si eo naves aliquando applicuissent de ea comperti aliquid habuissemus. Piscibus scatet regio salmonibus videlicet et alecibus [Stockfish omitted, probably from scantiness of vocabulary] et id genus compluribus. Silvas habent omnifariam perinde ut omni lignorum genere abundet regio: propterea naves fabricantur antennas et malos, transtra et reliqua quæ pertinent ad navigia: ob id hic Noster Rex instituit inde multum emolumenti sumere: tum ob ligna frequentia pluribus rebus haud inepta, tum vel maxime ob hominum genus Laboribus assuetum: quibus ad varia eis uti quibit, quandoquidem suapte natura hi viri nati sunt ad Labores suntque meliora mancipia quam unquam viderim.”

The principal perversions are noted in italics. Instead of a region discovered last year," we have "a region formerly visited by our countrymen." The distance sailed along the coast becomes almost eight hundred miles. There is created amongst the natives a preference of Venetian manufactures. This region "very populous" according to the original, is converted into one "admirably cultivated," and instead of the Pine, &c. well suited for the spars of vessels, we have the natives actually engaged in ship building! The captives "adapted" to labour become "habituated" to it, and at length "born" to it; and in speaking of the king of Portugal, the ambassador is made to call him "our King." And this is a professed translation, by an ecclesiastic, dedicated to a high public functionary!

In order to comprehend fully the extensive influence which this fraud has exercised on the modern accounts of Cortereal's voyage, it will be necessary to advert briefly to a subsequent piece of imposture of which more will be said in another place

In the year 1558, there was published, at Venice, a little volume containing the adventures of two brothers, Nicholas and Antonio Zeno, in which an effort is made to show that they were acquainted with the New World long before the time of Columbus. It is not necessary to give more of the story at present, than that these persons, about the year 1380, were in an island somewhere in the Atlantic, designated as Frisland. They there conversed with a fisherman, who, twenty-six years before, had been carried by a tempest far to the westward, and been cast ashore, with a few companions, on a place called Estotiland, plainly designed, by the framer of the story, for the Northern Coast of America. After remain

ing a number of years in this country, the fisherman, with the aid of his transatlantic friends, built a vessel and recrossed the ocean to Frisland. The editor of the work gives the following digest of the information gathered as to the inhabitants of this newly-discovered region-"It is credible that in time past they have had traffic with our men, for he said that he saw Latin books in the king's library." Again, "They sow corn and make beer and ale," &c. &c. An expedition was fitted out by the Prince of the Island, and sailed towards the west, but returned, as it would appear, without having reached Estotiland, so that the only visiter was the fisherman driven off his station and cast away there one hundred and forty-seven years, by computation, before the time of Cortereal's voyage.

It will be seen that the story, promulgated in 1558, is so framed as exactly to fall in with the perversion by the Itinerarium, half a century before, as to the probable intercourse with Venetians-the cultivation of the soil by the nativesand their building vessels fit to navigate the ocean. The only difference is, that the Itinerarium merely makes the supposed traffic precede generally the visit of Cortereal, but the author of the Zeni voyages carries it back beyond the disaster to the fisherman which must have occurred about the year 1354.

We are now prepared for the following passages from Mr Barrow, and another more recent writer. The parts enclosed in parenthesis appear as Notes in the works quoted.

"In the first collection of voyages which is known to have been published in Europe, and printed in Vicenza, by Francazano Montaboldo, (Mundo Nuovo e Paesi nuovamente retrovati, &c. Vicenza, 1507; a very rare book; translated into Latin, by Madrigano, under the title of 'Itinerarium Portugalensium è Lusitania in Indiam, &c.') there is inserted a letter from Pedro Pascoal, ambassador from the republic of Venice to the court of Lisbon, addressed to his brother in Italy, and dated 29th October, 1501, in which he details the voyage of Cortereal, as told by himself on his return.

"From this authority, it appears that having employed nearly a year in this voyage, he had discovered between West and North West, a Continent until then unknown to the rest of the world, that he had run along the coast upwards of eight hundred miles; that according to his conjecture this land lay near a region formerly approached by the Venetians Nicholo and Antonio Zeno! almost at the North Pole! and that he was unable to proceed farther on account of the great mountains of ice which encumbered the sea, and the continued snows which fell from the sky. He

further relates that Cortereal brought fifty-seven of the natives in his vessel-he extols the country on account of the timber which it produces, the abundance of fish upon its coasts, and the inhabitants being robust and laborious." (Barrow, Chronological History, p. 40, 41.)

"From his own account it appears that having employed nearly a year in this voyage, he had discovered between West and North-West, a Continent till then unknown to the rest of the world; that he ran along the coast upwards of eight hundred miles; that according to his conjecture this land lay near a region formerly approached by the Venetians (an allusion to the voyages of the Zeni), and almost at the North Pole, and that he was unable to proceed further, &c." (Dr Lardner's Cyclopædia, Hist. of Maritime and Inland Discovery, vol. ii. p. 139.)

