The first considerable discovery which appears to have been made in or near the arctic circle, was the result of accident; one of the numerous Scandinavian depredators, who, in the ninth century, cruised the northern seas in search of plunder, having been driven, by a long-continued storm, from the eastward upon the coast of Iceland, in the year 861. This island, from the quantity of snow seen on the mountains, was, by its discoverer Naddodd, at first called _Schnee_, or _Snowland_. It was visited by a Swede of the name of Gardar Suaffarson, three years after its discovery, and afterwards by another Swede, Flocke, from whom it received the name of _Iceland_. It was again visited in the year 874, by Ingolf and Lief, two Norwegians, and became the seat of a Norwegian colony. The coast of Norway, to the entrance of the White Sea, was examined about this period by a person of the name of Ohthere, a Norwegian, who himself gave an account of his voyage to Alfred the Great, by whom it has been handed down to us along with the translation of the Ormesta of Orosius. About the middle, or towards the end of the tenth century, an extensive country, to the westward of Iceland, was discovered by one of the colonists of the name of Gunbiorn, which country was visited, in the year 982, by one Eric Rauda, who had fled from Norway to Iceland, to avoid the punishment due to the crime of murder and various other offences. To this country he gave the name of _Greenland_, and in consequence of his exaggerated account of its products and appearance, a respectable colony was founded. About the year 1001, one of the Iceland colonists, Biorn by name, was accidentally driven by a storm to the southward of Greenland, where he discovered a new country, covered with wood. Lief, the son of Eric Rauda, fitted out a vessel, and visited the country. Grapes were discovered in it, and from this circumstance it was called _Vinland_; the day was eight hours long in winter, whence it appears that it must have been somewhere on the coast of North America, probably on the shore of Newfoundland.