she went there, so there can be no doubt on that point. In the " Voyages," as translated by Beamish, it is stated thus : " But when Snorre was married, then went Gudrid abroad, and travelled southwards, and came back again to the house of Snorre, ner son, and then had he caused a church to be built at GldUuibsB ;" and in the synopsis of the historical evidence, by Proftssor Rafn, it is stated still more explicitly : " His son, Snorre, who had been bom in Ajx*«rica, was his successor on this estate. When the latter married, his mother made a pilgrimage to Rome, and afterwards returned to her son's house at Glaumboe, where he had in the meantime ordered a church to be built. The mother lived long as a religious recluse." Gudrid is spoken of in the narratives as " a grave and dignified woman, and therewith sensible, and knew well how to carry herself among strangers." As the widow of a highly-distin- guished man, for ThorHun Karlsefne was "a wealthy and powerful Icelandic merchant, descended from an illustrious line of Danish, Swedish, Norwegian, Irish, and Scottish ancestors, some of whom were kings, or of royal blood," Gudrid was one to carry much influence and must have been listened to in Rome with the most profound attention. Her wealth also conduced to p. lied OR, Honour to whom Honour is Due. 75 increase the respect with which she was treated by a set of people who have always shown the nicest discrimination in this regard, and when she afterwards became a nun, the Church reaped a double advantage from her sojourn in Vinland. Gudrid had encouraged her husband to colonize 'Viidand, having always felt the deepest interest in the new country, of which so much was said in Greenland, Aiid with the full prerogative of a Northern woman, a woman there being regarded as her hus- band's equal, took an active part in the management of aflfairs and was consulted on every point, consequently she was woll versed in all pertaining to Vinland and able to give very accurate information, embracing all possible topographical and geo- graphical details. Exploring expeditions were of frequent occurrence during the three years the colonists stayed in Vinland. By a singular coincidence Karlselne himself, as stated in the " Voyages," narrated originally the events that occurred on these voyages, this in Iceland, and his wife narrated her experiences — in Rome; his narrative, when committed to writing, destined, eight hundred years afterwards, to save the land he attempted to colonize from the disastrous effects of his wife's indiscretion in leading the covetous gaze of the Church to a laud so rich in promise and which might become its future empire." The famous geographer, Malte-Brun, states, in his " Histoire de la Geographie," that Columbus, when in Italy, had heard of the ]S"orse discoveries beyond Iceland, for Rome was then the world's centre, and all inlormation of importance was sent there. It was this some ages before, nay, it was more than this, it was a great whispering-gallery, in which not a word or sound, uttered in any part of the world, that was important for the Church to know, was lost. Besides the religious means of cotnmunication there was the commercial ; the Scandinavians carried on an enormous com- merce and their peaceful trading- vessels as well as war-dragons 5S " i mM i: m 76 The Icelandic Discoverers of America ; riiii.'^ed the seas. All authors note this with wonder and admiration. To cite Pigott : " It would not be difficult to show that the Scandinavians, from the eighth to the eleventh century, carried on a more active commerce, and could boast a more constant and extensive communication with distant countries, than any other nation of Europe. During the grr^ater part of this period, Eussia, Sweden, and Denmark were the only European nations which had any regular commerce with the East." Despising secrecy, ond having no motive for it, whatever they did was known to the world ; loving fame and glory, seeking these as the liighest earthly good, they increased their own celebrity by every means in their power, and each man in his endeavour was aided by the rest of his compatriots, the national pride among them being so great as to destroy all envy, the besetting sin of Christian communities from that day to this. The greatness of each individual conduced to the greatness of his country, and no attempt was made to suppress it. The Church of Rome knew, knew all that they had accom- plished, and every detail concerning the discovery and coloni- zation of Iceland, Greenland, and Vinland 1 "What use did it make of this knowledge I OR, Honour to whom Honour is Due. fi ! <\ I !( ; :i w CHAPTER V. ALL THE MOTIVES FOR THE CONCEALMENT AND FRAUD. l\\. Yes, what use did the Church of Rome make of tliis knowledge of the discovery of Greenland and Vinland % In the first phice it concealed it. As far as is known no writer of bouthern or middle Europe seems to have made an historical record of the great discovery hy the Norsemen except Adam of Bremen, until Snorre Sturleson's '* Chronicle of the Kings of Norway " was written, in the thirteenth century, and the two important Sagas relating exclusively to this discovery, contained in the '* Codex Flatoiensis," in the fourteenth. Ortelius accorded to them the merit of this discovery in 1670, Mylius in 1611, Grotius in 1642, Divcone in 164?., Montanus in 1071, Torfoeus in 1705. We know that Adam of Bremen received his information from King Swein of Denmark, and had very strong Northern sym- pathies, writing very favourably of the institutions and charac- teristics of the people, especially of the inhabitants of Sweden; Torfoeus based his assertions enti!r OS to be deprived during the Christian middle age?, throng the pluniering system directe{flinst us in all respedB."* The great Swedish king, Gustaf Va«A, had a three- fold twk : to free his iacd from the Danish yoke, to free it 1 , ? I It ' fi 1? ■ H ■ ** It may be fairiy conclnded," write* ^"Sgott, " that * people poBse^tnng ■o maey sources of wealth v^-\ wi tac continnnl oommunicatioD wUh the must civilized portionb uf the worki, roal«i uot have been so dnrkiy barbarous as Uie wei4-grovBd«d dafeattatiaB «t the nonkish ohrouiolei-:;. ha* represented them." F f-i'. MM 82 The Icelandic Discoverers of America; from the jurisdiction of the Pope and from the deep poverty into which fivt.^ centuries of priest-rule and medisBvalism had sunk it. The well-known traveller, Horace Marryat, in his " One Year in Sweden," affirms that poverty was unknown in Sweden until the introduction of Christianity there. * But with all the difference in disposition, character, moral status, the pagan Norsemen and the Roman Catholics had the same visible aim — the connues^ '^f uhe world. This made them rivals. One desired to obtain dominion to the end of freedom, the other to the end of slavery. Where the former succeeded, they established free institutions, good laws, physical and mental well-being, changing by a rapid metamorphosis, once the monkish ■hordes were subdued, into benign and able statesmen ; where the latter succeeded, they founded cathedrals and monasteries, destroying all law but that of the Church. The scope of their ambition was equal, the motives of it utterly dissimilar. No wonder then that Hastings was one of the most detested of the Northern leaders ! Hated in France, perhaps, as is alleged, " on account of the extent and cruelty of his ravages," but hated still more because of the extent of his ambition, which had made the conquest of Rome its cherished aim. In Wheaton's words : " Hastings proposed to the sons of Ragnar Lodbrok and his other followers an expedition against Rome, of whose wealth and splendour they had heard much, without knowing precisely in what part of Italy the capital of the Christian world was situate." Holmberg's "Norsemen during the Pagan Period" ' As an illustration of the extent to which Christianity has developed •^overty I quote the following paiagrnph from Felix Oswald's " Seciet of the East:" " We do not think it necessary to alleviate the distress of the poor till it reaches a degree that threatens to end it. We have countless benevolent institutions for the prevention of outright death, not one bene- voient enough to make life woHh living. Infanticide is now far more rigorously punished than in old times. We enforce every child's right to live and become a humble, tithe-paying Christian ; bat as for its claim to live happy, we refer it to the sweet by-and-by." 1&&. 'Ai. r ' OR, Honour to whom Honour is Due. 83 contains an interesting passage relative to this ; after citing one of the ancient poets of France quoted by Cronholm in his " Norsemen in Vester-viking," he says : ** The remarkable part of it is that these high thoughts are put in Hastings' mouth by a hdstih writer, who lets the terrible Hastings, the mostdreade«l leader of the Norse expeditions of the ninth century, chant o glory as the highest aim for which he had striven, and that for this hundreds of thousands had fallen under his sword. But there still remained a higher aim, for the winning of which he encouraged his warriors — namely, to let all the kingdoms of the world, which lay open to them, behold their glory, and when they placed the crown of Rome on Pjorn Jernsida's head, their praise with his should resound around the whole circumference of the earth." When this man was converted it was indeed an occasion for rejoicing among all Romanists ; as Wheaton says, " this was an object of the highest interest to the people, who had been so long terrified and distressed by his incursions." This same author, who has a clear perception of the nature of the animosity between the two opposing forces of Europe in those ages, analyzes it still further by saying that after the cruelties practised by Charlemagne, '* the great struggle between the North and the South assumed the character of a religious as well as national war, and the enmity of the Scandinavian invaders to the nations they had plundered and vanquished could only be appeased by their own conversion to Christianity, which finally put a period to their predatory incursions." The tiaith of this also appears in some words of "William and Mary Howitt's : " "War and plunder, therefore, in their eyes, so far from being in any degree criminal, were acts of glory and of merit. "When we read of the bloody Danes, who were, in fact, just as often Swedes or Norwegians, we should remember this, and more- over that they cherished a particular hatred to Rome and to the Christian religion, because it came to them from Rome with all its monks and, what appeared to them, efifemiuate doctrines." a 2 Im t : t ■! iii.!- i AS 84 The Icelandic Discoverers of America ; If ' The fact cannot be too strongly emphasized that the Chris- tianizing of tliis formidable race was a protective measure for the safety of the Romanists, not in any sense a kind or philanthropic work for the good of the Norsemen, for either their temporal or spiritual welfare. The authors just quoted say with great force : '* It is not, perhaps, so much an overwhelming number of tlicse Northmen, as the new spirit they brought with them, that mixed with and changed the social elements of the countries they settled in." This spirit could only be destroyed by transforming it into the Christian spirit. The only country in which there has been no admixture, to speak of, of the Norse spirit, is Spain, and Buckle, as we well know, describes the state of things there with absolute correctness in this passage : " These, then, were the two great elements of which the Spanish chai acter was com- pounded — loyalty and superstition ; reverence for their kings and reverence for their clergy were the leading jirinciples which influenced the Spanish mind, and governed the march of Spanish history." It is obvious that the Church of Rome liad a super- human work before it to reduce Scandinavia to such a condition as that. The time it took to bring about consent to baptism, a concession which did not mean as much as it seemed, was ii- calculable ; Laing mentions the startling fact that " this last remnant of paganism among the European people existed in vigour almost live hundred years after Christianity and the Romish Church establishment were difi'usi d in every other country." One reason of this was, as averred by Gt-ijor, that the Christian ethics were so unlike the pagan, and put bonds upon the individual freedom to which the Northerner was not willing to subject himself ; another was that the Scandinavians had no respect for the people who professed Christianity, no admiration for their institutions ; another, that there was so very little superstition in their nature for the priests to work upon. The foUowing anecdotes illustrate this: "When St. Olaf proposed to Gauka Thor to be baptized, the chief answered OR, ttoNOtJR to WHOM Honour is Due. 85 that hi! ami Ids eomrailes were neither Christians nnr hi atli.nP, but trusted to their own courage, strength, and fortune, with whioh until then they had had every reason to be satisfied ; but if the king was very anxious they should believe on some god, they w<»re as well content to believe in the white Christ as on any other, Arnliot Gellina told the same king that he had always been wont to put his trust in nothing but his own strength, \\'liich had never failed him, and that he had now thought to trust in the king; but since he (the king) was so desirous that he sliould be baptized, although he was not aware of what the white Christ was capable of performing, for the king's sake he would believe on him." Pigott, who relates these highly characteristic stories, continues : ** It was also said of Hrolf Krake and his warriors, at a much earlier period, that they never otlered to the -jods, but relied on their own strength. Some, although uninstnicted in the doctrines of Christianity, rejected the superstition :^ of '^heir countrymen from more exalted motives." So he justly arg les in this wise : " The difficulties, therefore, which the first preachers of Christianity in ocandinavia had to encounter, may be attributed rather to the contempt in which these la^\ less warriors held a creec ^hich thr<' itened them with a life of peace and inactivity, than i, barbarous ignorance, <^>r even to any big(jted adherence to their ancient religion." In short, the ancient Scandinavi ms, like the ancient Greeks, left the worship of the gods to the sti ' lerstitious lower class"«i. It was reserved for the Christian nations of modern times, and the free United States, to elevate this idttlatry ii.to the devout practice uf retined and cultivated people. Laing, who has made a deep study of this subject, states that *' the churches or temples of Odin appear to have had no con- secrated <»rde-: of men like a priesthood set apart for administer- ing in relii^iouM rites," and that " public worship under any form, or private or liousehold devotion in the Odin religion, cannot be distinctly traced in the Sagas." In conuuenting un thi.<<, h« ]li rm iii! m fl If llllll IMAGE EVALUATION TEST TARGET (MT-3) // // /v ^ 1.0 I.I 2.5 IM 1.8 1.25 1.4 J4 -^ 6" - ► Photographic Sciences Corporation 23 WEbY MAIN STREET WEBSTER, N.Y. 14580 (716) 872-4503 .%^. 2s? ^ 86 The Icelandic Discoverers of America ; ii ii-f III ; iff says : " Wo fiud in the North very few remains of temples j no statues, emblems, images, symbols ; was it actually more spiritual than any other systems of paganism, and, therefore, less material in its outward expression 1 " A comparison of the pagan festival Jul with the Christian festival Yule (Christmas) after the Bomanists had incorporated it into their system and remodelled it, will illustratt he difference in the mode of worship, as it is called, of these t^u races. The Norse festival is thus described by Beamish : '* Yule was a pagan festival, celebrated in honour of Thor, at the beginning of Feb- ruary, when the Northmen's year commenced, and they offered sacrifices for peace and fruitful seasons to this deity ; it lasted fourteen days. . . . After the introduction of Christianity, the anniversary of Yule was transferred to Christmas, which is still called by that name throughout Scandinavia." And by Mallet thus : " There were three great religious festivals in the year. The first was celebrated at the winter solstice. They called the bight on which it was observed the Mother Night, as that which produced all the rest ; and this epoch was rendered the more re- markable as they dated from thence the beginning of the year, which among the Northern nations was computed from one winder solstice to another, as the month was from one new moon to the next. This feast, which was very considerable, was named Jul, and was celebrated in honour of Frej, or the sun, in order to obtain a propitious year and fruitful seasons." j ji So little weight did the Northern people attach to baptism, when the proselyters, by dint of arduous etforts, had at Vast got them that far, *hat a story is toM of one man who was baptized twenty times. As Laing observes : " Christianity in Scandi- navia seems, in the eleventh century, to have consisted merely in the ceremony of baptism, without any instruction in its doctrines." It seemed in many instances t:: have been merely the deference that well-bred people, when travelling in foreign lands, pay to the natives of the country they happen to be in, ir II I ! OR, Honour to whom Honour is Due. 87 : to in, to judge from this remark of Wheaton's : *' Dn their return to their native country, they made no scruple to conform to the external practices of heathenism, believing that Thor, and the other deities of the North, were to be adored as the local gods of Norway, in the same manner as Christ was worshipped in England as the national god of that country." However, converted they were, after a long struggle and a sanguinary one. Expressing his satisfaction over this^ as befitted a canon, Adam of Bremen says naively : '* For the rest, the opinion has already become prevalent with the people^ that the god of the Christians is the strongest, and that one is often cheated by the other gods, but that this god is always near as a sure and timely help." It is not clear whether by "god" he means Christ or the SuprcMue Bt;ing, but, at any rate, it is plain that the new reli^'ion was an experiment, that it was only taken on trial. The followiiif,' paragraph of Oswald's — " The so-called Christian countries of Northern Europe were not converted before the eleventh century of our era, and revolted in time to prevent their utter ruin" — shows that the experiment was not altogether a satisfactory one, and that the old troubles had broken out afresh. To make a condensed statement of the first protest of the Scandinavian North against the supremacy of Rome, Gustaf Vah.i, in Sweden, again demonstrated the opposite tendency of the North from that of the South by eradicating Roman Catholicism in Sweden simultaneously with Philip II. 'a eradication of Protestantism in Spain. In about ten years the last vestige of the Reformation disappeared in Spain, but in les» time than that the spirit of Romanism was banished irom Sweden, and Norway and Denmark were scarcely less vigorouf* in expelling it. Philip II. declared that " it was betloi not to reign at all than to reign over heretics ; " Gustaf I. de- clnred by his acts that he would only reign over free men, and that neither he nor his subjects owed allegiance to Rome. On the presumption, however, that the conversion of the i . iiH 88 The Icelanidtc Discovehers of Amemcaj \i if i pngan J^orth to Christianity was a genuine one, the Bomish Church proceeded to obhterate all traces of this abominable paganism which had so long defied it; its notorious acts in Greece were repeated throughout the length and breadth of Scandinavia; submission to it had naturally not abated its hit red, there was still retribution to wreak on the contumacious race that had baffled it, scorned it ; all the descendants of this race, for generations to come, should be made to feel the im- placable wrath of the outra<^'ed power that has its seat in the Eternal City. Having control of literature, a ready means oflfered itself. The Church could corrupt history, brand the memory of the Norsemen eternally, by representing all their deeds as those of ferocious, bloodthirsty barbarians, by accusing them of such foul crimes as would pale the crimes of the Church, and by systematically concealing all achievements of theirs, of whatever nature, that would awaken the admiration or gratitude of posterity. The discovery of the New World by the Noi'se- men was the one event that must most sedulously he concealed ! "We can note Papish operations, step by step, through the centuries; the conversion or amalgamation of the Northern pagans into Christian subjects, of free soil into Church territory, of pagan festivals into religious holidays, of Norse deeds into the means of gratifying the Eomanists' inordinate desire for power, — this is the fell work that has been accomplished through the ages. And the consummation of this iniquity was reserved for the nineteenth century, to be out-worked on American soil 1 All authors and historians not party to the plot, those of liberal ideas, and who advocate the truth, have openly regretted that history has been made the means of concealing or perverting the truth in regard to the great religious strug^'la of Europe, and particularly of the Northern race who so valiantly defended the liberty that the sane, natural, healthy man, in possession of his full powers, holds so dear, against the combined assaults of the anii-naturali8t8,—Xla» bust name, fdl things considered, that OR, Honour to whom Honour is Due. 89 has been given to the Roman Catholic or Christian body. This definition haa been applied by Felix Oswald, who in further elucidation says, " Only anti-natural religions have achieved that deep abasement of the physical type of our race which wo see in China and Southern Europe," and expresses an undeniable tmth in the assertion : *' The night of the Middle Ages was not the natural blindness of unenlightened barbarians, but an unnatural darkness, maintained by an elaborate system of spiritual despotism, and in spite of the fierce struggles of many light-loving nations." But have the Romanists themselves ever deplored this horrible condition of darkness and degradation 1 Has not Spain, the spot where the black darkness concentrated, been held up as the model of Christian excellence, for other nations to emulate 1 Has any effort ever been made by the Church of Rome to abate this darkness, to infuse health into its morally-diseased votaries 1 Has not this, in every instance, been the work of heresy ! The Romanists did not even suspend their efforts when the limit of human misery seemed to have been reached ; there was still an unattained depth beyond, for which they strove with a hellish frenzy ! In Os\. aid's words : " But the efiforts of the spoilers did not cease ; and it may be doubted if the Caucasian race will ever wholly recover from the eflfects of a thousand years' atttnnpt to lure their children from earth to ghost-land, to poison their minds with the dogmas of pessimism, to sacrifice the pagan Elysium to the Buddhistic