[248] "The notices of Nyja land and Duneyjar, would seem to refer to a re-discovery of some parts of the eastern coast of America, which had been previously visited by earlier voyagers. The original appellation of Nyja land, or Nyjafundu-land, would have naturally led to the modern English name of Newfoundland, given by Cabot, to whose knowledge the discovery would [might?] have come through the medium of the commercial intercourse between England and Iceland in the fifteenth century."—Beamish.
[249] See the Decline of Greenland, in Introduction.
[250] Markland (Woodland) was Nova Scotia, as we know from the description of Leif and others. These vessels doubtless went to get timber. All these accounts show that the Western ocean was generally navigated in the middle of the fourteenth century.
[251] In the face of this and a multitude of similar statements, Mr. Bancroft endeavors to make his readers believe that the locality of Vinland was uncertain. He might, with equal propriety, tell us that the location of Massachusetts itself was uncertain, because, according to the original grant, it extended to the Pacific ocean.
[252] See note 1, p. 81.
[253] This is a blunder. The writer must have been more of a geographer than historian. See the Saga of Leif, p. 36.
[254] The part inclosed in brackets is an interpolation of a recent date, and without any authority.
[255] Not to be confounded with, the place of the same name at Cape Cod.
[256] This is another passage upon which Bancroft depends, to prove that the locality of Vinland was unknown, when in the Sagas the position is minutely described, the situation being as well known as that of Greenland.