We had an escape this day, which I must add to the many instances of good fortune experienced in this perilous expedition. The powder had been spread out—to the amount of eighty pounds’ weight—that it might receive the air. It was thus spread when the dunderhead Ljótsson carelessly and composedly walked across it with a lighted pipe in his mouth. I am confounded and amazed there was no ill consequence resulting from such an act of criminal negligence. I need not add that one spark might have put a period to all my anxiety and ambition in the mortal realm.
ENTRY FOURTEEN
WE TOOK SEVERAL DAYS TO build anew. I observed several trees and plants on the banks of this river, which I had not seen to the north of 52° latitude, such as the cedar, maple, and hemlock. This time the men determined to build sturdier craft, each dug out from an individual cedar tree, quicker to make and more durable on the rocks, but far heavier.
Every night, it rained very hard in the early part of the evening. I now considered myself a fulltruí of Frey, a disciple able to describe every detail of a downpour. I was instructed as a child that Frey bestows peace and pleasure on mortals, not abject misery and damp.
The weather became godlessly clear on the fourth morning, and so we embarked at our usual hour, which is to say, several hours later than I would have liked. The water had risen quickly with the rains. The current was so strong, in fact, that we dragged along the greatest part of the way, by grasping the branches of trees. Our progress, as may be imagined, was very tedious, and involved the most exhausting labour; the guides who went by land were continually obliged to wait for us. Further calamity struck when Herra Laufrey’s sword was carried out of the newly-made canoe and lost at a time when we appeared to have very great need of it. For that very moment, two canoes, with sixteen or eighteen Skræling in each, came down the stream with the rapidity of an elf-shot, whistling and whirring bullroarers about their heads.
I have a notion that Askr and Embla were giants and that mankind, from one generation to another, owing to poverty and other causes, has diminished in size. This tribe was very low in stature, not exceeding five feet six or seven inches; and they were of a very mean and meagre appearance. Their faces were round with high cheek bones; their hair was a dingy black, hanging loose and in disorder over their shoulders, and their complexion was swarthy. Their organs of generation were left uncovered and as proudly displayed as their necklaces of the grizzly bear’s claws.
From their general deportment, I was very fearful of a hostile design, and I acknowledged my apprehensions to the men. Herra Kyndillson agreed and advised the others to be very much upon their guard and to be prepared, if any violence was offered, to defend themselves to the last. Each Skræling had bows made of cedar, six feet in length, with a short iron spike at one end, to serve occasionally as a spear, much like the Norse attach their seax to their rifle muzzles. From these, the enemy began to volley arrows, pointed with iron and two feet in length, but at such a great distance, they fell short of our tiny fleet.
Those of us in the canoes landed, found the ruins of a village, and took positions calculated for defence. The place itself was overgrown with weeds, and in the centre of the houses there was a temple fashioned from ancient logs and moss. Herra Dahl kept watch on the riverbank. A dreadful silence then followed and persisted for many hours. Fearing the worst, I now mixed up some vermilion in melted grease and inscribed, in large characters, on the southeast face of the rock next to the temple, this brief memorial:
Karl Lind
Sólmánaður 1735
Towards the dusky part of the evening, we heard several discharges from the fowling pieces of our guides. Then, sometime after it was dark, they arrived fatigued and alarmed. They had been obliged to swim across a channel to get to us as it appeared that we were situated on an island—although we were ignorant of that circumstance until that moment. Keskarrah was positive that he heard the report of firearms above our encampment, and on comparing the number of our shots we heard with their estimations, there appeared to be some foundation for his alarm. He was certain that a war expedition must be in our vicinity, angered that we had entered some sacred grounds. If they were numerous, we would have no reason to expect the least mercy from them.
Though I remained unconvinced of that circumstance—or of the notion that the Skræling could be in possession of firearms—I thought it right we should be prepared. Our seax were readied, and each of us took his station at the foot of a tree. Herra Kyndillson directed the people to keep watch by threes in turn, and I laid myself down on my cloak and spent a restless but uneventful night.
In the morning, as I made to relieve myself, a trio of our enemies approached so closely that one of them contrived to get behind me and grasped me in his arms. I quickly disengaged myself from him—why he did not avail himself of the opportunity which he had of plunging his dagger into me, I cannot conjecture. They might have overpowered me then, and though I should probably have killed one or two of them, I’d almost certainly have fallen.
As it was, however, Herra Laufrey came out of the trees to investigate the commotion. On his appearance, the natives instantly took to flight, and with the utmost speed sought shelter in the forest from whence they had issued. I acted similarly—but in the opposite direction—while Herra Laufrey followed them, cursing them for cowards, the sons of cowards, and generally questioning the valour of their ancestors since time began. He was still raging through the trees when I spotted the trap and called to him. Like crows, the Skræling had scaled every tree in sight and were making ready to assail us from their perches. They had clearly determined it was better to wait and lure us into an ambush than assault our impromptu stockade.
