If he turned back, he was ruined. The door of opportunity to new success is a door that shuts against retreat. His friend, Smith of Virginia, had written to him of the great inlet of the Chesapeake in America. South of the Chesapeake was no passage to the South Sea. Smith knew that; but north of the Chesapeake old charts marked an unexplored arm of the sea. When Verrazano, the Italian, coasted America for France in 1524, he had been driven by a squall from the entrance to a vast river between Thirty-nine and Forty-one (the Hudson River); and the Spanish charts of Estevan Gomez, in 1525, marked an unknown Rio de Gamos on the same coast. Hudson now recalled Smith’s advice—to seek passage between the James River and the St. Lawrence. To clinch matters came a gust driving westward over open sea. Robert Juet, seeking guidance from the heavenly bodies, notices for the first time in history, on May 19, that there is a spot on the sun. If Hudson had accomplished nothing more, he had made two important discoveries for science—the Polar Current and the spot on the sun. Geographers and astronomers have been knighted and pensioned for less important discoveries. West, southwest, drove the storm flaw, the _Half Moon_ scudding bare of sails for three hundred miles. Was it destiny again, or his dæmon, or his Puck, or his will-o’-the-wisp, or the Providence of God—that drove Hudson contrary to his plans straight for the scene of his immortal discoveries? Pause was made at the Faroes for wood and water. There, too, Hudson consulted with his officers and decided to steer for America. Once more afloat, June saw the _Half Moon_ with its lazy lascars lounging over rails down among the brown fogs of Newfoundland. Here a roaring nor’-easter came with the suddenness of a thunderclap. The scream of wind through the rigging, the growlers swishing against the keel, then the thunder of the great billows banging broadsides—were like the burst of cannon fire over a battlefield. The foremast snapped and swept into the seas as the little _Half Moon_ careened over on one side, and the next gust that caught her tore the other sails to tatters, but she still kept her prow headed southwest. Fogs lay as they nearly always lie on the Grand Banks, but a sudden lift of the mist on June 25 revealed a sail standing east. To the pirate East Indian sailors, the sight of the strange ship was like the smell of powder to a battle horse. Loot! Spanish loot! With a whoop, they headed the _Half Moon_ about in utter disregard of Hudson, and gave chase. From midday to dark the _Half Moon_ played pirate, cutting the waves in pursuit, careening to the wind in a way that threatened to capsize boat and crew, the fugitive bearing away like a bird on wing. This little by-play lasted till darkness hid the strange ship, but the madcap prank seemed to rouse the lazy lascars from their torpor. Henceforth, they were alert for any lawless raid that promised plunder.