55/65 There is reason to believe that at one time they possessed the Atlantic coast considerably to the south. The Northmen, in the year 1000, found the natives of Vinland, probably near Rhode Island, of the same race as they were familiar with in Labrador. They call them _Skralingar_, chips, and describe them as numerous and short of stature (Eric Rothens Saga, in Mueller, _Sagaenbibliothek_, p. 214). It is curious that the traditions of the Tuscaroras, who placed their arrival on the Virginian coast about 1300, spoke of the race they found there as eaters of raw flesh and ignorant of maize (Lederer, _Account of North America_, in Harris, Voyages). |