In that instant, I saw Herra Laufrey change his footing. He heaved his buttstock and dealt one of the raiders a hefty blow and then attacked another so furiously that he was driven back along the side of the river. They struggled along the cove until Laufrey’s feet found purchase on a slab of stone, whereupon he released his hold on his firearm, took the foe by both shoulders and sprang backwards over the stone. As he did so, Laufrey jerked the Skræling so suddenly that he fell across the stone with a loud crack, proving that if you run from a wolf, you may run into a bear.
Herra Kyndillson came running up next. Hearing the reports of enemy rifles, he acquired the fowling pieces from our guides and thundered into the fray, belching fire from each hand. He marched into the treeline without hesitation. Without lead shot, he resorted to handfuls of gravel and scrap, blasting from the base of a trunk, then moving to the next. Our own hunters struggled after him, crouching with their bows and issuing strikes of their own when opportune.
A few moments later, the rest of the men emerged from the village under the cover of improvisation—the cedar canoes lashed together as a wooden wall. Audvard, Ljótsson, and Dahl hefted this moveable redoubt while Rothman and Rubeck fixed their rifle blades, ready to defend against any charge. Their ingenuity allowed us all to scurry to safety and then retreat to the village in good order.
The Skræling departed from the island shortly thereafter, having lost a tenth of their number. We picked through some of their weapons. Their spears were double edged and of well-polished iron. They were, indeed, furnished with muskets in a manner that I could not have supposed, and plainly proved to me that they have communication with the inhabitants of the sea coast and the means of procuring gunpowder of a more distant origin.
ENTRY FIFTEEN
AT FIVE THIS MORNING, WE were again in motion and passing in haste along a different river for fear of crossing paths again with the warband. This stream was not more than knee deep, about thirty yards wide, and with a jagged, stony bottom that we desired would hamper their pursuit, but to which our new and solid canoes were immune. At eleven, however, we unexpectedly came upon yet more Skræling, though thankfully of a very different kind. These received us with great kindness and examined us with the most minute attention. They even presented us with some fish, which they had just t
aken from the stream, at which Dahl, the faithful cook, appeared to be very much delighted at having encountered them.
I passed the rest of the day in conversing with these people, with Keskarrah assisting as best he could—it is clear there are many and varied languages amongst these tiny nations. They consisted of seven families, containing eighteen men in total. They were clad in leather and handsome beaver-skin blankets and so our guide named them Tsattine, “the people who live among the beaver.” They had not long arrived in this part of the country, where they proposed to pass the remainder of the summer catching fish for their winter provision.
When we spoke of our encounter with the warband the previous day, they descended into a worried silence, for our attackerswere a malignant race, the X̱aayda, who lived in large subterraneous recesses and, for generations now, had sailed from their island home to enslave their neighbours. They worshipped a cannibal giant with four terrible man-eating birds for companions and a black, bedraggled hag with long, pendulous breasts for his wife. This evil race they described as possessing iron, arms, and utensils, which they procured from people like ourselves, who brought them in great canoes across the seas (free-booters or secessionists perhaps; either way, I determined send a letter of warning to the viceroy). When they came to understand that it was our wish to proceed to the coast, they fervently dissuaded us, stating that we should certainly become a sacrifice to either the spirits of the drowned or the land-otter men. I would have laughed but for their earnestness; on reflection, I recognised that these stories were no different to the sagas I was raised on. What is this cannibal giant if not a Jötunn? What are spirits of the drowned if not the Nøkker? If I was to commune with nature, to understand these untamed wilds properly, perhaps I ought to be more open-minded. Speaker Högen would approve of the sentiment I am sure.
Not long after the beginning of this conversation, one of these new Skræling asked me a direct and blunt question. He was a sly looking fellow, vulpine, like the fox.
“What,” demanded he, “can be the reason that you are so particular in your inquiries of this country? Do you Ashmen not pretend to know everything in this world?”
This was so very unexpected, that it required some thought before I could answer it. At length, however, I replied that we certainly were acquainted with the principal geographies of every part of the world; that I knew where the sea was, and where I then was, but that I did not exactly understand what obstacles might interrupt me in getting to it, having never visited Markland before. In this way, I hoped to preserve of the superiority of the Ashmen in their minds.
That afternoon, we endured a thunderstorm with heavy rain—though whether it was Thor or a Thunderbird in attendance, I was too drenched to care. In the evening when it had subsided, the Tsattine amused us with singing and dancing, in which they were joined by their young women. We all sat down on a very pleasant green spot, but we were no sooner seated than Keskarrah and one of the Beaver folk prepared to engage in a game. They had each a bundle of about fifty small sticks, neatly polished, of the size of a quill: a certain number of these sticks had red lines around them. A kind of guessing game then ensued where the sticks were curiously rolled up in dry grass, and according to the judgment of his antagonist respecting their number and marks, he lost or won. Keskarrah was apparently made to look the goose, as he parted with several articles that I had given him over the past few weeks.
