.CiDZ7 
 
 

 riON II, If'.M. TRANS. KCIYAI. Sec CAN. 
 
 THE 
 
 VOYAGES OF THE CABOTS 
 
 IX 1497 AND 1498. 
 
 WITH AN ATTEMPT TO DETERMINE THEIR LANDFALL AND TO 
 IDENTIFY THEIR ISLAND OF ST. JOHN. 
 
 BY SAMUEL EDWARD D A W S O N , L i T . D , 
 
 FROM THE 
 
 TRANSACTIONS OF THE ROYAL SOCIETY OF CANADA, 
 VOLUME XII, SECTION II, 1894. 
 
 MONTREAL 
 W. FOSTER BROWN & CO., PUBLISHERS. 
 
 1894. 
 
Bfeacmt ubnqr 
 
 SECTION II., 1894. [ 51 ] TRANS. ROY. Soc. CANADA. 
 
 II. The Voyages of the Caltot* in 1497 nn.il 1498 ; with an attempt to determine their 
 landfall and to identify their inland of St. John. 
 
 By SAMUEL EDWARD DAWSON, Lit.l). 
 
 (Presented May 22, 1894.) 
 
 1. INTRODUCTION. 
 
 his continent has been the subject of so much 
 two Cabots. Their personal character, their 
 y made and the extent and direction of their 
 sputed over. The share, moreover, of each in 
 ery battleground for historians. Some learned 
 
 Wltn trie AutnOP S ? others would put him aside and award all the 
 
 es even of the voyages are disputed ; and very 
 
 Compliments. 5 not hesitate to declare that the voyages are 
 
 IB whole question a mystification, 
 of the Cabots have always rested the original 
 
 pon this continent. In the published annals of 
 
 iwa. Oct. 1894. ,. , , . , ,, ,. . . 
 
 ot them exist ; nor was there tor sixty years in 
 
 ichievements. The English claims rest almost 
 
 solely upon second hand evidence from Spanish and Italian authors, upon contemporary 
 reports of Spanish and Italian envoys at the English court, upon records of the two letters 
 patent issued, and upon two or three entries lately discovered in the accounts of disburse- 
 ments from the privy purse of king Henry VII. These are our title-deeds to this continent. 
 The evidence is doubtless conclusive, but the whole subject of western discovery was 
 undervalued and neglected by England for so long a period that it is no wonder if Portuguese 
 savants deny the reality of those voyages, seeing that their riation has been supplanted by a 
 race which can show so little original evidence of its claims. 
 
 It may appear presumptuous for a Canadian, far away from the great libraries of the 
 world, to venture into paths trodden by so many able and learned historians ; but the 
 labours of Humboldt and Kunstmann, and Kohl, and Kretschmer, and Deane, and Harrisse, 
 and Biddle, and "Wiusor have brought into accessible shape all the data now extant for 
 forming a judgment, and Canadians can bring to the discussion the advantage of an intimate 
 local knowledge which these learned men could not possess. For that part of continental 
 America first trodden by Europeans is Canadian land, and to Canadians nothing concerning 
 John Cabot can be considered foreign. When Ferland or Bourinot, or Pope, or Patterson, 
 or Laverdiere, or Ganong write upon this subject they are writing of seas and coasts familiar 
 
> 
 
 SECTION II., 1894. [ 51 ] TRANS. ROY. Soc. CANADA. 
 
 IE. 77/6' Voyages of the Cabots in 1497 and 1498 ; with an attempt to ilclennine their 
 landfall <n/<l to identify f/fir i*1<ind of St. John. 
 
 By SAMUEL EDWARD DAWSON, Lit.l). 
 
 (Presented May 22, 1894.) 
 
 1. INTRODUCTION. 
 
 Probably no question in the history of this continent has been the subject of so much 
 discussion as the lives and voyages of the two Cabots. Their personal character, their 
 nationality, the number of the voyages they made and the extent and direction of their 
 discoveries have been, and still are, keenly disputed over. The share, moreover, of each in 
 the credit due for the discoveries made is a very battleground for historians. Some learned 
 writers attribute everything to John Cabot, others would put him aside and award all the 
 credit to his second son, Sebastian. The dates even of the voyages are disputed ; and very 
 learned professors of history in Portugal do not hesitate to declare that the voyages are 
 apocryphal, the discoveries pretended, and the whole question a mystification. 
 
