"being olde," says the record, "the other
encombred with a yong childe, we took. The olde wretch, whom
divers of our Saylors supposed to be eyther the Divell, or a
witch, had her buskins plucked off, to see if she were
cloven-footed; and for her ougly hewe and deformitie, we let
her goe; the young woman and the childe we brought away."

This was not the last of their encounters with the Eskimos,
who, incensed against them, made every effort to entrap them
into their power. Their stratagems consisted in placing
tempting pieces of meat at points near which they lay in
ambush, and in pretending lameness to decoy the Englishmen
into pursuit. These schemes failing, they made a furious
assault upon the vessel with arrows and other missiles.

Before the strait could be fully traversed, ice had formed
so thickly that further progress was stopped, and, leaving
the hoped-for Cathay for future voyagers, the mariners
turned their prows homeward, their vessels laden with two
hundred tons of the glittering stone.

Strangely enough, an examination of this material failed to
dispel the delusion. The scientists of that day declared
that it was genuine gold-ore, and expressed their belief
that the road to China lay through Frobisher Strait. Untold
wealth, far surpassing that which the Spaniards had obtained
in Mexico and Peru, seemed ready to shower into England's
coffers. Frobisher was now given the proud honor of kissing
the queen's hand, his neck was encircled with a chain of
gold of more value than his entire two hundred tons of ore,
and, with a fleet of fifteen ships, one of them of four
hundred tons, he set sail again for the land of golden
promise. Of the things that happened to him in this voyage,
one of the most curious is thus related. "The Salamander
(one of their Shippes), being under both her Courses and
Bonets, happened to strike upon a great Whale, with her full
Stemme, with suche a blow that the Shippe stood still, and
neither stirred backward or forward. The whale thereat made
a great and hideous noyse, and casting up his body and
tayle, presently sank under water. Within two days they
found a whale dead, which they supposed was this which the
Salamander had stricken."

Other peril came to the fleet from icebergs, through the
midst of which they were driven by a tempest, but they
finally made their way into what is now known as Hudson
Strait, up which, filled with hope that the continental
limits would quickly