1544, published during Cabot's lifetime, which is as follows: graven map of Cabot's in existence at Imperial," "Terram hanc olim nobis claufam aperuit Only enJohannes Cabotus Venetus, nec non Sebaftianus Cabotus ejus filius anno ab orbe redempto, "Bibliotheque 1494, die vero 24 Junii hora 5, fub dilucolo quam terram primum vifam appellârunt et infulam quandam ei oppofitam Infulam divi Joannis nominârunt quippe quæ folemni die fefto divi Joannis aperte fuit." This infcription cannot be a mistake in the date, for it is alike in both the Spanish and the Latin infcriptions, and it is abundantly evident that the publisher of the map confidered and believed it to be perfectly true that Cabot did make this voyage in 1494. Kochhaf alfo notes this date in his book as having been feen by him on a map of Cabot at Oxford. By the courtesy of the officials connected with the above admirable library, and the kindness of R. H. Major, Efq., F.S.A., of the map department of the British Museum, we are enabled to give a fac fimile of this precious document; "The only engraven copy," fays Monfieur Taschereau, "which is known of the map of Kochhaf's testimony. Cape Breton probably dif covered first, and that in 1494. Sebastian Cabot." If, therefore, this is to be The above view is perfectly confiftent with Sebaftian's defcription to Ramufio's friend; nor is it at all at variance with the wording of the first charter, but rather the contrary. They were to take five fhips, to fet up our banner and enfigns in every village, town, castle, ifle, or mainland of them newly found.' *** to trade and pay a fifth of the profits to the king." For an uncertain voyage of discovery, five ships would be needlefs: for trading purposes with a newly-discovered region as a mutual defence, and a politic difplay of power before the heathen and infidels we can understand it. Befides, in the Venetian envoy's letter, written. after the return from the first voyage under the charter, he is spoken of as "a man who has good skill in difcovering new islands;" a retrospective view, which points back to fome discovery previous to the one juft then made. Again, in the "Spanish State Papers," vol. i. p. 177, we have corroborative teftimony which carries us back actually beyond the date of Columbus. Don Pedro de Ayala, a Spanish envoy in England, in a letter to his fovereigns Ferdinand and Ifabella, dated July 25, 1498, fays "That the people of Bristol fent out every year two or three or four light fhips, caravelas, in fearch of the island of Brazil and the seven cities, according to the fancy of that Italian Cabot, and that they have done for the last feven years." Whether the father or the fon was the moving spirit of the enterprise, must be left largely to conjecture; one thing feems to be quite certain, Lewis and Sanctus, who are named in the patent, did not fail in the ship; it was either John and Sebastian, or Sebastian alone, to whom the honour of the discovery belongs. "Venetian Calendar." Pedro de Aynith envoy, fays Bristol ala, the Spa and Cabot fent out ships in fearch as early as 1491, one year before Columbus, vide "Spanish State Papers," vol. i. p. 177. This was only one year, fee page 26. "Venetian Calendar." Erafmus. Though the charter was granted in 1495, yet from fome unknown reafon, most probably the difordered ftate of the country, the expedition did not fet fail until early in the fummer of 1497; and then in but one ship, the now famous "Matthew," of and from Bristol. It was the custom in England (vide the "Venetian Calendar") to hire mariners by the voyage; it is not wonderful then, or even matter of surprise to us to find, as we shall, in the course of the narrative, that the men were in a hurry to return, and wifhed to shorten their perilous fearch as much as poffible. Venice acted more wifely, paying her failors by the month and inflicting a penalty of 200 ducats on any captain who hired men by the voyage. It may help us to a better understanding of the greatnefs of the undertaking, if instead of looking at it from our stand point in this year of grace 1869, we fancy ourselves living in the clofe of the fifteenth century, and, as in a panorama, view the varied pictures it presents at that period. Erasmus, in his letters, gives us some pic turefque peeps at our ancestor's life, more pungent than pleasant. He fays: "The English construct their rooms so as to admit of no thorough draft; before I was thirty years old, if I flept in a room which had been shut up for months without ventilation, I was immediately attacked with fever." It was his opinion (and a moft fenfible one it was) that the impure atmosphere of the dwellings caufed the deadly peftilence called the "fweating fickness," which broke out about 1486. In Bristol it carried off vaft numbers of the inhabitants; both here and all over the country, gentle as well as fimple fell victims. Those attacked moftly died in about three hours and many towns loft half their inhabitants. Jortin's Eraf mus, p. 60. MS. Calendars. Evans' "Hiftory of Bristol." Seyer, vol. ii. more than a month. Strangers were faid to be free from danger: lafted little was it, perchance, because of their greater perfonal cleanlinefs? for whilft the houses of the English gentry were in the state described by Erafmus, we cannot conceive that any of the community were cleanly in their perfons. Hear what the scholar from Rotterdam fays: clafs Ꭰ |