HUDSON. 43 



called the Discovery, of fifty-five tons' burthen, fitted 

 out in the Thames, at the expense of Sir John 

 Wolstenholme, Sir Dudley Digges, and other distin- 

 guished persons, and victualled for six months. The 

 ship touched at the Orkney and Faro Islands, and, on 

 the llth of May, the crew descried the south-eastern 

 part of Iceland ; but hearing breakers, and a fog coming 

 on, they cast anchor. They now found themselves 

 embayed. Weighing anchor, they next proceeded 

 northward along the western coast, taking a quantity 

 of fine fish during a day's calm, which overtook them. 

 A south-east wind then arose, and they reached tho 

 Vestmanna Isles, where the Danes had a fort, and passed 

 the grand and awful mountain called Snow Fell, which 

 towers to a vast height over those inhospitable and 

 desert shores. They saw Mount Hecla in the blaze of 

 an eruption, surrounded by eternal snows ; and fell in 

 soon afterwards with a mass of ice, stretching far to the 

 westward from the northern part of the island. Here 

 Hudson entered a port in the north-west side, where they 

 killed a quantity of wild fowl. They sailed, but were 

 again obliged \o put back, without being able to make 

 the harbor, but fortunately fell in with another haven, 

 where they found some hot springs, and bathed. The 

 water of this spring was so hot it would boil a fowl. 



On the first of June they set sail for Greenland, and 

 soon fancied they saw land to the westward, but it 

 proved to be fog. It was not until the fourth that 

 Greenland appeared in sight. The coast was lined with 

 a vast barrier of ice. " This day/ 1 says Hudson, " we 

 saw Greenland perfectly, over the ice ; and this night 

 the sun went down due north, and rose north-north-east ; 

 BO, plying the fifth day, we were in 65. n 



Their course lay mostly west and north-west, till 

 Cape Desolation appeared on the western side. Here 