 Nevertheless solely upon the discoveries of the Cabots have always rested the original 
 claims of the English race to a foothold upon this continent. In the published annals of 
 England, however, no contemporary records of them exist ; nor was there for sixty years in 
 English literature any recognition of their achievements. The English claims rest almost 
 solely upon second hand evidence from Spanish and Italian authors, upon contemporary 
 reports of Spanish and Italian envoys at the English court, upon records of the two letters 
 patent issued, and upon two or three entries lately discovered in the accounts of disburse- 
 ments from the privy purse of king Henry VII. These are our title-deeds to this continent. 
 The evidence is doubtless conclusive, but the whole subject of western discovery was 
 undervalued and neglected by England for so long a period that it is no wonder if Portuguese 
 savants deny the reality of those voyages, seeing that their nation has been supplanted by a 
 race which can show so little original evidence of its claims. 
 
 It may appear presumptuous for a Canadian, far away from the great libraries of the 
 world, to venture into paths trodden by so many able and learned historians ; but the 
 labours of Humboldt and Kunstmann, and Kohl, and Kretschmer, and Deane, and Harrisse, 
 and Biddle, and Wiusor have brought into accessible shape all the data now extant for 
 forming a judgment, and Canadians can bring to the discussion the advantage of an intimate 
 local knowledge which these learned men could not possess. For that part of continental 
 America first trodden by Europeans is Canadian land, and to Canadians nothing concerning 
 John Cabot can be considered foreign. When Ferland or Bourinot, or Pope, or Patterson, 
 or Laverdiere, or Ganong write upon this subject they are writing of seas and coasts familiar 
 
52 SAMUEL EDWARD DAWSON ON THE 
 
 to them from boyhood under every aspect of sunshine and storm. This is a most important 
 auxiliary to book-knowledge and prevents many misconceptions. One instance may suffice 
 Mr. Harrisse is arguing ' for a theory that the Portuguese Fagundes, possessed, in 1521, 
 an intimate knowledge of the gulf of St. Lawrence, and he seizes upon the name Auguada 
 bay. This he translates by "Watering bay" from the "place where vessels went to fill 
 their casks with fresh water at the entrance of the St. Lawrence river." Having made this 
 assumption, probably from a supposed analogy with the Amazon which is reported to 
 freshen the water out of sight of land, he naturally concludes that when Fagundes went up 
 the gulf for fresh water he would have seen Prince Edward island, the Magdalens, and 
 Anticosti. Probably he would ; but then before he could fill his casks he must have gone 
 550 miles from the strait of Canso, because the St. Lawrence water is not fresh below Crane 
 island 34 miles from Quebec. To a Canadian the absurdity of vessels coming up from the 
 maritime provinces to Quebec for fresh water is palpable ; but, from want of that local 
 knowledge, the immense research of Mr. Harrisse is led into a false path. Canadians should 
 not quietly resign Cabot into other hands, for he is more to them than Columbus is to the 
 people of the United States. Cabot sailed in the service of the British crown and belauded 
 on territory which still owns allegiance to the queen of England. And then our own gulf 
 all our own we, who know it in all its moods who have seen the gloomy forest steeps 
 of Cape North and the inaccessible cliffs of the Bird Rocks lit by the sun or when the ice 
 was grinding at their bases and the fog sullenly lifting from their summits we who know 
 its waters when black with storm or rippling in inconstant beauty under the clear blue of 
 our northern summer we have a commentary on the books and charts which all the 
 learning of a Humboldt or the minute research of a Harrisse can never supply. 
 
