"
This was interesting. For a private reason, Thorolf held Greenland to be
the most fascinating of all places.
"Can she speak their language?"
"Of course. I asked her to teach me, and she said that perhaps she would
some day. The songs that she sings to the little ones are some that the
Skroeling woman who adopted her used to sing to her when she cried for
her own mother. One of them begins like this:
"'Piche Klooskap pechian
Machieswi menikok.'"
"What does it mean?"
"'Long ago Klooskap came to the island of the partridges.' Klooskap was
like Odin, or Thor. The priests in Greenland told her he was a devil and
wouldn't let her talk about him, but the Skroelings had runes for
everything just like the people in the sagas,--runes for war, and
healing, and the sea."
"How did she ever get away?"
"Some men came from Westbyrg to cut wood in the forest, and when they
saw that she was not really a Skroeling they bought her for an iron pot
and one of them married her. But he was drowned a long time ago."
"I wish I knew the Skroelings' language. Some day I mean to go to
Greenland."
"Perhaps Mother Elle will teach you. I'll ask her."
The Wind-wife was rather chary of information about the country of the
Skroelings until Nikolina's coaxing and Thorolf's silent but intense
interest had taken effect.
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