o his son Biarne.

Biarne had not been present when the two sails were first observed, but
he chanced to come over to Brattalid just before their arrival.

"What, ho! Biarne," shouted Leif, as the son of Heriulf went down to
the beach, "come up hither."

Leif stood on an elevated rock apart, and Biarne, a good deal excited,
went up to him.

"Why, what ails thee?" asked Leif.

"Nothing," replied Biarne, "but I think I know whose ship that first one
is."

"Ay! is it the ship of a friend or a foe?"

"A friend," replied Biarne--"at least he was a friend when I knew him in
Norway, nigh twenty summers past, and I did not think him changeable.
You and I, Leif, have often sailed these northern seas together and
apart, but I do not think that in all our wanderings either of us has
met before or since a finer man than Karlsefin, though he was a mere
stripling when I knew him."

The Norseman's eyes flashed as he spoke of his friend, for, besides
being a strong and handsome man, he possessed a warm enthusiastic heart.
Indeed, he had been noted in the settlement for the strength of his
affection for his father Heriulf, and his dutiful conduct towards him as
long as the old man lived.

"Karlsefin," repeated Leif, musing; "I know him not."

"Yet he knows you," said Biarne; "when I met him in Norway I told him
all about your discovery of Vinland."

"Nay, thine own discovery of it," said Leif.

"Not so," replied the other, with a blush, in which a frown mingled; "I
did but look upon the land--you went ashore and took possession."

"Well, if I did so I have not retained it," replied Leif, with a laugh;
"but say, how know you that this is Karlsefin's ship?"

"I know by the cut of her figure-head and the colour of her sails.
Karlsefin was always partial to stripes of white and blue."

"Well, it may be as you say; we shall soon know." Thus saying, Leif
descended to the beach as the vessels approached and ran their keels
straight on the sandy shores of the bay. There was great bustle on
board, and there were many men, besides some women, who could be seen
looking over the bulwarks with keen interest, while Leif's men brought
planks with which to make a gangway from the ship to the shore.

The ships which had thus come to Greenland were of the quaint build
peculiar to the Norse vessels of those days--a peculiarity of build, by
the way, which has not altogether disappeared, for to this day the great
central mast, huge sq