THE CODFISH FRONTIER 263 



coasts and men laid plans for profitable settlement there, the 

 real progress in the western world was along the sweep of the 

 Ocean River where it cut north and east at the edge of the 

 continental shelf off the codfish Banks. By the end of the six- 

 teenth century an annual fleet of over two hundred vessels 

 from France, Portugal, and England at the end of winter 

 bucked the headwinds and March storms of the North Atlan- 

 tic to load with cod for the Catholic markets. From time to 

 time pirates or raiders of one nation against the other stole 

 cargoes of this 'Toor John" in order to pre-empt the early 

 market. The merchants of the west country in England fitted 

 out vessels and sometimes let men go along as crew to share in 

 the catch — what was termed ''on their own hook." But these 

 shipowners continued to frown on any attempt at a permanent 

 settlement along the shores of Nova Scotia or Newfoundland. 



Other men meanwhile turned their attention to the shores 

 just west of the Ocean River. In 1602 Bartholomew Gosnold, 

 formerly with Raleigh, sailed from Maine to Cuddyhunk off 

 Cape Cod and came home with a cargo of sassafras and cedar 

 wood. Martin Pring followed the next year, cruising the waters 

 of Massachusetts Bay. And George Weymouth in 1605 ran 

 from Cape Cod to the Kennebec and wrote such glowing 

 reports of the Maine coast that in 1607 Popham sent out his 

 colony to the mouth of the Kennebec that lasted one brief, 

 unhappy year. But the English were working up to it; in the 

 next few years new projects came thick and fast. The year of 

 the Popham colony John Smith settled Jamestown in Vir- 

 ginia. For the French, Champlain landed at the site of Quebec 

 the following year. In 1609 Henry Hudson explored the Hud- 

 son River for the Dutch, and in 1614 opened up the great bay 

 and future fur-trading empire which bears his name; then was 

 cruelly marooned, with his son, to perish in those icy waters.' 



Six years before the Pilgrim fathers arrived from Holland, 

 John Smith cruised the New England waters, gave the region 



