As years passed, people became more and more anxious to find a short passage to India. The Turks controlled and blocked the overland passage to Asia. The ocean route by way of Africa was long and roundabout; for the Dutch this had also the disadvantage of making it necessary for their ships to pass and repass their enemy Spain and their trade-rival Portugal. The Dutch had, by long and desperate fighting, freed themselves from Spanish control and they had become the great sea-traders of the world. In the beginning of the seventeenth century they had about three thousand vessels on the seas--more than all the rest of Europe combined. Most of these were under control of the Dutch East India Company, the largest and richest trading association in the world. They traveled the long ocean route south of Africa and brought back tea, coffee, spices, silks, and dye-woods from Asia. If only they could find a direct way to Asia how their profits would be increased! Early in the seventeenth century they heard of a sailor in England who had been to seek this direct route and they engaged him to make a voyage for them. This sailor was Henry Hudson. When and where he was born and what were the events of his early life, we do not know. He was an Englishman by birth, a brave, energetic man by nature, a navigator by profession. We first hear of him in 1607, four days before he started on a voyage for some London merchants, to seek a northeast passage to India. He had a small vessel with only ten men, besides himself and his little son John who accompanied him on all his voyages. Hudson left London in April, 1607. He sailed along the coast of Greenland and was at last turned back by the ice barrier between Greenland and Spitzbergen. He made two interesting observations in these unknown seas--first, the changing color of the sea near Spitzbergen,--green, blue, dark, transparent,--second, the great number of whales which afterwards were the source of a profitable industry. Unable to carry out his purpose, he returned to England after an absence of four and a half months. In April of the next year, 1608, the London merchants sent him out again to seek the northeast passage. He reached Spitzbergen and Nova Zembla and vainly endeavored to find a passage through the ice; in August he returned from his unsuccessful voyage. The London merchants now gave up the scheme--at least for the time. But the Dutch heard of Hudson and asked him to make a voyage for them. He agreed to undertake for the Dutch East India Company a third voyage in search of a northeast passage to India. He set out in April, 1609, with two vessels, the Half Moon and the Good Hope, and a crew of about twenty men, some Dutch, some English. As before he sailed to the northeast, and as before his passage was blocked by ice. The Good Hope returned to Amsterdam, it is supposed, after a mutiny near Nova Zembla.