Nirvana." The caution cannot be repeated too often against placing credence in monkish records of tlie acts of their Scandinavian enemies; several warnings are given by Beamish : "From tlio eighth to the eleventh centuries theNi>rthmen carried on a more active commerce, and a more extensive maritime communication with forei'jn countries than any other nation in Europe. Such intercourse appears quite incompatible with that extreme degree of ignorance and barbarity in which so many writers would clothe ail their actions and enterprises ; " and in another m 'A vtS '■ '11* V':ll' lit i"^ 90 The Icelandic Discoverers of America ; if place he writes : " We should receive with caution all statements upon a subject to which national or religious feeling is likely to have given an exaggerated colouring. Our knowledge of the excesses of the Northern invaders is chiefly derived from the evidence of monkish chroniclers, whose Christian faith and feelings were no less outraged by the deeds than the infidelity of the pagan ravagers, and who, writing in many cases long after the events, would naturally aid defective evidence with a fervid zeal and fertile imagination." Buckle ha" been peculiarly observant of this uniform vitiation of historical accounts, and traces the operation of the same causes even up in the I^orth : "But in the ninth and tenth centuries Christian missionaries found their way across the Baltic, and introduced a knowledge of their religion among the inhabitants of Northern Europe. Scarcely was this eflfected, when the sources of history began to be poisoned." His " History of Civilization " is no more nor less than the history of the conflict of science, invention, research j enlightenment, with the theological system that was against everything but bigotry and idolatry, substituting the de- basing worship of the Cross for the true aim of human existence. The concealment of the Norse discovery of America was the negative part of the Romanists' work ; when Christopher Columbus, a nameless Italian adventurer, appeared upon the scene of action, their positive work began, namely, the sub- stitution of another discoverer for the original ones, and a transfer of all the benefits of the Norse discovery to the Roman Catholic power : the foundation had been laid j they would now raise the superstructure. Columbus was a particularly obscure man ; no one knew where he was born, — " the question of Columbus' birthplace has been almost as hotly contested as that of Homer," remarks Arthur Helps : no one knew wha«< iu» had been doing in Italy before he went to Spain, after the itxvm of making a great discovery had taken full possession of him, and of course the Church kept its own counsels. That august of as md OR, Honour to whom Honour is Due. 91 institution has always been blessed with a long memory and was not likely to have forgotten Gudrid's visit, nor the various reports of the Norsemen's voyages that had reached Rome as the world's centre, and been duly recorded, and the recollection of the hated fact, which might after all be turned to account, had been burned into the minds of Popes and prelates for those five centuries by the anxious labour of preventing the remotest allusion to it from getting into any annals. Columbus made his way to Spain, whether ^dtb or without instructions from Rome may be left to conjecture. " Spain at that time," as the Roman Catholic author, Barry, proudly boasts, " commanded the destinies of the whole Catholic world ; her struggle against the Koran, the zeal of her crusade under- taken on the soil of Europe, excited the sympathies of the whole Christian world." Columbus went to Spain, from Italy, after he had made his visit to Iceland. It is altogether contrary to reason to infer, because this trip to Iceland was kept a profound secret to the world, that the heads of the Church were not privy to it. This knowledge of theirs of his visit to the place where all the information concerning the Norse voyages was preserved, his access to the archives of Iceland, his consultations with Christitm prelates there, especially Bishop Magnus, who could put him in the way of learning all he required, — all this was the cause of the absolute secrecy maintained. There is more than sufficient evidence that the wily Italian obtained all that he sought in Iceland ; his discovery of America proves that ; hence to go to Spain was his next practical move, and entirely in order. He found himself one day, whether by chance or no can be imagined, at the gates of the monastery of La Rabida^ in Andalusia, the guardian of which, Juan Perez de Marchina, hai't* to the queen, and Boman Call was the proudest '• renown for evei vVorld." But St. ecessary funds, for . not been confided .haps Jesuit) as he was, he realized that knowledge ^ better than faith, at least in this instance. On this basis of knowledge he pledged the funds. " Armed with these royal commissions," writes Arthur Helps, who also describes the occurrences l. the monastery in detail, " Columbus left the Court for Palos ; and we may be sure that the knot of friends at the monastery were sufficiently demon- strati "?^e in their delight at the scheme on which they had pinned their faith being fairly launched." Christopher Columbus discovered America, in the year 1492, in the tcay described. Then history, pliant, ductile history, had a new oiiice to perform : to extol Columbus and immortalize him 1 The monkish chroniclers did this with as little scruple as they had consigned the true discoverers to oblivion. Aaron Goodrich, who has made a very close study of the character of Columbus, arrives at conclusions in re^'ard to him that will clearly demonstrate to the mind of any candid and unprejudiced reader the reason why Barry, the Roman Catholic, should say of him : "This man had no deftct of character, or no worldly quality ; we have weighty reasons for considering him a saint." But Goodrich gives a contrary analysis : " By representing himself as the chosen of God, the champion of the Christian religion, carrying the light of the Gospel to heathen nations, by performing the smallest acts with affectation of religious ceremony, by inserting Scriptural and religious sentences OR, Honour to whom Honour is Due. 95 the Jind [lie, or ling in his most trivial letters, hy recoiuiting miracles and interviews with God, by giving, in fact, a leligiuus culouriiig to all his acts, he became the protegS of the Cliurch, which has continued through all after centuries to regard him as one of her niost zealous votaries, and is now strenuously urged to place him among her saints." ,'; . - < i' ' ' '' ' * •' After citing the remark of Lord Klingsborough — "Tlio writing of history, as far as regards the New World, was by the law of Spain restricted to men in priestly orders " — Gootlrith performs much-needed service by placing before the public, as a specimen of the exacticms, the list of licences that were appended to a small work on Mexico, by Boturini : — " 1. The declaration of his faith. , '^ . : "2. The licence of an Inquisitor. : "3. The licence of the Judge of the Supreme Council of tl.o ,,.,. ' Indies. . ' •• • ' -■-: ' ■ ..'■■,'. \\ ,■ ^ >-r: .. /'4. The licence of the Jesuit father. : : ;' ,i ;,. "6. The licence of the Royal Council of the Indies. ' f. "6. The approbation of the qualiticator of the Inquisition. ; " 7. The licence of the Royal Council of Custile. " Beyond all this the person must be of sufficient influence to obtain the favourable notice of the bodies thus represented. Nor was this the end of the difficulty ; the licence of any one of these officials could be revoked at pleasure ; and, when repub- lished, the work had to be re-examined. The penalty attached to the possession of a book not thus licensed," was death. Such was the tyranny," he adds, " which weighed upon historical writers; and it is not difficult to perceive how all these censors would deal partially with Columbus." ' ( ' An especial adaptation had to be made to the case ; the New World was a dangerous suhjict altogether, which had to bo handled with extreme caution ; the difficulty was not only to preserve the fame of Columbus from all heretical cavil, but to rigorously exclude from the pages of history all hint that n 'f ^} fi;^' u^ 9*5 TiiE Icelandic Discoverers of America ; Columbus might have had predecessors who were more justly entitled to the fame he reaped. ^ •■■'■ ' . ,•' .'. " To ecclesiastical tyranny and popular prejudice," continues Goodrich, '* may be added the exaggerations and falsehoods of the chief actor of the scene ; " Columbus' visit to Iceland is the key that reveals all these exaggerations and falsehoods, and many of these were bom of the diffi ;ulty of keeping his own secret He quotes Aristotle, Ptolemy, St. Isadore, Bede, Striibo, Petrus Comestor, St. Ambrose, Scotus, Pliny, Nicolas do Lira, St. Augustine, Marinus, and the Holy Scriptures, but not once the " Codex Flatoiensis " the manuscript finished as late as 1395, which contained full information about the new land he sought, and recent information at that. As a specimen of his policy, I quote an extract from one of his letters: "Much more I would have done, if my vessels had been in as good condition as by rights they ought to have been. This is much, and praised be the eternal God, our Lord, who gives to all those who walk in K is ways victory over things which seem impossi- ble ; of which this is signally one, for although others may have spoken or written concerning these countries, it was all mere conjecture, as no one could say that he had seen them — it amounting only to this, that those who heard listened the more^ and regarded the matter rather as a fable than anything else. ' Only a few years after this well-attested (1) discovery of the New World, Sweden's period of greatness began; in 1527 King Gustaf L proclaimed Lutheranism the State religion of Sweden ; his son, Carl IX., defeated the attempt of the Catholic reaction, of which Spain was the soul, to re-establish Romanism in Sweden ; his grandson, Gustaf Adolf, was one of the leading generals in the " Thirty Years' "War," which effected the victory of the Reformation in Europe j in 1776, the American cohmies, which had been growing apace in these three centuries, declared independence of Great Britain, and — the severest stroke in the succost on of hard strokes that bad befallen the Cl^urch of Rome--> OR, Honour to whom Honour is Due. 97 18IU ory ies, red the established a purely secular government! The old Koree spirit, supposed to have been effectually quenched in the year 1000, had broken out again, proven itself indestructible. It had again given Sweden goud warriors, gord statesmen, good kings and generals ; the country doomed to iiedieeval obscurity and penance, agh ji stepped to the front and made itself felt as a power in Europe, but, worse than all else, it made of the new American BepuUic the most formidable power for good that the powers of darkness, incarnate in the Church, had ever liad to contend with, and this occupied an immense territory, rich, fertile, comprising enormous resources, and admirably calculated to promote enlightenment and the well-being not only of its own inhabitants, but of the down-trodden, oppressed, priest-ridden, pining, inhabitants of Europe ! No nation, since the Scandina- vian North had devoted itself to glory, had ever been so proud as the American Republic, so boastful of its liberty, its grandeur, its advancement, so impatient of the slightest touch upon its freedom, its rights. No people were so little disposed to bow to either Church or throne, indeed they made a national procla- mation of their determination not to bow to anything. Norse defiance flamed up again in the person of free-bom Americans. The greatest possible progress was threatened in republicanism and free ideas ! .. ; , ., ■ " * > • :; ;:>• ..i; "What did the Church of Eome do, what could it do but claim the United States as its own, on the score of the disco\'cry of America by Columbus 1 If this claim could be presseIl the favourable reaction. He boasts of his own book, "The Gross in the Two Worlds,** as haying " come to reveal for the first time the providential mission confided to Columbus, and to afiirm loudly the saintliness of his character." Aii ascending series of publications, he declares, " show the progressive interest that is attached to the memory of Columbus." In lamenting the past injustice to Columbus^ for his keen perception seems to have detected something resembling this even in Spain, he avers devoutly that "the Roman Pontificate alone preserved the thought of the apostolic grandeur of Columbus; successively three Popes had honoured with their confidence this herald of the Cross ; the Holy See never failed in its regard for him." We can well believe thai I " But in our days," he cries jubilantly, ''there is manifested a movement of reparative justice and friendliness for the fame of Columbus. Pains are taken to honour him." The plot once clearly discerned, these pains will be taken in vain. It cannot but be apparent to one who gives the subject a moment's serious consideration, that the Church that has fought the Scandinavians for ages in Europe, is not likely to fraternize or coalesce with American institutions that are the natural out* ' growth of the Scandinavian spirit. There is a new conflict impending in the United States. The same people who were compelled to abolish the physical slavery of which the seeds were sowed by Spain, will noy have to abolish the spiritual slavery which Spain and Borne with combined force are en-> ' deavouring to fasten upon it. ^ In finding fault with the four biographers of Columbus, ' Spotorno, Irving, Navarrete, and Alex, von Humboldt, who, as he declares, " denaturalize his person and his providential rSle," Barry writes this pregnant sentence : " The biography of Columbus has remained in the hands of his natural enemies . . . whence it follows that the view taken of it by Protestantism is the only one by which people have judged of the most vasty OR, Honour to whom Honour is Due. 99 and evidently the most superhuman achievement of Catholic genius.** Yes, he is right, the whole plot is most assuredly the most vast and the most superhuman achievement of Catholic genius ! "What but Catholic genius^ the genius for deceit, for trickery, , for secrecy, for wicked and diabolical machinations, could have pursued such a system of fraud for centuries as the one now being exposed 4 What but Catholic genius, a prolific genius for evil, would have attempted to rob the Norsemen of their fame, of the knowledge of their great discovery, and to foist a miserable Italian adventurer and upstart upon Americans as the true candidate for these posthumous honours, the man, or saint, to whom they are to do homage, and through this homage allow the Church of Rome to slip the yoke of spiritual subjection over their necks 1 One of the most interesting pages in history, the history as yet unwritten, will be the account of the manner in which the American people, the descendants of the Vikings, treat this attempt! ^ >rv(_^..^.,iv:^^^. f . I * . f ? , .i.>'-. !:;.<- O.V.' ili'.Uv. ■)>S';>;T| ,;'?-(C;s,/l. ■* ;iM ' ! >■ ■ !r. f • A .! if ■ t .,?v.,t'' i> ..■» ' .'<'>i: i.f il'\sf'Vt;h}iq "> ^ jv'-i', Jl! M:*^ ^;ii: w McMASIER UNIVERSITY LIBRARY U !■; 1, ::■.!, 100 The Icelandic Discoverers of America; n - '',,-M-t'V';.; ■m''ii'rni- )'•!-'♦•'. ->i tv ^•. -.' ''-^'l ''-"' ■■' ■'^'■- ' 'f^^ ■ • ' ■ ' ' i '• V, •<■<:■:,{ ■ . ■'■•■•■ 1' '-''i. ■'". -If ■).;'■')■ J . fffii'' l.hf '-'t " ,'':. ''■-:■ ■:■_ ' - i^ii' ' ' .* ' ' ■"■ •'- ■ ' ' .■J .•>, . ( ' 1. ''■ "m • '-' • ■:■ ,, -V ■'•;,.•: : •■ :■',■-,. n •■ ." ' •■ ■•,,• ■: i r ' ■ M ■ 1 ^^:ihf-\ v^^ is' 1:- " CHAPTER VL ;.*,■'; 1 :• '. nj ifriM? -1 '•; COLUMBUS' VISIT TO lOBLAKD. ! i .'! -O 11 The best proof that Columbus went to Iceland, before perfecting his plans for the discovery of the land the other side of the Western ocean, is that he said so himself. The pregnant passage is quoted by Irving, in his " Life of Columbus : " " While the design of attempting the discovery in the West was maturing in the mind of Columbus, he made a voyage to the North of Europe. Of this we have no other memorial thjm the following passage, extracted by his son from one of his letters : ' In the year 1477, in February, I navigated one hundred leagues beyond Thule, the southern part of which is seventy-three degrees distant from the equator, and not sixty-three, as some pretfind ; neither is it situated within the line which includes the west of Ptolemy, but is much more westerly. The English, principally those of Bristol, go with their merchandise to this island, which is as large as England. When I was there, the sea was not frozen, and the tides were so great as to rise and fall twenty-six fathom.'" This statement, according to Professor R. B. Anderson, is itlso to be found in chapter four of the biography which the son of Christopher Columbus wrote of his father, and which was published in Venice in 1571. Its title is ** Yita dell' adiniraglia Christoforo Columbo." Professor Anderson's book, "America not discovered by vv'Avl>M ' .V!iVv^3Vjl'';U h-'TCAr^l'M. Ok, MONOUR TO WHOM ttONOUR IS t)UE. tOl Coiniiihus," aside from its bolci ne^^ation of the proud pontilical assertion that the saint in question did discover that country, leads attention to a point that has been almost entirely over- looked, namely, the connection between the true and the alle/ed discovery ; he says : " While the various writers here alluded to" (he goes over the ground pretty thoroughly) " freely admit the fact that the Norsemen, as well as others, discovered and ex- plored parts of America long before Columbus, they are unwil ing to believe that there is any historical connection between the discovery of the Norsemen and that of Columbus ; or, in other words, that Columbus profited in any way by the Norseman's knowledge of America. This is all the more singular since none of them even try to deny the statement made by Fernando Golumbo, his son, that he (Christopher Columbus) not only spent some time in Iceland, in 1477, but sailed 300 miles beyond, which must have brought him nearly within siglit of Greenland. We are informed that he was an earnest student, and the best geographer and map-maker of his day. He was a dUigent reader of Aristotle, Seneca, and Strabo. Why not also of Adam of Bremen, who, in his volume published in the year 1076, gave an accurate and well-authenticated accoimt of Vinland (New England) 1 " He goes on to say that he believes that " Columbus was a scholar who industriously studied all books and manuscripts that contained any information about voyages and discoveries; that his searching mind sought out the writings of Adam of Bremen, that well-known historian who in the most unmistakable and emphatic language speaks of the Norse discovery of Vinland; that the information thus gathered induced him to make his voyage to Iceland." --• *. > • Aaron Goodrich, on the other hand, does not believe that Columbus went to Iceland, notwithstanding Columbus wrote about his visit there to his son and his son quoted the passage in his letter, — and he doubts this for the very reason that ab.oald have made him credit it implicitly, namoly* because. 'I 102 The Icelandic Discoverers op America; it' Columbus has so very little to sty about it. Goodrich comments : " He does not give any reasons for such a voyage (to Iceland) nor mention the ship he sailed in, or the port he sailed from; he gives nothing, in fact, but the most vague assertions. All contemporary writers, State papers, &c., are silent upon the subject^ when less important matters are re- corded." It is astonishing that so shrewd a writer as Good- rich, who seems to have fathomed Columbus' motives in all other regards, should have expected him to give his reasons for the voyage, mention the ship he sailed in and the port he sailed from, when he was going on a secret expedition, probably com- missioned by the Pope himself, for the purpose of stealing knowledge that would put the Church in possession of a vast new territory for the acquisition of gold, slaves, and souls i This secrecy is prima-facie evidence that he went to Iceland. But it would have been better for the Church of Bome if his son had burned this letter as soon as he had read it 1 On so slight a thread, on this little indiscretion of his in keeping the letter and mentioning it, rested the vindication of the fame of the Norsemen and the conviction of Columbus of a base fraud ! Barry, however, does not seem to doubt that Columbus went to Iceland. He writes in his usual ecstatic way : " We see him crossing the German Ocean and advancing to the Polar Seas. In February, 1474, he was a hundred leagues beyond Iceland, and verified some phenomena interesting to hydro- graphy. From the sombre horizons of the North, from the Ultima Thule of the ancients to the splendid skies of the tropics " — the writer does not hint at what Columbus verified in Iceland hmdes phenomena— "with his powerful faculty of generalization, he united together in his memory the harmonies of land and sea, seeking to penetrate beyond the poetry of appearances the great laws of the glob'>." This is not very lucid, but it is suggestive. There is nothing so good to hide a little hard fact as a lot of rhapsodical vapour. Far from > OR, Honour to whom Honour is Due. 103 seeking to penetrate the great laws of the globe at tliat precise period, the Italian mariner, who, failing of being a skilful one, was bent on being a lucky one, was on the hunt for those particular paragraphs, in some old manuscript or other, that would serve him as a chart to the coveted land in the West. This is only one evidence more of the elaborate disguise that was thrown around all his movements while at Iceland. R. H. Major, in the introduction to " Columbus* Letters," mentions the fact of his having gone to Iceland, yet adds : " But upon the whole of this portion of his history there rests an impenetrable cloud of obscurity." It was indeed like a secret of the confessional, divulged only to the holy fathers themselves ! Arthur Helps^ in his " Life of Columbus," asserts positively ; " We are sure that he traversed a large part of the known world, that he visited England, that he made his way to Ice- land and Friesland (where he may possibly have heard vague tales of the discoveries by the Northmen in North America), that he had been at El Mina, on the coast of Guinea, and that he had seen the islands of the Grecian Archipelago." And there can scarcely be anything more emphatic than the follow- ing words by Toulmin Smith: "There can be little doubt that he (Columbus) had gained the chief confirmation of his idea of the existence of terra Jirma in the Western ocean, during the visit which he is known to have made, before his Western voyage, to Iceland." It was on the coast of Guinea, as Goodrich has ascertained, that Columbus qualified himself in a branch of trade that he evidently considered indispensable in the future founder of a colony, for Goodrich states : " For some years, it is unknown at what precise period, Columbus was engaged in the Guinea slave-trade, in which he subsequently showed himself such an adept with regard to the unfortunate Indians as well to de- serve the compliment paid him by Mr. Helps, who calls hia ■i i li 104 The Icelandic Discoverers of America; procceilings and plans worthy of a practised slave-dealer.