[Footnote 196: Bardsen, _Descriptio Groenlandiae_, appended to
Major's _Voyages of the Venetian Brothers_, etc., pp. 40, 41;
and see below, p. 242.]

[Footnote 197: Zahrtmann, _Journal of Royal Geographical
Society_, London, 1836, vol. v. p. 102. On this general subject
see J. D. Whitney, "The Climate Changes of Later Geological
Times," in _Memoirs of the Museum of Comparative Zooelogy at
Harvard College_, Cambridge, 1882, vol. vii. According to
Professor Whitney there has also been a deterioration in the
climate of Iceland.]

[Footnote 198: One must not too hastily infer that the mean
temperature of points on the American coast south of Davis
strait would be affected in the same way. The relation between
the phenomena is not quite so simple. For example, a warm early
spring on the coast of Greenland increases the discharge of
icebergs from its fiords to wander down the Atlantic ocean; and
this increase of floating ice tends to chill and dampen the
summers at least as far South as Long Island, if not farther.]

[Footnote 199: Rink's _Danish Greenland_, pp. 27, 96, 97.]

[Sidenote: With the Northmen once in Greenland, the discovery of the
American continent was almost inevitable.]

[Sidenote: Voyages for timber.]

When once the Northmen had found their way to Cape Farewell, it would
have been marvellous if such active sailors could long have avoided
stumbling upon the continent of North America. Without compass or
astrolabe these daring men were accustomed to traverse long stretches of
open sea, trusting to the stars; and it needed only a stiff
northeasterly breeze, with persistent clouds and fog, to land a westward
bound "dragon" anywhere from Cape Race to Cape Cod. This is what appears
to have happened to Bjarni Herjulfsson in 986, and something quite like
it happened to Henry Hudson in 1609.[200] Curiosity is a motive quite
sufficient to explain Leif's making the easy summer voyage to find out
what sort of country Bjarni had seen. He found it thickly wooded, and as
there was a dearth of good timber both in Greenland and in Iceland, it
would naturally occur to Leif's friends that voyages for timber, to be
used at home and also to be exported to Iceland, might turn out to be
profitable.[201] As Laing says, "to go in quest of the wooded countries
t