any notice, probably because a western inlet there would have taken him in amid Smith’s surveys. On September 3, in 40° 30′, he entered the fine bay now known by the name of New York. After having gone 150 miles up what is now the Hudson river, treating with the Indians, surveying the country, and trying the stream above tide-water, he became satisfied that this course did not lead to the South Sea or China, a conclusion in harmony with that of Champlain, who the same summer had been making his way south through Lake Champlain and Lake St Sacrement to the South Sea. The two explorers by opposite routes approached within 20 leagues of each other. On October 4 the “Half-Moon” weighed for the Texel, and on November 7 put in to Dartmouth, where she was seized by the English Government and the crew detained. The voyage had fallen short of Hudson’s expectations, but it served many purposes perhaps as important to the world. Among other results it exploded Hakluyt’s myth, which from the publication of Lok’s map in 1582 to the 3d charter of Virginia in May 1609 he had lost no opportunity of promulgating, that near 40° lat. there was a narrow isthmus, formed by the sea of Verrazano, like that of Tehuantepec or Panama.]
Hudson’s three failures served only to increase men’s confidence in the existence of a passage by the north-west, for the discovery of which a new and strong joint-stock company was accordingly formed. The command was given to Hudson, who on April 10, 1610, sailed in the “Discoverie” of 70 tons, the ship that took Waymouth in 1602 in the same direction. How he penetrated through the long straits, discovered the great bay that bears his name, at once his monument and his grave, how he and his men wintered in its southern extremity, how in coming north in the next summer, near the east coast, half way back to the straits, he, his son, and seven of his men, in a mutiny, were put into a shallop and cut adrift on Midsummer day 1611, is told in many books. The ringleaders and half the crew perished miserably, but the “Discoverie” was finally brought home to London. No more tidings were received of Hudson, but no one doubted the complete success of his voyage. A grander company was incorporated in 1612, under Prince Henry, to complete the exploration of the passage, and to find the lost discoverer and his companions. Sir Thomas Butler was the commander in 1612, and the “Discoverie” was again the chosen ship. In 1613 the voyage was repeated by Gibbons, and once more in 1614 by Baffin; and the bay was thoroughly explored with the results which have long been universally familiar.
HUDSON’S BAY COMPANY is a joint-stock association formed for the purpose of importing into Great Britain the furs and skins which it obtains, chiefly by barter, from the Indians of British North America. The trading forts of the company are dotted over the immense region (excluding Canada Proper and Alaska) which is bounded E. and W. by the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans, and N. and S. by the Arctic Ocean and the United States. From these forts the furs are despatched by boat or canoe to York Fort on Hudson’s Bay, whence they are shipped to England to be sold by auction.
In the year 1670 Charles II. granted a charter to Prince Rupert and seventeen other noblemen and gentlemen, incorporating them as the “Governor and Company of Adventurers of England trading into Hudson’s Bay,” and securing to them “the sole trade and commerce of all those seas, straits, bays, rivers, lakes, creeks, and sounds, in whatsoever latitude they shall be, that lie within the entrance of the straits commonly called Hudson’s Straits, together with all the lands and territories upon the countries, coasts, and confines of the seas, bays, &c., aforesaid, that are not already actually possessed by or granted to any of our subjects, or possessed by the subjects of any other Christian prince or state.” Besides the complete lordship and entire legislative, judicial, and executive power within these vague limits (which the company finally agreed to accept as meaning all lands watered by streams flowing into Hudson’s Bay), the corporation received also the right to “the whole and entire trade and traffic to and from all havens, bays, creeks, rivers, lakes, and seas into which they shall find entrance or passage by water or land out of the territories, limits, or places aforesaid.” The first settlements in the country thus granted, which was to be known as Rupert’s Land, were made on James’s Bay and at Churchhill and Hayes rivers; but it was long before there was any advance into the interior, for in 