We had no sooner laid ourselves down to rest that night than the Tsattine began to sing, although in a manner very different from what I had been accustomed to from the Denésoliné. It was not accompanied either with dancing, but by a drum, and consisted of soft plaintive tones and a modulation that was rather agreeable; it had somewhat the air of the varðlokur or warlock-song. During the chanting, I spoke again to the Tsattine who interrogated me so unexpectedly earlier in the day. I informed him that one of my people had lost his seax and requested his assistance in the recovery of it. He asked me what I would give him to conjure it back again, and I offered another knife as the price of his exertions. Accordingly, all the seax and knives in the place were gathered together, and the natives formed a circle around them. The conjurer remained in the middle and began to sing, the rest joining in the chorus; and after some time, he produced the lost seax, and returned it to me. I could not see any evidence of sleight of hand. This most curious event had me once more in mind of the Finnar shamans.
The man called himself a Dreamer, a songkeeper, and the others named him Makénúúnatane, or He Opens the Door. I was about to ask him where one might find a door in the forest, but he then proceeded to talk to me of an extraordinary kind of tree, growing over on the far side of the mountains, which many of his people had visited, but none could recognize. This Dreamer asked me if I would lend him my vast knowledge of the world to help him to understand the tree’s nature. I resolved to accompany him to solve the mystery and demonstrate my accomplishments in this field.
Before the sun rose, our guides summoned us to proceed, and we descended into a beautiful valley, watered by a small river. By eight, we came to its end, where we stumbled upon a great number of moles. These ground-hogs were seemingly everywhere whistling in every direction. The Skræling went in pursuit of them and soon rejoined us with a female and her litter, almost grown to their full size. The hunters stripped off their skins and gave the carcasses to my people, which Herra Dahl duly cooked. My young Skræling friend, Idotliazee, told me they eat the flesh of the hog, the rump is thrown away, but the feet are kept. The meat is very seldom roasted but generally boiled. I found the boiled flesh very insipid, for want of salt. They also pulled up a root that appeared like a bunch of white berries of the size of a pea—it was shaped like a fig and had the colour and taste of a potato.
Though we continued our route with a considerable degree of exertion, as we proceeded, the mountains appeared to withdraw from us. We continued to ascend from the valley until we came to the brink of a precipice. This precipice, or rather succession of precipices, was covered with large timber, which consists of pine, spruce, hemlock, birch, and other trees. Our Tsattine conductors informed us that it abounded in animals, which, to guess from their description, must have been wild goats. In about two hours, we arrived at the bottom, at the confluence of two rivers that issued from the mountains. We crossed the leftmost although they eventually united their currents, forming a stream of about twelve yards in breadth. Here the timber was also very large, with some of the largest and loftiest alder and cedar trees that I had ever seen. We were now sensible of an entire change in the climate—the berries here were quite ripe. I measured several of the trees that were forty feet in girth, and of a proportionate height. The alder trees were also of an uncommon size; several of them were twelve feet or more in circumference and rose to sixty feet without a branch. There was little underwood, and the soil was a black rich mould, which would well reward the trouble of cultivation. From the remains of bones on certain spots, it is probable that the natives occasionally burned their dead in this wood.
The Dreamer had withdrawn himself to a secluded location and covered himself with an intricate hide, decorated with an embroidery of very neat workmanship with porcupine quills and the hair of the moose, coloured red, black, yellow, and white. He had not yet identified the mysterious tree to me, but the other natives told us he was sitting with the ancestors and that, during this time, it was important that no one speak to him, else it would interrupt the working. The trance he entered in this manner was heralded by a huge and unnatural yawn, suggesting that the practitioner’s consciousness was issuing out through the mouth. The Urðr are said to change shape into a variety of animals, often sea-mammals or birds, in order to make spirit journeys to other lands to seek information. I resolved to speak to him further at daybreak, so I might become wise about those things, and in the interim, Dahl and I took and pressed many samples.
ENTRY SIXTEEN
WHEN THE TREE WAS FINALLY brought to my attention, I wond
ered how I could have missed it. It was a giant among monsters. One hundred feet all round—if not more—and hundreds of feet high. There was simply no way to tell; it was so tall that I wondered how it might pull water from the soil to such extremities. It had a fibrous, furrowed bark, red in hue although tending to much darker patches. The root systems were gnarled and intricate, intertwining with others across the whole glade. I asked Herra Dahl to take an axe to a branch, but he barely made a scratch.
When the Dreamer appeared, it was only to confound me further. He explained that my guides had misinterpreted him, and that the tree wasn’t just that one colossal trunk, but a whole village. I surmised by this that he meant each tree to be an offshoot of the first: I have already observed that heavy snow may push a tree’s low-lying branches to ground level, where they take root and prosper, growing anew in the spring.
At my request, the Dreamer regaled me with his people’s sagas. He informed me that the world was created by a raven flying over water, who, finding nowhere to land, decided to create islands by dropping small pebbles into the water. Nonsense, of course, but one may note the honored place of Odin’s own heralds. The raven then created this tree, and then he made the first man and woman out of wood and clay. The raven once conversed daily with the tree but had long since flown away. The Dreamer then stated, in his own language of clicks and sighs, that I was to sing to the tree. As I have mentioned, I have an ear for the music and know something of the incantations of the Finnar. Upon seeing that he was serious in his intent, I decided to humour him.
The All Father Paradox Page 15