“The fifth, in the morning, as soone as the day was light, the wind ceased; so we sent our boate in to sound the bay. Our men went on land there and saw great store of men, women, and children, who gave them tobacco at their coming on land. So they went up into the woods, and saw great store of very goodly oakes, and some currants.
“The sixth, in the morning, was faire weather, and our master sent John Colman with foure other men in our boate over to the north side, to sound the other river,” (the Narrows.) “They found very good riding for ships, and a narrow river to the westward,” (probably what is now called the Kells, or the passage between Bergen-Neck and Staten Island,) “between two islands. The lands, they told us, were as pleasant, with grasse and flowers, and goodly trees, as ever they had seen, and very sweet smells came from them. So they went in two leagues and saw an open sea, and returned; and as they came backe they were set upon by two canoes, the one having twelve, the other fourteen men. The night came on, and it began to raine, so that their match went out; and they had one man slain in the fight, which was an Englishman, named John Colman, with an arrow shot into his throat, and two more hurt. It grew so dark that they could not find the shippe that night, but laboured to and fro on their oares.
“The seventh was fair, and they returned aboard the ship, and brought our dead man with them, whom we carried on land and buried.”
On the eighth, Hudson lay still, to be more sure of the disposition of the natives before venturing farther in. Several came on board, but no disturbance occurred, and on the ninth he got under weigh, passed the Narrows, and proceeded by slow degrees up the river destined to bear his name.
THE NOTCH HOUSE—WHITE MOUNTAINS.
A considerable tract of land in New Hampshire was granted to two individuals of the names of Nash and Sawyer, for the discovery of “the Notch.” This pass, the only one by which the inhabitants of a large extent of country, north-westward of these mountains, can, without a great circuit, make their way to the eastern shore, was known to the savages, who used to conduct their prisoners, taken on the coast, through this gap to Canada. By the people of New Hampshire, it was either unknown, or had been forgotten. Nash discovered it; but Sawyer persuaded Nash to admit him to an equal share of the benefits resulting from the discovery. It was, however, little advantage to either. They were both hunters, and with the thoughtlessness of men devoted to that employment, squandered the property soon after it was granted.
The Notch-house is inhabited by a family of the name of Crawford, who have the reputation, given them by travellers to the Notch, of being giants in size and strength. Ethan, one of the brothers living a mile or two further up, is called the “Keeper of the Mountains.” A manuscript journal of a pedestrian excursion to Mount Washington lies before us, in which the writer (a friend of ours, who is a small Titan himself, and whose estimate of thewe and sinew is to be taken with a grain of allowance) rather sneers at the proportions of the mountain-keeper. After walking from thirty to thirty-four miles a day, mostly up hill, our friend and his companion arrive at the Notch-house.