In any
event, nothing else had been found, either north or south of this point,
which could possibly be a strait, and Hudson meant to discover exactly
what this was before he set sail for Amsterdam.
They passed an Indian village in the woods to the right, and according
to the Indians who had come on board the place was called
Sapokanican,[5] and was famous for the making of wampum or shell beads.
A brook of clear sweet water flowed close by. Presently Hudson anchored
and sent five men ashore in a boat to explore the right-hand bank of the
channel. Night came on, and it began to rain, but the boat had not
returned. Hudson slept but little. In the morning the missing men
appeared with a tale of disaster. After about two leagues' travel they
had come to a bay full of islands. Here they had been attacked by two
canoes carrying twenty-six Indians, and their arrows had killed John
Colman and wounded two other men. It grew so dark when the rain began
that they dared not seek the ship, and the current was so strong that
their grapnel would not hold, so that they had had to row all night.
Sailing only in the day time and anchoring at night the little Dutch
ship went on to the north, looking between the steep rocky banks like a
boat carved out of a walnut-shell, in the wooden jaws of a nutcracker.
Pages:
309
310
311
312
313
314
315
316
317
318
319
320
321
322
323
324
325
326
327
328
329
330
331
332
333