Page:Oregon, her history, her great men, her literature.djvu/31

28 -laden ship, "the Queen, declaring her approbation of all that he had done," confeired upon him the honor of knighthood.

Cook Sails Through Bering's Strait. In 1778, two years after the declaration of American Independence Captain James Cook, sailing under the British flag, discovered the Sandwich Islands* Then he sailed north, in search of the legendary strait connecting the Pacific with the Atlantic Ocean. According to Dr. John Fiske, "Captain Cook first saw a point which he called Cape Foulweather, and sailing south from there he named Capes Perpetua and Gregory. Thence he turned about to the northward and in the struggle with adverse winds was carried well out to sea, so that the next land he saw was Cape Flattery." He then entered Nootka Sound which he also named. Following the coast line northward, Captain Cook penetrated into the bay afterwards known as Cook's Inlet. Upon failtng to find a passage in this direction, he sailed for Bering Strait. On August 9 he named the north-eastermost point of the Asiatic continent, East Cape; and to the northwestern extremity of America he gave the name Cape Prince of Wales—both of which he visited. Finding the passage interrupted by an impenetrable wall of ice, Captain Cook returned to Hawaii, vhere he was killed by a native August 14, 1779.

Cook's Expedition Resulted in Fur Trade. When the ships of which Cook had been captain touched at Canton on their return to England, the furs purchased of the Indians at Nootka Sound were readily sold at many times the cost price. Such was the profit, and so intense was the consequent excitement on board ship, that the crews threatened to mutiny when the officers refused to return to the Pacific Northwest for more furs. As soon as the news of the fur trade spread throughout Europe, trading ships were sent to the northwest coast by England, France and Portugal; and in the course of time ships from Spain and the United States visited harbors in the fur bearing region.