Page:The Heimskringla; or, Chronicle of the Kings of Norway Vol 1.djvu/162

and it does not appear that Hans Egide himself, at first, had any idea that he was settling upon the ruined seats of Christian' predecessors of the same tongue and mother country. It is a curious paragraph in the history of the human race, showing how true it is that in the tide of time man and his affairs return to where they set out,—that Christian churches, bishops, and consequently people in some numbers, and in some state of civilisation, had existed, been extinguished, and forgotten, and again on the same spot, after the lapse of 400 years, men have attempted to live, colonise, and Christianise. The feeble attempt in our times, the struggle to subsist, and the trifling amount of population in the modern colony after a century, are strangely in contrast with the state of the old colony. There are but about 150 Europeans at present in these Danish colonies; and the whole population of the natives, from Cape Farewell as far north as man can live, is reckoned under 6000 people, and about five or six vessels only are employed in trading with them; and this is in a country which formerly subsisted a population of European descent, which had at least sixteen ecclesiastical establishments or parishes, a bishop, monasteries, and consequently a number greatly exceeding 150 souls. The old colonists do not appear to have ever made converts among the natives, and their numbers, which must at one time have been considerable, appear to have found abundant subsistence; for we read in the sagas of vessels with sixty men arriving in autumn, being subsisted all winter, and fitted out in spring, and victualled for voyages of uncertain and long duration: and now if one of the vessels fitted out by charitable contributions by the sect of the Moravians to carry food to their missionaries be delayed for a season, they are in danger of starving. Is it man or nature that has changed? Are men less vigorous, less energetic,