CHAPTER IX

ONUND SETTLES IN KALDBAK

Onund Treefoot was driven away from the shore for several days, after which the wind shifted and blew towards the land.  Then they made land again, which those of them who had been there before recognised as the western coast of the Skagi peninsula.  They sailed in to Strandafloi, almost to Sudrstrandir.  There came rowing towards them a ten-oared boat with six men on board, who hailed the sea-going ship and asked who was their captain.  Onund told them his name and asked whence they came.  They said they were the men of Thorvald from Drangar.  Then Onund asked whether all the land round that coast was occupied; they answered there was very little left at Sudrstrandir and none at all in the North.  So Onund asked his men whether they would seek some land further to the West or take that of which they had just been told.  They said they would first explore a little further.  They sailed in along the coast of the bay and anchored off a creek near Arnes, where they put off in a boat to the shore.

Here dwelt a wealthy man named Eirik Snare, who had taken the land between Ingolfsfjord and Ofaera in Veidileysa.  On hearing that Onund had arrived in those parts, he offered to let him have such portion as he needed from his own lands, adding that there was little land which had not already been taken up.  Onund said he would first like to see what there was.

Then they went further into the bay past some fjords and came to Ofaera, where Eirik said:  “Here is what there is to see.  From here down to the lands of Bjorn is unoccupied.”  A high range of mountains, on which snow had fallen, rose from beside the river.  Onund looked at the mountains and spoke a verse: 

     “My lands and my might have drifted away
       as drifts the ship on the ocean. 
     My friends and my home I have left behind me,
       and bartered my acres for Kaldbak.”

“Many a man,” answered Eirik, “has lost so much in Norway that it may not be mended.  I expect too that nearly all the lands in the main districts have been taken, so that I will not urge you to leave these parts and seek elsewhere.  I will keep to my word and let you have whatever lands of my own you may require.”

Onund said he would take advantage of his offer, and in the end he took some of the Ofaera land and the three creeks Byrgisvik, Kolbeinsvik, and Kaldbaksvik as far as Kaldbak’s Cliff.  Afterwards Eirik gave him Veidileysa with Reykjarfjord and the outer part of Reykjanes on that side.  Nothing was settled about the drift which came to the coast, because there was so much of it that every one could have what he wanted.  Onund made his home in Kaldbak and had a large household.  His property increased and he had another house in Reykjarfjord.  Kolbeinn lived in Kolbeinsvik and for some years Onund lived quietly at home.