There are some who scoff at the idea that the Vikings discovered North America. But there are first-rate authorities, among whom may be reckoned Dr. Nansen himself, who are quite convinced that these men did sail across the sea and land there. Certain incredulous people would have us believe that an open craft such as the Viking type would never last out a voyage like that across the Atlantic. But this supposition is immediately refuted by the Norse craft which was built on the lines and to the exact dimensions of the Gogstad Viking ship discovered in 1880. Rigged with a squaresail, with a jib added and without any other ship as convoy, this replica was sailed from Bergen to Newport, Rhode Island, in the year 1893. The voyage began on May 1, and the United States were reached on June 13. She was commanded by Captain Magnus Andersen, who had already, in 1886, crossed the Atlantic in an open boat. Although bad weather was encountered, yet Captain Andersen and his crew of eleven men reached Newport in safety. His ship proved that the Viking type made a very fine seaboat, and furthermore that she was fast even in the deep furrows of the ocean; for she did an average of nine knots easily, but when the seas fitted her exactly she could reel off her eleven knots. For these old Vikings, intrepid mariners and pioneers of the sea, had by their skill and experience been able to develop an improved type of ship which combined the advantages of speed and seaworthiness. In such craft they voyaged to places as far apart as Palestine and Greenland. By their travels they completely changed the existing ideas of geography. When they ceased to make merely coasting voyages and took to the blue water, they were doing more than perhaps they realised. They crossed the North Sea to the Shetlands and Orkneys, to Britain and Ireland, to the Faroe Isles, to Iceland, to Greenland, and finally to America. Just exactly when first the Northmen crossed the North Sea cannot be determined; but some authorities believe that it was undertaken before the Viking age. As early as the third century of the Christian era, the Eruli sailed from Scandinavia over the seas of Western Europe and ravaged Gaul and Spain, and even penetrated during the fifth century to the Mediterranean as far as Italy. During the sixth century the Vikings voyaged from Denmark to the land of the Franks, but the first Viking expedition began in A.D. 793. In the year 999, Leif, the son of Eric the Red, sailed from Greenland via the Hebrides to Norway. This is the first recorded time that such a lengthy sea voyage was attempted, for prior to this the journey had been made via Iceland. But it is also clear, from the sailing directions which have come down to us for navigating the northern waters, that voyages were made direct from Norway to Greenland. It was this same Leif who, in the year A.D. 1000, discovered America.