1749, when an unsuccessful attempt was made in parliament to deprive the company of its charter on the plea of “non-user,” it had only some four or five forts on the coast, with about 120 regular employés. Although the commercial success of the enterprise was from the first immense, great losses, amounting before 1700 to £215,514, were inflicted on the company by the French, who sent several military expeditions against the forts. After the cession of Canada to Great Britain in 1763, numbers of fur-traders spread over that country, and into the north-western parts of the continent, and began even to encroach on the Hudson’s Bay Company’s territories. These individual speculators finally combined into the North-West Fur Company of Montreal, of which Washington Irving has given an interesting description in his Astoria. The fierce competition which at once sprang up between the companies was marked by features which sufficiently demonstrate the advantages of a monopoly in commercial dealings with savages, even although it is the manifest interest of the monopolists to retard the advance of civilization towards their hunting grounds. The Indians were demoralized, body and soul, by the abundance of ardent spirits with which the rival traders sought to attract them to themselves; the supply of furs threatened soon to be exhausted by the indiscriminate slaughter, even during the breeding season, of both male and female animals; the worst passions of both whites and Indians were inflamed to their fiercest, and costly destruction of human life and property was the result (see Red River Settlement). At last, in 1821, the companies, mutually exhausted, amalgamated, obtaining a licence to hold for 21 years the monopoly of trade in the vast regions lying to the west and north-west of the older company’s grant. In 1838 Hudson’s Bay Company acquired the sole rights for itself, and obtained anew licence, also for 21 years. On the expiry of this, it was not renewed, and since 1859 the district has been open to all, the Hudson’s Bay Company having no special advantages beyond its tried and splendid organization. The licences to trade did not of course affect the original possessions of the company. These it retained till 1869, when they were transferred to the British Government for £300,000; in 1870 they were incorporated with the Dominion of Canada. The company, which now trades entirely as a private corporation, still retains one-twentieth of the entire grant, together with valuable blocks of land round the various forts; and these possessions will doubtless, as the country becomes opened up and colonized, yield a considerable revenue at some future time.
For further information see the Report of the Select Parliamentary Committee in 1857; The Hudson’s Bay Territories and Vancouver’s Island, by R. M. Martin, 1849; An Examination of the Charter and Proceedings of the Hudson’s Bay Company, &c., by J. E. Fitzgerald, 1849; Notes of a Twenty-five Years’ Service in the Hudson’s Bay Territory, by J. Maclean, 2 vols., 1849); The Great Lone Land, 1872, and The Wild North Land, 1873, both by Captain W. F. Butler.
HUE, or HUE-FOO (variously called QTJANG-DUK, PHU- THUA-THIEN, and SAN HUE), the capital of the kingdom of Anam, is situated in a province of its own name, on the left bank of the Truong-Tien or Hue river, which falls into the Chinese Sea about 8 miles further down in 16 34 28" N. lat. and 107 38 39" E. long. The surrounding country is a flat alluvial plain, traversed by streams and canals, and largely occupied by extensive rice-fields ; to the south-west, at a distance of about 3 or 4 miles, rise the Ai-van hills, of which Hondun has a height of 1445 feet. The centre of Hu6 is formed by the citadel, which was built in the reign of Gialong (d. 1820) after the plans of the French colonel Olivier, It is 7323 feet square, has six equal bastions on each side, and is surrounded by ditches about 120 feet in width, but not more than 5 or 6 feet in depth. Yithin are the royal residence, the houses of the ministers, the treasury, the arsenal, the barracks, &c., the royal residence, or Thanh Noi, having a special encincture of its own, measuring about 2290 feet each way. The inner town or citadel has a population of 30,000, inclusive of the garrison, and there are nearly as many in the suburbs and market- villages within a radius of 2^ miles. The suburb of Mang- Sa (i.e., Fish Mouth) at the north-east corner of the citadel is the centre of the local traffic, and the neighbouring part of the river serves as an inner harbour. At the village
Thanh Phuoc, about 2 miles below the town, are the winter