FROBISHEITS SECOND VOYAGE 219 



thirty were miners and other landsmen, and, in addition, 

 six condemned criminals whom he was to land in Green- 

 land as colonists but put ashore at Harwich instead. 



To the new land named by the Queen Meta 

 Incognita, " the unknown limit of the outward course " 

 -he made his way without much adventure. Land- 

 ing on Hall's Island, he sought for more stone but 

 could find not so much as a piece as big as a walnut ; 

 for Hall, who was again with him as master, had 

 apparently lighted, in the one sample, on the whole of 

 its mineral wealth. This disappointment, however, was 

 forgotten in the finding of occasional patches of pyrites 

 on the mainland and other islands which in due course 

 were visited. Thirty leagues up the bay a landing was 

 made on what was called Countess of Warwick's 

 Island, where more ore was found and a fort called 

 Best's Bulwark was built. That was Frobisher's 

 farthest on this voyage, and thence he sailed on the 

 24th of August, bringing with him two hundred tons 

 of pyrites, and, as a present for the Queen, a horn two 

 yards long, wreathed and straight, which he had found 

 in the nose of a dead narwhal. 



The ore was received with rejoicings. Some of it 

 was deposited in Bristol Castle, some in the Tower of 

 London under four locks, but there was not enough of it ; 

 and as there were then, as now, no furnaces in England 

 capable of getting gold out of marcasite, a new ex- 

 pedition was despatched while the furnaces were being 

 prepared. This time the enterprise was to be on a very 

 different scale. Frobisher was given a fleet of fifteen 

 vessels, Drake's old ship, the Judith, amongst them, the 

 Aid, as before, being the flagship. He was to bring 



