A.D. 

 I587. 



THE ENGLISH VOYAGES 



[III. 119.] A report of Master John Davis of his three 

 Voyages made for the discovery of the North- 

 west passage, taken out of a Treatise of his, 

 Intituled the worlds Hydrographicall descrip- 

 tion. 



Ow there onely resteth the North parts of 

 America, upon which coast my selfe have 

 had most experience of any in our age : 

 for thrise I was that waye imployed for 

 the discovery of this notable passage, by 

 the honourable care and some charge of 

 Syr Francis Walsingham knight, princi- 

 pall secretary to her Majestie, with whom divers noble 

 men and worshipfull marchants of London joyned in 

 purse and willingnesse for the furtherance of that 

 attempt, but when his honour dyed the voyage was 

 friendlesse, and mens mindes alienated from adventuring 

 therein. 

 Thei.zoyage. In my first voyage not experienced of the nature of 

 those climates, and having no direction either by Chart, 

 Globe, or other certaine relation in what altitude that 

 passage was to be searched, I shaped a Northerly course 

 and so sought the same toward the South, and in that 

 my Northerly course I fell upon the shore which in 

 ancient time was called Groenland, five hundred leagues 

 distant from the Durseys Westnorthwest Northerly, the 

 land being very high and full of mightie mountaines all 

 covered with snow, no viewe of wood, grasse or earth to be 

 seene, and the shore two leagues off into the sea so full of 

 yce as that no shipping could by any meanes come neere 

 the same. The lothsome view of the shore, and irksome 

 noyse of the yce was such, as that it bred strange con- 

 cedes among us, so that we supposed the place to be wast 

 and voyd of any sensible or vegitable creatures, where- 

 upon I called the same Desolation : so coasting this shore 

 towards the South in the latitude of sixtie degrees, I 



440 



