In 1769, Gerhard Schöning, in his _Norges Riges Historie_, established the scene in America. Robertson, in 1777, briefly mentions the voyages in his _Hist. of America_ (note xvii.), and, referring to the accounts given by Peringskiöld, calls them rude and confused, and says that it is impossible to identify the landfalls, though he thinks Newfoundland may have been the scene of Vinland. This is also the belief of J. R. Forster in his _Geschichte der Entdeckungen im Norden_ (Frankfurt, 1784).[620] M. C. Sprengel, in his _Geschichte der Europäer in Nordamerika_ (Leipzig, 1782), thinks they went as far south as Carolina. Pontoppidan’s _History of Norway_ was mainly followed by Dr. Jeremy Belknap in his _American Biography_ (Boston, 1794), who recognizes “circumstances to confirm and none to disprove the relations.” In 1793, Muñoz, in his _Historia del Nuevo Mundo_, put Vinland in Greenland. In 1796 there was a brief account in Fritsch’s _Disputatio historico-geographica in qua quæritur utrum veteres Americam noverint necne_. H. Stenström published at Lund, in 1801, a short dissertation, _De America Norvegis ante tempora Columbi adita_. Boucher de la Richarderie, in his _Bibliothèque Universelle des Voyages_ (Paris, 1808), gives a short account, and cites some of the authorities. Some of the earlier American histories of this century, like Williamson’s _North Carolina_, took advantage of the recitals of Torfæus and Mallet. Ebenezer Henderson’s _Residence in Iceland_ (1814-15)[621] presented the evidence anew. Barrow, in his _Voyages to the Arctic Regions_ (London, 1818), places Vinland in Labrador or Newfoundland; but J. W. Moulton, in his _History of the State of New York_ (N. Y., 1824), brings that State within the region supposed to have been visited. A writer more likely to cause a determinate opinion in the public mind came in Washington Irving, who in his _Columbus_ (London, 1828) dismissed the accounts as untrustworthy; though later, under the influence of Wheaton and Rafn, he was inclined to consider them of possible importance; and finally in his condensed edition he thinks the facts “established to the conviction of most minds.”[622] Hugh Murray, in his _Discoveries and Travels in North America_ (London, 1829), regards the sagas as an authority; but he doubts the assigning of Vinland to America. In 1830, W. D. Cooley, in his _History of Maritime and Inland Discovery_,[623] thought it impossible to shake the authenticity of the sagas.