of Greenland.
195
The Stories concerning the Creation and Origin of Man.Concerning the Creation and Origin of all Things, they have little to ſay, but they think all has been as it ever will be. Nevertheleſs they abound in Fables in regard to theſe Matters. Their Tale of the Origin of Mankind runs thus: At the beginning one Man, viz. a Greenlander, ſprung out of the Ground, who got a Wife out of a little [1]Hillock. From theſe are deſcended lineally the Greenlanders; which may paſs for a Remnant, though an Adulteration from the true Tradition of the Origin of Man. But as to us Foreigners, whom they ſtile Kablunæt, (that is, of a ſtrange Extraction) they tell a moſt ridiculous Story, importing our Pedigree from a Race of Dogs; they ſay, that a Greenland Woman, once being in Labour, brought forth at the ſame time both Children and Whelps: Theſe laſt ſhe put into an old Shoe, and committed them to the Mercy of the Waves, with theſe Words: Get ye gone from hence, and grow up to be Kablunæts. This, they ſay, is the Reaſon, why the Kablunæts always live upon the Sea; and the Ships, they ſay, have the very ſame Shape
O2
as
- ↑ A Word not known to me in the Daniſh Tongue.
