Hudson sailed north until he reached a point near where Albany now stands. As the river now became narrower and its water fresh, he was convinced at last that he could never find his way to India by this route.
86. Hudson returns Home; his Sad Fate.—After a time, disappointed at his failure to reach India, Hudson sailed out of the river and across the ocean to England, and afterwards to Holland. The stout-hearted mariner never saw his "great river" again. On his next and last voyage he sailed farther north and entered the immense land-locked bay that now bears his name. He thought that he had this time surely discovered the long-sought opening to the Pacific. Imagine his dismay when, after coasting around its sides for nearly three months, he was forced at last to believe that this inland sea had no western outlet!
The long Arctic winter came. Hudson's men were nearly starved. They had endured so many hardships that in a frenzy of despair and wrath they at last bound their captain hand and foot, thrust him on board a small boat with his son and some sick sailors, and set them adrift. This was the last ever seen or heard of Hudson.
Probably, like De Soto, the bold navigator found his grave in the vast waters that he was the first to discover.
87. The Dutch claim the Territory; Manhattan Island bought of the Indians.—The Dutch now laid claim to all the territory along the Hudson River, and in 1614 they took possession of it under the name of New Netherland. In a few years they began to establish trading posts, where they might buy of the Indians the skins of bears, beavers, and otters.
After a time the Indians sold the Dutch the island of Manhattan for the sum of twenty-four dollars. This settlement, then called "New Amsterdam," was the beginning of what is now one of the largest and richest cities in the world—Greater New York.
88. The Dutch Settlers prosper.—For the first few years the settlers in New Amsterdam were poor; but after a time richer and more influential men made homes for themselves in this colony. They secured from the Dutch East India Company the right to own by purchase from the Indians a tract of land sixteen miles in length and extending an unlimited distance into the interior, and to establish there a colony of fifty people. The rich landholders were called "patroons," and their great estates laid the foundation of the wealth of many of the leading families of the Empire State.
Dutch Windmill.
89. How the Dutch People lived.—As the Dutch prospered, they built better houses. These were of wood. Each house had on its roof one weathercock, and often many of them. The gable ends were built of various-colored bricks brought over from Holland.