** Professor Anderson states, for the benefit of those who have not read Goodrich's book, " History of the Character and Achievements of the so-called Christopher Columbus," that '• Aaron Goodrich pronounces Columbus a fraud, and denounces him as mean, selfish, perfidious and cruel. He has evidently made a very careful study of the life of Columbus, and we have looked in vain for a satisfactory refutation of his state- ments." Still less can the following statement, by the same author, be refuted : " Columbus owes most of his fame to the Church, which, charmed with the devotion he professed, has chanted his praises, and crushed any historian who would not join in them, as long as her power was sufficient." The next thing necessary for a full understanding of this momentous visit of Columbus to Iceland is to know the full extent of his opportunities there and the use he made of them. Much light is thrown on this by Laing ; in his " Sea-kings of Norway " he makes substantially the same statement as the one quoted in the first chapter of this book ; it is this : *' It is evident that the main fact is that of a discovery of a Western land being recorded in writing between 1387 and 1395 ; and whether the minor circumstances, such as the personal adventures of the discoverers, or the exact localities in America which they visited, be or be not known, cannot aflfect this fact, — nor the very strong side-fact that eighty years after this fact was re- corded in writing, in no obscure manuscript, but in one of the most beautiful works of penmanship in Europe, Columbus came to Iceland, from Bristol, in 1477, on purpose to gain nautical information, and must have heard of the written accounts of discoveries recorded in it." The writer also cites the paragraph in the memoir of Columbus by his son. Professor Anderson says, very pertinently, that "there were undoubtedly people still living whose grandfathers had crossed the Atlantic, and it would be altogether unreasonable OR, Honour to whom Honour is Due. 105 to suppose that he (Columbus), who was constantly studying and talking about geography and navigation, possibly could visit Iceland and not hoar anything of the land in the West." He goes rather farther than other authors, but still does not express himself as severely as the case deserves, when he saya : " The fault that we find with Columbus is, that he was not honest and frank enough to tell where and how he liad obtained his previous information about the lands which he pretended to discover ; that he sometimes talked of himself as chosen of Heaven to make this discovery, and that he made the fruits of his labours subservient to the dominion of Inquisi- tion." This is undeniably a very grave charge, yet it far from characterizes the religious felony of which Columbus was guilty : he purloined the knowledge of a discovery of trans- cendent value made by men of a pwgan race, but recently and very reluctantly converted to Christianity, for the purpose of securing princely honours and emolument for himself, the greatest conceivable aggmndizement for the Church, such an oppor- tunity for universal dominion as could never, in the nature of things, occur again in the life of the world ; and last and most important of all, for the purpose of making the New World, through its entire submission to the Holy See, the means of crushing out all tendencies to rebellion against the Church that might possibly manifest themselves again in Europe. The sway of the Church of Rome could not be complete without the acquisition of this new territory, of which the natives were to be forced into allegiance and which was to be colonized only l»y those firm in the faith. It is utterly impossible for this deed to be understood in all its enormity by those who shrink from regarding it as a religious crime, the most heinous one of tlie long li«t that the Church of Rome has committed, and which was to have been the glorious reward for all the others, emblazoning the favourite maxim of this hierarchy, " The end garn-Hfi'S the iiieanny" on the very skies ! Christians of every hi* ' ■ W io6 The Icelandic Discoverers of America; m sect, Protestants of all grades, treat Eoman Catholicism very tenderly, for they cannot strike it at tmy of its vulnerable points, without striking that which is almost equally vulner- able in their own system of religion. Romanism creeps in everywhere under the cover of Protestantism j Protestantism, whatever bears the name of Christianity, is its best shield and defence — in fact its sole one. It is only by regarding Cliristianity as one, of which Komanism is the full expression, and Protestantism the diluted, the component parts of this being, when analyzed, Roman Catholicism and liberality^ the first not less evil, intrinsically, through the mixture, the latter only rendered less effective, — and by realizing the atrocious way in which Christianity was introduced in every land, and in every colony — by noting its deadly effects upon every race that were forced to succumb to it, that one can understand the full nature of the crime under consideration. Now, h'^wever, the issue can no longer be evaded 1 > ;■'?.' That Columbus had abundant opportunities, in Iceland, to pursue his inquiries is shown clearly by Beamish, in his " Discovery of America by the Northmen : " " Nor should it be forgotten that Columbus visited Iceland in 1477, when, having had access to the archives of the island and ample opportunity of conversing with the learned there through the medium of the Latin language, he might easily have obtained a complete knowledge of the discoveries of tlie Northmen — sufficient at least to confirm his belief in the existence of a Western continent. How much the discoveries of the dis- tinguished Genoese navigator were exceeded by those of the Northmen, will appear from the following narratives." (Then follows the translation of the voyages so often referred to, the same that was published by the Prince Society, in Boston.) ■ "According to Irving's larger work," the same author re- marks, " this visit (to Iceland) took place in February, 1477, when Columbus appears to have observed with surprise that the OR, Honour to whom Honour is Due. 107 sea was not frozen. The learned Icelander, Finn Magnusen, directs attention to the following remarkable coincidence : ' In the year 1477, Magnus Eiolfson was Bishop of Skalbolt in Ice- land ; since 1470 he had been abbot of the Monastery of Helgafell, the place where the oldest documents relating to Greenland, Yinland, and the various parts of America discovered by the Northmen had been written, and where they were doubtless carefully preserved, as it was from this very district that the most distinguished voyagers had gone forth. These documents must have been well known to Bishop Magnus, as were their general contents throughout the island, and it is, therefore, in the highest degree improbable that Columbus, whose mind had been filled with the idea of exploring a "Western continent since the year 1474, should have omitted to seek for and receive information respecting these early voyages. He arrived at Hvalfjord, or Hvalfjardarejri, on the south coast of Iceland, at a time when that harbour was most frequented, and it is well known that Bishop Magnus visited the neighbouring churches in the spring or summer." Laing gives still further information on this point, obtained from the same source and one other, namely, Captain Zahrt- mann on the voyage of Zeno, and Finn Magnusen on ** The English Trade to Iceland," second volume of " Nordisk Tid- skrift," 1833. It is this : " Columbus came in spring to the south end of Iceland, where Whalefjord was the usual harbour, and it is known that Bishop Magnus, exactly in the spring of that year (1477), was on a visitation to that part of his see, and it is to be presumed Columbus must have met and conversed with him." In a review of that great work by Professor Rafn, " Antiqui- tates AmericansB," which appeared in the Foreign Quarterly Review^ ior May, 1838, it is asked very apily : " But what could be more to his purpose or better adapted to his views than the fact that the Northmen, the boldest of navigators, i'Ul F5f'r 168 The Icelandic Discoverers of America; had knowledge of a land in the West which they supposed to extend far southwards till it met Africa ? Or would not the intelligent Genoese find some suggestion in the following more accurate statement of an Icelandic geographer : ' On the west of the great tiea of Spain, which some call Ginnuugagap, and leaning somew><%t towards the north, the first land whi(jh occurs isthegood VinlandV" If we turn to Swedish authors, we find the same belief with them, that Columbus paid a visit to Iceland and obtained there all the information requisite to enable him to carry otit his pre- sumptuous plan. Holmberg's words are conclusive : " With certainty do we know that Columbus toward the end of the fifteenth century, presumably in the year 1477, sojourned at Iceland, where he was sent by Englishmen, whose industrial mind had already fixed its attention upon Iceland's rich fisheries. Here ho without doubt met the descendants of those who had first made said discovery, got knowledge of the written mgor thereof, and probably also obtained fresh intelligence concerning the great land in the West, Vinland det goda, as history is able to mention an American voyage only one hundred and thirty years previous. He was, however, sufficiently prudent never to reveal this, and such a traij perhaps diminishes his greatness. The edge of the well-known story of Columbus is through this turned against himself, and one cannot well avoid seeing a Nemesis in the fact that the New World did not obtain his name, but that of another who sailed in his wake.'* And in Spain, when it became a matter of obtaining royal sanction to his enterprise, the funds to carry it through, what evidence so incontrovertible of the success that had attended his inquiries in Iceland as his supreme confidence — in himself 1 — no, in the certainty he had obtained up there in the North, from records that did not lie, like the Southern ones, from a people who did not lie, and who treasured the great deeds of their illustrious ancestors, — ts his grand pretensions, and, foi OR, ttONOUH TO WHOM HONOUU IS DuE. 100^ that mntter, his patience and fortitude, which have been so Uiuch lauded, in holding out during so long a struggle and wait- ing 1 This certainty, based on reliable Icelandic records, was more stimulating than scientific knowledge, such scientific know- 1< dge as he could command, more sustaining than faith, mora delicious than even bia own vanity ! He was not too proud, this man, to enjoy a stolen inheritance. As is well known, his plan stranded, in the first instance, on account of his preposterously high demands. Irving, observing the fact, but misconstruing the cause, says : " So fully imbued was Columbus with the grandeur of his enterprise, that he would listen to none but princely conditions." Not with " the gran- deur of his enterprise," but with the money value of his stolen knowledge, the three-fold advantage of it to the Church, the throne of Spain and himself, was he imbued 1 " The courtiers who treated with him," continued Irving, " were indignant at such a demand. Their pride was shocked to see one whom they had considered as a needy adventurer, aspiring to rank and dignities superior to their own." Needy adventurer he indeed was ! But the consciousness that he had a genuine commodity for which he was sure to find a customer in the long run, gave him the hardihood to make large demands. Naturally insolent, this secret certainty inflated his insolence to the extreme of audacity. It was not reckless audacity, however, for he was sure of his ground, and could not very well presume too much. The reader will now be interested to know what share of the spoils fell to Columbus — these guaranteed beforehand— Qs\h&xe' suit of the knowledge he stole at Iceland, and which rendered this trip the most successful voynge on record. The following is quoted from Arthur Helps* "Life of Columbus : " — " The favours which Christopher Columbus has asked from the King and Queen of Spain in recompense of the discoveries M ; \ Sit» ." ''■ '»3^!^^ tfH .:'■ 1. ■ no The Icklandic Discoverers of America; which he has made in tho ocean seas, and as recompense for the voyage which he is ahout to undertake, are the 'oUowiiig : — "1. He wishes to be made admiral of i tvn . o^i.l' *;r.-»» * ». - • -^i .'I WAi-ii f^'-.'^'-d* .'ii' *'-' ■'• i:: i:: .'v , • ij _•>,■ "■ : •->--V:-.t vxi i 6R, Honour to whom Monour is Duk. itt 3' I { S I ^ ■I' I ' p. ..-^t r VJt CHAPTER VIL TBI SCANDINAVIAN NORTH AND SPAIN CONTRASTED. The signal national act of Spain, whicli has given it a ghastly pre- eminence — this act extended into a unifonn lino of conduct for several centuries— was that of crushing out all the civilization with- in its borders, or in lands adjacent to it. That which distinguishes ancient Scandinavia is its persistent resistance to the power that enabled Spain to do the European race this almost irreparable injury, the national traits of the Northern people alone pre- venting the injury from becoming universal destruction. To be sure; Llorente and others assert that Spain resisted the intro- duction of the Inquisition, " It is an incontestable fact," he says, " in the history of the Spanish Inquisition, that it was intro- d'laed entirely against the consent of the provinces, and only by the influence of the Dominican monks ;" yet the resistance was but feeble, the ruling traits of the Spanish people, rightly defined by Buckle as loyalty and superstition, operating more decisively to further its introduction than even the zeal of the Dominicans. "These, then, were the two great elements of which the Spanish cha. acter was compoundid. Loyalty and superstition ; reverence for their kings and reverence Ibr their clergy were the leading principles which influenced the Spanish mind, and governed the march of Spanish history," states Buckle succinctly. The popes and bishops of the fourth century had profited of the circumstance of the emperors having embraced Christianity, and this gave the Church the reins of power, while 11?/ The Icelandic Discoverers of America j B: I': the predomitiant traits of the Spaniards rendered them sab- missive tools for any infamy Church and Throne united might devise. This nation were destitute of that instinct which was the strongest in the Norsemen, the instinct of freedom. The motives for establishing the Inquisition must of necessity have actuated the Spaniards at large as well as the heads of the Church and the reigning sovereigns, Ferdinand and Isabella, else tne people, weak as they were, could have frustrated the attempt of these to establish such a system of terrorism ; but hatred of the Jews, a consuming envy of their superior pros- perity, as well as their learning and skill, prevailed everywhere, and the ecclesiastical and imperial proposition to persecute this race in a body, met with a hearty response. Llorente declares this with absolute authority : " The Christians who could not rival them in industry, had almost all become their debtors, and envy Boon mado them the enemies of their creditors." The Spanish Moors were still more obnoxious to them. How could a race who were Christians in the full sense of the word, steeped in t!je ignorance and superstition that this implies, i-oierate the proxi- mity of apeople whose "culture and prosperity rivalled the Golden Age of the Grecian Republics " 1 This glorious height had been reached, affirms Felix Oswald, tv: enturies after the conversion of Mecca, "and, six hundred years later, the Moors of Spain were still the teachers of Europe in science and arts, as well as in industry and in agriculture." True Christians are manifestly of the same type everywhere, and the Spanish Christians could not have diflfered essentially from the class in Greece and Rome upon which Celsus visits such severe reprobation. " You shall see weavers, tailors, fullers, and the most illiterate and rustic fellows, who dare not speak a word before wise men, when they can get a company of children and silly women together, set up to teach strange paradoxes among them. . . . This is one of their rules — Let no man that is learned, wise, or prudent come anicmg us J but if any be unlearned, or a child, or ao idiot, let hipi OR, Honour to wttom Honour is Due. 113 were as in ifestly could I Rome shall [rustic they set up their It him freely come. So they openly declare that none but fools and sots, and such as want sense, slaves, women end children, are fit disciples for the God they worship." St. Mark also, in the second chapter, sixteenth verse, says that Jesus went surrounded by men and women of ill-repute, and that the Pharisees and the learned were astonished that He ate and drank in such company. In a few terse words Felix Oswald draws the contrast between the enlightened and unenlightened in Spain : " At the same time when Moorish Si)ain rivalled the god-gardens of ancient Italy, and every Moorish town had its schools of poetry and philosophy, Christian Spain was cursed with a chronic plague of mental and physical famines." Prescott also affirms that " the Spanish Moors in the Peninsula re:iched a higher degree of civilization than in any other part of the world," and, further- more, that " this period of brilliant illumination with the Saracens corresponds precisely with that of the deepest barbarism of Europe ; when a library of three or four hundred volumes was a magnificent endowment for the richest monastery.** '■ It was the same with the Albigenses, a refined, enlightened, free minded people, opposed to the doctrines of Rome ; they excited the some feelings of hatred, envy and malignity in the Spaniards, and. the command to exterminate all three of these races, the Moors, Jews, and Albigenses, was more than welcome. This ready acceptance of a fiendish policy in itself proves Sj)uin to have been brutally debased. In religious parlance this nai ion abhorred heresy ; in the language of truth, it abhorred civiliza- tion. Nevertheless, it must be admitted candidly, that it is the only nation that has ever pursued a thoroughly consistent policy, for Chri^^tiaiiity and civilization are utterly incompatible and e-:mot exist on the same soil. If salvation has any meaning, if faith is ncLJPsary for salvation, if heresy is a crime, entailing the most frightful consequences, here and hereafter, almost any means are justifiable to prevent that crime, and no means less rigorous than the Jlnt^uisition could have checked all the natural .114 The Icelandic Discoverers of America; instincts of the human heart and mind, the impulse, craving, determination, inseparable from human nature, for knowledge, freedom, happiness, progress, a natural and unrestrained life. If Christianity is better than all this, according to its own dogmatic assertion, which Spain implicitly believed, it was right to impose it there, through any menns at command, which Spain did, and it would also be right to impose it, at this present day, on all the nations of the earth, and through the same means, the only effectual means, the Inquisition. Christianity, in short, pro- nounces human nature wrongj all its attribute s wrong, and sets about a reconstr iction so violent, so contrary to the mental, moral, and physical conformation of human beings, that nothing less than the extinction of the species will eflect it. The Spanish Inquisition barely failed of this result within its own jurisdic- tion. Prescott sums up Lloreiite's figures thus: " Llprente computes that during the eighteen years of Torquemada's ministry, there were no less than 10,220 burnt, 6860 con- demned and burnt in effigy as absent or dead, and 97,321 reconciled by various other penances ; affording an average of more than 6000 convicted persons annually." But in his preface, this brave and outspoken man, who with almost super- human courage dared to expose the full iniquity of the Inquisi- tion, describes the evil it wrought : " I have also shown that these ministi^rs of persecution have been the chief causes of the decline of literatu i, and almost the annihilators of nearly all that could enlighten the people, by their ignorance, their blind submission to the monks who were qualifiers, and by persecuting the mngistrates and the learned who were anxious to disseminate information. These monks were despicable scholastic theologians, too ignorant and prejudiced to be able to ascertain the truth betv\ een the doctrines of Luther and those of Roman Catholicism, and so condemned as Lutheran, propositions incontestably true. The horrid conduct of this holy nffire woakeued the power and diminished the populatio.. of Spain by arresting the progreas of OR, Honour to whom Honour is Due. 115 arts, science."', industry, and commerce, and by compelling multi- tudes of families to abandon the kingdom, by instigating the expulsion of the Jews and the Moors, and by immolating on its flaming shambles more than three hundred thousand victims / / " ; . ' Concerning this invaluable work, which will yet, I trust not in the far future, serve the purpose of doing away witii Chris- tianity as the prime cause, not only of this particular evil, but of all evil, Prescott writes : " Llorente's work well deserves to be studied as the record of the most humiliating triumph which fanaticism has ever been able to obtain over human reason, and that too during the most civilized periods and in the most civi- lized portion of the world." Llorente gives his own reasons for undertaking a work fraught with such difficulty and danger. "A firm conviction, from knowing the deep objects of this tribunal, that it was vicious in principle, in its constitution, and in its laws, notwithstanding all that has been said in its support, induced me to avail myself of the advantage my situation afforded me, and to collect every document I could procure relative to its history." He was secretary of the Inquisition at Madrid durmg the years 1789, 1790, and 1791. The purpose was thus to exterminate heresy and heretics. Heresy, as we have seen, is a very comprehensive word, and in the eflfort to exterminate that, Spain was in reality exterminating all that was of value to the human race. In corroboration of this I quote several authors, for the testimony must be so abundant as to leave no doubt on this point. " It is remarkable that a scheme so monstrous as that of the Inquisition, presenting tlie most etfectual barrier, probably, that was ever opposed to tlie progress of knowledj^e, should have been revived at the close of the fifteenth century, when tlie light of civilization was rapidly advancing over every part of Europe," writes Prescott, also remarking : " It is painful, after having dwelt so long on the important benefits resulting to Castile from the compreheu- X 2 ii6 The Icelandic Discoverers of America; Ip m give policy of Isabella,' to