84 Bristol manufactures. Conclufion arrived at that Cabot Life of Sebaftian Cabot. tured small stocks; and in the company of this fhip failed alfo, out of Bristow, three or four fmall ships, fraught with fleight and groffe wares, as coarse cloth caps, laces, points, and fuch other .... of whom in this mayor's time, came no tidings." That is, they had not returned in October 1498. From all this, we gather that this voyage was made for colonization, trade, and discovery combined; that the King fhared in the exHudfon's Bay penfe, probably fitting out one ship, as well as furveyed the American coaft from to Florida, and colonized it for fome months. helping the men before named; that the coaft, inhabitants, beasts, fish and birds, as well as Cabot's own map, prove that the scene of their principal operations was the country now known as Labrador, but then called by Cabot, "The land of the Baccalaos;" and that Sebastian Cabot was the firft man who difcovered Hudfon's Bay, which he afterwards more thoroughly explored in the following reign, in the year 1517, when he specially failed in the service of Henry VIII. in search through it of the North-West Paffage. CHAPTER VI. Services declined by Henry; traditionary statements of in- N but met "with no great or favourable reception from the king." "The fierce and ftrong wave," fays Hall, "which devoured the real, and alfo the pretended Earl of Warwick," was gathering and fwelling all through that year, and the troubled monarch had home cares enough, without any foreign adventures. "History of Bristol." Hall's "Chronicles," p. 488. P. 208. Seyer, the Bristol hiftorian, says that Cabot Seyer, vol. ii. now, with no extraordinary preparation, fet forth from Bristol, and made great discoveries. Navarette, vol. iii. p. 41. Ibid. p. 86. Privy purse expenses, Hy. VII. Rymer, vol. xiii. Hojeda, a Spanish navigator, who failed from Spain May 20, 1499, and was abfent one year, found certain Englishmen at Caquibaco; and in his account he mentions this, when giving a defcription of the discoveries of the English under Henry VII. Was this Cabot? The probability is great that it was, and that he would take up the thread of the voyage where he dropt it, at Florida, and so coaft along to the southward; this would speedily bring him to the spot where Hojeda found the English. An idea, founded partly on tradition and from certain payments from the privy purse, has found fome favour, viz., that he was engaged in colonizing Newfoundland, and the neighbourhood. In Nov. 17, 1503, we read: "To one that brought hawkes from the Newfounded ifland, £1." "8th April. To a Prieft, that goeth to the new island, £2, &c. &c." But we rather incline to put these to the account of the Portuguese and the Bristol merchants, whose expedition failed in 1502; and who were doubtless the men who brought over the Salvages, who were exhibited before the king in that year. For if, as some think, Cabot brought them to England, the novelty would have worn off, and the king have seen them, before three years paffed away. Yet, Rymer, vol. xiii. p. 42. Befides, it was ever against Cabot's wish to lure or steal away from their homes the natives of the lands he vifited. It has been faid again, that now comes a moft dishonourable act on the part of the king. The Cabots had been to great expense, and their discoveries, though vaft, had been hitherto unremunerative. declining Sebastian's fervices in 1499, in 1501 the king granted to certain Portugales, in conjunction with Richard Warde, Thomas Ashehurst, and John Thomas, of Bristol, a charter to trade to these lands, which has in it a clause, to the effect that they shall not be interfered with by any persons to whom previous grants have been made; but in the origi- Biddle, p. nal roll the pen is drawn through this claufe, and the charter is limited to lands before unknown to all Chriftians; fo that the king's character is once more redeemed from dif honour. 318. Don Pedro d'Ayola. Navarette, vol. iii. p. 77. Lardner's Lofing fight, for a while, of our great feaman, let us briefly glance at what his brother navigators have been meanwhile doing. On Cabot's return from his continental difcovery, in Auguft, 1497, the news would be at once transmitted to Spain, by the ambaffador, who was then in England, negotiating the marriage of Katharine of Arragon with Prince Arthur. Columbus, ftirred with honourable rivalry, urgently preffed for another and immediate expedition; this failing in May, 1498, refulted in the discovery of the continent of South America, by him, fourteen months after the landing of the chartered expedition, under Cabot, in June, 1497, or four years and two months after, Cabot's map fays, the land was by them discovered. Eight years afterwards, on May 29th, the great Columbus died. Hojeda, whom we have before mentioned, had with him in his employ, in the year 1499, a Florentine, named Americus Vesputius, on his first voyage, he having come to Spain to learn navigation, it is more than probable that |