HENRY HUDSON.
Henry Hudson. By Edgar Mayhew Bacon. (G. P. Putnam's Sons. 6s.)—We cannot say that this volume throws much new light on the obscure subject of Hudson's career and character. The existing materials are limited in extent, and unless a dis- covery of something new is made—a very unlikely contingency— we must be content with conjecture. Mr. Bacon, who is studiously fair, does something for Henry Hudson's reputation. It is common to regard him as another Captain Bligh, and it is difficult not to think that there was something difficite or contrary in the man. He did not in the main get on satisfactorily either with his subordinates or his crew. Mr. Bacon finds a chief cause of the final catastrophe in a certain Henry Greene, a "ne'er-do-weel " whom Hudson took with him in the benevolent hope that an enterprise of this kind might help him to break off his dissolute habits. This fellow was a ringleader in the mutiny. In the last scene, which is vigorously described, the noblest figure is that of a quite obscure person, Philip Staffe, ship's carpenter. Hudson bore his fate with resolute courage. Staffe might have saved his life, for the mutineers, anxious to have the benefit of his services, offered to keep him. He told them that they were a pack of thieves who would all be hanged when they got home. It shows some spark of good feeling in the villains that they gave him his
tool-chest.
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