The Boy's Book of Heroes

by Helena Peake

After the little fleet had gone past the palace, Queen Elizabeth sent one of the gentlemen of her court on board the Gabriel to tell Frobisher how much pleasure the enterprise afforded her, and to bid him come and take leave of her the following day. She was proud, too, to think that one of her subjects was brave enough to venture up into the icy seas and cold regions, the very idea of which had struck terror into the hearts of many a mariner, when he had met on the ocean great icebergs floating southwards, as though they were messengers sent to warn him of approaching the frozen seas.

When Frobisher had got as far as the Shetland Isles, he turned his course towards the west, and on the 11th of July, nearly four weeks after he had started, he came in sight of land, which he supposed to be the Freeseland seen by a Venetian, named Zeno, two hundred years before. He could not land there because of the great blocks of ice which filled the sea near the shore, and they had much ado to keep clear of them, because there was a thick fog. Here a great misfortune happened; the pinnace disappeared in the mist, and the services of the four men it had on board were thus lost. The company of the Michael also began to distrust the voyage, and to repent that they had engaged in it. Under cover of the fog, they went off towards England, and were so wicked as to say on their arrival that the bark Gabriel had been cast away.

Thus forsaken, the brave captain went on alone; the mast of his vessel was broken, and the topmast was blown over; nevertheless he continued to sail towards the north-west, thinking that he must surely come to some shore. And nine days after he had seen Freeseland, he came to a high piece of land, which he called Queen Elizabeth's; it was part of what is now called Labrador. Still more to the north he reached another foreland, with a great bay or passage of sea dividing two lands, but this was so blocked up with ice that he had to wait until it melted, or was carried away by currents. He called the passage "Frobisher's Straits," after himself, by which name it has been known ever since. If any little readers will unfold a map of North America and look just north of Hudson's Straits, they will see Frobisher's Straits, and how the land on either side is broken up into islands, some of which are named "Hall's Islands," after Christopher Hall, the master of the bark Gabriel. Frobisher thought as yet that the shores were all firm land; and when the ice broke up, he sailed sixty leagues along the strait, and there he landed. First of all he had to defend himself from some great deer, which ran at him in such a manner that he had a very narrow escape of his life. Another time when he landed he went to the top of a hill, and saw from thence several objects in the distance which he thought were porpoises or seals, but when they came nearer he found that they were boats filled with men. The boats were made of sealskins, with a keel of wood inside. The men were of dark complexion, with long black hair, broad faces, and flat noses; the women's faces were painted in blue streaks. Some of these people hid behind a rock, and were evidently watching for an opportunity of stealing his boat, but he hastened down the hill just in time to secure it, and went back to the vessel. It was terribly cold already; in one night the snow lay a foot thick upon the hatches: the brief summer of the northern regions was past. The natives soon began to come on board the bark, and to talk with the sailors in an unknown tongue; they brought the captain salmon and flesh which they eat raw themselves; also bearskins and sealskins, for which Frobisher gave them toys, bells, and looking-glasses. They got very friendly with his men, although he warned them not to trust them too quickly; and one day five of the sailors were enticed by the savages to go in a boat to the shore, and neither men nor boat ever appeared again. What was to be done? Frobisher was on board his bark, and now the only boat was gone, and he could not get to the shore. He thought that he must try and capture one of the sealskin boats of the natives, and he rang a low, sweet-toned bell, which was sure to be a great temptation to the wild men, and made signs that he would give it to him who should fetch it. The first bell he purposely threw into the sea, and then he rang another. The savages, getting more eager to secure the prize, crowded around him, and one came so very near that he had just put out his hand to grasp the bell, when the captain pulled him, boat and all, on board the bark. The poor savage was said to have been so angry at being captured, that he bit his tongue in two in his rage; he was brought to England as a specimen of the newly found race, but he fell ill soon after his arrival and died.

As the cold was rapidly increasing, Frobisher began to think of returning home to report what he had seen, and after many useless attempts to land, on account of the ice along the coasts, he told his men when next they could set foot on shore, that they were to bring him whatever they could find in memory of the region he had taken possession of in the queen's name. Some of them brought him a few flowers, some only grasses, and one brought him a piece of black stone very like sea-coal, which from its weight seemed to be a mineral. Frobisher did not think much of it at first sight, but he brought it with him to England. He arrived in his native country on the 2nd day of October, and all people praised him for his courage and perseverance; and it was thought that if another expedition were made, there would be every chance of finding the desired north-west passage to China.

