History, Wonder Tales, Fairy Tales, Myths and Legends The Flemish | Page 225

In order to avoid any confusion, it is important to know that in the sixteenth century,
the Netherlands covered a part of North of France and Lorraine, Belgium,
Luxembourg and the present Netherlands. Its inhabitants were called the Belgians,
and the maps represented the country in the shape of a lion: the "Leo Belgicus".
During the same difficult period, in Antwerp, was born Willem Usselinx. Son of a family
active in the spices trading, he was later sent in Spain, Portugal and the Azores Island
for his education. On his return from the Azores in 1591, Usselinx decided to leave
Antwerp for Holland. Knowing how much Spain's wealth was coming from the
American colonies, he wouldn’t rest until he convinced the Dutchmen to settle colonies
in the New World, in order to fight the Spaniards.
Nearly thirty years of stubbornness and efforts were necessary from Willem Usselinx
before the West India Company was finally founded in 1621. It is the one who
chartered the "Nieu Nederlandt"...

Henri Hudson
In 1609, an English sailor named Henri Hudson discovered a great bay with a big river
flowing into it from the mountains, at a latitude of forty-one degrees north and a
longitude of seventy-four degrees west.
Hudson had been entrusted by the Flemings Emmanuel Van Meteren, Judocus
Hondius and Petrus Plancius to discover a new passage to the land of Tartars and to
China, on behalf of F