IMAGE EVALUATION TEST TARGET (MT-3) V /- f/. % ^ 1.0 lA^IM 12.5 ■^ 1^ 11112.^ S KS |12£ tut 1.1 h*. 1.25 IIII-L8 1111== ||l.4 |,.6 — 6" VQ VQ 7 y ^ Photographic Sciences Corporation 23 WEST MAIN STREET WEBSTER, N.Y. 14580 (716) 872-4503 CIHM/ICMH Microfiche Series. CIHM/ICMH Collection de microfiches. Canadian Institute for Historical Microreproductions / Institut Canadian de microreproductions historiques Technical and Bibliographic Notes/Notes techniques at bibliographiques The Institute has attempted to obtain the best original copy available for filming. Features of this copy which may be bibliographically unique, which may alter any of the images in the reproduction, or which may significantly change the usual method of filming, are checked below. The toth L'Institut a microfilmd le meilleur exemplaire qu'il lui a 6t6 possible de se procurer. Les details de cet exemplaire qui sont peut-dtre uniques du point de vue bibliographique, qui peuvent modifier une image reproduite, ou qui peuvent exiger une modification dans la mdthode normale de filmage sont indiqu6s ci-dessous. The posi of tl fllml D D n D D D D D D Coloured covers/ Couverture de couleur Covers damaged/ Couverture endommagde Covers restored and/or laminated/ Couverture restaurde et/ou pelliculde Cover title missing/ Le titre de couverture manque Coloured maps/ Cartes gdographiques en couleur Coloured ink (i.e. other than blue or black)/ Encre de couleur (i.e. autre que bleue ou noire) □ Coloured plates and/or illustrations/ Planches et/ou illustrations en couleur D Bound with other material/ Relid avec d'a"tres documents Tight binding may ciuse shadows or distortion along interior margin/ Lareliure serr^e peut causer de I'ombre ou de la distortion le long de la marge int6rieur«> Blank leaves added during restoration may appear within the text. Whenever possible, these have been omitted from filming/ II se peut que certaines pages blanches ajout6es lors d'une restauration apparaissent dans le texte, mais, lorsque cela dtait possible, ces pages n'ont pas 6X6 filmdes. Additional comments:/ Commentaires suppl6mentaires: □ Coloured pages/ Pages de couleur □ Pages damaged/ Pages endommagdes □ Pages restored and/or laminated/ Pages restaurdes et/ou pelliculdes Pages discoloured, stained or foxed/ Pages ddcolordes, tachetdes ou piqu6es Pages detached/ Pages d6tach6es D D Orig begi the I sion othc first sion or ill Pages Showt Transparence Quality of prir Quality indgale de I'impression Includes supplementary materia Comprend du materiel suppl^mentaire r^ Showthrough/ I I Quality of print varies/ I I Includes supplementary material/ The shal TINI whit Map diff( •ntii bag! righ requ metl Only edition available/ Seule Edition disponible Pages wholly or partially obscured by errata slips, tissues, etc., have been refilmed to ensure the best possible image/ Les pages totalement ou partiellement obscurcies par un feuillet d'errata, une pelure, etc., ont 6t6 film^es d nouveau de fapon d obtenir la meilleure image possible. This item is filmed at the reduction ratio checked below/ Ce document est filmd au taux de reduction indiqud ci-dessous. IPX 14X 18X 2X 26X 30X 12X 16X 20X 24X 28X 32X ails du difier jne lage The copy filmed here het been reproduced thanks to the generosity of: University of British Columbia Library The images appearing here are the best quality possible considering the condition and legibility of the original copy and n keeping with the filming contract specifications. L'exemplaire film6 fut reproduit grflcG k la gAnArositi de: University of British Columbia Library Les images suivantes ont 6t6 reproduites avec le plus grand soin. compte tenu de la condition et de la netteti de l'exemplaire filmi, et en conformity avec les conditions du contrat de filmage. Original copies in printed paper covers are filmed beginning with the front cover and ending on the last page with a printed or illustrated impres- sion, or the back cover when appropriate. All other original copies are filmed beginning on the first page with a printed or illustrated impres- sion, and ending on the last page with a printed or illustrated impression. Les exemplaires originaux dont la couverture en papier est imprimis sont film6s en commenpant par le