be compelled to turn to the darkez side of the picture, and to exhibit her as accommodatiug he^ Bolf to the illiberal spirit of the age in which she lived, so far as to sanction one of the grossest abuses that ever disgraced humanity." Buckle's verdict is this : " In such a state of society, anything approaching to a secular or scientific spirit was, of course, impossible. Every one believed; no one inquired. Among the better classes, all were engaged in war or theology, and most were occupied with both. Those who made literature a profession, ministered, as professional men too often do, to the prevailing prejudice. . . . The quantity of Spanish works to prove the necessity of religious persecution is incalculable ; and this took place in a country where not one man in a thousand doubted the propriety of burning heretics. . . . The greatest men, with hardly an exception, became ecclesiastics, and all temporal considerations, all views of earthly policy, were despised and set at naught. No one inquired ; no one doubted ; no one pre- sumed to ask if all this was right. The minds of men succumbed and were prostrate. While every other country was advancing, Spain alone was receding. Every other country was making some addition to knowledge, creating some art, or enlarging some science, Spain, numbed into a deathlike torpor, spell-bound and entranced by the accursed superstition which preyed on her strength, presented to Europe a solitary instance of constant decay." There were other practical results to which he also draws attention : " The Spanish Christians considered agricul- ture beneath their dignity. In their judgment war and religion were the only two avocations worthy of being followed. Some of the richest parts of Valencia and Granada were so neglected that means were wanting to feed even the scanty population remaining there. Whole districts were deserted, and down to the present day have never been repeopled. All over Spain > "History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella," W. H. Frescott, ted ion to Dain ' '8r, Honour '1*6 HViiok flrbNOuk'i^ Due. 117 the same destitution prevailed. That once rich and prosper: us country was covered with a rabble of monks and clergy, v/hcrse insatiate rapacity absorbed the little wealth yet to be found. The fields were left uncultivated ; vast multitudes died from want and exposure ; entire villages were deserted." W. H. Lecky, in his " History of Eationalism," describes another phase of the evil : " The persecutor can never be certain that he is not persecuting truth rather than error, but he may ' be quite certain that he is suppressing the spirit of truth. And indeed, it is no exaggeration to say that the doctrines I have reviewed represent the most skilful and at the same time most successful conspiracy against that spirit that has ever existed among mankind. Until the seventeenth century, every mental disposition which philosophy pronounces to be essential to a legitimate research was almost uniformly branded as a sin ; and a large proportion of the most deadly intellectual vices were deliberately inculcated as virtues. ... In a word, there is scarcely a disposition that marks the love of abstract truth, and scarcely a rule which reason teaches as essential for its attainment, that theologians did not for centuries stigmatize as oflfensive to the Almighty." Felix Oswald groups the evils thus: "Hence, inquisitions and crusades, thirty years' wars, heretic-hunts, massacres of St. Bartholomew, expulsions of the Moors, and exterminations of the Albigenses." He asks : " Has the happiness of the human race been secured, or in any degree promoted, by the dogmas of the Christian religion V And then proceeds to say the words which the continued presence of Roman Catholicism, or original Christianity, in the midst of civilized modern communities, renders so imperatively necessary: "Cowardice and stupidity have too long connived at the crime of abetting the dissemina- tion of that earth-blighting superstitiim, and it is time to say the truth in plain terms. The demonstrable truth then is that, if (41 the countries of Europe that were destined to pass undei J'"!, !' '• • ■ i iiiii' 11 m A.\i ii8 The Icelandic Discoverers of America; the yoke of the Cross had, instead, for a thousand years been covered by the ashes of the fire-storm that buried the cities of Pompeii and Herculaneum, the world would to-day be benefited by the result. Our earth would be more fertile and prosperous, our fellow-men would be freer, wiser, and happier. The waste of the volcanic cinders would have proved less irreclaimable than the desert of pessimism. The survivors of the catastrophe would have saved their children from the alternative of death or moral slavery that awaited the next forty generations of their descendants. The nations of the Caucasian race would have been spared the systematic extirpation of their wisest and bravest men. The Saracens, whose Western empire was destroyed by the insane fanaticism of the Christian priests, would have cultivated the garden of civilization in a more grateful soil." ji, ■[■a Llorente states as a fact that " the war against the Albigenses was the first cause of the establishment of the Inquisition, and the pretended necessity of punishing the apostacy of the newly- converted Spanish Jews was the reason for introducing it in a reformed state." After a very thorough dissection of all the motives and objects, he says: " It is to these projects " — having proved most of them to be mercenary — " concealed under the appearance of zeal for religion, that the Inquisition of Spain owes its origin.** Prescott also says that "some writers are inclined to show the Spanish Inquisition, in its origin, as little else than a political engine," and throws further light on the motives of the Pope that instigated it: " Sixtus IV., who at that time filled the pontifical chair, easily discerning the sources of wealth and influence which this measure opened to the Court of Eome, readily complied with the petition of the sovereigns, and expedited a bull bearing date November Ist, 1478, autho- rizing them to appoint two or three ecclesiastics inquisitors for the detection and suppression of heresy throughout their dominions." But it is reserved for Llorente to state this with ca; — — ^» 8 been ities of snefited iperous, e waste }le than istrophe f death ions of i would ■ wisest lire was priests, a more ibigenses iion, and 3 newly- it in a all the —having ider the )f Spain iters are as little t on the who at sources le Court jrereigns, I, autho- ][uisitor3 it their with OR, Honour to whom Honour is Due. 119 full authoritjr and reveal the ferocious brigandage of the Church officials: "Facts prove beyond a doubt," he says, " that the extirpation of Judaism was not the real cause, but the mere pretext, for the establishment of the Inquisition by Ferdinand V. The true motive was to carry on a vigorous system of confis- cation against the Jews, and so bring their riches into the hands of the Government. Sixtus IV. sanctioned the measure to gain the point dearest to the Court of Rome, an extent of domination." In revealing the intricate mechanism of the Inquisition, its invisible network, its secrecy, its diabolical craft and artifice, he shows how impossible it was for a victim to escape from its toils, except by a deeper cunning than the inquisitors themselves were masters of, for " the Inquisition employed every means and neglected nothing in the trials of the prisoners to make them appear guilty of heresy, and all this was done with an appearance of charity and compassion, and in the name of Jesus Christ." Prescott, too, remarks: "The sword of justice was observed, in particular, to strike at the wealthy, the least pardonable offenders in time of proscription." This strips away the last disguise ; whatever religious zeal, bigotry, or fanaticism may have fired the uninitiated, the heads of the Church at Rome were actuated by money-greed and love of dominion ; this also removes the last excuse of those religious persons everywhere, who are always ready to extenuate the crimes of the Church and to find justification for all forms of intolerance. The Inquisition was highway robbery and murder on a stupendous scale. If missionary work of all kinds, con- version, and proselyting is less than that in our own day, it is only because the moment is not propitious for the full operation of the system, the Church not being in a position to employ all its resources. No other nation than Spain has ever allowed it to exercise its full prerogative. This privilege extended over a considerable length of time, as Llorente shows : " Charles V. protected it (the Inquisition) from ft* If ,j 120 The Icelandic Discoverers of America; 1^ 4 motives of policy, being convinced it was the only means of preventing the heresy of Luther from penetrating into Spain. Philip II. was actuated by superstition and tyranny to uphold 'it; and even extended its jurisdiction 1o the excise, and made "the exporters of horses into France liable to seizure by the ' oflficers of the tribunal, as persons suspected of heresy. ' Philip III., Philip IV., and Charles II. pursued the same course, stimulated by similar fanaticism and imbecility, when the reunion of Portugal to Spain led to the discovery of many * Jews. Philip V. maintained the Inquisition from considerations ' of mistaken policy, inherited from Louis XIV., who made him believe that such rigour would ensure the tranquillity of the * kingdom, which was always in danger when many religions were tolerated. Ferdinand VI. and Charles III. befriended ^ this holy office, because they would not deviate from the course ' that their father had traced, and because the latter hated the freemasons. Lastly, Charles FV. supported the tribunal, be- ' cause the French Ee volution seemed to justify a system of surveillance, and he found a firm support in the zeal of the * inquisitors-general, always attentive to the preservation and extension of their power, as if the sovereign authority could " find no surer means of strengthening the throne than the terror inspired by an Inquisition." The Inquisition has continued into the present century. The Spaniards made an abortive attempt to abolish it in 1820, and we learn that it was mitigated in 1834 ; it can almost be " rej^arded throughout as a modern institution, Spain's defence against the encroachment of enlightenment through the Moors, ' the Jews, the Albigenses, French infidelity, and Luthemnism ! It is not so very long since this paragraph appeared in a New York paper: "What is the matter with Spain? She seems to be utterly dull, lifeless, and inert. Germany, France, and Italy are pressing on grandly towards liberal and representa- tive government, sloughing the gangrene of vicious political OR, Honour to whom Honour is Due. 121 pra(;ticea, and breaking down the barriers reared by the enemies of the people. Everywhere within their boundaries is life and activity, mental and physical" i •• • • . • r • .-> . .i. fij t Spain's hope for the future has manifestly lain in the characteristic effort to gain spiritual ascendency in the United States through foisting upon the young and rich Republic, as discoverer, saint, paragon, claimant-in-chief for American gratitude, the Italian fanatic and charlatan, Christopher Co- lumbus 1 In its folly and infatuation, Spain no doubt looks forward to the re-establishment of the Inquisition on American soil, where the opportunities for persecution and confiscation would be more brilliant even than in Spain, when three races were extirpated ! ' . • ; "With what sickening disgust and loathing one turns from this black picture, from the nation which, in alliance with Rome, blighted the race I But if Spain, past or present, is the most horrible subject in Europe to survey, the North is the brightest 1 Spain blighted, the North saved 1 Spain exhibits deformity, the North the natural man ; one of the finest types the earth has produced, in some attributes excelling all others. Spain, in devotion to its religion, laboured for the extinction of man- hood ; the Northern nations, whether inside or outside of their religion, worshipped manhood, and cultivated it to a high degree of perfection in themselves. In this they resembled the Greeks, but were even more rigid in conforming to their own standard of excellence, tolerating no defect or weakness in themselves. Whatever they did was in obedience to the requirements of their ideal. And this was not from any species of fear; the hell of their religion, if anything of so slight religious substance can be called a religion, was for those who felt fear, for cowards ; there these most despicable of wretches w§re consigned to a Palace of Anguish, had Famine for their board, Slowness and Delay for their attendants, and slept on a Bed of Care j and this is so purely retributive justice that qq '! •* I 122 The Icelandic Discoverers of America; thinking person can deplore it. Their hell would be filled with the elect of the Christian world, and Spain, with its two dis- tinguishinj? national traits, " loyalty and superstition," would go there en maseBf together with the hordes of zealots it has propagated in other lands, and in its possessions in South America. If the Norsemen worshipped Odin and Thor, it was because they considered them good, brave, intelligent fellows, worthy of admiration, and not because servile adoration was obligatory upon them ; if any doubted the virtues or superior excullence of these gods, they did not hesitate to say so^ and did not profess to revere them unlt^ss this was their sincere feeling. " The Inquisition," according to Lloreate, " encouraged hypocrisy, and punished those who either did not know how to, or would not, assume the mask." Christianity in itself en- couraged hypocrisy; but hypocrisy was the vice that the Odin- worshippers, so-called, considered most despicable ; they were as free from that as the Spaniards were from sincerity. We are all of us, at this present day, chiefly indebted to Spain and to Eome for what Felix Oswald calls " that chief disgrace of our own age — the cowardly hypocrisy which, like an all-pervading poison- vapour, taints the whole atmosphere of our social life." A mythological religion did not satisfy the Northern mind, however grand the mythology and exalted its personages, al- though the Southern mind could thrive for centuries on *' Buddhism and its daughter-creed," as Oswald rightly designates the Christian myth, adding that these " can flourish only in a sickly soil. Christianity developed its first germs in the carcass of the decaying Roman Empire, and still retains its firmest hold upon the degenerate nations of Southern Europe ; while the manlier races of the North resisted its propaganda to the last, and were the first to fiee themselves from its despotism." A. E. Holmberg notes this absence of the spirit of idolatry in the Scandinavians:" Without doubt this lack (in the Asa- dootriue) of a rational morality, conduced with more thoughtful a ss OR, Honour to whom Honour is Due. 123 miuds to bring it iuto contempt. We find, namely, as far aa that is concerned, very prevalent free-thinking, which directed itself now to something better, now to something worse, as well as a consequent tolerance toward those who thought differently, which, however, declined toward the close of that doctrine's life." That the Norsemen took their divinities entirely on their merits is proven by a multitude of anecdotes from those times, and that they were not allowed to subject Jesus Christ to the same criticism must have been a most surprising after-revelation to them ! The following stories are narrated by Mallet, in his " Northern Antiquities : " " In the history of Olaf Tryggveson a warrior fears not to say publicly that he relies much more on his own strength and on his arms, than upon Thor or Odin. Another, in the same book, speaks thus to his friend : ' I would have thee know that I believe neither in idols nor spirits. I have travelled in many places; I have met with giants and monstrous men : they could never overcome me 3 thus to this present hour my own force and courage are the sole objects of my belief.* ... In an Icelandic chronicle a vain-glorious man makes his boast to a Christian missionary that he had never yet acknowledged any religion, and that his own strength and abilities were everything to him. For the same reason others refused to sacrifice to the gods of whom they had no need. . . . In the life of King Olaf Tryggveson, mention is made of a man who was condemned to exile for having sung in a public place, Ferses the sense of which was to this purpose, * I will not insult or affront the gods ; nevertheless the goddess Freja inspires me with no respect : it must certainly be that either she or Odin are chimerical deities,* " . • ^ ^ Free to think and act, to follow their impulses, the dearest aim of the Norsemen was to cidtivate character, to attain that degree of excellence which would make their life a joy to them ; their heaven was only valuable to them as following upon a r 1' '1: h -e f ' £ \ • if, 41. !k'?;;ll W ns 124 The Icelandic Discoverers of America; valuable lifo here on earth, and they were never disposed to resign this life for the sake of a future one ; if they sought death, or met it bravely, it was for other reasons, not savouring of sickly renunciation. This aim of theirs to be great, developed a heroic age ; the warriors and the bards emulated each other, one to supply valorous deeds, worthy of being eulogized in in- spired improvization, the other to praise these deeds as they deserved, and transmit the memory of them to posterity. The court was the scene of this laurel-crowning, and the king, the comrade of the warriors, not an isolated despot enjoining homage and plotting ruin for his subjects, was a fellow-aspirant for these honours, gaining his glorj' on the same high path. So much were the bards respected, that one of these, though a stranger, needed no introduction at court. P. E. Miiller, who is one of tha most reliable of authors on this subject, asserts that " no nation ever possessed a poetry more strictly national than the Scandinavian." This was due to the fact that the individuals of the nation possessed character, that their actions and thoughts were spontaneous, allowing free play to their genius, which in its turn, feeling no curb or restriction, engendered a boundless am- bition and love of fame. " Harold H&rfager's reign," says Miiller, " was the Augustan age of the Scalds. Ambitious and warlike, he kept a splendid court, to which he sought to draw all the distinguished men of his country," The advent of Christianity changed things in this reppoct. The sume author continues: " Olaf Tryggveson's zeal for Christianity caused him rather to discourage than to favour the Scalds ; but one of tliem, indig- nant at seeing his art slighted, forced the king to listen to his song, by declaring that if he did not, he would immediately abjure Christianity, which Olaf, with much trouble, had induced him to embrace." Some other words of Miiller's bear upon the point I have drawn attention to, the cultivation of character among the Norsemen, an object which the Christians have uniformly neglected out of contempt for their own nature, and OR, Honour to whom Honour is Due. 125 human nature in general, and the other members of the com- munity, in modern times, passive Christians for the most part, wearing the badge, but evading the observances, have set aside, for the reason that the pursuit of knowledge or wealth was more agreeable to them, requiring one or other of these to stimulate pride in themselves or even self-respect. The modern man, as a rule, has no very great respect for character in the abstract, does not believe in it, in fact ; he believes that men are made by their circumstances, not tliat truth, courage, sin- cerity, goodness, have the slightest power in and of themselves, or that these mould circumstances. Here we see the blessed fruits of the Spanish Inquisition. The stigma still attached to heresy, heterodox views or freethought, is another. The words of Miiller referred to are these: "The importance attached by the Scandinavians to the delineation of character is evident from the language itself, which is much richer than any other of Europe in all terms expressive of characteristic qualities, whether of mind or body, so as to be f.lle to convey the strength, weakness, obstinacy, quarrelsome or peaceable disposition of every individual in its finest shades." The vocation of Scald, therefore, was one that required the nicest discrimination and power of analysis, as well as rhetorical skill, and as absolute truthfulness was demanded both by the subject of the epic, if he happened to be present, and the assembled hearers, this could only be gained by accuracy of perception, the same exact- ness in delineating traits of character, all that pertains to one individuality as distinct from another, as an artist must use in portraying features that are to be a true likeness of the sitter. As knowledge of character could only be attained through knowledge of the world, and as the characters to be drawn, far from being simple, provincial ones, of a settled type, were com- plex, finely-organized ones, developed through the largest inter- course with foreign nations, none but the most accomplished men of the world were competent to imdertake the ta»k of s Mi.f mi 1,' i.ii ' ..t" 126 The Icelandic Discoverers of America; making that first oral record of their attributes, personality, and deeds that was to be preserved and transmitted as history. That the narratives from these times which claim to be historical, as distinct from, fabulons, romantic, or n.ythological,are uniformly vouched for, by the best authorities of the present day, as authentic and reliable, is due to the correctness of the first analysis and description of the Scalds, the eye-witnesses and keen, in^rrruptibie judges of the events and persons they described. One could almost venture to say that this in itself ren- ders" ancient Scandinavian history more valuable and trustworthy than any other. After the introduction of Christianity not even a Scald of the North cculd dare to " speak the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth 1" That which a Spanish writer says of the Moors: "Their trustworthiness was such, that their bare word was more relied on than a written contract 78 now among us," and the rules of life laid down in HS,vamSl: " A man ought to be self-reliant, wise, prudent, mild, hospitable, temperate, firm in friendship, magnanimous toward the weak and those seeking protection, inflexible in his promises and faithful iu his obligations," were only possible among those who were un-Christianized. Consequently the Scalds travelled abroad, going from court to court, not only for fame and profit, but to perfect themselves in their high calling, to learn to see with their own eyes and to judge with their own understanding ; such was their ability to form an opinion of their ovta and to rely on it, that it is doubtful whether they would have read columns upon columns in the newspapers to know what was general!