The Hudson | Page 5

has left a broadening wake whose ripples
have written an indelible history, not only along the Hudson's shores,
but have left their imprint on kingdoms over the sea.
William Wait.

* * *
=Its Discovery.=--In the year 1524, thirty-two years after the discovery
of America, the navigator Verrazano, a French officer, anchored off the
island of Manhattan and proceeded a short distance up the river. The
following year, Gomez, a Portuguese in the employ of Spain, coasted
along the continent and entered the Narrows. Several sea-rovers also
visited our noble bay about 1598, but it was reserved for Hendrick
Hudson, with a mixed crew of eighteen or twenty men in the "Half
Moon," to explore the river from Sandy Hook to Albany, and carry
back to Europe a description of its beauty. He had previously made two
fruitless voyages for the Muscovy Company--an English
corporation--in quest of a passage to China, via the North Pole and
Nova Zembla.
In the autumn of 1608 he was called to Amsterdam, and sailed from
Texel, April 5, 1609, in the service of the Dutch East India Company.
Reaching Greenland he coasted southward, arriving at Cape Cod
August 6th, Chesapeake Bay August 28th, and then sailed north to
Sandy Hook. He entered the Bay of New York September the 3d,
passed through the Narrows, and anchored in what is now called
Newark Bay; on the 12th resumed his voyage, and, drifting with the
tide, remained over night on the 13th about three miles above the
northern end of Manhattan Island; on the 14th sailed through what is
now known as Tappan Zee and Haverstraw Bay, entered the Highlands
and anchored for the night near the present dock of West Point. On the
morning of the 15th beheld Newburgh Bay, reached Catskill on the
16th, Athens on the 17th, Castleton and Albany on the 18th, and sent
out an exploring boat as far as Waterford. He became thoroughly
satisfied that this route did not lead to China--a conclusion in harmony
with that of Champlain, who, the same summer, had been making his
way south, through Lake Champlain and Lake George, in quest of the
South Sea.
* * *
O mighty river of the North! Thy lips meet ocean here, and in deep joy
he lifts his great white brow, and gives his stormy voice a milder tone.

William Wallace
* * *
There is something humorous in the idea of these old mariners
attempting to sail through a continent 3,000 miles wide, seamed with
mountain chains from 2,000 to 15,000 feet in height. Hudson's return
voyage began September 23d. He anchored again in Newburgh Bay the
25th, arrived at Stony Point October 1st, reached Sandy Hook the 4th,
and returned to Europe.
=First Description of the Hudson.=--The official record of the voyage
was kept by Robert Juet, mate of the "Half Moon," and his journal
abounds with graphic and pleasing incidents as to the people and their
customs. At the Narrows the Indians visited the vessel, "clothed in
mantles of feathers and robes of fur, the women clothed in hemp; red
copper tobacco pipes, and other things of copper, they did wear about
their necks." At Yonkers they came on board in great numbers. Two
were detained and dressed in red coats, but they sprang overboard and
swam away. At Catskill they found "a very loving people, and very old
men. They brought to the ship Indian corn, pumpkins and tobaccos."
Near Schodack the "Master's mate went on land with an old savage,
governor of the country, who carried him to his house and made him
good cheere." "I sailed to the shore," he writes, "in one of their canoes,
with an old man, who was chief of a tribe, consisting of forty men and
seventeen women. These I saw there in a house well constructed of oak
bark, and circular in shape, so that it has the appearance of being built
with an arched roof. It contained a large quantity of corn and beans of
last year's growth, and there lay near the house, for the purpose of
drying, enough to load three ships, besides what was growing in the
fields. On our coming to the house two mats were spread out to sit
upon, and some food was immediately served in well-made wooden
bowls."
"Two men were also dispatched at once, with bows and arrows in quest
of game, who soon brought in a pair of pigeons, which they had shot.
They likewise killed a fat dog, (probably a black bear), and skinned it
in great haste, with shells which they had got out of the water."

* * *
Down whose waterways the wings of poetry and romance like magic
sails bear the awakened souls of men.
Richard Burton.
* * *
The well-known