ity should have
spent his efforts on so vain a task.

Although the gold mines of Meta Incognita had become discredited, it
was not long before hope began to revive in the hearts of the English
merchants. The new country produced at least valuable sealskins.
There was always the chance, too, that a lucky discovery of a Western
Passage might bring fabulous wealth to the merchant adventurers. It
thus happened that not many years elapsed before certain wealthy men of
London and the West Country, especially one Master William Sanderson,
backed by various gentlemen of the court, decided to make another
venture. They chose as their captain and chief pilot John Davis, who
had already acquired a reputation as a bold and skilful mariner. In
1585 Davis, in command of two little ships, the _Sunshine_ and the
_Moonshine_, set out from Dartmouth. The memory of this explorer will
always be associated with the great {24} strait or arm of the sea which
separates Greenland from the Arctic islands of Canada, and which bears
his name. To these waters, his three successive voyages were directed,
and he has the honour of being the first on the long roll of navigators
whose watchword has been 'Farther North,' and who have carried their
ships nearer and nearer to the pole.

Davis started by way of the English Channel and lay storm-bound for
twelve days under the Scilly Islands, a circumstance which bears
witness to the imperfect means of navigation of the day and to the
courage of seamen. The ships once able to put to sea, the voyage was
rapid, and in twenty days Davis was off the south-west coast of
Greenland. All about the ships were fog and mist, and a great roaring
noise which the sailors thought must be the sea breaking on a beach.
They lay thus for a day, trying in vain for soundings and firing guns
in order to know the whereabouts of the ships. They lowered their
boats and found that the roaring noise came from the grinding of the
ice pack that lay all about them. Next day the fog cleared and
revealed the coast, which they said was the most deformed rocky and
mountainous land that ever they saw. This was Greenland. The
commander, {25} suiting a name to the miserable prospect before him,
called it the Land of Desolation.

Davis spent nearly a fortnight on the coast. There was little in the
inhospitable country to encourage his exploration. Great cliffs were
seen glittering as with gold or crystal, but the ore was the sam