It is hardly necessary to add that the forces governing the variation of the needle, both local and general, are so inconstant that the hope of fixing longitudes by it was long since abandoned.
The reason for the introduction of the explanation of the maps at this place will be seen _antea_, p. 39.
229. The rose is the face or card of the mariner"s compa.s.s. It was anciently called the fly. Card may perhaps be derived from the Italian cardo, a thistle, which the face of the compa.s.s may be supposed to resemble. On the complete circle of the compa.s.s there are thirty-two lines drawn from the centre to the circ.u.mference to indicate the direction of the wind. Each quarter of the circle, or 90, contains eight lines representing the points of the compa.s.s in that quarter.
They are named with reference to the cardinal points from which they begin, as: 1, north, 2, north by east, 3, north-northeast; 4, northeast by north; 5, northeast; 6, northeast by east; 7, east- northeast; 8, east by north. The points in each quarter are named in a similar manner.
230. The above t.i.tle is on the large map of 1612. This note is on the upper left-hand corner of the same map.
231. For this note see the upper right-hand corner of the map.
232. In Champlain"s issue in 1613, the note here given was placed in the preliminary matter to that volume. It was placed there probably after the rest of the work had gone to press. We have placed it here in connection with other matter relating to the maps, where it seems more properly to belong.
233. This refers to the fourth voyage of Henry Hudson, made in 1610, for the purpose here indicated. He penetrated Lomley"s Inlet, hoping to find a pa.s.sage through to the Pacific Ocean, or, as it was then called, the South Sea, and thus find a direct and shorter course to China. He pa.s.sed the winter at about 52 north lat.i.tude, in that expanse of water which has ever since been appropriately known a.s.s Hudson"s Bay. A mutiny having broken out among his crew, he and eight others having been forced into a small boat, on the 21st of June, 1611, were set adrift on the sea, and were never heard of afterward.
A part of the mutinous crew arrived with the ship in England, and were immediately thrown into prison. The following year, 1612, an expedition under Sir Thomas b.u.t.ton was sent out to seek for Hudson, and to prosecute the search still further for a northwest pa.s.sage It is needless to add that the search was unsuccessful.
A chart by Hudson fortunately escaped destruction by the mutineers.
Singularly enough, an engraving of it, ent.i.tled, TABVLA NAVTICA, was published by Heffel Gerritz at Amsterdam the same year. Champlain incorporated the part of it ill.u.s.trating Hudson"s discovery in his smaller map, which is dated the fame year, 1612. He does not introduce it into his large map, although that is dated likewise 1612. A facsimile of the Tabula Nautica is given in Henry Hudson the Navigator, by G. M. Asher, LL.D. published by the Hakluyt Society in 1860.