For the first three weeks, the ship skirted up the east coast of Great Britain, then turned westward. On May 11, she reached Iceland. Poor winds and fog locked her up in a harbor the crew called ``Lousie Bay.'' The subsequent two-weeks wait made the crew quarrelsome. With Hudson looking on, his protege Greene picked a fight with the ship's surgeon, Edward Wilson. The issue was settled on shore, Greene winning and Wilson remaining ashore, determined to catch the next fishing boat back to England. With difficulty, Hudson persuaded him to rejoin the ship, and they sailed from Iceland.

Early in June, the Discovery passed ``Desolation'' (southern Greenland) and in mid-June entered the ``Furious Overfall.'' Floating ice bore down from the north and west. Fog hung over the route constantly. Turbulent tides rose as much as fifty feet. The ship's compass was useless because of the nearness of the magnetic North Pole.

As the bergs grew larger, Hudson was forced to turn south into what is now Ungava Bay, an inlet of the great strait. After finding that its coasts led nowhere, however, he turned north again, toward the main, ice filled passageway -- and the crew, at first uneasy, then frightened, rebelled.

The trouble was at least partly Juet's doing. For weeks he had been saying that Hudson's idea of sailing through to Java was absurd. The great, crushing ice masses coming into view made him sound like the voice of pure reason. A group of sailors announced to Hudson that they would sail no farther.