/ thought of such and such a hero, general, king, or leader, even if newspapers had been at their command, and no instance is recorded of a Scald going to a fares Harold H&rfager's reign to the Augustan age. The courts, then, were the hotbeds of Scandinavian literature and history, and the Scalds were the gardeners. It now be- hoves us to consider the quality of this literature. That it is reliable, historically, is its highest excellence, particularly now when history has been proven such treacherous ground ; " Prof. Miiller shows," says Pigott, " that the greater portion of the early Sagas may be depended upon as faithful historical narratives." Wilhelmi, in his " Discovery of America by the Northmen 500 years before Columbus," goes still further, and dechirea that the Eddas and the old Norse sagor, and not Caesar, Tacitus, Procopius, Jornandes, Paulus Diaconus, Adam of Bremen, and the rest, were the especial sources of knowledge of the religious doctrines of the Germans. In the " * Heimskringla,' " he says, *'we obtain from the narratives of the Icelanders* extensive journeys through all Europe to Rome, Constantinople, and Jerusalem, also the knowledge of the history, geography and antiquity of eastern, western and southern Europe." So thosa were no local annals of a single obscure race 1 In regard to the extent of this literature, Laing contributes some valuable inlbr- niation: "The following list will show the reader" — one taken ki^-x'. that given by Thormod Torfaeus, in his "Series Dynastarum c i flgum DanicB," from that given by Miiller, in his " S;lga- J ^■ ul^ek," and from that of Biom Haldorson — "that in the J&Vb ce.xturies between the days of the venerable Bede and tliose of Matthew Paris, that is from the ninth to the end of the thir- teenth century, the northern branch of the common race was not destitute of intellectuality, notwithstanding all their paganism and barbarism, and had a literature adapted to their national spirit, and wonderfully extensive." In this list of 169 works, forty- eight are historical, and forty-six works of fiction, while the remainder are mixed fable and history, poetical or mythologi al worka Besides these^ there are other works cited by the b % r it .1 i I30 The Icelandic Discoverers of America; ancient historians " Si'arcely any of it," observes Laing, " con- sists of the legends of saints, or homilies, or theological treatises, which constitute the greater proportion of the literature of other countries during the same ages, and which were evidently composed only for the public of the cloisters." An eminent American author, Hubert Howe Bancroft, expresses an opinion concerning European literature, during this and a later period, that coincides perfectly with the statement here given: "Learning .»"ch as it was, had hitherto been almost the exclusive pir.^ of the Church, which vehemently repudiated science eis absOi^^tely incompatible with its pretensions; now and then gleams of important truths would flash up in the writings of some heretical philosopher, illuminating for a moment the path of intellectual progress ; but such dangerous fires were speedily quenched, and that they might not spring forth again to endanger the religious equilibrium of Christendom, their authors were generally destroyed. The literature of the age consisted for the most part of musty manuscripts, emanating from musty minds, utterly devoid of thought and destitute of reason." After dwelling on the peculiar quality of mind, and the prowess of the Scandinavians, Laing continues: "It will not at least surprise the philosophic reader that some of this mental power was applied at home in attempts, however rude, at history and poetry ; but he will be surprised to find that those attempts surpass, both in quality and quantity, all that can be produced in Anglo Saxon literature during the same ages, either in the Anglo-Saxon language or in the Latin." In regard to Snorre Sturleson's '* Chronicles of the Kings of Norway," he says: '' His work stands unrivalled in the Middle Ages. In that class of literary production — the lively representation of historical events by incidents, anecdotes, speeches, touches true to nature, bring- ing out strongly the character and individuality of each eminent actor in historical events — it may be doubted if, even since the ) OR, Honour to whom Honour is Due. 131 the )tat [ntal [tory ipts iced the Middle Ages, any, excepting Shakespeare and Sir Walter Scott in their historical representations, have surpassed Snurie Sturleson." ;> .. ■ ., .; .^ v, - '.■■ -< r- 'i';..-:'* Wheaton offers further evidence of the concurrence of authors in respect to the merits of ancient Scandinavian literature: "In Iceland an independent literature grew up, flourished, and was brought to a certain degree of perfection, before the revival of learning in the south of Europe. This island was not converted to Christianity until the end of the tenth century, when the national literature, which still remained in oral tradition, was full-blown and ready to be committed to a written form. With the Komish religion, Latin letters were introduced ; but instead of being used, as elsewhere, to write a dead language, they were adapted by the learned men of Iceland to mark the sounds which had been before expressed by the Runic characters." His words ^^ the renvoi of learning in the south of Europe" bring to one's mind the extinction of learning there, incident upon the in", )duction of " the blessed light of Christianity," as it is rapturously styled. It is hard to believe that the following was ever true of the country where Christianity was allowed to shed its full effulgence and germinate its peculiar products: " Spain, a {)rovincial part of Arabian dominion, was especially the seat of Arabian learning. Cordova, Granada, Seville, and all the cities of the peninsula, rivalled each other in the mag- nificence of their schools, academies, colleges, and libraiies." And what were the effects of that enlightened and beneficent faith upon literature and learning 1 Llorente states: " Since the establishment of the holy otfice, there has scarcely been any man celebrated for his learning, who has not been prosecuted as a heretic ;" and he gives a most appalling list of the victims among savants and literati, besides describing many of the trials and aiito8-(la-fe. " The theological censures," he says, " like- wi>o attack wnrkf on philos(>phy, on civil and natural law, ani on the people. Those books which have been published ou ■i ' *1 : :| i'' o. i. % VA \im\ km iir ^•;i'S K 2 132 The Icelandic Discoverers of America; mathematics, astronomy, physic and other subjects which depend upon these, have not been more highly favoured. The Spaniards have, consequently, been deprived of the advantages which other nations have derived from all the recent dis- covories." No wonder then, knowing the " Twly office " as he did, that ho was amazed at what he experienced in England 1 I quote his own words: " During the time I remained in London, I heard some Catholics affirm that the Inquisition was iLseful in Spain ^ to presei-ve the Catholic faith, and that a similar institution would have been useful in France." How extraordinary, in the face of these execrable facts, of the chronology of horrors designated as the MidiUe Ages — it is a strange coincidence that the black death was brought from Palestine to Apulia and raged from 1347 to 1351 — of the woe and desolation, the brutal ignorance and diabolism that reigned supreme, and were the in)mediate results of the establishment of Christianity (the edict of the Emperor Theodius against the Ma- nicheans, in 3S2, being the virtual origin of the Inquisition, for, as Llorente states, *' it is here that inquisition and accusation are first mentioned in relation to heresy ") — how extraordinary, I repeat, that any authors, outside of the priesthood, can at- tribute all the good that has befallen the race to this accursed idolatry 1 Even so intelligent an author as Mallet, after expressing the highest admiration of the Scandinavians, and mentioning especially those traits of character which were the direct antitheses of Christian traits, as impossible in a Christian convei-t as a lighted torch in a ditch, — writes such sickening twaddle as this: " Such was the immediate effect of Christianity in the north, an event which, considered only in a philosophical light, should be ever regarded as the dawn of those happy days which were afterwards to shine out with superior splendour. In effect, this religion, which tended to correct the abuse of licentious liberty^ to banish bloody dissensions from among OR, ttoNOtJR to WHOM HoNOtJR IS DUB. 1 33 of indiviilufils, to restrain robberies and piracy, softening the ferocity of manners, requiring a certain knowledge of letters and history, re-establishing a part of mankind, who groaned under a miserable slavery, in their natural rights, introducing a relish for a life of peace, and an idea of happiness independent of sensual gratifications, sowed the seeds, if I may so speak, of that new spirit which grew to maturity in the succeeding a^es, and to which the arts and sciences, springing up along witli it> added still more strength and vigour." Could a greater satire be found than this upon the actual conditions resulting from Christianity? It is a work of supererogation to single <»ut particular phrases, such as " the dawn of those happy days," " to correct the abuse of licentious liberty," " to banish bloody dissensions," "to restrain robberies and piracy," "requiring a certain knowledge of letters and history," &c., as specimens of exquisite, although unconscious, irony; it will suffice to 1 lot out this pernicious nonsense with one sharp sentence of Felix Oswald's: " The warriors of the old pagan Northland, with all their martial truculence, would have shuddered at the mention of the inhumanities which their children perpetrated at the instigation of their priests." No, "the dawn of those happy days" actually culminated in this: "At the end of the thir- teenth century, the enemies of nature had reached the zenitli of their power ; and, at that time, it may be said that icitluut a tingle exceptioUf the countries of Christian Europe were m orse governed, more ignorant, more superstitious, poorer, and un- happier than the worse governed province of pagan Rome." Til is is Oswald's assertion again, and is absolutely true. This anti-naturalism, alas 1 also fastened itself upon the Noith, The Norse nature, fortunately, was not as receptive to the poison as the Spanish, in fact, was not receptive to it at all ; the Scandinavians did not accept Christianity voluntarily, but they were deceived and forced into the acceptance of it, not knowing what it was. Although intellectual beings^ shrewd and 5 r 134 The Icelandic Discoverers of America; sn<,'n«-ious, they hairit of the age. This is shown inferentially by the following paragraph from Pigott's " Scandinavian Mythology:'* *'In the year 1262 Iceland was united to the crown of Norway. By this revolution it was indeed freed from the miseries brought upon it by its turbulent chiefs ; but all interest in public affairs thence- forth died away, and no Sagas were written, because there was nothing to write about. They were replaced by dry chronicles, which also ceased with the great plague in 1350, and were not resumed until so late as the seventeenth century." Still the darkness did not settle down upon the North as upon the rest of Europe, and but a few yejirs ago Wilhelmi could ex- claim : " Iceland's old glory has not yet disappeared, but reminds one, on the contrary, of the scientific life, "which still develops itself there, of the brilliant antiquity, when this remote island, in the neighbourhood of the North Pole, was, in a scientific respect, one of the brujhtest points on earth." And, indeed, how could it fail to be ; how could all Scandi- navia fail to be one of the brightest points on earth, with such people as are described in the following paragraph 1 And by a foreigner, too, quoted in the first part of " Sveriges Historia : " " A stranger, who in an unusually high degree made himself familiar with the condition in the North during the time that is now in question, aays of the Norsemen and their liie during the last century of paganism : ' The stress that was laid upon intercourse with other persons, and the love for joyous festivals, woman's free and respected position, as well as the profound understanding of her relation to man, which is not seldom ex- pressed in the Sagor, the high value that was assigned to the poetic art and all attainments, the zeal with which one, through travel in foreign countries, sought to acquire knowledge, to- gether with many other traits in the ancient Northern folk-life, show, that one did not only take life from the dismal and rude side, and that we m- st not by any means imagine the Scandi- navian pagans to be such savage and insensible barbarians at lit ft irt'' 136 The IcELAi^DTC Discoverers of America; in they are usually described by their English and French enemies. In physical attributes these Northerners were also conspicuous and compelled the admiration of their foes. A. K Holmberg states that " the foreign annalists, who have had an opportunity to take closer cognizance of the Northmen who overran Europe during the Viking expeditions, coincide therein, that they have never seen handsomer or taller men than these robbers, at the same time that they praise their strength and bravery and also such traits of character as keeping their word and the like." It was no ferocious and bloodthirsty impulse that led them into warfare ; they made war because this was to them the path of glory. Their religion, so to speak, enforced bravery, just as the Christian doctrine enforced cowardice. Thomas Carlyle describes it well, when he says : " That Norse religion, a rude but earnest, sternly impressive Consecration of Valour (so we may define it) sufficed for these old valiant Norsemen." And did the Christians then never fight, never wage war, never shed blood, that they denounce all this so fiercely in the Norsemen 1 And which were the nobler, wars, or crusades, for the extermi- nation of heretics, or wars of conquest over depraved and enfeebled Catholic nations for the purpose of founding better nations on the ruins of the old, of establishing free institu- tions and manly customs 1 Was an instance ever known of the Scandinavians making a nation worse than they found it ? Their incursions were a severe remedy, to be wsure, but has the thinking world ever considered how things would have been if the Vikings had never made any expeditions, but had remained quietly at home, allowing the swarms of black-gowned priests to rule the whole of Europe with the crucifix and to settle its fate for all time 1 And when we Americans owe what we value most in life to the grand Norse conquests, why should we be loth to ascribe the same glory to tLese ancient conquerors as to Napoleon or any other modem general 1 To be sure^ they did not parad<3 their intentions in the way of OR, Honour to whom Honour is Due. 137 «_ . national reform and republican organizations, but after theii conquests the result was invariably the same, the work of recon- struction was begun at once, and all Europe was, in fact, re- modelled by them. Mallet does them full justice in tlio following description: "In effect, we everywhere see in those swarms of Germans and Scandinavians, a troop of savaj^o warriors, who seem only born for ravage and destruction, changed into a sensible and free people as soon a-s ever they had confirmed their conquests ; impregnating (if I may so say) their institutions with a spirit of order and equality ; electing for their kings such of their princes of the blood royal as they judged most worthy to wear the crown ; dividing betwef^n thoso kings and the whole nation the exercise of the sovereign power ; reserving to the general assemblies the right of making laws and deciding important matters ; and lastly, to give a solid support to the powers immediately essential to monarchy, distributing fiefs to the principal warriors, and assigning certain privileges proper to the several orders of the state." "Warfare, too, aside from its martial or political bearing, was their chosen method for the perfecting of character, absolute courage being the finishing touch. They fought joyously, jubilantly, and met death with a laugh. " Accordingly," says Mallet, " we never find any among these people guilty of cowardice, and the bare suspicion of that vice was always attended with Tiniversal contempt. , . . Lastly, like the heroe% of Homer, those of ancient Scandinavia, in the excess of their over-boiling courage, dared to defy the gods themselves. * Though they should bo stronger than the gods,' says a boastful warrior, speaking of his enemies, *I would absolutely fight them.'" But these people were much else besides warriors, were as remarkable for their versatility as for their surpassing ability in certain directions. Thus Laing observes : " In the characters of great men given iu the sagas wo alwa^r-find eljquence, ready. 138 The Icelandic Discoverers of Ameiiica ; . agreeable speaking, a good voice, a quick apprehension, a ready delivery, and winning manners, reckoned the highest qualities of a popular king or eminent chief. His talent as a pubUc speaker is never omitted." And Prof. R. B. Anderson, too, exclaims : " Yes ; the Norsemen were truly a great people ! Their spirit found its way into the Magna Charta of England and into the Declaration of Independence in America. The spirit of the Vikings still survives in the bosoms of Englishmen, Americans, and Norsemen, extending their commerce, taking bold positions against tyranny, and producing wonderful internal improvements in these countries." In the Norsemen one continually has the gratifying surprise of hearing of a race who, in all the main political and social questions, were right in themselves, without the need of reform or agitation. That the people, in Scandinavia, had a voice ^ public aflfairs, is best proven by the fact that the people America and England are free, at least comparatively so, in a political respect. Laing says of this : " Our civil, religious, and political rights, — the principles, spirit, and forms of legislation through which they work in our social union, are the legitimate offspring of the Things of the Noithnien, not of the Wittenage- moth of the Anglo-Saxons — of the independent Norse Viking, not of the abject Saxon monk." But nothing gives such conclusive evidence that our present st'ate of civilization is not the outgrowth of a steady progressive development from the earliest ages, but is the feeble revival of a civilization, ripe, far advanced, brilliant, that was destroyed at the beginning of the Middle Ages, — as the position that woman held in the North. " In pagandom," writes August Strindberg, "woman seems almost to have been man's equal. . . . Woman was treated by man with such respect and acted with such self- feeling and freedom, that any such thing in our enlightened times would be considered unheard-of." Ample corroboration p£ this is found in whatever author one turns to. MsUet OR, Honour to whom Honour is Due. 139 it re )f it affirms : " We find the reverse of all this " (the general condi- tion) "among the Northern nations, who did not so much con- sider the other sex as made for their pleasure, as to be their equals and companions, whose esteem, {is valuable as theii other favours, could only be obtained by constunt attentions, by generous . irvices, and by a proper exertion of virtue and courage. I conceive that this will at first sight be deemed a paradox, and that it will not be an easy matter to reconcile a manner of thinking which supposes so much delicacy, with the rough, unpolished character of this people. Yet I believe the observation is so well grounded that one may venture to assert that it is this same people who have contributed to diffuse through all Europe that spirit of equity of moderation and generosity shown by the stronger to the weaker sex, which is at this day the distinguishing characteristic of European manners ; nay, that we even owe to them that spin u of gallantry which was 80 little known to the Greeks and Bomans, how polite soever in other respects." Two things the Norsemen seemed to have understood by instinct — namely, that woman was naturally man's equal, and that the other life was, equally in conformity with nature, a continuation of this, under the same general conditions, aside from a change of physique. Complete sanity, on these two fun- damental points, enabled them to lead the sensible life that has never been led since by any nation of Europe, and never will be, until some remedy is found for Christian hallucinations, which see in the other life unspeakable terrors, the most monstrous unrealities, and in the other sex (the true half of the nation as well as the man) a creature little less than an idiot and imbecile. But again it may be asked, how was this " spirit of equity," the political freedom, good laws, and all the other beneficiul things in the Norsemen's possession, to be diffused through all Europe, save by the Viking expeditions that have been so much execrated 1 Were the monkish, or monk-ridden, hiiwt a- r. ,1 n 140 The Icelandic Discoverers of America; inhabitants everywhere so docile, so eager for Northern know- ledge and enlightenment, that the Norse leaders, splendid orators that they were, could have instilled it all into them through public speaking 1 Was it their moral duty to go into the land of the enemy as lecturers on reform topics, aud to be slaughtered piecemeal by those fiends who knew nothing well but the action of fire on human flesh, or the use of the dagger 1 Was it possible in those days, and with such a population as the Church had reared, to effect the conquest of thought and repub- licanism otherwise than through the conquest of the sword ? And if this had not been effected, what would the consequences have betn to posterity 1 ,; .r • , , . . ' ..u < • But whatever brave leaders and statesmen did, the women of the North were with them, to encourage and stimulate. One ; gets a new idea of the sex by reading about them. One realizes ■ clearly, by these words of Holmborg's, that no feeble or silly Woman could share the thoughts of such men: " We ought above all to draw attention to the fact that there was with these an unquenchable desire for knowledge, a striving for wisdom . aud a respect for knowledge, which perhaps does not stand , forth so plainly in our enlightened time." And this is what he ; says about their treatment of woman : " With no ancient people . has respect for woman been higher, her true value more appre- ; ciated, and her rights more extended than with our forefathers. She was, it is true, not the idol, for which one during the age of chivalry kindled incense and brought home the sacrifice of even .