HUDSON. 265 



a passage between the land and the ice. He a.d. 

 was here, however, nearly embayed in the ice, 

 and, to prevent being beset, was obliged to stand 

 to the southward. After beating about in ex- 

 tremely cold thick weather, and strong winds, 

 it cleared up, and he found that he had entered 

 the channel between Prince Charles 1 Island and 

 Spitsbergen, and it was the 6th of July before 

 he could get clear. On the 7th, finding the 

 ice again in the northwest, and having the wind 

 at N.N.E., he seems to have formed the deter- 

 mination of passing round the south end of 

 Spitzbergen, and of trying, as Cornelison Ryp 

 had done, to pass along the eastern side of the 

 island; "hoping by this meane either to defray 

 the charge of the voyage, or else, if it pleased 

 God in time to give us a fair wind to the north- 

 east, to satisfie expectation." The next day it 

 was calm, and on that following he had a con- 

 trary wind, which compelled him to stand to the 

 northeast, and again to encounter the ice, by 

 which he was soon encompassed. He managed, 

 however, to escape being beset, and the wind 

 shifting to S.S.E., " it behooved me;' says Hud- 

 son, " to change my course,^ and to sayle to 

 the northeast by the southern end of Newland;"* 

 but being come into a "green sea," he again 



* Spitzbergen. 



