compensation, rank, and authority none comparable with the case of Christopher Columbus) it is scarcely presumable that Henry Hudson entered the service of the Dutch East India Company merely for the paltry sum named in that contract and in a route which he himself on two occasions or more had found impracticable—presumably impossible. Henry Hudson, a bold and experienced navigator, well posted in the discoveries made by maritime discoverers especially in the New World; in the discoveries in geography, geometry, and in possession of the latest and best maps of the world, surely had some strong motive, presumably a worthy ambition to become a discoverer of a new all-water route to India, and in his journal he told of his desire to seek that route by sailing _westward_ when his instructions were distinct and positive to sail _north_ and _east_. If, then, such were the views and purposes of Hudson when he made the contract (which is quoted herein) with the Amsterdam directors of the Dutch East India Company, let us see, if we may, the real and principal motives actuating that company, so powerful, so dominant in the Netherlands, to engage Hudson by contract and whether either party was not going to live up to it in good faith or whether the strong presumption is that it was merely a blind to deceive rivals and that there was another and very different secret agreement. Charles V, German Emperor, was born at Ghent, Flanders, 1500. He was the eldest son of Philip, Archduke of Austria, and of Joanna, the daughter of Ferdinand and Isabella of Spain. Philip’s parents were the Emperor Maximilian and Marie, daughter and heiress of Charles the Bold, Duke of Burgundy. On the death of his grandfather, Ferdinand, in 1516, Charles took possession of the throne of Spain by the title of Charles I.