> his human worth — a position which is always unworthy of , woman, as founded only on outer charms, aud as the step from idol to doll is only a hair's breadth. Still less was she, as with many other races of antiquity, man's passive slave, only existing .; for his pleasure, or doomed for his comfort to drag forth a joy* • less and arduous life. The Northern woman's place was right between these two extremes, and such as ought to accrue to lier M an important part of the communiiy. She was, as womiu / OR, Honour t6 Whom Honour is t)vt. 141 •Iways ought to be, ni'in's eqval, neither more nor leas, and this especially when she became a wife. Indeed we do not say too much, if we to woman in pagan tin.>.ii, grant almost the same ri<,'hts as those she now enjoys, with the only diflTerence that the general respect for her sex was really greater than that paid to it in our time." It must be remembered that these noble words are from the pen of a modem Swede, one of a race who have always accorded woman her due rank. Ha continues : " Of such respect, such freedom, the Northern woman of antiquity was well deserving for her innate high-mindedness. Constantly we find her animated by the same idea as man, by that of free- dom, glory, and love of country." = - -• '* ; ; > n/i 't> ■^ ^ Pigott cites the Sagor for confirmation of the many points of excellence with the Norsemen, this included : " If we consult the Icelandic sagas, many of which are faithful and unpretend- ing pictures of the times in which they were written, we shall find that the Scandinavians were by no means unacquainted with the comforts and even the luxuries of life ; that they were skilful mechanics ; held music and poetry in the highest esteem j have some claim to the invention of oil-painting, and, above all, in their relations with the weaker sex, showed a degree of refinement and generosity which we may look for in vain amongst the Greeks and Romans in their highest civiliza- tion." There is still another point, not a reform brought about by desperate efforts, through socialism, philanthropy, new financial theories, or the like, but the natural result of wise and good legislation, that has not bee., mentioned as yet, and that is, the absence of poverty in the North ! Mallet speaks of it as a very remarkable feature of Norse government, and indeed it is ! He says : '* That the leading men of this republic (Ice- land) should have framed a code of laws, which, whatever may be tlieir defects, secured at least an ample provision for the poorest members of the community, and suffered no one to ^%,'' 'it, ' «... •r. 142 The Icelandic Discoverers of America; peiish from starvation, are facts which will always render Ice- land peculiarly interesting to all who make human nature — or the development of humanity on earth, in its multifarious and ev^r-varying aspects — the object of their special attention." But now we must turn abruptly from this too fascinating contemplation of Norse antiquity, and trace the contrast in religious action, during the Eeformation, between the Northern nations and Spain. Bishop Percy, in his preface to Mallet's work, calls attention to the absence of secrecy in the religious ceremonies or teachings of the ancient Scandinavians : ** But what particularly distinguishes the Celtic institutions from those of the Teutonic nations, is that remarkable air of secrecy and mystery with which the Druids concealed their doctrines from the laity; forbidding that they should ever be com- mitted to writing, and, upon that account, not having so much as an alphabet of their own. In this the institutions of Odin and the Scalds were the very reverse. No barbarous people were so addicted to writing, as appears from the innumer- . able quantity of Runic inscriptions scattered all over the north ; no barbarous people ever held letters in higher reve- rence, ascribing the invention of them to their chief deity, and attributing to the letters themselves supernatural virtues. Nor is there the least room to believe that au}'^ of their doc- trines were locked up or concealed from any part of the com- munity. On the contrary, their mythology is for ever displayed in all the songs of their Scalds, just as that of the Greeks and Romans is in the odes of Pindar and Horace. There never existed any institution in which there appears less of reserve and mystery than in that of the vScandinavian people." It is superfluous to more than allude to the systematic mystery and secrecy of the Christian Church, its Bible, creed, ministration, and all connected with it ; I will merely quote what Llorente says about the working of its characteristic iustitutioii, the Inquisition: "Secrecy, the foe of truth and ve ntic k Ue tie id OR, Honour to whom Honour is Dufi. 143 justice, was the soul of the tribunal of the Inquisition ; it gave to it new life and vigour, sustained and strengthened its arbitrary power, and so emboldened it, that it had the hardihood to arrest the highest and noblest in the land, and enabled it to deceive, by concealing facts, popes, kings, viceroys, and all in- vested with authority by their sovereign." The "'holy ofl&ce" ■was in full operation when Cohimbus went to Spain, and the notorious Torqueraada was inquisitor-general ; it continued, under imperial support, through several dynasties, but it is our purpose now to consider its work at the time the Reformation was taking firm root in Sweden. The Spaniards would have been less than human if Luther's doutrines had not crept into their minds, too; but the Pope was piejjared for this coniingency j according to Llorente, " in 1521, the Pope wrote to the governors of the provinces in Castile, during the absence of Charles V., re- commending them to prevent the introduction of the works of Luther into the kingdom; and Cardinal A Irian, in the same year, ordered the inquisitors to seize all books of that nature: this order was repeated in 1523," T niperor sliowed him- self no less zealo\is, for "he commissioiisd the University of Louvain to form a list of dani,'erous books, an*! in 1539 he obtained a bull of approbation from the Poj)e. The index was published in 1546 by the University in all the states of Flanders, six years after a decree had been issued to i)rohibit lie writings of Luther from being read or bought on pain of de. li." Li 1529, King Gustaf L proclaimed Lutheranism the State- religion of Sweden, and soon after deprived the bi&hcps of their name and dignity, prohibited the invoking of saints, i ' use of holy water, pilgrimages, in short cleared all the liomisli mummery out of the kiugdum ! The Popo and his successors lost their power for ever in the North I From Spain, however, they extended it to America, under royal protection as usual. '*Tho Spanish possessions in the New World," to quote Arthur Helps, '* occupied au immense I 144 'Tllfi tCET,ANDIC t3lSC0VEkERS OF AMEktCA; extent of territory, namely from 40° 43', south latitude, to 37** 48' north latitude, the distances from the Equator, on each side, being nearly the same. Humboldt has observed that the Spanish territory in the New "World was not only equal in length to the whole of Africa, but was also of much greater width than the empire of Russia." Accordingly, in this vast dominion Spanish rigour was exercised. The following state- ments are Llorente's : " Charles V. and Philip II. had regu- lated the circulation of books in their American states. In 1543 the viceroys and other authorities were commanded to prevent the introduction or printing of tales or romances. In 1550, a new decree obliged the tribunal of the commerce of Seville, to register all the books destined for the colonies, to certify that they were not prohibited. In 1556, the Govern- ment commanded that no work relating to the affairs of America should be published without a permission from the Council of the Indies, and that those already printed should not be sold unless they were examined and approved, which obliged all those who possessed any to submit them to the council. The officers of the customs in America were also obliged to seize all the prohibited books which might be im- ported, and remit them to the archbishops and bishops, who, in this case, possessed the same powers as the inquisitors of Spain. Lastly, Philip II., in 1560, decreed new measures, Rud the surveillance was afterwa Is as strictly observed in the colonies of the New "^oild as in the peninsula. In the year 1558 the terrible law of Philip II. was published, which decreed the punishm nts of death and confiscation for all those who should sell, buy, keep, or read the books prohibited by the holy office ; and to insure the execution of this sanguinary law, the index was printed, that the people might not allege ignorance in their defence." Thus, simultaneous with the deliverance of Sweden from the power of Borne and the consequent infliction of the Inquisi- OR, Honour to whom Honour is Due. 145 tion there, too, had the ruling monarch shown any weakness or irresolution, this fatal sway was extended over a teriitory "equal in length to the whole of Africa, and of much gi eater width than the empire of Russia," in fact, over all that was then known as the New World. Freedom was born again in the North, tyranny forged new fetters in the South ! Yes, Americans, in considering this most frightful of all subjects, must be brought to the harrowing conviction, fraught with the Qoepept humiliation, that the worst atrocities of the Spanish Inquisition have been perpetrated on American soil, and that these were the results of the discovery by Columbu.«<, theBe the scenes enacted in the Spanish colonies ! Voltaire has remarked that "an Asiatic, arriving at Madrid on the day. of an auto-da-fe^ would doubt whether it were a festival, re- ligious celebration, sacrifice, or massacre ; — it is all of them." The writer of the preface, or advertisement, to Llorente's book, says: "All the records of the fantastic cruelties of the heathen world do not afford so appalling a picture of human weakness and depravity as the authentic and genuine docunu'iits of the laws and proceedings of this Holy Office, which ]>ro- feased to act under the influence of the doctrines of the Re- deemer of the World!" And the jurisdiction of this Holy OflB^.e comprised America ! To revert again to the same authority, Lloronte : "In l."70 Philip II. appointe I an Iiiquisition in Mexico, and in 1 57 1 established three tribunals for all America ; one at Lima, one in Mexico, and the (jther at CarLhagena, assigning to each the extent of territory which they were to jiossess, and subjiM ting them to the authority of the inquisitor-: ■''<'■: ' ■ i-''' ':■'■■''. ■'■. ' ':'<'' - <,■..">-' .' .♦ « . '4 ■•,[■■' ' ' I'l' '■.''' ■ h: t 'xiit^''* •> i.'f'^'iii ji.'iHj! ' ^,-, ■ ■',.';.■ , ■: , f-J t \i ■ ; i ; .< .', . , {f „ , "' - • ■''[.''■■'■■■'' ■'';'" ,Hn'f<,'-''i i aS ■• •I - ■ \ i .i ■fj, \v J i ' ' ^ ;-.'/•■> '■:Ji'lVV'<' •■!•«-' i''' ■ 'i.;:j.,-J .--I'l.'./ '. ■■: ■' '■■ - V, * '■* . * . ^ f <',*:• ' .. .' ■"■"'■ ■••■i"y' ; {^'1C.\ •v-> ,••- ;/..,,) uix.''{.' • '' .'■' !. i : • / » /^.v. „ \ ■■';l' •K , , . M "'•.',■''' i •■* -'l ■ :>•/ .' ■ ; ; , •' ,',' ■■?•:■ :,•»•, V ■i-^y ii i idi'" -te'iviivr''''. ••• ; '1.0 .■ /■■• 5'i ., ■ (■'•■' .M t-l'^1 <,iV-- • !;, 'A *■-'''■■' 1.11 . . 1 . , OR, Honour to whom Honour is Due. 147 ■ Klii^iiSi) Mfiii/ .-fei;/ /iTio'^'C i fT'??'.|..vi'..;iii y' .,>;;. .(a. CHAPTER Vm. THB NOBSB DISOOVERBRS AND COLUMBUS CONTRASTED. Christopher Columbus, " the immortal discoverer of America,** as D. Gio. Batista Spotomo calls him, and " that great man to whom we are indebted for the New World," was the true son of his age and his double nationality, Italian-Spanish. His over-mastering desire to discover a new world was not to get away himself from the fetid air of Spain and to secure a refuge, at a safe distance from Spain, for hundreds of thousands of victims of religious persecution, but to gain new territory fop the extension of the Gospel and that indispensable appendage of the faith, the Inquisition. We never see in any book treating of him, or that period, that he was shocked at any of the public doings in Spain, or that he was filled with horror at the cruelties that were perpetrated there under his very eyes. A man of a different mould would rather have been burnt at the stake than have been the means of carrying this foul system across the ocean, of running the remotest risk of transplanting it, but Columbus' dearest wish was to become the humble instrument, in the hands of the Lord, of briuLjing this added glory to the Church and to his sovereigns ! Barry, the Roman Catholic author referred to in fornier chnpters of this book, lamt^nts that *' prejudice, enmity, h(»stility against the Catholic Cliurch, have the incredible privilege of tj* C! ti I $6 The Icelandic Discoverers of America; use our weapons much against them.' Greeted by peaceable Indians, Columbus orders the ship's gun fired in the midst, in order * to abate their pride and make them not contemn the Christians.* " He says also, as the narrative has already told us, that "all the Norse leaders, Bjarne Herjulfson, Leif and Thorvald Ericson, Karlsefne, Bjarne Grimolfson, worked fop the common good, and were as much loved and respected by their followers as Columbus was hated and despised by his." Goodrich also draws a just comparison in regard to the extent of exploration of each party, and says : " If the discovery by Columbus in 1492 of the islands of San Salvador and San Domingo was the discovery of the continent of America, then the discovery and permanent colonization of Iceland and Green- land, six hundred years before by the Scandinavians, was also the discovery of that continent ; the portion of mainland coasted by Columbus was avowedly but small, and he professed to be in Asia. The Northmen, on the contrary, visited all the eastern coast of America, from the extreme north to Florida, formed settlements, and for centuries carried on commerce with the products of what are now the mttst civilized, populous and enlightened portions of America ; and the American might well feel relief and pride at the knowledge that the first of his race to touch upon his native shores were the heroic Norsemen — ' Kings of the main, their leaders brave, " ' Their barks the dragons of the wave.'" Toulmin Smith, in his " Discovery of America by the North- men," argues each point, and seems to have chosen the dialogue form for his book in order to debate every inch of ground with the defenders of Columbus. He dissects Bancroft's entire state- ment relative to both in the most scathing way. His summing up is this : " Columbus was not the discoverer of America ; he was not the first visitant to her shores ; his act was not so perilous, or complete, or adventurous a one as the oft-repeated / OR, Honour to whom Honour is Due. 157 It I acts of the Northmen ; nor was his actual knowledge of the country in any degree so exact, while all his ideas concerning it were purely erroneous. . . . Shall the Northmen be deprived, then, of the well-deserved meed of honour and glory which is so justly due to them, for their bold and enterprising achieve- ments, for their often-repeated explorations, and for their early but accurate knowledge of these distant regions 1 " Happy for Columbus if he could be let off with a comparison with the discoverers and colonists, Bjarni, Leif, and Thorvald, but there is still another distinguished Norseman, whose bio- graphy and character belittle the ingloiious Italian fortune- hunter still more, and this man is Thorfinn Karlsefne. Illus- trious, influential, possessing immense wealth and a lineage so splendid as only to be equalled by his celebrated line of descendants, Karlsefne was a truly remarkable man, and him must the American people honour as their first worthy colonist. " Snorre, his son, was born in Vinland, a.d. 1007. From him, according to a genealogical table" (atfirms E. F. Slafter) •' introduced into * Antiquitates Americanse ' by Prof. Rafn, aro lineally descended a large number of distinguished Scandinavians. Among them we note the following : Snorre Sturleson, the celebrated historian, born 1178 ; Bertel Thorvaldson, the eminent sculptor, born 1770 ; Finn Magnusen, born 1781 j Birgin Thorlacius, professor in Copenhagen, born 1776 ; Grim Thorkelin, professor in Copenhagen and many others earlier in the line." In a note, in this edition of the Norse voyages, published by the Prince Society, it is stated that " it would appear that Karlsefne himself narrated originally the events that occurred on these voyages, and that only the more important portions were written out by the saganian ; that it was not written till a numerous race of distinguished men had descended from Karlsefne." " Thorfinn took to trading voyages," says the narrative, " and was thou^'ht m able seaman and merchant. . , . Que summer i 158 The Icelandic Discoverers of America ; Karlsefne fitted out his ship, and purposed a voyage to Vinland." And now follows an example of the lavish hospitality of the Norsemen, showing the grand scale upon which they exercised it: "Leif, on his side, showed them hospitality, and bade the crews of these two ships home, for the winter, to his own house at Brattahlid. This the merchants accepted and thanked hira. Then were their goods removed to Brattahlid; there was no want of large out-houses to keep the goods in, neither plenty of everything that was required, wherefore they were well satisfied in the winter. But towards Yule " — the Norse oul which the Church appropriated and converted into the Christian Christ- mas, a season of extreme festivity in the North, devoid of tedious religious ceremonies — " Leif began to be silent, and was less cheerful than he used to be. One time Karlsefne turned towards Leif and said : ' Hast thou any sorrow, Leif, my friend 1 People think to see that thou art less cheerful than thou wert wont to be ; thou hast entertained us with the greatest splendour, and we are bound to return it to thee with such services as we can command ; say now, what troubles thee ? ' Leif answered : * Ye are friendly and thankful, and I have no fear as concerns our intercourse, that ye will feel the want of attention ; but, on the other hand, I fear that when ye come elsewhere it will be said that ye have never passed a worse Yule than that which now approaches.* " With the aid of the resources on Thorfinn's two vessels, freely offered for his host's use, the joyful holidays could be duly kept, and Thorer having died, some time since, the occasion was rendered yet more festive by the wedding of Thorfinn and Gudrid, Thorer's widow. And notwithstanding the extensive explorations that had been m&de, "in Brattahlid," says the narrative, "began people to talk much about, that Vinland the Good should be explored." Columbus could not give up his time to exploration, in the strict sense of the word, for he was engaged in gold- hunting and pondering how to turn his discovery to speedy account. The Is [s r f OR, Honour to whom Honour is Due. 159 Noi-semon, as Goodrich clearly demonstrates, " were actuated by motives far different from those of Columbus ; they did not come in search of gold or slaves, but to gather by industry the natural products of the laTid, carrying on therewith a flourishing trade between the continent, Greenland, Iceland, and Norway." He adds his testimony also to the fact of the prevailing ignorance in Europe, by stating that '^ letters and learning flourished in Iceland when the rest of Europe was intellectually stagnant ; histories and annals are therefore copious." The Norsemen manifestly had a gift for navigating, exploring, and colonizing, while Columbus, better fitted for an ecclesiastical calling or for a crusader, and with mind distraught by visions of the holy sepulchre, which he was some time to recover, after he had found his gold-mine, proceeded laboriously and with infinite difficulty. What made the Norsemen such skilful and daring navigators it is superfluous to state, but as Laing very wittily observes : " Ferocity, ignorance, and courage will not bring men across the ocean." History does not relate to us for our malicious gratification what were Columbus' reflections, in Iceland, when reading of these Norse voyages, or rather he did not commit his bitter and envious thoughts to writing, but the anecdote Laing repeats about Charlemagne will serve very well to indicate what he must have felt at the bare mention of their bold doings, no doubt recounted to him with Icelandic enthusiasm and national pride. This is the story of the French prot^elyter : " Historians te us that when Charlemagne, in the ninth century, saw some piratical vessels of the Northmen cruising at a distance in the Mediterranean, to which they had for the first time found their way, that he turned away from the window and burst into tears. Was it the barbarism of these pirates, or their civilization, their comparative superiority in the art of navigation, and of all be- longing to it that moved him 1 None of the countries under hitt sway, none of the Christian populations of Europe in the seventh, eighth, or ninth centuries, had ships ar4 men capable of suoh • f*.