he tide rolled south over shelving, sandy
shores, past countless islands yellowing to the touch of September
frosts, and silent as death but for the cries of gull, tern, bittern,
the hooting piebald loon, match-legged phalaropes, and geese and ducks
of every hue, collected for the autumnal flight south. It was a
yellowish sea under a sky blue as turquoise; and it may be that Hudson
recalled sailor yarns of China's seas, lying yellow under skies blue as
a robin's egg. At any rate he continued to steer south in spite of the
old mate's mutterings. Men in unwilling service at a few shillings a
month do not court death for the sake of glory. The shore line of rocks
and pine turned westward. So did Hudson, sounding the ship's line as he
crept forward one sail up, the others rattling against the bare masts in
the autumn wind--doleful music to the thoughts of the coward crew. The
shore line at the south end of Hudson Bay, as the world now knows, is
cut sharply by a ridge of swampy land that shoals to muddy flats in
what is known as Hannah Bay.

Hudson's hopes must have been dimmed if not dashed as he saw the western
shore turn north and bar his way. He must suddenly have understood the
force of the fear that his provisions would not last him to England if
this course did not open towards China. It was now October; and the
furious equinoctial gales lashed the shallow sea to mountainous waves
that swept clear over the decks of the _Discovery_, knocking the sailors
from the capstan bars and setting all the lee scuppers spouting. In a
rage Juet threw down his pole and declared that he would serve no
longer. Hudson was compelled to arrest his old mate for mutiny and
depose him with loss of wages. The trial brought out the fact that the
crew had been plotting to break open the lockers and seize firearms. It
must be remembered that most of Hudson's sailors were ragged, under-fed,
under-clothed fellows, ill fitted for the rigorous climate of the north
and unmoved by the glorious aims that, like a star of hope, led Hudson
on. They saw no star of hope, and felt only hunger and cold and that
dislike of the hardships of life which is the birthright of the
weakling, as well as his Nemesis.

What with the north wind driving water back up the shallows, and with
tamarac swamps on the landward side, Hudson deemed it unwise to anchor
for the winter in the western corner of the Bay, and came back to the
waters that, from the description of the h