Our criticism on this epitome of errors is confined to the original wrong-doer. Not only does Mr Barrow fall an unresisting victim to the treachery of the monk, but, such is the influence of bad company, he himself is found taking, in his turn, rather dishonest liberties with his own guide. In the original, Cortereal is said to have passed along between six and seven hundred miles of the newly discovered coast without reaching its termination. Madrignanon stretches out the distance to almost eight hundred, while Mr Barrow insists on "upwards" of eight hundred. For all this, too, he vouches the wretched monk, whereas his audacity, as we have seen, did not quite enable him to reach the point over which the Secretary of the Admiralty, with the gathered impetus of so rapid a progress, takes a fearless leap.

In happy ignorance of the host of authorities which fix conclusively the limit of the voyage, this gentleman evinces an amiable anxiety to frame an apology for one of Cortereal's countrymen whose statement he found in Hakluyt's translation:

"Galvano places it, although with little accuracy, in 50°; misprinted probably for 60° which would be correct!" (Barrow, p. 39.)

We have forborne, as has been said, to press a censure of the writer in Dr Lardner's Cyclopædia, because he is merely a pitiable martyr to faith in his predecessor; but another work, published on the 1st of October last, does not merit the same forbearance, as it sets at equal defiance the genuine and the spurious authorities. The reference is to the "Narrative of Discovery and Adventure in the Polar Seas and Regions,

&c.; by Professor Leslie, Professor Jameson, and Hugh Murray, Esqre. F.R.S.E." forming vol. i. of the Edinburgh Cabinet Library. By this work it appears (p. 158) that Cortereal," immediately upon the discovery of the Western World, resolved to follow in the steps of Columbus." We are informed further (ib.), "Respecting the details of this voyage, there remain only detached shreds which Mr Barrow has collected with equal learning and diligence!" The character of a work put forth under such auspices, may be gathered from the following passage (p. 159)—

"The natives are correctly described as of small stature-a simple and laborious race; and no less than fifty-seven being allured or carried on board were conveyed to Portugal. After a run along this coast estimated at 800 miles Cortereal came to a region which appeared to some (!) as lying almost beneath the Pole, and similar to that formerly reached by Nicolo and Antonio Zeno! Ramusio more explicitly states, &c. &c."

All the rest is in a similar strain. Only one part of the passage quoted calls for particular remark,—that as to the stature of the inhabitants. The writer is evidently anxious to give a sanction to his own absurd hypothesis that the natives whose wonderful symmetry and aptitude for labour extorted the admiration of the Venetian Ambassador-whose "goodly corporature" is specially mentioned by Richard Eden (Decades, 318) were the Esquimaux of Labrador. Now, without relying on the circumstances already stated, we mention one fact. Ramusio, whose name is here invoked, devotes to the voyage of Cortereal about half a page, and expressly declares that the inhabitants were large and well proportioned, "gli habitanti sono huomini grandi, ben proportionati."

CHAP. VI.

DIFFUSIVE MISCHIEF OF THE ITINERARIUM PORTUGALLENSIUM-GRYNEUS —MEUSEL-FLEURIEU-HUMBOLDT, &c.

THE perversion by Madrignanon has passed into the earliest and most esteemed Collections of Voyages and Travels, and thus exercised a mischievous influence on more recent works.

In the Novus Orbis of Grynæus published at Basle, in 1532, the Letter of Pasquiligi is given (p. 138) according to the version of the Itinerarium; and so in the edition of that work published in the same year at Paris (p. 121), and in the Basle Edition of 1555 (p. 99). Everywhere, indeed, we are presented with lamentable proofs of the blind confidence reposed in it, even as to other matters. Thus, the "Biographie Universelle" (art. Cadamosto) sharply rebukes Grynæus for having stated 1504, instead of 1454, as the year in which Cadamosto represents himself to have been at Venice previous to his voyage. The Itinerarium (cap. ii.) is the source of this error. The explanation does not, it is true, relieve Grynæus from censure. The mistake appears in the Basle Edition of the Novus Orbis of 1532 (page 5), in the Paris Edition of the same year (p. 3), and is not corrected in that of Basle in 1555 (p. 2).

So implicitly has Madrignanon been followed, that Meusel (Biblioth. Hist., original Leipsic Ed. vol. ii. part ii. p. 318) not only gives the year 1504, but finding a statement, on the same page, by Cadamosto as to his age, makes a calculation accordingly, and gravely informs us that the voyager must have been born in 1483-just, in fact, twenty-nine years after the expedition! Meusel finds out afterwards, in some way, that he was wrong, and throws the blame (vol. iii. p. 159, 160), like the "Biographie Universelle," on Grynæus.