 It is not my intention to wander over all the debatable ground of the Cabot voyages, 
 where every circumstance bristles with conflicting theories. The original authorities are 
 few and scanty, but mountains of hypotheses have been built upon them, and, too often, 
 the suppositions of one writer have been the facts of a succeeding one. Step by step the 
 learned students before alluded to have established certain propositions which appear to me 
 to be true and which I shall accept without further discussion. Among these I count the 
 following : 2 
 
 1. That John Cabot was a Venetian, of Genoese birth, naturalized at Venice on 
 March 28th, 1476, after the customary fifteen years of residence ; and that he 
 subsequently settled in England with all his family. 
 
 2. That Sebastian, his second son, was born in Venice and when very young 
 was taken by his father to England with the rest of the family. 
 
 3. That on petition of John Cabot and his three sons, Lewis, Sebastian and Sancio, 
 letters patent of king Henry VII. were issued, under date March 5, 1496, 
 empowering them, at their own expense, to discover and take possession for 
 England of new lands not before found by any Christian nation. 
 
 4. That John Cabot, accompanied perhaps by his son Sebastian, sailed from 
 Bristol early in May, 1497. He discovered and landed upon some part of 
 America between Cape Cod, in Massachusetts, und Cape Chidley, in Labra- 
 dor ; that he returned to Bristol before the end of July of the same your; that 
 whatever might have been the number of vessels which started, the discovery 
 was made by John Cabot's own vessel, the " Matthew of Bristol," with a crew 
 of eighteen men. 
 
VOYAGES OF THE CABOTS IN 1497 AND 1498. 53 
 
 5. That thereupon, and in consideration of this discovery made by John Cabot, 
 king Henry VII. granted new letters patent, drawn solely to John Cabot, 
 authorizing a second expedition on a more extended scale and with fuller 
 royal authority, which letters patent were dated February 3rd, 1498. That 
 this expedition sailed in the spring of 1498, and had not returned in October. 
 It consisted of several ships and about three hundred men. That John and 
 Sebastian Cabot sailed on this voyage. "When it returned is not known. 
 From the time of sailing of this expedition John Cabot vanishes into the 
 unknowable, and from thenceforth Sebastian alone appears in the historic 
 record. 
 
 These points are now fully supported by satisfactory evidence, mostly documentary and 
 contemporary. As for John Cabot, Sebastian said he died, which is one of the few undis- 
 puted facts in the discussion ; but if Sebastian is correctly reported in Ramusio 3 to have 
 said that he died at the time when the news of Columbus's discoveries reached England, 
 then Sebastian Cabot told an untruth, because the letters patent of 1498 were addressed to 
 John Cabot alone. The son had a gift of reticence concerning others, including his father 
 anil brothers, which in these latter days has been the cause of much wearisome research to 
 scholars. To avoid further discussion of the preceding points is, however, a great gain. The 
 aim of the present paper is mainly to ascertain the landfall of John Cabot in 1497, and, 
 incidentally, to identify the island of St. John, discovered on the same day, viz., on St. 
 John the Baptist's day. In attempting this, other points of interest in the historical 
 geography of the gulf of St. Lawrence will necessarily arise. 
 
 II. THEORIES OP THE LANDFALL. 
 
 From among the numerous opinions concerning the landfall of John Cabot three 
 theories emerge which may be seriously entertained, all three being supported by evidence 
 of much weight. 
 
 1st. That it was in Newfoundland. 4 
 
 2nd. That it was on the Labrador coast. 3 
 
 3rd. That it was on the island of Cape Breton. 8 
 
 Until a comparatively recent period it was universally held by English writers that 
 Newfoundland was the part of North America first seen by Cabot. The name New-found- 
 land lends itself to this view; for, in the letters patent_of 1498, the expression, "Londe and 
 iles of late founde," and the wording of the award recorded in the king's privy purse 
 accounts, August 10, 1497, "To hym that founde the new ile 10," seem naturally to 
 suggest the island of Newfoundland of our day ; and this impression is strengthened by 
 reading the old authors, who spell it, as Richard "Whitbourne in 1588, New-found-land, 7 in 
 three words with connecting hyphens, and often with the definite article, "The Newe- 
 found-land." A cursory reading of the whole literature of American discovery before 1831 
 would suggest that idea, and some writers of the present day still maintain it. Authors of 
 other nationalities have, however, always disputed it, and have pushed the English dis- 
 coveries far north, to Labrador and even to Greenland. Champlain," who read and studied 
 everything relating to his profession, concedes to the English the coast of Labrador north of 
 56 and the regions about Davis straits ; and the maps, which for a long period, with a few 
 
