UP THE GI^EAT RIVEK 11

himself went ashore. The early Dutch writer, De
Laet, who used Hudson's last journal, quotes at
length Hudson's description of this landing, and
the quotation, if genuine, is probably the longest
description of his travels that we have from the
pen of the great navigator. He says that he sailed
to the shore in one of their canoes, with an old man
who was chief of a tribe. There he found a house
of oak bark, circular in shape, apparently well
built, and with an arched roof.

On our coming near the house, two mats were spread to
sit upon and immediately some food was served in well-
made red wooden bowls; two men were also dispatched at
once with bows and arrows in quest of game, who soon
after brought a pair of pigeons which they had shot.
They likewise killed at once a fat dog and skinned it
in great haste, with shells which they get out of the
water. . . . The natives are a very good people, for
when they saw that I would not remain, they supposed
that I was afraid of their bows, and taking the arrows
they broke them in pieces and threw them into the fire.

So the Half Moon drifted along "the River of the
Steep Hills," through the golden autumnal weather,
now under frowning cliffs, now skirting low sloping
shores and fertile valleys, till at length the shoaling
water warned Hudson that he could not penetrate
much farther. He knew now that he had failed to