Two years later Leif said to his brother Thorvald, “Go brother, take my ship to Vinland.” Thorvald with thirty men spent the winter in the dwellings Leif had erected two years before; the next summer they explored the surrounding country and wintered again in “Leif’s booths.” In the summer of 1004, the Norsemen coasted along the shore exploring the country. At one time when they landed, they were attacked by natives, supposed to be Esquimaux, whom they called Skrælings. In the skirmish Thorvald received a fatal wound from an arrow. His followers returned to “Leif’s booths” and in the summer of 1005 went back to Greenland; they gave an enthusiastic description of Vinland, with its vines, wild corn, fish, and game. A few years later, Thorfinn Karlsefne and his wife Gudrid with three ships and one hundred and sixty persons made a voyage to Vinland. Gudrid’s son Snorri, the ancestor of the famous Danish sculptor Thorwaldsen, is said to have been born in Vinland. At the end of three years, the party returned to Greenland. After the death of her husband, Gudrid made a pilgrimage to Rome, where she described to the pope the fair new land in the west, the Christian settlement in “Vinland the Good.” From Greenland, we are told, hunters and fishermen made frequent voyages to Vinland. They established settlements there and carried on a fur trade with the Indians. But in course of time, these posts were destroyed by the Indians, and the Norse settlements in Greenland itself were destroyed by war and plague. The western voyages and the memory of them ceased. Only the Scalds, trained to repeat family histories and tales of war and conquest, remembered and related the story of Vinland. In the course of time, these sagas, or stories, were written down, and centuries later men learned about the Norse colony, or “western planting,” in the New World. Marco Polo A Famous Traveler You do not need to be told that the world as known to us to-day is very different from the world as it was known--or misknown--to the people of the thirteenth century. Two great inventions broadened the horizon of Europe; these were the mariner’s compass and the printing press. The mariner’s compass made it possible for men to strike boldly across unknown seas instead of clinging to familiar shores; the printing press spread books abroad and conveyed the knowledge of the few to the masses. To-day, the steamship and the railway unite countries and destroy distance. Even the parts of the world where these do not penetrate, own, to a greater or less extent, the power of the great nations of the world. A citizen of the United States can cross the deserts of Africa or penetrate the wilds of Asia and be protected by his nation’s flag. There is hardly a place so secluded that some hardy traveler has not visited it, describing and picturing the country, people, and customs so as to make them known to all the world.