One day when he was with some friends in London, it happened that he had nothing to show for his voyage except the lump of coal. The wife of one of the adventurers who was present, threw by chance a piece of it into the fire, and it burned so long that at last it was taken out and quenched in a little vinegar, when lo! as if by magic, it appeared "like a bright marquisset" of gold. It was then shown to some gold finers in London, who tried it and found that it contained pure gold, and gave great hope that more might be found in the region whence it was brought. The gold finers even offered themselves to share in a fresh enterprise, so that a second voyage was proposed for the following year, Queen Elizabeth herself entering heartily into the scheme.

The second expedition was fitted out in a more important manner than the first one had been. Frobisher sailed in a tall ship of the queen's, which was called the Aid, accompanied by the two barks Michael and Gabriel. The vessels were provisioned for six months, and had on board in all 140 men, although many more would have liked to go on the voyage.

They sailed northwards until they anchored in the bay of St. Magnus, one of the Orkney Isles. The inhabitants fled in terror as soon as the ship's company landed, and only took heart when they heard for what purpose they had come. For few indeed were the visitors who came to those barren islands, except perhaps the pirates who roamed the northern seas. There is scarcely a tree amongst the whole group, and the people, having no wood, make their fires of turf and heather to cheer them during the long stormy winter. But the nights in these cold northern latitudes are made bright and beautiful by the aurora borealis, which flashes across the sky, and is of the same nature as lightning, only that it travels through a higher region of the air. Sometimes it is purple and sometimes green, and where the air is driest it is red. When the auroræ, or northern lights, flicker in the sky, the inhabitants of the Shetland Isles call them, "the merry dancers."

The gold finers were very glad that they stopped on their way at the Orkneys, for in one of the islands they found a mine of silver. The vessels only stayed there one day, however, and then put out to sea, now drifting to the north and now to the west, as the wind shifted. They were seventy-six days without sight of land, but they met on their way trunks of trees, and monstrous fishes and fowls. At length the wind was prosperous, and they came to Greenland, where the sea near the coast was again full of drift ice. One day whilst they were cruising about here they dropped a hook into the sea, and caught an enormous fish called a halibut, which is said to have furnished a whole day's food for the ship's company. It must have been a very large fish to have dined and supped 140 persons. All along the dreary shores the only living creatures they saw were some little birds. The weather, being very cold and stormy they made for Frobisher's Straits, and came again to the smaller of Hall's Islands, where the ore had been taken up the year before, but they only found this time one little piece. On the large island, however, they found plenty of what they supposed to be gold, and Frobisher, with forty gentlemen and soldiers, ascended a steep hill, and planting a column or cross upon it, he sounded a trumpet, and called the place Mount Warwick, after the good earl. Then they knelt down in a ring, and said their prayers and thanksgivings. As they were going back to their boats, they saw a number of savages making signs to them from the top of the hill, as if they wished to be friendly, but Frobisher, remembering the fate of the five mariners, did not feel inclined to trust them, and he only held up two of his fingers to signify that two of their men should advance towards two of his own. This was done, and then they began to be more confident of each other's designs. The people here had a very odd way of bartering their wares: they would bring sealskins and raw flesh and lay them on the ground, and make signs that the strangers should do the same with the things they meant to exchange. Then they went away, and if they liked the toys and the beads they saw on the ground, they came back in a little while and took them up, leaving their own wares behind them; and if they did not like them, they gathered up their property and departed.

After passing through many dangers and tempests Frobisher found a bay which he thought would be a good harbour for his ships, and he landed with his gold finers on a little island, where all the sands and cliffs glittered so brightly, that they thought they had indeed come to a land of gold. But when they tried it, to their great disappointment it turned out to be only black-lead. In the same sound they came to a small island, to which they gave the name of Smith's Island, because the smith belonging to the ship's company first set up his forge there. Here they found a mine of silver, but they had a great deal of trouble to get it out of the rocks.

Soon after this Frobisher marched upon the southern shore of the strait in search of ore with all his best men, and when he had appointed leaders, and told all those who were to follow them that they must be orderly and persevering, he made every man kneel down and thank God that He had preserved them hitherto from all dangers. Then, with a banner flying, they marched towards the tops of the mountains, which were steep and very difficult to ascend. The whole land was silent; not a human being was to be seen, so they went back to their ships, and landed next on the northern shore. Here they saw people, and found hidden under a stone such things as kettles made of fish-skins, knives of bone, and bridles. One of the savages took a bridle and caught with it a dog belonging to the strangers, to show how dogs were used to draw the sledges.