^ Mil ;r I i6o The Icelandic Discoverers of America; voyage. The comparative state of shipbuilding and navigation, in two countries with sea-coasts, is a better test of their com- parative civiliziition and advance in all the useful arts than that of thoir church-building." / ■ '• • ' • i But this was the superiority of contemporaries ! What if Charlemagne with his over-sensitive self-love, had been trans- ferred to Columbus' age and been compelled to acknowledge, if even in his secret soul, the superior civilization, and the superiority in the art of navigation of a race of ferocious, bar- barous, Christian-hating pagans, who had lived half a millenary before 1 This would have been the refinement of suflFering to Columbus, if he had been intelligent enough to perceive it ; but he was not. A wise man, with some little knowledge of his own incapacity, would have forsworn navigation, after studying those documents in Iceland ; but Columbus persisted, missed the route and still persisted, and knew nothing of geography till the day of his death. It must also have annoyed Charlemagne excessively to know that democracy was carried to such an extent in the North, that every ambitious leader could have his own vessel 1 Laing calls attention to this, with the rest : " It is to be observed also that the ships of the Northmen in those ages did not belong to the king, or to the State, but to private adventurers and peasants, and were fitted out by them." If Columbus had read in the Sagor that " Bjami possessed his own ship," and that I.eif, when he made up his mind to start on a voyage of discovery, " bought the ship of him and engaged men for it,'' without any pother or delay, the recollection of these two little facts couhl not hav© sweetened his own fourteen years of waiting for funds, vessels, and royal patronage. It is no exaggeration for Wheaton to say of the men o| tii« North: " Their familiarity with the perils of the ocean, and with the diversified manners and customs of foreign Jaiuls, stamped tbftir national cbaiucter wuU bold and orify'iaal Icutures, which OR, Honour to whom Honour is Due. i6i distinguished them from every other people." But little did these men dream, with all their proud ambition, that the clasdo antiquity they created in the North would yet stand forth, one thousand years afienoardSi as the scene of extinct virtues and traits, of acts so bold and original, that no subsequent race has ever attempted to repeat them, and that have always been regarded as little short of fabulous ! Still, Columbus made a sufficiently good use of his time and opportunities to be able to return to Spain in the guise of a great discoverer and magnate, and in Las Casas' description of his reception at Barcelona, we are told that " a modest smile lighted up his features, showing that he enjoyed the state and glory in which he came." His situation, for all that, was precarious ; he had excited rather too much sordid expectation in a court and a land whose insatiate cry was ever gold, souls I gold, souls ! So one day, after his return to the New World, he wrote a letter to their majesties in Spain, from which a paragraph has already been quoted in this book ; even Irving disapproves of this letter and the suggestions it contains, and comments thus : " Among the many sound and salutary sugges- tions in this letter, there is one of a most pernicious tendency, written in that mistaken view of natural rights prevalent at the day, but fruitful of so much wrong and misery in the world. Considering that the greater the number of these cannibal pagans transferred to the Catholic soil of Spain, the greatvr would be the number of souls put in the way of salvation, he proposed to establish an exchange of them as slaves, against live stock, to be furnished by merchants to the colony. The ships to bring such stock were to be landed nowhere but at the island of Isabella, where the Carib captives would be ready for delivery. A duty was to be levied on each slave for the benefit of the royal revenue. In this way the coh ny would be furcished with all kinds of live stock free of expense ; the peaceful islands would be freed from warlike and inhuman neighbours; the ^r i62 The Icelandic Discoverers of America; royal treasury would be greatly enriched, and a vast number of Bouls would be snatched from perdition, and carried^ as it were, by main force to heaven." So much for the suggestion, the details of the plan ; but it did not stop at that; Irving goes on to say: " In his eagerness to produce immediate profit, and to indemnify the sovereigns for those expenses which bore hard upon the royal treasury, he sent, likewise, about five hundred Indian prisoners, who, he suggested, might be sold as slaves at Seville. It is painful to find the brilliant renown of Columbus sullied by so foul a stain, and the glory of his enterprises degraded by such flagrant violations of humanity." If Irving had taken the pains to read the narratives of the Norse voyages, and to ascertain the merits of the case, he would have turned his sympathies into a nobler channel, and spared himself the pain of being shocked at anything that Columbus said or did. With such a key to the character of the man as that yielded by the Iceland episode, in 1477, this based upon Columbus' anticipation of what he would obtain at Iceland, Irving would have realized that nothing could sully a character so uniformly bad and unprincipled as the one he made the subject of his biography. His wicked work was continued, for in 1496 Don Bartholomew Columbus sent three hundred slaves to Spain, from Hispaniola; in course of time Indian slavery was varied with African, and "in 1552," as stated in Arthur Helps' " Spanish Conquest in America," *' Philip the Second concluded a bargain for the grant of a monopoly to import 23,000 negroes into the Indies ; and so this trafl&c went on until the great asaiento of 1713, between the English and the Spanish Governments was concluded, respecting the importatioii of negroes into Spanish America. The number of negroes imported into America from the year 1617, when the trade was first permitted by Charles V., to 1807, the year in which the British Parliament passed, the act abolish- !• e OR, Honour to whom Honour is Due. 163 ing the slave-trade, cannot be estimated at less than five or six tnillions." .•'!*» ?v,;i:;.f.. ;:.)';t: '/ •'!; ' r» ': •■• ''vre* ■vvfi. The present ago, as little as the past, owes gratitude to Columbus; praise is not duo to him for anything that he did, while the blame is too heavy to be dealt adequately. Better than to waste valuable time in contemplating this deeply cul- pable and bigoted man, would be to con ign both him and the i)"i!«er;iblo country that fostered his dishonest purposes, to a Bwift forgetfulness. We have that with which we can profitably occupy our thoughts: the deeds of our own indomitable ancestors! • : - • ■, . / '•,- < n Daniel Wilson, in his " Prehistoric Man," before adding the weight of his testimony also to the truth of the Norse discovery of America, aptly cites these words of the great Niebuhr: " He who calls what has vanished back into being enjoys a bliss like that of creating." This is the glad duty of the American Republic, to call the grand Scandinavian antiquity back into being, and to continue the progress started so nobly in the pagan North, as if there had been no intermission, caused by the ''anti- naturalists " of Southern Europe, for one thousand years 1 Let us continue where they left off ; we shall not find much of value in the intervening ages ; we shall only see Spain's foul autogiaph scrawled on every fair nation in Europe, except the Northern ones, and on half the American continent ! The paragraph of Daniel Wilson's referred to is this: "From the appearance of the * Antiquitates Americanae,' accordingly, mny be dated the systematic resolve of American antiquaries and historians to find evidence of intercourse with the ancient world prior to that recent year of the fifteenth century in which the ocean revealed its great secret to Columbus. From the literary memorials of the Norsemen, thus brought to light, we glean sufficient evidence to place beyond doubt not only the discovery and colonization of Greenland, by Eric the Red — apparently in the year 985 — but also the exploration of more M 2 II i L if r I i64 The Icelandic Discoverers of America; southern landt^, some of which, we can scarcely doubt, must have formed part of the American continent. Of the authenticity of the manuscripts from whence these narratives are derived there is not the slightest room for question." This chapter would not be complete without the words of Hubert Howe Bancroft on this all-important question: "Mr. B. F. de Costa, in a carefully studied monograph on the subject, assures us that there can be no doubt as to their authenticity, and I am strongly inclined to agree with him. It is true that no less eminent authors than George Bancroft and Washington Irving have expressed opinions in opposition to De Costa's views, but it must be remembered that neither of these dis- tinguished gentlemen made a ver' ro found study of the Ice- landic Sagas, indeed Irving directly .ates that he ' has not had the means of tracing this story to its original sources ;' nor must we forget that neither the author of the ' Life of Columbus,' nor he of the * History of the Colonization of the United States,' could be expected to willingly strip the laurels from the brow of his familiar hero, Christopher Columbus, and concede the honour of the * first discovery ' to the Northern sea-kings, whoso exploits are so vaguely recorded." It is the office of the American people, as a nation, to strip these laurels from the brow of a man made great by a glory he stole 1 Ok, Honour to whom Honour is Due. 165 f n\- 1: : I ..■ ■.,1,1 i; J ;;. :i .-■' '.^i' a I ■ .;^... :.;>.< I CHAPTER IX. THB BBNBPIOIAL RESULTS TO THE PRESENT AQB AND POSTBniTT OP ATTRIBUTING THIS MOMENTOUS DISCOVERY TO THE TRUE ' PERSONS. Had the vast literature of Iceland preserved in the retentive and faithful memories of its scalds and sagamen, the annals of what was in many respects an ideal civilization, describing? the life of a race mentaUy and physically sound, whose thoughts, words and acta were strong and vigorous — had this literature existed in a written or printed form, in any tangible form, at the introduction of Christianity in the North, it would un- doubtedly have shared the fate of the pagan literature of other countries. The destruction of immense quantities of the works of Grecian and Eoman anti-Christian writers signalized the impo- sition of this faith in the Roman empire, and the destruction of temples and images, of all relics of the Odin and Thor worship in Scandinavia, is a sufficient indication of the fate that wouM have befallen books and manuscripts, had there been any for the priests and bishops to lay hands on. But, to the supreme good fortune of future generations, this was preserved where the Christian deseciators could not enter, it was safely guarded behind spiritual bolts and bars, in the faithful and reverent minds of the people, and long after, not much before Lhf seven- teenth century, when the nations of Europe, after the first decisive revolt represented in the Reformation, had begun to lecover from the asphyxia into which the unnatural and pre* li 1 66 The Icelandic Discoverrrs of America; pcxsterous doctrines of the Christian religion had thrown them, Icelandic history was made known to them, the revelation of a system of ethics, of a moral cod'*, of political and social regu- lations and customs so unlike those which Christian Europe had adopted and lived after, that it could not at first produce anything but astonishment and very partial understanding. Had any one realized then that this history of an enlightened past threatened the existence of the unenlightened condition in which the modem world was sunk, there would have been an effort made to suppress these writings as soon as they appeared. As it was, the public, and the guardians of the public weal, wore too enervated to realize the moral force contained in the Sagas, and too secure in the belief that the Christian religion would endure for all time, and was really impervious to assault, :tv„>. *?mI7/ to take any precautions. . Although the reader has again and again been asked to con- sider the great value and importance of this ancient literature, there are still some opinions in regard to it that must not be overlooked. Beamish, referring to Iceland, has said: "There the unerring memories of the scalds and sagamen were the depositories of past events, which, handed down from age to age, in one unbroken lino of historical tradition, were committed to writing on the introduction of Christianity (a.d. 1000), and now come before us with an internal evidence of their truth which places them among the highest order of historic records." In an address before the Historical Society of Rhode Island on the visits of the Northmen to that state, Alexander Farnum uttered words that will have much weight with Americans: " At first sight it seems a remarkable circumstance that nine centuries ago, when the literature of continental Europe presents so little of value or interest, we should find on the remote, in- hospitable shores of Iceland a body of men who carefully studied the past and closely observed the present, and whose recoUections when committed to record on the introduction of OR, Honour to whom Honour is Due. 167 Christianity and the art of writing became at once an historical literature such as hardly any contemporary nation of Europe could rival'* William Cullen Bryant says: "These sagas were reduced to writing by diligent and studious men ; inestimable treasures laid up for the use of future historians." But the noblest tribute of all is that from Professor W. Fiske, called by Samuel Kneeland "the most learned cultivator of these Northern languages in this country :" " It (the old Tcelaudio literature) deserves the careful study of every student of letters. For the English-speaking races, especially, there is nowhere, so near home, a field promising to the scholar so rich a harvest. Tiio few translations, or attempted translations, which are to be found in English, give merely a faint idea of the treasures of antique wisdom and sublime poetry which exist in the Eddie lays, or of the quaint simplicity, dramatic action, and striking re ilism which characterize the historical sagas." To strengthen the testimony still more, I cite B. F. De Costa: " Yet while other nations were without a literature, the intellect of Iceland was in active exorcise, and works were produced like the Eddas and Heimskringla, works, which, being inspired by a lofty genius, will rank with the writings of Homer ar.d Herodotus." The Howitts even assert that "the Icelandic poems have no parallel in all the treasures of ancient literature; they are the expressions of the souls of poets existing in the primeval and uneffeminated earth. Tiie Edda is a structure of that grandeur and importance, that it deserves to be far better known to us than it is. The spirit in it is sublime and colossal." In the sentence, " they are the expressions of the souls of poets existing in the primeval and unejjeminated earth,^' the pith of the whole matter is reached. The sagas, whether poetical or prose, do indeed relate of a life diametrically opposite from that of which we are now cognisant ; of an earth which some cause has essentially changed. These poets, and all who formed the chief characters in the Northern epics, had a different Sr :t It, im •*\ i68 The Icelandic Discoverers of America; ideal from that of the rest of Europe ; their standard was not the idealization of suffering, but the conquest of suffering, that is, of all the weakness, sickliness, depravity, moral feebleness and evil of all kinds that produce it ; all this the pagans of the North crashed out as pertinaciously as it was engendered by the Christian communities in which suffering was the only ideal. The Norsemen believed that human nature was good, capable of whatever the individual in his highest pride might will ; the Eomanists believed that human nature was evil, and that the will was the worst snare ; to one class the earth was a perfectly satisfactory field of activity, which could be rendered all that man could wish, to the other a den of misery, hopeless from the beginning. The value of this literature, this history of the North, which from all accounts seems to be the only reliable history we have, is that it describes, with that graphic force yielded by truth alone, a state of society founded on natural principles. At this late hour the people of the nineteenth century are beginning to yield some slight reverence to nature, and depute science to tell them what nature is. What little has b^en learned regarding the physical laws has scarcely extended as yet to the domain of moral and spiritual laws ; an entrance has been forced to the one, but the Church, as of old, forbids access to the other. The race moulded and fashioned by the Bible, who are aching in every limb fr'">m the cramp it has caused, have the inesti- mable privilege of reading of a race who had no Bible to warp them out of all human shape, and who were as they were created to be. The conclusion is unavoidable that the people of the North were so totally unlike any other nation because they were wholly untinctured with Christianity ; thence their strength of character, their intrepidity, thtur marked indi- viduality, tbo large results consequent upon their every act. Mr, Bryant remarks, half humorously: "The Northmen had a genius for discovering new countries by accident," and they OR. Honour to whom Honour is Due. 169 really did accomplish more, even in other directions, by mere chance, than others accomplished by the most painful efforts, proving Emerson's words that "it is as easy for the strong n)iin to be strong, as for the weak to be weak." The nature that they had never defied or insulted was their constant ally. But the two elements could not live conjoined in Europe ; one or the other had to go uncler. Christianity, the prostitu- tion of nature, won the victory over the natural life, and the North, too, finally accepted the teachings that pronounce man vile. From that hour the darkness settled swiftly over all Europe and the Middle Ages chronicled the complete sv.ay of the Church. The Scandinavian nations had at la&D been re- deemed from barbarism. To this triumph of the Church we are told that we are to ascribe the blessings of modem civiliza- tion ; indeed this is the prevailing theory. It is this crazy theory which the Icelandic history, treasured up for this }»re- sent age, is to dispel, its province being to rectify an error in which the European race have lived for eighteen hundred years and to which they still stubbornly cling. The extinction of Northern paganism, so-called, but more properly of Nortliern irreligion, ought to have demonstrated clearly that under the shadow of Christianity nothing else could live; it athliates with nothing else, and never can. Felix Oswald shows very forcibly this lack of homogeneity between Christianity and that which is alleged to be insejiar- able from it : " But in examining the claims of these theorists," he says, "the impartial inquirer cannot overlook the following objections: 1. That the rise of tlie Cliristian faith coincides with the sunset of the great South-European civilization ; 2. That the zenith of its power coincides with the midnight of mediaival barbarism ; 3. That the decline of its influence coincides with the sunrise of a North-European civilization j 4. That all the principal victories of Freedom and Science have been achieved in spite of the Church, in spite of her utmoat 170 The Icelandic Discoverers of America; efforts to thwart or diminish their triumph, that only in conse- jjuence of the futility of these efforts the heresies of one age have become the truisms of the next, so that Christianity has always marched in the rear of civilization ; 5. That the exponents of the Christian dogmas persist in their hostility to the progress of a reform which they recognize only by condescending to share the fruits of its former victories ; 6. That the worst enemies of political and intellectual liberty were firm believers in the dogmas of the Now Testament, while the direct or indirect re- pudiation of those dogmas has been the fundamental tenet of nearly every great thinker, scholar or statesmen, till the degree of Protestantism has become the chief test of intellectual sanity; 7. That among the contemporary nations of the Chris- tian world, the most sceptical are the most civilized, while the most orthodox are the most backward in freedom, industry and general intelligence." These are objections which Christian believers do not attempt to explain away ; their only strength lies in ignoring facts and in maintaining their assertions in the face of truth. If we look back across the black chasm of the Middle Ages, we see an uncontaminated soil, up there in the North, on which were no prisons, brothels, houses of correction, churches, charitable institutions or court-hoases ; and in Iceland, where the brightness concentrated, a state of society in which free- dom, happiness and prosperity were not postponed till the millennium. How was it possible for Iceland to preserve the proudest national position on record for four hundred years, to beuomo the model of a republic, and almost the sole intellec- tual repository in Europe 1 How was it possible for this remote and desolate island to conserve so much moral force, so much of the essence of its own transcendent power and genius, as to revive the flagging energies of the modern world and reveal to it the long road of its stupid and imbecile retrogression, every step of which muHt be retraced, until the stragglers get back to OR, Honour to whom Honour is Due. 171 first principles? And why cannot the American Republic, with its brilliant opportunities, reach the same moral and in- tellectual height that the Republic of Iceland attained one thousand years ago 1 The fault does not lie with Americans, with their Government or their Constitution, but in the in- sidious evil wrought by the Christian emissaries in their midst. If they had made th*; whole structure of S'xdety secular, as well as their Consti'^ution, reduced Sunday to the level of other days, the Bible to the level of other books, churches and cathedrals to the level of other buildings, xmconsecrated, and allowed to be used only for useful purposes, priests and clergy- men to the level of other men, nay, below that, to the level of idlers and beneficiaries, who, pursuing no useful calling, live on the community and impoverish it, the nation would have made enormous progrosb, and history could again have recorded the almost fabulous deeds of indomitable and grandly ambitious men ! As it is, all the vices and abominations of Europe have Ix^en transplanted there ; in American cities are to be seen the pomp and mummery of cathedral service, the squalor of the worst poverty, the brazen infamy of the lowest crime and de- pravity, just as in Europe. Is it because the Constitution of the United States has germinated the same evils as Russian, or Spanish, or Gern:an, or English monarchy? Is it because " human nature is the same, all over the world," as those wh<' despise it are fond of saying 1 Or is it because the Church germinates the same evils everywhere, under a republic or under a monarchy, becausi; the Church produces a certain species of huiiuui nature, whirh chokes out all others, and thus gives a certain show of truth to the trite saying that human nature is the same, all over the world, for the poophi of the United States have given the Christian idolaters full freedom to carry on their work. The Christian nature is undoubtedly the same all over the world : hypocritical, canting, secretive, avaricious, deeply designing and Machiavellian ; each leader makes a tool J 172 The Icelandic Discoverers of America; , and dupe of his followers ; congregations do their priest's or •• minister's bidding, and the whole society is permeated with their • spirit and purpose. "We do not know what human nature , is ; we have not seen it j we have only seen the regeneration ; effected by the Church. We can read about it, however, in . the old Norse sagas, and in some blessed hour this will rouse the desire in all who read to become human and natural again, to shake off this palsying superstition that has benumbed heart and mind for so many ages. Listening to the twaddle of the priests and Bible interpreters, we had almost forgotten that we possessed any capabilities akin to those of the Icelandic re- publicans of the olden time. When will it become possible for Americans to do away with church-taxation, with religious holidays and fasts, with penal servitude, with poverty, with prostitution, with unhappy marriages, with the life-long misery of nine-tenths of those born to the earth 1 Hospitality, but one of the many virtues of the Norsemen, in and of itself did much to prevent poverty and at all events prevented any one from dying of starvation. But hospitality, in the broad sense understood by the Norse- men, is despised by their English and American descendants, in fact by all civilized nations. In speaking of the hospitality everywhere shown by the natives of the islands he visited to X-oiurabus, Irving observes : "The untutored savage, in almost every part of the world, scorns to make