east passage having failed, a new effort was made to find an opening to the north-west. Three small vessels were placed under the command of Martin Frobisher, an eminent mariner of that day; but although he made three successive voyages, and explored to some extent the coast of Labrador, he did not succeed in accomplishing the object of his expedition. It was about this same date that Sir Francis Drake entered upon his voyage of fortune, which by its success added a kind of lustre to his name, without producing any essential benefit to legitimate trade and commerce. Drake had the boldness to follow in the track of Magellan, and, crossing the equator, he ranged the Pacific coast of America to the latitude of forty-three degrees north, in hope of discovering the north-west passage from the Atlantic to the Pacific; but without accomplishing that object.
In the same year that Frobisher's third voyage terminated so fruitlessly, an attempt was made by Englishmen, under the queen's patronage, to plant a colony in America. It was mainly due to Sir Humphrey Gilbert, a gentleman of distinction and marked ability, as a soldier and a writer on navigation. Without difficulty he obtained a patent from the queen which empowered him to proceed at once with every hope of success in carrying out his designs. Six years were allowed for the establishment of the colony. As this is the first charter to a colony granted by the crown of England, the articles in it merit especial attention, as they unfold the ideas of that age with respect to the nature of such settlements. Elizabeth authorizes Sir Humphrey Gilbert to discover and take possession of all remote and barbarous lands, unoccupied by any Christian prince or people; invests in him the full right of property in the soil of those countries whereof he shall take possession; empowers him, his heirs and assigns, to dispose of whatever portion of those lands he shall judge meet, to persons settled there, in fee simple, according to the laws of England; and ordains that all the lands granted to Gilbert shall hold of the crown of England by homage, on payment of the fifth part of the gold or silver ore found there. The charter also gave Gilbert, his heirs and assigns, full power to convict, punish, pardon, govern, and rule, by their good discretion and policy, as well in causes capital or criminal as civil, both marine and other, all persons who shall, from time to time, settle within the said countries; and declared, that all who settled there should have and enjoy all the privileges of free denizens and natives of England, any law, custom, or usage to the contrary notwithstanding. And finally, it prohibited all persons from attempting to settle within two hundred leagues of any place which Sir Humphrey Gilbert, or his associates, shall have occupied during the period named for the permanent founding of the colony.[1]
Sir Humphrey Gilbert embarked a large part of his fortune in this projected expedition, but dissensions and
- ↑ Hakluyt, vol. iii., p. 135.
