Voyages of Samuel De Champlain — Volume 03Champlain, Samuel de
History
Voyages of Samuel De Champlain — Volume 03
Champlain, Samuel de
America -- Discovery and exploration -- French; Indians of North America -- Canada; New France -- Discovery and exploration
It is hardly necessary to add that the forces governing the variation
of the needle, both local and general, are so inconstant that the hope
of fixing longitudes by it was long since abandoned.
The reason for the introduction of the explanation of the maps at this
place will be seen _antea_, p. 39.
229. The rose is the face or card of the mariner's compass. It was
anciently called the fly. Card may perhaps be derived from the Italian
cardo, a thistle, which the face of the compass may be supposed to
resemble. On the complete circle of the compass there are thirty-two
lines drawn from the centre to the circumference to indicate the
direction of the wind. Each quarter of the circle, or 90 deg., contains
eight lines representing the points of the compass in that quarter.
They are named with reference to the cardinal points from which they
begin, as: 1, north, 2, north by east, 3, north-northeast; 4,
northeast by north; 5, northeast; 6, northeast by east; 7, east-
northeast; 8, east by north. The points in each quarter are named in a
similar manner.
230. The above title is on the large map of 1612. This note is on the upper
left-hand corner of the same map.
231. For this note see the upper right-hand corner of the map.
232. In Champlain's issue in 1613, the note here given was placed in the
preliminary matter to that volume. It was placed there probably after
the rest of the work had gone to press. We have placed it here in
connection with other matter relating to the maps, where it seems more
properly to belong.
233. This refers to the fourth voyage of Henry Hudson, made in 1610, for
the purpose here indicated. He penetrated Lomley's Inlet, hoping to
find a passage through to the Pacific Ocean, or, as it was then
called, the South Sea, and thus find a direct and shorter course to
China. He passed the winter at about 52 deg. north latitude, in that
expanse of water which has ever since been appropriately known as
Hudson's Bay. A mutiny having broken out among his crew, he and eight
others having been forced into a small boat, on the 21st of June,
1611, were set adrift on the sea, and were never heard of afterward.
A part of the mutinous crew arrived with the ship in England, and were
immediately thrown into prison. The following year, 1612, an
expedition under Sir Thomas Button was sent out to seek for Hudson,
and to prosecute the search still further for a northwest passage. It
is needless to add that the search was unsuccessful.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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