By the time the Indian boy had seen twelve or fourteen _snows_, as the Indian would say, he could make his own bows and arrows and could help make canoes. He had received many lessons about shaping tomahawks and war clubs, and how to use them. Playing ball was a favorite game with Indian youth. Catlin, the celebrated authority on Indian life, tells us that he used to ride thirty miles to see a ball game, and would sit on his horse all day to see a match played by six to eight hundred or even a thousand young Indians. =80. How the Indians buried their Dead.=--For the most part the Indians buried their dead in mounds or in shallow graves, sometimes prostrate, but often in a sitting posture facing the east. But some tribes placed the body on a high scaffold raised on long poles out of the reach of wild beasts. Beside the body were carefully placed the weapons of the dead, paints, any favorite trinkets he used to wear, and food to sustain him on his journey to the far-off Happy Hunting Grounds. CHAPTER VII. THE DUTCH IN NEW YORK; THE QUAKERS IN PENNSYLVANIA. =81. The Search for a Shorter Route to India.=--We must not forget that during all these years the European nations in their desire for riches were often searching for a shorter route to China and the East Indies. They hoped to succeed in this either by sailing to the north of Europe or America, or by finding some opening across the newly discovered continent. For more than a hundred years after the time of Columbus many a daring navigator came forward to undertake this business. =82. Sir Henry Hudson, the Bold and Skillful Mariner.=--Several years before the Pilgrims landed at Plymouth, a bold and skillful mariner named Henry Hudson, a friend of Captain John Smith, was hired by some London merchants to search for the imaginary northern passage. For this purpose he made two perilous voyages. Once he sailed along the eastern coast of Greenland until the ice stopped him. After three months he returned to England. The next year he tried it again, and sailed farther north, but as before was turned back by the ice. Hudson tells us that on one of these voyages two of his sailors saw a mermaid swimming close to the ship's side. The upper parts of her body were those of a woman, but below she was a fish, and as big as a halibut! Probably the creature was a seal, an animal with which English sailors were not at that time familiar. =83. Hudson enters the Dutch Service.=--At last, in 1609, Hudson, who had now become famous, entered the service of the Dutch East India Company and sailed from Amsterdam to find the long-sought route. Living near the ocean, the Dutch at this time were great sailors and traders. They owned more ships than all Europe besides. Their sails whitened every ocean. They were glad to hire "the bold Englishman, the expert pilot, and the famous navigator," as they called Hudson, to brave the perils of the Arctic seas.