The Norsemen in the West | Page 2

fellows. Like the adventurous two he had a tail--a very short tail--to his coat; but indeed this might be said of all the men of the tribe. The women's tails, however, were long. Perhaps this was meant as a mark of distinction, for their costume was so very similar to that of the men that their smaller size and longer tails alone marked the difference. To be sure there was additional presumptive evidence of their sex in the fact that most of them carried babies in their hoods; which hoods were made preposterously large for the express purpose of containing the babies.
To the tall man with the flat face the assembly listened with eager looks, bated breath, and open mouths. What he said--who can tell? His language was unintelligible to civilised ears. Not so, however, his actions, which were vigorous and full of meaning, and comprehensible by all nations. If there be any significance in signs at all he began by saying, "Hold your stupid tongues and I will speak." This drew forth loud and prolonged applause--as consummate impudence usually does. When he pointed with both hands to the women and children, and spoke in tender tones, instantly thereafter growling in his speech, gnashing his teeth, glaring fiercely, waving one hand at the surrounding hills and shaking the other, clenched, at the unoffending sea--he was obviously stating his grievances, namely, that the white men had come there to wrest from him his native hills and glaciers, and rob him of his wife and children, and that he defied them to come on and do their worst, seeing that, in regard to the whole assembled white world in arms he did not care a button--or a walrus-tusk, for buttons were unknown to these creatures at that time. When, suddenly changing his manner and tone, he seized a spear, hissed his sentiments through his teeth with great volubility, and made a furious plunge that caused the assembly to gasp, and the man nearest the spear point to shrivel up--what could be his meaning save that nothing short of a hole right through the body of a Norseman could appease the spirit of indignation that caused his blood to boil? And when, finally, he pointed to the setting sun, traced a line with his finger from it downward to the centre of the earth under his feet, then shook his spear wrathfully toward the sea and wound up with a tremendous Ho! that would have startled the echoes of the place had there been any there, it was plain to the meanest capacity that an attack--impetuous and overwhelming--was to be made on the strangers at midnight.
Whatever were his sentiments, the assembly heartily appreciated, applauded, and approved them. They cheered and shouted "Hear, hear," after their own fashion, and then the whole band rushed back into the mountain gorge,--doubtless with the intent to gorge themselves with raw blubber, prepare their weapons, and snatch a little repose before issuing forth to battle.
But let us return to the Norsemen, over whose innocent heads such awful prospects were impending.
The sturdy man with the fair shaggy locks was Leif, the son of Eric the Red of Iceland. The boy with the silken curls, who rode on his foot so joyously, was his son Olaf.
Eric had died several years before the date on which our tale opens, and Leif inherited his cottage and property at Brattalid in Ericsfiord, on the west coast of Greenland--the hamlet which we have already described.
"Come now, Olaf," said Leif, flinging the child from his foot to his knee, and thence to the ground, "give me your hand; we shall go see how the boats and nets get on.--Hey! there goes a puff of wind. We shall have more presently." He paused and scanned the seaward horizon with that intent abstracted gaze which is peculiar to seafaring men. So long did he gaze, and so earnestly, that the child looked up in his face with an expression of surprise, and then at the horizon, where a dark blue line indicated the approach of a breeze.
"What do you see, father?" asked Olaf.
"Methinks I see two ships," replied Leif.
At this there came a sweet musical voice from the cottage:--"Ships, brother! Did I not tell you that I had a dream about two ships, and said I not that I was sure something was going to happen?"
The speaker appeared in the doorway, drying her hands and arms on a towel,--for she had been washing dishes. She was a fair comely young woman, with exceedingly deep blue eyes, and a bright colour in her cheeks,--for women of the richer class were remarkably healthy and well-made in those days. They did a great deal of hard work with their hands, hence their arms were strong and well developed without losing