54 SAMUEL EDWARD DAWSOX ON THE 
 
 notable exceptions, were made only by Spaniards, Portuguese and Italians, bear out Cham- 
 plain's remonstrances. It seems, moreover, on a cursory consideration of the maps, probable 
 that a vessel on a westerly course passing south of Ireland should strike 1 somewhere on the 
 coast of Newfoundland about Cape Bonavista, and Cabot being an Italian, that very place 
 suggests itself by its name as his probable landfall. The English, who for the most part 
 have had their greatness thrust upon them by circumstances, neglected Cabot's discoveries 
 for fifty years and during that time the French and Portuguese took possession of the whole 
 region and named all the coasts ; then when the troubled reign of Henry VIII. was over, the 
 English people began to wake up and in fact re-discovered Cabot and his voyages. A care- 
 ful study however of the subject will be likely to lead to the rejection of the Newfoundland 
 landfall plausible as it may at first sight appear. 
 
 In the year 1831 Richard Biddle, a lawyer of Pittsburg in Pennsylvania, published a 
 memoir of Sebastian Cabot which led the way to an almost universal change of opinion. 
 He advanced the theory that Labrador was the Cabot landfall in 1497. His book is one of 
 great research and, though confused in its arrangement, is written with much vigour and 
 ability. But Biddle lost the historian in the advocate. His book is a passionate brief for 
 Sebastian Cabot ; for he strangely conceives the son to have been wronged by the ascription 
 to John Cabot of any portion of the merit of the discovery of America. Not only would he 
 suppress the elder Cabot, but he covers the well-meaning Hakluyt with opprobrium and 
 undermines his character by insinuations, much as a criminal lawyer might be supposed to 
 do to an adverse witness in a jury trial. Valuable as the work is there is a singular heat 
 prevading it, fatal to the true historic spirit. Hakluyt is the pioneer of the literature of 
 English discovery and adventure at once the recorder and inspirer of noble effort. He is 
 more than a translator; he spared no pains nor expense to obtain from the lips of seamen 
 their own versions of their voyages, and, if discrepancies are met with in a collection so 
 voluminous, it is not surprising and need not be ascribed to a set purpose ; for Hakluyt's 
 sole object in life seems to have been to record all he knew or could ascertain of the maritime 
 achievements of the age. 
 
 Biddle's book marks an epoch in the controversy. In truth he seems to be the first 
 who gave minute study to the original authorities and broke away from the tradition of 
 Newfoundland. He fixed the landfall on the coast of Labrador and Humboldt and Kohl 
 added the weight of their great learning to his theory. Harrisse, who in his John and 
 Sebastian Cabot had written in favour of Cape Breton has, in his latest bock, " The Discovery 
 of America," gone back to Labrador as his faith in the celebrated map of 1544 gradually 
 waned- and his esteem for the character of Sebastian Cabot faded away. Such changes of 
 view, not only in this but in other matters, render Mr. Harrisse's books somewhat confusing, 
 although the student of American history can never be sufficiently thankful for his untiring 
 research. 
 
 The discovery in Germany by Von Martins in 1843 of an engraved mappemonde bear- 
 ing date of 1544 and purporting to be issued under the authority of Sebastian Cabot, soon 
 caused a general current of opinion in favour of a landfall in Cape Breton. The map is 
 unique and is now in the National Library at Paris. It bears no name of publisher nor 
 place of publication. Around it for forty years controversy has waxed warm. Kohl does 
 not accept the map as authentic. D'Avezac, 9 on the contrary, gives it full credence. The 
 tide of opinion has set of late in favour of it and in consequence in favour of the Cape Breton 
 
VOYAGES OF THE CABOTS IN 1497 AND 1498. 55 
 
 landfall because it bears, plainly inscribed upon that island, the words prima tierra vista, and 
 the legends which are around the map identity beyond question that as the landfall of the 
 first voyage. Dr. Deane, in " Winsor's Narrative and Critical History," supports this view. 
 Markham in his introduction to the volume of the Hakluyt Society for 1893 also accepts it 
 and our own honorary secretary in his learned and exhaustive monograph on Cape Breton 10 
 inclines to the same theory. 
 
