situations in the most southern part of Greenland. But it seems more likely that one of those berries, which these northern regions yield in profusion, was mistaken by the fancy of Tyrker for the grape. A subsequent and more careful account preserved by Torfaeus describes the country as producing neither grain nor wine.* But there is another theory which has recently obtained acceptation among the northern literati, and which would no doubt change the complexion of this question. According to Mr Eggers, whose opinion is embraced by La Richarderiet and Malte Brun,‡ all the early Greenland settlements were, not upon the eastern coast, which faces Iceland, but upon the western, which extends along Baffin's Bay, and faces America. This supposition would no doubt diminish the impossibilities above recited, though it could never solve the voyage to America (a distance nowhere less than seven hundred miles) in one day and one night. But this hypothesis is directly opposed to all Icelandic faith and tradition. By Torfaeus himself, and in all the series of maps copied by him, these settlements are placed on the eastern coast; nor does there seem to have been ever a doubt in Iceland upon the subject. The map of Zeno, who states himself to have actually visited Greenland, and whose authority the present writers are far from wishing to * Vinland, p. 51. + Bibliothèque Universelle des Voyages, i. 46-7. undervalue, is equally positive to the same effect. It seems, indeed, a very wild supposition, that those little barks should sail seven hundred miles along a stormy coast in search of a place of settlement, which, according to the information of Crantz and Egede, was similar and in no respect superior to that which they passed by. The ancient belief, indeed, which makes Herjolfsness the most southern point of Greenland, may be urged in support of the opinion of Eggers; but it is accompanied with the belief that it is also the most eastern, and the conclusion, that, in that case, Greenland stretches little or nothing to the south (parum procedit ad austrum). But the point on which they mainly rest is the north-west course which, after coming first in view of Greenland, the vessels took in order to reach the place of settlement. That this course was followed to a certain extent admits of no doubt. That coast, when first viewed by the mariner, was rugged and precipitous, and the surrounding sea encumbered with masses of floating ice. But the sailing directions quoted by Torfaeus expressly state, that from this point the navigator had only to sail twelve Icelandic miles (60 English) till he came to the episcopal seat of Gardar. Lowenorn, sent out in 1786 to seek the lost settlements of Old Greenland, but who unluckily never read any of the works in which they are described, came in view of this rugged and perilous coast; but, instead of avoiding it by taking the south-west direction, which had been clearly pointed out, he stood always more to the north, till, being dangerously involved in ice-islands, he was obliged to return. Lowenorn has somewhat shaken the authority of the ancient sailing directions, by disproving one leading statement, according to which there was a point in the voyage, where the mountains Snowfell in Iceland, and White-Shirt in Greenland, were seen at the same moment.* This was clearly proved to be an optical deception; fully accounted for, however, by the fact, that in sailing towards Greenland his people had an almost continued view of apparent land, which melted away as they approached. But if he had read Torfaeus's account of the country which he came to explore, he would have found that this imagined contemporaneous vision of Snaefell and Huit-Serk was not accompanied with any false estimate of the actual distance between the two coasts. Torfaeus supposes, from this middle point, the distance to each to be thirty-five German miles, making the entire distance nearly three hundred English, which agrees very exactly with Lowenorn's own estimate of eighty-six marine leagues (of twenty to a degree).† To those who attentively consider the views which have now been given, it will manifestly appear, that the Oesterbygd and the Westerbygd, the East and West Greenland of the old Icelanders, instead of being both on the western, were both on the eastern side of this great peninsula. The Westerbygd was only seated farther in the interior of the great gulf, (called by * Torfaeus, Grönland, 75, &c. Purchas, iii. 520. + Lowenorn, Annales des Voyages, Septem. 1826, &c. Arngrim Jonas vastus sinus) on the northern side of which appear to have been placed all the settlements of Old Greenland. This view exactly agrees with the statement of the great antiquary just named, who describes the whole of these settlements as "maximae continentis districtus, reliquæ continentis respectu perexiguus, in duplicem habitationem Asturbygd et Westurbygd, i.e. Orientalem et Occidentalem Grænlandiam divisa," a part of this vast continent very small in comparison of the rest. Thorlacius also, though he separates Greenland from Vinland, gives to the former a long coast facing the south, on which are both the Oesterbygd and the Westerbygd, while he marks our western coast as "Grænlandia Occidentalis veteribus incognita," -West Greenland unknown to the ancients. Our division of East and West Greenland, therefore, is founded upon a much more extensive knowledge, and has no relation to this early distribution of the Icelandic settlements. I cannot quit this subject without observing, that the belief, according to which a coast extending upwards of six hundred miles in direct distance, and partly situated within the temperate zone, is supposed to be bound in chains of perpetual ice, appears very gratuitous. It has come by frequent repetition to be received as an established fact, that numerous attempts have been made to discover the site of these lost colonies, but that all have been vain. But if we look narrowly into the matter, we shall find, that the attempts to reach this eastern coast have been excessively few, and those few not vain. In 1578, the king of Denmark sent Magnus Henningsen with a vessel to search for these lost colonies. But as Captain Henningsen was approaching with a favourable gale and an open sea, the ship suddenly stopped, and could not be worked forward in the direction of Greenland. Henningsen was obliged to return; and his failure became a subject of deep speculation among the northern sages. According to some the vessel must have been caught by the teeth of the fish remora ; while others conceived that it must have been drawn back by an immense mountain of magnet, placed at the bottom of the sea; but Crantz insinuates, that the magnetic attraction exercised in the minds of the sailors by the idea of home was that which really produced this sudden and marvellous pause in her career.* Whatever theory we may adopt on this subject, it is in no quarter alleged, that the nature of the coast had any influence in producing this signal failure. Yet from it seems to have been originally derived the idea of its inaccessible character. In 1606, Christian IV. king of Denmark, sent out Gotske Lindenau, with the title of Admiral, and three vessels, one of which was commanded by James Hall, an Englishman. Three voyages were accordingly made; but the researches were almost exclusively confined to Davis's Straits, and consequently to Western Greenland. On one occasion only, Lindenau touched on the eastern coast, which he found no difficulty in reaching, maintained for several days a traffic with the natives, and ended with carrying off * Crantz, i. |