premier pint et en terminant soit par la derniire page qui comporte une empreinte d'impression ou d'illustration, soit par le second plat, selon le cas. Tous les autres exemplaires originaux sont filmis en commenpant par la premiere page qui comporte une empreinte d'impression ou d'illustration et en terminant par la dernidre page qui comporte une telle empreinte. The last recorded frame on each microfiche shall contain the symbol -^ (meaning "CON- TINUED"), or the symbol y (meaning "END"), whichever applies. Un des symboles suivants apparaitra sur la dernidre image de chaque microfiche, selon le cas: le symbole — ^ signifie "A SUIVRE", le symbols V signifie "FIN". Maps, 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 dtre filmAs A des taux de rMuction diffirents. Lorsque le document est trop grand pour dtre reproduit en un seul cliche, il est filmi A partir de Tangle supirieur gauche, de gauche d droite, et de haut en bas, en prenant le nombre d'images nicessaire. Les diagrammes suivants illustrent la mithode. 'rata o >elure. Id □ 32X , 1 2 3 1 2 3 4 5 6 H 7- 1892.] LEIP ERICSON AND THE NORSE SAGAS. 849 Relation sur le Canada 1695, 1G96, and various papers on French Canada 1 packet. Papers relating to Louisbourg, 1745, and extracts from Journal de Franquet, 1752 1 portfolio. Papers relating to La Vcrendrye, from >, 'finals in Depot des Cartes de la Marine. Various autograph papers on Acadia, etc 1 packet. Very truly yours, F. Pa UK MAN. [Indorsed : " List of Papers given to Mass. Hist. Soc, 11 April, 1892, by F. P.") The President said he had received a letter from Major James Walter, reaffirming the genuineness of the so-called Sharpless- Washington portraits ; ^ and on his suggestion the letter was referred to Mr. A. C. Goodell, Jr., for examination. Mr. Henry W. Haynes, from the second section, on being called on, read the following paper : — I Afeip Words more about Leif Ericson and the Norse Sagas. A committee of this Society was a^.pointed in November, 1887, to consider the question of the alleged discovery of America by the Northmen ; and at the following meeting their report was presented. In it they stated their conclusion to be that "there is the same sort of reason for believing in the existence of Leif Ericson that there is for believing in the ex- istence of Agamemnon, — they are both traditions accepted by later writers ; but there is no more reason for regarding as true the details related about his discoveries than there is for acf jpting aa historic truth the narratives contained in the Homeric poems." ^ The grounds for this conclusion were said to be that " such details, if true, now rest upon no stronger foundation than a tradition of four hundred years." The report also suggested '\s an alternative that '-''all of these details are a romantic fiction, as some of them plainly are." Since this report was presented, the researches of the late Arthur Middleton Reeves (whose tragical death all students of history deplore) have tended to reduce the period of tradi- tion to three hundred years.^ Your committee, however, do not think that their argument as to the truth of the multi- 1 See 2 Proceedinps, vol. iii. pp. 179-187. 2 u,i(i. vol. iv. p. 43. 3 The Finding of Wineland the Good, p. 2:j. 350 MASSACHUSETTS HISTORICAL SOCIETY', [April, ])liciiy of details contained ill the Sagas has been invalidated by this. It seems that the believers in the historical character of the Sagas have taken great exception to the comparison instituted between the probable existence of Leif Ericson and of Aga- memnon, for which, as the writer of the report, I suppose I must be held accountable. On a previous occasion I have referred to certain criticisms of this report, and of the motives that were alleged to liave inspired it, made by Rev. Dr. B. F. De Costa ; ^ and I now wish to call the attention of the Society to some comments upon it, of a character by no means compli- mentary, to be found in the recently published historical work of Mr. John Fiske. These I will quote at considerable length : — " It would be difficult to find a comparison more inappropriate than that between Agamemnon and Leif, between the Iliad and the Saga of Eric the Red. ... It is in a high degree probable . . . that in times long before the first Olympiad an actual ' king of men ' at Mycena; con- ducted an expedition against the great city by the Simois, that the Aga- memnon of the poet stands in some such relation towards this chieftain as that in which the Charlemagne of mediaeval roraaiice stands towards the mighty Emperor of the West. Nevertheless the story, as we have it, is simply folk-lore. If the Iliad and the Odyssey contain faint remi- niscences of actual events, these events are so inextricably wrapped up with mythical phraseology that by no cunning of the scholar can they be construed into iiistory. The motives and capabilities of the actors, and the conditions under wiiich they accomplish their destinies, are such as exist only in fairy tales. ... It would be hard to find anything more unlike such writings than the class of Icelandic Sagas to which that of Eric the Red belongs. Here we have quiet and sober narrative, not in the least like a fairy tale, but often much like a ship's log. In act and motive, in its conditions and laws, its world is the every-day world in which we live. ... I suspect that misleading associations with the word 'Saga 'may have exerted an unconscious influence in producing this particular kind of blunder, — for it is nothing less than a blunder. Re- semblance is tacitly assumed between the Iliad and an Icelandic Saga. Well, between the Iliad and some Icelandic Sagas there is a real and strong resemblance. In truth, these Sagas are divisible into two well- marked and sharply contrasted classes. In the one class belong the Eddie Lays and mythical Sagas. ... In the other class come the his- torical Sagas." ^ 1 2 Proceerlings, vol. v. p. 332. - The Discovery of America, vol. i. pp. I!t4-197. 1892.] LEIP ERICSON AND THE NORSE SAGAS. 351 In ti foot-note Mr. Fiske cites Vigfiisson as his principal autliority for tliis cliaructcrization of Icelandic literatnie; but ^^igfusson's exact lan<,niage is : " Wiiat we hold is that the Sagas are to be looked upon as epics, founded on fact, not as exact histories." ^ The Saga of Eric the Red is regarded by Mr. Fiske as belonging to the class of histori- cal Sagas, and it is to be found in two versions, — an earlier (Western) one, the Haukshok, which gives an account of events that happened three centuries before it was written ; and a later (Northern) version, the FlateyarhoTc^ containing con- siderable additional material concerning the Vinland voyages. This, however, can scarcely be thought to add to its historic value, Mr. Fiske thinks that the Hauksbok "may be a faith- ful transcript of some earlier document since lost." lie docs not believe that " it will ever occur to any rational being to suggest that Hank may have written down his version of Erie the Red's Saga from an oral tradition nearly three centuries old. . . . One cannot reasonably doubt ... it was copied bv him . . . from some older vellum not now forthcoming." Finally, in his summing up of his argument Mr. Fiske says : " It is probiible that the facts mentioned in Hauk's document rested upon some kind of a written basis as early as the eleventh century. The data are more scanty than we could wish, but they all point in the same direction. . . . For these reasons it seems to me that the Saira of Eric the Red should be accepted as history." Such is the line of argument, drawn mainly from a supposed transmission through imagined copies, that is relied upon by Mr. Fiske to establish the historical character of this " quiet and sober narrative, not in the least like a fairy tale," notwith- standing all its strange stories about the " uniped " ; and the " big ball swing from a pole over the heads of the white men, falling to the ground with a horrid noise " ; " the ships of the. Skraellings, with their crews and oars " ; the grapes found by LeiPs foster-father, Tyrker, upon whose juice he became "quite merry " ; the fields of " self-sown wheat," and similar vera- cious narratives. Because your Committee were unable to see in a Saga abounding in episodes like this more than a poetic narrative based upon certain actual occurrences handed down 1 "Leif Erikson," by Mrs. Ole Bull. (Magazine of American History, March, 1888.) 