PART II.

A.D. 860-1777.

THE EARLY DISCOVERIES OF AMERICA, AND THE FIRST BANNERS PLANTED ON ITS SHORES,

A.D. 860-1634.

COLONIAL AND PROVINCIAL FLAGS,

1634-1766.

FLAGS OF THE PRE-REVOLUTIONARY AND REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD, PRECEDING THE STARS AND STRIPES,

1766-1776.

THE GRAND UNION OR CONTINENTAL FLAG OF THE

UNITED COLONIES,

1776-1777.

"Far o'er yon azure main thy view extend,
Where seas and skies in blue confusion blend:
Lo! there a mighty realm, by Heaven designed
The last retreat for poor oppress'd mankind;
Formed with that pomp which marks the hand divine,
And clothes yon vault where worlds unnumbered shine.
Here spacious plains in solemn grandeur spread,
Here cloudy forests cast eternal shade;
Rich valleys wind, the sky tall mountains brave,
And inland seas for commerce spread the wave.
With noble floods, the sea-like rivers roll,
And fairer lustre purples round the pole.
Here, warmed by happy suns gay mines unfold
The useful iron and the lasting gold;
Pure, changing gems in silence learn to glow,
And mock the splendors of the covenant bow.

Far from all realms this world imperial lies,
Seas roll between, and threat'ning tempests rise,
Alike removed beyond ambition's pale,
And the bold pinions of the venturous sail;
Till circling years the destined period bring,
And a new Moses lift the daring wing.

On yon fair strand behold that little train
Ascending venturous o'er the unmeasured main;
No dangers fright, no ills the course delay;
'Tis virtue prompts, and God directs the way.

Here empire's last and brightest throne shall rise,
And peace and right and freedom greet the skies;
To morn's fair realms her trading ships shall sail
Or lift their canvas to the evening gale:

In wisdom's walks her sons ambitious soar,

Tread starry fields, and untried scenes explore;

And hark! what strange, what solemn breaking strain

Swells, wildly murmuring o'er the far, far main !

Down time's long lessening vale the notes decay,

And lost in distant ages roll away."

Timothy Dwight's Prophecy of America, written 1771-1774.

PART II.

THE EARLY DISCOVERIES OF AMERICA, AND THE FIRST BANNERS PLANTED ON ITS SHORES,

EXPEDITIONS to the shores of North America are said to have gone forth from the British Isles even in advance of the Northmen. Only vague traditionary accounts of these expeditions have come down to us, but records of early voyages from Greenland have been found, which afford strong circumstantial evidence that the New England coast was visited, and that settlements were attempted thereon, by Scandinavian navigators, five hundred years before the first voyage of Columbus.

The fact that the Northmen knew of the existence of this continent prior to the age of Columbus was prominently brought before the people of this country in 1837, when the Royal Society of Northern Antiquaries, at Copenhagen, published their work on the antiquities of North America, under the editorial supervision of that great Icelandic scholar, Professor Rafn. It had always been known that the histories of certain early voyages to America by the Northmen were preserved in the libraries of Denmark and Iceland. Adam of Bremen, who wrote about A.D. 1074, had heard of the exploits of the Northmen in Vineland, and made mention of that country in his work.

Naddod, a Scandinavian pirate or viking, in the year 860, and Gardar, a Dane, soon after, are said to be the first Northmen who, driven by storms, came in sight of and reconnoitered Iceland. The news they carried home induced others to follow in their track, and Northman Ingolf, A.D. 874, was the first who settled there. He and his men found there Christian Irishmen, the Papas or Papar, who soon left the island.

In 876, a northeast storm drove one of these Icelandic settlers, named Gunnbjorn, to some rock near Greenland, which he appears only to have seen in the distance. It was more than fifty years before any other adventurer followed in his track, until, in 928, Are Marson was driven by a storm from Iceland to America.1 At last, in the spring of 984-985, Eric the Red, having been banished, for manslaughter, from Iceland, sailed with the intention of seeking the country seen by Gunnbjorn. Having found it, he established a settlement, which he called Brattalid, in a bay on the west coast of Greenland, which, after him, was called Eric's Fiord. He found the country pleasant, full of meadows, and of a milder climate than the more northern Iceland. He gave it the name of Greenland, saying that this would be an inviting name, which would attract other people from Iceland. Another adventurer, Heriulf, soon followed him, and established himself on the west coast, north of our present Cape Farewell, at a place which, after him, was called Heriulfsness.

1 De-Costa's Pre. Col. Dis. p. 86.

2 De Costa holds that Eric did not originate the name.

It

Heriulf had a son, Biarne, who, when his father went to Greenland, was on a trading voyage to Norway. Returning to Iceland in 986, and, finding that his father had gone to the west with Eric the Red, he resolved to follow him, and to spend the winter in Greenland. Boldly setting sail, he encountered northerly storms. After many days they lost their reckoning or course, and, when the weather cleared, descried land entirely unlike that described to them as Greenland. They saw it was a more southern land, and covered with forests. not being the intention of Biarne to explore new countries, but to find his father in Greenland, after sailing two more days and nights, he improved a southwest wind, turned to the northeast, and, after several days' sailing by other lands bordered by icebergs, reached Heriulfsness. His return occupied nine days, and he speaks of three distinct tracts of land along which he had coasted, one of which he supposed to be a large island.

The results of the expedition of Biarne were these: He was the first European who saw, though from a distance, and very cursorily, some parts of the coasts of New England, Nova Scotia, and Newfoundland. When he returned to Norway, he was blamed for not having examined the new-found countries more accurately.

In Greenland there was much talk about undertaking a voyage of discovery to the west. Leif, the son of Eric the Red, the first settler in Greenland, having bought Biarne's ship, A.D. 1000, with a crew of thirty-five men, among whom was Biarne himself, went out on Biarne's track to the southwest. They anchored and went on shore, probably at Newfoundland, and after a brief delay pursued their voyage, and came to a low, wooded coast, with shores of white sand, which they named Markland (Woodland), our present Nova Scotia.1 Continuing their course, in two days they again made land, a promontory projecting in a northeasterly direction from the main, corresponding to our present Cape Cod.

Leif, rounding this cape to the southward, sailed westward, and

1 About 1659, Francis Fuller, of Winthrop, Maine, stated that he went as a ship carpenter's apprentice to the Kennebec, and at Agrys Point, near the present town of Pittston, three miles below the city of Gardiner, in clearing the ground for a ship-yard, they discovered the bottom of a brick chimney. Further examination disclosed the remains of thirteen other chimneys. "Within the limits of one," said Mr. Fuller, "grew a tree three feet in diameter. We had the curiosity to count the rings of this tree, to ascertain its age, and found that they exceeded six hundred, thereby indicating that it was over six hundred years old. We concluded a village had existed there long before Columbus discovered America." -Joseph Williamson, Esq., on the Northmen in Maine, in Historical Magazine, January, 1869.