They found beautiful trees, trees big
enough for use in building houses, something vastly
important to men from Greenland, where no trees grow.
Delighted with this, Leif and his men cut down some trees
and loaded their ship with the timber. One day a sailor,
whose home had been in a 'south country,' where he had
seen wine made from grapes, and who was nicknamed the
'Turk,' found on the coast vines with grapes, growing
wild. He brought his companions to the spot, and they
gathered grapes sufficient to fill their ship's boat. It
was on this account that Leif called the country 'Vineland.'
They found patches of supposed corn which grew wild like
the grapes and reseeded itself from year to year. It is
striking that the Norse chronicle should name these simple
things. Had it been a work of fancy, probably we should
have heard, as in the Chinese legends, of strange demons
and other amazing creatures. But we hear instead of the
beautiful forest extending to the shore, the mountains
in the background, the tangled vines, and the bright
patches of wild grain of some kind ripening in the open
glades-the very things which caught the eye of Cartier
when, five centuries later, he first ascended the St
Lawrence.
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