352 MASSACHUSETTS HISTORICAL SOCIETY. [April, by tradition, they are accused of having committed " a blunder." Now, Webster defines a blunder as meaning " a gross error or mistake, resulting from carelessness, stupidity, or culpaldo ignorance." Under which head Mr. Fiske would class our difference of opinion he has not made quite clear. In his attempt to elucidate the historical character of this Saga he is constrained to give up the " uniped " in despair, as " a fabulous creature "; but the " self-sown wheat " causes him no trouble whatsoever, — indeed, for him it is " an important ear-mark of truth in the narrative " ; it means mtiize, " a cereal re(|niring so little cultivation that without much latitude of speech it might be described as growing wild." Governor Bradford, however, who had had some practical experience on this point, thought differently. In his account of the earliest doings at Plymouth he tells us : — " As many as were able began to plant ther come, in which servise Sqnanto stood them in ^reat stead, showing them both y" inaner how to set it, and after how to dress and tend it. Also he tould them excepte they gott fish and set with it (in these old grounds) it would »» 1 come to nothing. In turning over Mr. Fiske's pages, however, I have chanced upon certain statements that would seem to me to come quite up to the accepted definition of a blunder. For example, he states that Helbig^ says that "stone-pointed spears were used by the English at the battle of Hastings." ^ But if he had taken the trouble to read what Helbig actually does say, he would have found only a literal translation of William of Poictiers's statement that the Anglo-Saxons had " club-like weapons, consisting of stones made fast to wooden stocks." Again, he tells us that " the Romans in the regal period were ignorant of iron."* This is stated upon the authority of Lan- ciani;" but a long while ago I showed this conclusion of Lanciani to be entirely wrong, and that he " might as reason- ably have argued that Rome was founded in the Age of Stone as in the Age of Bronze." '^ So, also, Mr. Fiske asserts that 1 Bradford's History of Plymouth, p. 100. 2 Die Italiker in der Poebene, p. 42. 8 Discovery of America, vol. i. p. 186. * Ibid. p. 31. 6 Ancient Rome in the Lipbt of Recent Discoveries, pp. 39-48. Tiie Nation, Jan. 24, 1880. 1802.] LEIF EUICSON AND THE NOUSE SAGAS. 353 " tho earliest distinct reference to Cohnnhus in tiie Englisli language is to be found in a prose translation of Sebastian Brandt's 'Shyppe of Fooles,' by IJenry Watson, published in London, by Wynkyn dt Woode, in 1509." ^ The authority cited for this statement is Ilarrisse.^ But Mr. Fiske failed to notice that Harrisse makes a reservation expressly in regard to Alexander Barclay's poetical version of the same poem, as he had been unable to find it. Warton,'^ however, informs us that Barclay's translation was made in 1508, and that it was pub- lished in 1509 by Pynson. Consequently the world seems to have agreed to regard this us the earliest notice of Columbus in our tongue. But enough of picking flaws in so learned, painstaking, and entertaining a work as Mr. Fiske has produced. Indeed, I think he has made it quite evident that he has no very differ- ent opinion in regard to the personal identity of Agamenuion from that of your Committee. True, in speaking of Abraham and Agamenuion, he says in a foot-note : " I here use these workl-famous names without any implication as to their his- torical character or their precise date." * But, earlier in his work, he has drawn a contrast between Agamemnon and Ed- ward III. ;^ and in a subsequent passage he says that "the Inca was in all probability much more a king than Agamem- non, — more like llameses the Great" ;^ thus sandwiching him between two personages certainly historical in a most realistic fashion. When your Committee made their much-criticised compari- son between the actuality of Leif and of Agamemnon, they only voiced the sentiment so admirably expressed by one of the greatest living classical scholars of England, in considering the confirmation of Agamemnon's existence supposed to be afforded b}^ Schliemann's discoveries at MyceiisB. He says : "■ This wide sway of the Pelopidae, on which Homer so emphatically dwells, thon