Page:Journal of a Voyage to Greenland, in the Year 1821.djvu/238

184. That this country, however, is still able to support a colony, may appear from the following considerations. The island of Iceland is exactly in the same latitude, as that part of Greenland to which I refer. It is represented by Mr. Henderson, who has recently visited it, as being capable of growing corn, but the inhabitants consider the cultivation of grass, for the benefit of breeding sheep, to be more to their advantage. The numerous lakes, rivers and streams which intersect the island, produce an extraordinary abundance of salmon, and salmon trout; and, on the coast, cod and other sea fish are in profusion; birds for the sustenance and comfort of man are also found in the greatest plenty, and turf for fuel to supply all possible wants. I cannot therefore suppose that the same bounties of a kind Providence, would be withheld from Greenland, a country so nearly and similarly situated. I wish now to refer my reader to the general map, and to call his attention to the west side, or opposite coast of Old Greenland, (running by the side of Davis' Straits), for the purpose of shewing in what high latitudes that part is inhabited, and that, consequently, the colonization of the eastern side would have nothing of peculiar severity in it. The west side of Old Greenland was visited and minutely examined, in the year 1813, by Sir Charles Giesecke, and divided into two districts; from Cape Farewell, or the southern extremity, to Ice-blink were two thousand three hundred and fourteen souls; and from