silence." _Christophe Colomb_, Paris, 1884, tom. i.
p. 307.]

[Sidenote: Those stories are of little value;]

It is not my purpose to weary the reader with a general discussion of
these and some other legends or rumours of pre-Columbian visitors to
America. We may admit, at once, that "there is no good reason why any
one of them may not have done" what is claimed, but at the same time the
proof that any one of them _did_ do it is very far from
satisfactory.[167] Moreover the questions raised are often of small
importance, and belong not so much to the serious workshop of history as
to its limbo prepared for learned trifles, whither we will hereby
relegate them.[168]

[Footnote 167: Winsor, _Narr. and Crit. Hist._, i. 59.]

[Footnote 168: Sufficiently full references may be found in
Watson's _Bibliography of the Pre-Columbian Discoveries of
America_, appended to Anderson's _America not discovered by
Columbus_, 3d ed., Chicago, 1883, pp. 121-164; and see the
learned chapters by W. H. Tillinghast on "The Geographical
Knowledge of the Ancients considered in relation to the
Discovery of America," and by Justin Winsor on "Pre-Columbian
Explorations," in _Narr. and Crit. Hist._, vol. i.]

[Sidenote: but the case of the Northmen is entirely different.]

[Sidenote: The Viking exodus from Norway.]

[Sidenote: Founding of Iceland, A. D. 874.]

But when we come to the voyages of the Northmen in the tenth and
eleventh centuries, it is quite a different affair. Not only is this a
subject of much historic interest, but in dealing with it we stand for a
great part of the time upon firm historic ground. The narratives which
tell us of Vinland and of Leif Ericsson are closely intertwined with the
authentic history of Norway and Iceland. In the ninth century of our era
there was a process of political consolidation going on in Norway,
somewhat as in England under Egbert and his successors. After a war of
twelve years, King Harold Fairhair overthrew the combined forces of the
Jarls, or small independent princes, in the decisive naval battle of
Hafursfiord in the year 872. This resulted in making Harold the feudal
landlord of Norway. Allodial tenures were abolished, and the Jarls were
required to become his vassals. This consolidation of the kingdom was
probably beneficial in its main consequences, but to many a proud spirit
and crafty brain i