HUDSON, Henry. Of this eminent navigator nothing is known prior to the year 1607, when he was employed by some London merchants in a small vessel, for exploring a north-east passage to China and Japan. He set sail on the 1st of May with only ten men and a boy, and reached as high as 80° of north latitude, where being stopped by the ice, he returned to England in the month of September following. In his next voyage he landed at Nova Zembla; but being unable to make any farther east, he returned in August the following year. The Dutch East India Company fitted him out in the year 1609, with a crew of twenty men, English and Dutch; and after attempting in vain to penetrate eastward, he steered for the American coast, and went as far as Chesapeake Bay. But his crew having mutinied, he durst not attempt a westerly passage through Davis’s Strait, and therefore returned home. The knowledge acquired by him in these voyages increased his ardour for discovery, and he again made an offer of his services to the Dutch East India Company, which were not accepted; and for his last voyage, Sir Thomas Smith, Sir Dudley Digges, and some other of his friends, fitted him out. lie set sail on the 17th of April, and came in sight of Greenland on the 4th of June. Sailing westward, he reached the mouth of the strait which bears his name, through which he advanced along the coast of Labrador, which he called Nova Britannia. Here he hoped to have discovered the long-wished-for passage; but he found he was only in a bay, in the southern part of which he determined to winter. After this he fitted out his shallop for further discoveries; but as he had no means of revictualling his ship, he distributed his last remaining bread, with tears in his eyes, amongst his people, and proposed to return home. But his mutinous crew entered his cabin by night, tied his hands behind his back, and set him ashore at the west end of the straits, with 'seven of the crew who were most attached to him. They were never more heard of, and it is probable that they were swallowed up by the waves.

Hudson, William, a celebrated English botanist, was born at Westmoreland about 1730. He was bound apprentice to an apothecary in London, whose business he continued, and proved a friend to the widow and daughters of his master. It appears from the testimony of Dr Pulteney, that he had a residence in the British Museum, but we are not informed in what capacity. He died of a paralytic distemper in May 1793. He possessed a comprehensive knowledge of English plants, which induced him to undertake an arrangement of English botany according to the Linnaean classification; a task which had been previously attempted by Dr Hill, but the execution [7:11:717]of which was very imperfect. Hudson’s Flora Anglica appeared in 1762, in one volume 8vo, the Latin preface to which was written by Mr Stillingfleet, received with great applause, and contributed greatly to the adoption of the sexual system in England.

Hudson's Bay, a large bay of North America, lying between 51 and 69 degrees of latitude, discovered in 1610 by Henry Hudson. This intrepid mariner, in searching after a north-west passage to the South Seas, discovered three straits, through which he hoped to discover a passage to Asia by America. He had made two voyages before on the same adventure; the first in 1607, and the second in 1608. In his third and last, 1610, he entered the straits leading into this new Mediterranean, the bay known by his name; coasted a great part of it, and penetrated to eighty degrees and a half into the heart of the frozen zone. His ardour for the discovery not being abated by the difficulties he struggled with in this domain of winter, he staid there until the ensuing spring, and prepared in the beginning of 1611 to pursue his discoveries; but his crew, who had suffered equal hardships, without the same spirit to support them, mutinied, seized upon Hudson and seven of those who were most faithful to him, and committed them to the fury of the arctic seas in an open boat. As already mentioned, Hudson and his companions were either swallowed up by the waves, or, gaining the inhospitable coast, were destroyed by the savages; but the ship and the rest of the men returned home. Other attempts towards a discovery were made in 1612 and 1667; and a patent for planting the country, with a charter for a company, was obtained in the year 1670. In 1746 Captain Ellis wintered as far north as fifty-seven degrees and a half; and Captain Christopher attempted further discoveries in 1761. The company being desirous of obtaining information regarding a river called the Coppermine River, directed Mr Hearne, a young gentleman in their service, to proceed over land for that river, which he had orders to survey if possible down to its embouchure; to make observations for fixing the latitudes and longitudes; and to bring home maps and drawings both of it and the countries through which he might pass. Accordingly Mr Hearne set out from Prince of Wales’s Fort, on Churchill River, latitude 58° 47⅜' north, and longitude 94° 7⅜' west from Greenwich, on the 7th of December 1770. On the 13th of June he reached the Coppermine River, and found it all the way, even to its mouth, encumbered with shoals and falls, and emptying itself into the sea over a dry flat of the shore, the tide being then out, which seemed by the edges of the ice to rise about twelve or fourteen feet. Mr Hearne was nevertheless sure of the place where it emptied itself into being the sea, or a branch of it, by the quantity of whalebone and seal-skins which the Esquimaux had at their tents, and also by the number of seals which he saw upon the ice. It appears from the map which Mr Hearne constructed of this singular journey, that the mouth of the Coppermine River lies in latitude 72° north, and longitude 25° west from Churchill River; that is, about 119° west of Greenwich. Mr Hearne’s journey back from the Coppermine River to Churchill lasted till the 30th of June 1772, so that he was absent about a year and seven months. The subsequent progress of discovery in this quarter has been detailed in the article on Greenland. Hudson' s Bay Company. See Company. Hudson's River, a large river of North America, which rises on the east of Lake Ontario, and running by Albany, and on the back of the south part of New England through part of New York, falls into the bay of the sea beyond the west end of Long Island, and below the town of New’ York.