SUPPLEMENT.

I.

THE PREPARATION IN EUROPE FOR THE DISCOVERY

AND OCCUPATION OF NORTH AMERICA.

1. The World's Progress. We began the study of our history with the birth of Christopher Columbus, whose faith and resolution opened the way to the discovery of the western world. But great events in history, though closely connected with the lives of particular men, are also steps in a series too vast to be referred only to the life of this or that man. If Columbus had not sailed from Palos in 1492, or Cabot from Bristol in 1497, yet the studies of geographers and the adventures of sailors would sooner or later have been followed by the discovery of the western continent.

In tracing the development of the United States, we see with greater or less clearness how each epoch is dependent upon events which took place in a preceding generation; and one of the greatest pleasures in the study of history is to discover how effect follows from cause. We cannot understand our own history unless we know something of the history of Europe, yes, and of Asia, before there was a white man on the continent of America. Every person now living as a citizen of the United States, with the exception of a few Indians, is the descendant of persons who once lived in other parts of the world and helped to make history elsewhere; or he may himself have once been a citizen of some other nation. Per

haps, if we knew more, we should not make the few Indians exceptions.

It is not possible, of course, to attempt to give an outline of the world's history before the birth of Columbus, or indeed to do more than touch upon a very few of the events which led up to the discovery of America; but it is worth while to glance at the world as it was for the space of about five hundred years before there was any real knowledge of another great continent on the globe.

2. The continent of America lies between two great oceans, the Atlantic and the Pacific. Thousands upon thousands of people cross these oceans every year, so that there are ocean highways, wide belts of the sea over which the great steamers travel in a regular course from port to port; but there was a time when the oceans were undisturbed and only sea fowl skimmed the waters; the people living on the coasts of Asia and Europe had only boats and small vessels and rarely went out of sight of land.

A study of the map of the world will show that the three continents come nearest one another at the far north. There are some who suppose that the Aleutian Islands were stepping stones by which in very early times Asiatic people made their way to America; and it is quite certain that the first people in Europe who crossed to America, and left any signs of their discovery, were those who lived in the far north.

3. Voyages of the Vikings. The coast of Norway is broken by long arms of the sea, called fiords,' which stretch far inland and branch into lesser creeks and inlets. The moun

tains which cover the greater part of Norway, end sharply by the side of these waters; and in sheltered coves, the vikings,2 so called from the Norse word vik, which means a creek, kept their vessels. These were long boats driven partly by sails and partly by oars; and out of the mountain fastnesses the vikings would issue forth to plunder by sea and by land.

The word fiord is the same as "firth" or "frith" in Scotland. 2 The word has nothing to do with "kings."

When they returned to their mountain homes and gathered about their hall fires, and sat at their feasts, some of their number would sing the wonderful deeds of the vikings. These singers were called skalds, and the songs and stories which they sang and told were called sagas. The sagas were repeated by one and another and handed down from one gen

eration to the next. At last they were written down; and it is from these sagas that we learn something of the early history of the ancestors of the Norwegians, Swedes, and Danes.

In the ninth century after Christ, the hardy Norsemen found Iceland, when their vessels were blown across to it by fierce winds; later, by a like chance, they came upon Greenland. They occupied Iceland, and made a few settlements in Greenland. In the sagas there is mention of voyages still farther

away to Vinland, and there is little doubt that about the year 1000 these Norsemen made landings upon the northern coast of North America; but they made no permanent settlement and left no certain trace of occupation.

The Norsemen were bold sailors. It has been pointed out1 that they made two great inventions which rendered long voyages possible: the keel, whereas Roman and other ancient vessels were flat-bottomed and could go only with the wind; and the cask for holding water, whereas southern nations depended on leather bottles or earthenware jars, which could carry but small supplies. Yet bold as were these northern mariners, they had little to do with southern Europe, except in a piratical way, and it is almost certain that Vinland was wholly unknown to geographers, who were busy in the time of Columbus with their speculations about the world beyond the Atlantic.

4. The Crusades. When the vikings were, making these voyages, there was very little travel from one part of Europe to another. There were no large kingdoms, but the country was ruled over by a great number of kings, princes, dukes, counts, and petty lords, who were fighting continually with one another. The great bond of union for all these peoples was the Church, whose head was the Pope of Rome; and the Church, about a hundred years after the Norsemen made voyages to Vinland, set in motion a popular enterprise which failed of its direct object, yet brought about a wonderful change in Europe.

It had long been the custom for pious men to make pilgrimages to Jerusalem, but they did it at the peril of their lives, for the Mohammedans held Jerusalem, and illtreated the pilgrims. A zealous preacher, called Peter the Hermit, encouraged by the Pope, went up and down calling for volunteers to go to Jerusalem and rescue the holy places there, especially the Sepulcher of Christ. Thus began the crusades, and for nearly two hundred years great 1 By N. S. Shaler in Nature and Man in America.

1094.