The books most frequently cited in the margins are Higginson’s Young Folks’ History (N.Y., Longmans), cited as “Higginson”; Eggleston’s United States and its People (N.Y., Appleton), cited as “Eggleston”, McMaster’s School History of the United States (N.Y., American Book Co.), cited as “McMaster”; Higginson’s Book of American Explorers (N.Y., Longmans), cited as “Explorers”; Lodge and Roosevelt, Hero Tales from American History, cited as “Hero Tales”; and Hart’s Source-Book of American History (N.Y., Macmillan), cited as “Source-Book.”

THE UNITED STATES

I

DISCOVERY AND EXPLORATION,
1000-1600

Books for Study and Reading

References.—­Parkman’s Pioneers of France (edition of 1887 or a later edition); Irving’s Columbus (abridged edition).

Home Readings.—­Higginson’s Tales of the Enchanted Islands of the Atlantic; Mackie’s With the Admiral of the Ocean Sea (Columbus); Lummis’s Spanish Pioneers; King’s De Soto in the Land of Florida; Wright’s Children’s Stories in American History; Barnes’s Drake and his Yeomen.

CHAPTER I

THE EUROPEAN DISCOVERY OF AMERICA

[Sidenote:  Leif Ericson.]

1.  Leif Ericson discovers America, 1000.—­In our early childhood many of us learned to repeat the lines:—­

     Columbus sailed the ocean blue
     In fourteen hundred, ninety-two.

[Sidenote:  Leif discovers America, 1000. Higginson, 25-30; American History Leaflets, No. 3.]

We thought that he was the first European to visit America.  But nearly five hundred years before his time Leif Ericson had discovered the New World.  He was a Northman and the son of Eric the Red.  Eric had already founded a colony in Greenland, and Leif sailed from Norway to make him a visit.  This was in the year 1000.  Day after day Leif and his men were tossed about on the sea until they reached an unknown land where they found many grape-vines.  They called it Vinland or Wineland.  They Then sailed northward and reached Greenland in safety.  Precisely where Vinland was is not known.  But it certainly was part of North America.  Leif Ericson, the Northman, was therefore the real discoverer of America.

[Illustration:  EUROPE, ICELAND, GREENLAND, AND NORTH AMERICA.]

[Sidenote:  Marco Polo, Cathay, and Cipango.]