a traffic of hospitality." This traffic, together with the slave-traffic, the woman- traffic, the soul-traffic, was introduced by Christianity ; every- thing must be bought and paid for, from bread to absolution. Human beings had no rights ; whatever blessings tliey enjoyed were by grace ; food and shelter wore costly luxuries, to be earned, never to be given. If a little hungry boy steals a loaf of bread, Christian England sends him to gaol and con- demns him to a month of hard labour. Famishing adults, in Jwurope or America, can only get food on credit if their 01^, ttONOttR TO WHOM ttONOWR IS DtiE. 1^3 promise to pay is good. In Iceland, even at the present day, there is said to be only one prison, a good, strong one, but with no one in it. There are no inns, and hospitality is the custom. But the other nations allow the Icelanders to starve, in case of famine. Samuel Kneeland, in his exceedingly interesting ^look, " An American in Iceland," describing the visit of ;. party of Americans to this famous island at the time of the Millennial celebration, says that there is a remarkable revival of the old Icelandic literar^ spirit in the present century, as exhibited by their poets, historians, linguists and journalists. *' The present mental cultivation of the people," he affirms, " is very high. . . . The common people are well acquainted with their own and other national histories, ancient and modern ; they know all about the early discovery of America by the Northmen, five centuries before Columbus, while very few of us, until recently, knew any more of Iceland than we did of the South Pole, or the wilds of Africa." After bestowing many encomiums upon these proud, in- dependent people, who he declares are "born republicans," he says : *' And now I trust that the reader will admit that Iceland was justified in proclaiming to thu nations the celebra- tion of her one thousandth anniversary ; that she deserves the admiration of the civilized world for what she has done for liberty, the advance of knowledge, and the preservation of historic records, at a time when the rest of Europe was in dft^Vness ; and especially that she has proved that man is superior to his surroundings, and that hardship, oppression and poverty can neither stifle the aspirations for liberty, nor degrade a poetic and heroic race." ** Hardship, oppression and poverty " have been the more modern experience of Iceland, coming with the Christian dis- pensation. It was not poor emigrants tliat first sought her shores, nor those belonging to the common people. A bleak la ■ ;i.t it 174 The Icelandic Discoverers of America; an.l sterile land could never induce what Christianity and sub- jection to the throne of Norway induced almost immediately. In Pigott's mention of this fact that in 1262 Iceland was united to the crown of Norway, the pregnant sentence follows, already quoted : " But all intei-est hi public affairs thence- forth died away, and no Sagas were written, because there was nothing to write about." This was the case all over Europe ; there was really nothing to write about until the " revival of letters " in the seventeenth centary. " In Europe generally," as Buckle states, " the seventeenth century was distinguished by the rise of a secular literature in which ecclesiastical theories were disregarded." By a ludicrous coincidence, remarked upon by several Swedish authors, St. Birgitta was the first ptrson to make Sweden known, in modern times, and Gfustaf Vasa, the second. The worthy woman mercifully freed Sweden from her presence and went to Rome, to seek a broader field of activity ; while Gustaf Yasa obliterated her work, in Vadstena, and in Sweden generally, and cleared the land thenceforth of all saints. But previous to this, all three of the Scandinavian nations, as well as Iceland, had sunk into a decline ; there had been five hundred years of Roman delirium ; pageants, pilgrimages, baptismal rites, miracles, saint- worship, throughout the North, but in a somewhat modified form : religious zeal and fanaticism could never run quite to the same excess there as in Southern Europe, but yet Gustaf Vasa rose in opposition none too soon. As it was, silly, superstitious legends superseded the Sagas, and slinking, black-gowned monks trod Norse soil. The splendid realities which only began to pale toward the year 1000, had become fabulous things of the past, bearing so little resem- blance to existing conditions, that they were even more dis- credited then than now. Only in thid present decade is there sufficient understanding, in a few chosen minds, to appreciate properly the ancient life of the North, and sulBficient courage to dare to state to the world the cause of the long blight and tl sa' OR, Honour to whom Honour is Due. 175 the remedy provided in the knowledge Iceland so generously yields. Were it not for the recuperative power of nature, always savouring of the miraculous, there would bo little hope of the recovery of the human race from eighteen hundred years of Christianity. As Dr. Oswald says, and his words cannot be too often repeated : *' The night of the Middle Ages was not the natural blindness of unenlightened barbarians, but an unnatural darkness, maintained by an elaborate system of spiritual des- potism, and in spite of the fierce struggles of many light-loving nations." To this is due our mixed ideas of right and wrong, our confusion when we are forced to any moral step, our de- pendence on. authorities, our vacillation, our utter lack of self- reliance. Pride is not in a man's own conscious sense of worth, of honour, of bravery, but in externals ; money is his glory and defence. He cannot trust himself, nor, from his knowledge of himself, is he inclined to trust or love others. What reason has he to suppose them any better than himself 1 Policy rules him, why should it not rule them 1 He bus his master, and he knows it ; the Church owns him ; with the little remaining intelli- gence he possesses he knows that the Church owns all, except the unbelievers, and these are dangerous company. Even if the truth is with these persons, which he is not quite clear- headed enough to decide — and after all is there any such thing as truth 1 — he is not willing to relinquish the benefits the Church doles out to him fw the ^ake of any fanatical notions of follovnng one's convictions Mai: Nordau. m ids '* C >nventional Modern Lie*,'' describes this mental state w«ll : **Iiie coodict betwoen the new view of life and the old institutioiw rages in tbn soul of ev ry cultured person, and each ami all long to fit* fr ;n Un-- innei tumult. It 1* now believed in many ..uarter-. tha there are two methods of regaining tht^ lost soul's-peace and Ui^t oue has a free choice between avaiiing oxw's aaU of 4B« or tfaiB olkab lUsoiute retro* .^fi tyS The Icelandic Discoverers of America gression one is called, resolute advance the other. Either one gives the forms that have lost their substance this substance back again, or one tears them down completely and gets them out of the way." He elaborates this idea very skilfully, de- monstrating that there is really no middle course : one must either revive niedisevalism, or sweep all mediaeval institutions from the earth. " These are the two methods," he concludes, " and the adherents of the first combat those of the other, and their desperate conflicts constitute the only contents of the political and mental life of the age." There is even more under this conflict than he indicates : it is the unceasing eflbrt of the Romish Church, even through the channels of Protestantism, to regain its lost dominion, to bring back the Middle Ages upon the earth. Whatever the dissatisfaction of the victims during those deplorable ages, the Church had no complaint to make, and paganism, the Reformation, science, rationalism, republi- canism, are all forms of one and the same apostasy, which it is the business of the Church to stop, once and for ever. It is plain that this apostasy has reached its worst stage in America, and that in the United States, which, in the framing of their Constitution, have given such a mortal afiront to the Church, the battle must be fought out. It is not to be supposed for an instant that Americans will repudiate science, rationalism, and republicanism ; they are already more liberal than they know ; the only mistake has been that they have not yet realized the discrepancy between loyalty to the Constitution and loyalty to the Christian religion, and that only a monarchist of Europe, devoted to all the old institutions, can be a true Christian. The hour is approaching that will reveal to Americans tJje un- tenable position they have attempted to hold, and the immediate occasion for discussion upon the subject is the question of the relative claims of Columbus and the Norse discoverers to American recognition. The decision of the people of this Republic will thus turn th( cla pr( it exc clai siv( OR, Honour to whom Honour is Due. 177 the scale, one way or the other. The recognition of Columbus' claims, and homage paid to him as the discoverer, signifies ap- proval of the Christian motives and policy since their incipiency ; it is to accept as genuine garbled and mutilated history, to exalt a pretender to the highest h(mour. The recognition of the claims of the Norse discoverers is to show forcibly and conclu- sively that national integrity, at this present day, consists in paying the highest respect to historical truth, and in honouring those who have transmitted it to posterity, pure and complete ; it consists in attributing the greatest blessings enjoj'ed by civilized nations, liberty, general intelligence, personal rights, just and equitable laws, to the true sources of these. To follow the bidding of the Church and celebrate Columbas' deed were to commit a ridiculous and irretrievable blunder, while to cele- brate the Norse achievement would retrieve at a single stroke all the blunders of the past and inaugurate a new era. However firmly the foundations of the Church are laid upon a future life, all its creeds and dogmas being based on salvation or the reverse, its doctrine and theory one of postponement, — the action of the Church has ever been materialistic, lent on im- mediate results of the most tangible and advantage ous kind ; in other words, the benefits to be derived from the Christian religion were, to the votaries, relinquishment of actual adv m- tages for long-deferred ones ; to Church dignitaries and officials, the appropriatitm of present advantages witliout reference to the future heaven. The poor devotees and zealots needed heaven ; or were made to believe that they did ; the Church needed landed estates, money, temporal power, followers, sub- jugated nations, and to secure these has been its only object. Preaching heaven, it prized earth ! But for the idea of heaven, it could not have spoliated and plundered all the {)eople of the earth. This has been the practical use of Bible, creed, and Christ I If this has been the ecclesiastical policy all through the Middle Ages, it is equally the policy pursued still in Europe 178 The Icelandic Discoverers of America; and the United States, and will be until religious brigandage is suppressed by the law of nations. As far as the Scandinavian North was concerned, the Romish purpose is again indicated in the following paragraph from Fryxell's ''Narratives from Swedish History:" "At this period Swedish, Norwegian, and Danish Vikings swarmed throughout the whole of Southern Europe, and caused universal dismay by their plundering and marauding. It was therefore determined at several Church Councils to attempt the conver- sion of these heathen people to Chiistianity, and by softening their manners and feelings, put an end to their murder and bloodshed." Thus conveision, forced conversion of these people, was purely a prudential measure on the part of the Church ; the only way, moreover, in which the plundered property could be made to change hands. As for " softening their manners and feelings, and putting an end to their murder and blood- shed," we can take the two Christianized kings, Olof Trygg- vason and Olof the Saint, not to speak of the Swedish king, Olof Skotkonung, and their Christianizing processes, as shining examples of this ! Olof Tryggva^on declared that " he would either bring it to this, that all Norway should be Christiai. or die." It is said of him that " he was distinguished for cruelty when he was enraged, and tortured many of his enemies " — of course all pagans were his enemies ; — " some he burnt in fire ; some he had torn in pieces by mad dogs ; some he had muti- lated, or cast down from high precipices." Olof the Saint pro- pagated "the doctrine of mildness and peace," in the same way : "He also made the laws to be read there as elsewhere, by which the people are commanded to observe Christianity ; and he threatened every man with loss of life, and limbs, and property, who would not subject himself to Christian law. He inflicted severe punishments on many men, great as well as small, and left no district until the people had consented to adopt the holy i'aith." OR, Honour to whom Honour is Due. 179 Prescott remarks that *' many a bloody page of history attests tlie fact, that fanaticism, armed with power, is the sorest ovil which can beftdl a nation." If we substitute Christianity for fanaticism, the words will have precisely the same force, and, indeed, the proselyting work thn/Uj?hout has been much more characterized by cold-blooded calculation than by burning zeal. The same author also says : " Acts of intolerance are to be dis- cerned from the earliest period in which Christianity became the established religion of the Eoman Empire." Lloix nte, in tracing the origin of the Inquisition, leads direr ily to the fact that cruelty, torture, and murder were th» Church cur^e is taken off of iu u" ™"f ^'^^- "^en the appear, when they for the fljf ,;1 ,T '"" "^ «°>J women «»•! aee no brand Lre y^ tC! "^ ^* °**' '» ">e fac! will have no sorrow save tte sH " "'" '=°"" '"■™ P^eple eould ever have been suTp^J^o^l ??> r"*"""" '""'A Newfound health and JoHh!?' I *°'"' *» «" P^' ' will in themselves be a celeC? HT' "*»"■"»- Powe,,, never fail of producing tmtTor ^T" '"""^ »"*«»" materials for that which^m CI the '"""' '"' """P'' •enses. It will be a duty, mor^l ' T ■"" ^'»^'»"e the -n, to show that a gJnrtri^'eTn'T'""''"* -- not depend upon the Church te'„rJ ° Y"'^'^ States, does arrange a festival on a sc^l7of „'^ "^"^ 'P'^""'''' effects or to Pan of the celebratioT^t Irr ^ °"=""'''™"-=" the Mount of Laws, the te^'lt T '"''■»'" ^'h-gvalU, „„ were held, "during L palS 'o;'hT *"' --»' ?■*%. Iceland Kepublic,_duriLtl„, f '''°^°™8andflouri8hme and .markable Int^lCTv^W^Tf^a'^^ ^"ed there in 9.8 and in ISotlJ^Z ^^T tr" i I- ■ :« i iS8 The Icelandic Discoverers of America; celebration might take place along the whole Atlantic coast discovered and explored by the Northmen, from Labrador to Florida, and in the next one hundred years the free institutions of which the ancient Tliinqti ^vere the germ, will render those shores glorious in the exti hundred years has been the persecution of the Quo hunto, the war indep' the clamour for ^'^ working-classes — a The progress of the last two led by Puritanism, witch-hunts, and Quaker conservatism, slave- ice and the war for emancipation, justice from slaves, women, the rs. Somehow with the emigrants to America, all the old c ^d had emigrated too, and sought iree- dom to exercise themselves. They were tenacious, these evils, and hard to eradicate. Puritanism still remains ; if that could have been eradicated ^rs^, the whole train of evils would have been removed with it. As it was, Americans left that unmolested, ,and have had to grapple with each of the social problems in turn : the slavery question, the woman question, the temper- .ance question, the labour question, the finance question, settling but one of them in these two centuries — the slavery question. Social economists and reformers are tugging away at each of the social evils, honestly deploring them, but really nourishing them through this allegiance to the Church. What is needed is manhood : too much manhood to oppress, too much manhood to endure oppression ; too much manhood to offer liquor, too much manhood to drink it ; too much manhood to troat women badly, or as inferiors, too much womanhood, which is the same in essence, to put up with ill-treatment or to accept an inferior position. The Church has destroyed self-respect ; hence these evils. They are the direct result of Christian pri^aching. Poverty is not caused by lack of money, but its appropriation in large quantities by those authorized by the Church to be rulers and masters, ecclesiastics of all grades, of which the Pope is hefid, sovereigns, state officials, capitalists, employers; the rest may fare as best they can. OR, Honour to whom Honour is Due. z^ In the Iceland Republic none of these leforms were needed, unless, perhaps, the vice of intemperance could have been abated. We have been told repeatedly by Christian v/riters that the in- troduction of Christianity in the North did away with slavery. ?f this is true, why did the northern states of the American Union have to wage a fierce war with the southern states for the suppression of an institution which the Church, calling it divine, fully supported ; nay, which the Church, through its good servants^ the Spanish monarcha and Columbus, had intro* duced and promoted 1 Mallet gives Christianity the credit of having " re-established a part of mai>':ind, who groaned under a miserable slavery, in their natural rights," but there is no evi- dence of this in the sagas ; on the contrary, there is a vehement protest from many a fearless and outspoken pagan against the slavery that the priests and kings were attempting to put upon them, the bondage of the new faith, and Laing asserts that " in Norway this class (the slaves) appear to have been better treated than on the south side of the Baltic and to have had some rights. Lodin had to ask his slave Astrid to accept of him in marriage. . . . One owner, Erling Skialgsson, gave them land to sow, and gave them the benefit of their own crops ; and he pat upon them a certain value, so that they could redeem them- selves from slavery, which some could do the first or second year, and ' all who had any luck could do it in the third year.' " F.om this it appears that slavery already existed in the Christian countries on the south side of the Baltic, and consequently could not have offended the religious sense of the missionaries and priests when they travelled northward. Oswald expresses the plain truth by saying : " The Church that abolished slavery in name promoted it in fact ; for her doctrine implied a divine sanction of despotism, and an entire disregard for man's natural rights. The slave-barracks of ancient Eome were temples of liberty compared with the dungeons of the hierarchical torture- dens, where thousands of nature's noblemen vainly invoked i; iQo The Icelandic Discoverers of America; death and madness as a refuge from the power of a more omel foe." A continuation of the slave-system is the poverty-curse. The poor have no rights, and they are considered to be hound for life. A hireling is a slave to all intents and purposes ; labour and the labourer are equally despised ; the favoiured upper classes all over Europe and the United States hold the belief that the working-class are born solely to toil for them and to minister to their comfort ; this servitude is to be their permanent state, and they have no right to resist it or to aspire beyond it. Their wages are the least amount that they can possibly subsist on ; educa- tion, leisure, enjoyment, opportunity, the use of their higher faculties, are denied them ; they are regarded as a species of domestic animal, whose muscles are of the only value to the community. Artisans and mechanics are a grade higher, but are likewise condemned to routine work, have closely stipulated exactions laid upon them^ and are debarred from privileges. The sum-total of the wrongs and injustice suffered by women, including that monster evil prostitution, is to be traced directly to the Bible, to the gross impurity of all the ideas contained in that book regarding marriage, the conjugal relation, procreation, woman's nature. Pretending to worship the Creator, to revere his revealed work, creation, the Bible pronounces the highest function delegated to the human species, procreation, vile, an act instigated by the lowest, most bestial carnal desire, and the human race are invariably spoken of as " conceived in sin." This is the reason why Jesus Christ was an ascetic and celibate, and why this unnatural way of life was alone deemed holy and exemplary. Marriage could only be hallowed by making it a sacrament, and was respectable and decent only because it was a bond for life. The Church recognizes in marriage nothing but a sexual relation ; it is the legalizing of passion ; hence it is opposed to divorce, which at once places man and woman on a higher footing with each other, inferring intellectual companion- (( i«?r'-j ere est an the OR, Honour to whom Honour is Due. 191 ship, reciprocity of thought and feeling, and liberty of choice. It is conceded to be the duty of moral beings, in every ether respect, to retract a wrong course and to repair any blunder they mp.y have committed ; in the matter of marriage the Church forbids this. But in the Scandi- navian North, before Bible or treed were accepted, or the Galilean god set up for worship, marriage was contracted without any religious ceremony and could be dissolved for any just and sufficient cause. ' , , .,.,., Oswald observes : "We have been taught to treat the body as an enemy of the soul; and, if bodily health is an obstacle to true saintliness, we have evidently progressed in tlie path of salvation." But the Norsemen honoured the body, developed it to the highest possible perfection, and in the sngor and " Heimskringla " one frequently reads of some king or warrior, that he was extremely handsome, largo and well-fonne>l, while great praise is given to the beauty of the Northern wonu-ii. Sickliness and weakness were despised among them, and no death was more ignominious for a man than that on a sick-bed. Their theories were the reverse of those held in these modem times in every respect. " Sublunary life," says Oswald, " according to a still prevalent theory, is a state of probation for testing a man's power of self-denial." Where the Christians relinquished, the Norsemen grasped ; and in their grand self- expansion, acknowledging no limits, no prohibitions, they fairly imbibed greatness from their surroundings, visible and in- visible, and absorbed the power of the elements into themselves j essentially spiritual in their mentality they paid all deference to qualities, analyzed these, and arriving at accurate conclusions as to what was worthy of high-minded men, they accorded to themselves the true place in the scale of being and took their place, proudly and defiantly, as the lords of creation, in a literal sense. The modern, or Christian world, has been divided in opinion as to whether ma:.kind were bom to rule, or to be .It; l I., ! "IS;! m