 I do not propose, in this portion of my paper, to discuss the difficult problems of this 
 map. For many years, under the influence of current traditions and cursory reading, I 
 believed the landfall of John Cabot to have been in Newfoundland ; but a closer study of 
 the original authorities has led me to concur in the view which places it somewhere on the 
 island of Cape Breton, and this view I shall endeavour, in the first instance, to establish 
 without recourse to the disputed map of 1544. That map has, I conceive, introduced into 
 current belief a very serious error by putting forth, as is supposed, Prince Edward Island as 
 the island of St. John of Cabot's first voyage. This error is gaining ground every day as it 
 is passing into all our histories " and guide books. In the course of this paper I shall 
 endeavour to explain the reasons which move me to dissent from it. And while it seems 
 clear that the landfall of 1497 was on the island of Cape Breton, I shall endeavour to show 
 that it was not at Cape North, but rather at the easternmost point of the island at or near 
 Cape Breton itself. In short it will, I think, appear that the more the attention is fixed 
 upon Sebastian Cabot the more we shall think of Labrador ; but when John Cabot alone is 
 considered we shall incline to believe that the landfall was at Cape Breton. 
 
 III. THE FIRST AND SECOND VOYAGES CONTRASTED, 1497 AND 1498. 
 
 At the very threshold of an inquiry into the prima tierra vista, or landfall of 1497, it is 
 before all things necessary to distinguish sharply, in every recorded detail, between the first 
 and second voyages. I venture to think that, if this had always been done, much confusion 
 and controversy would have been avoided. It was not done by the older writers, and the 
 writers of later years have followed them without sufficiently observing that the authorities 
 they were building upon were referring almost solely to the second voyage. Even when 
 some occasional detail of the first voyage was introduced the circumstances of the second 
 voyage were interwoven and became dominant in the narrative, so that the impression of 
 one voyage only remains upon the mind. We must therefore always remember the 
 antithesis which exists between them. Thus the first voyage was made in one small vessel 
 with a crew of eighteen men 1: the second with five ships and three hundred men. 13 The 
 first voyage was undertaken with John Cabot's own resources the second with the royal 
 authority to take six ships and their outfit on the same conditions as if for the king's 
 service. " The first voyage was a private venture the second an official expedition. " 
 The first voyage extended over three months and was provisioned for that period only, " 
 the second was victualled for twelve months 16 and extended over six months at least ; for 
 how much longer is not known. The course of the first voyage was south of Ireland, then 
 for a while north and afterwards west, with the pole star l7 on the right hand. The course 
 of the second, until land was seen, was north, 13 into northern seas, towards the north pole, 
 in the direction of Iceland, t9 to the cape of Labrador, at 58 north latitude. On the first 
 voyage no ice was reported on the second the leading features were bergs * and floes of 
 
56 SAMUEL EDWAED DAWSON ON THE 
 
 ice and loi>g days of Arctic summer. On the first voyage Cabot saw no man a on the 
 second lie found people clothed with " beastes skynnes." During the whole of the first 
 voyage John Cabot -was the commander n on the second voyage he sailed in command, 2I 
 but who brought the expedition home and when it returned are not recorded. It is not 
 known how or when John Cabot died and, although the letters patent for the second 
 voyage were addressed to him alone, his son Sebastian during forty-five years took the 
 whole credit in every subsequent mention of the discovery of America without any allusion 
 to his father. This antithesis may throw light upon the suppression of his father's name in 
 all the statements attributed to or made by Sebastian Cabot. He may always have had the 
 second voyage in his mind. His father may have died on the voyage. He was marvellously 
 reticent about his father. The only mention which occurs is on the map seen by Hakluyt 
 and on the map of 1544 supposed, somewhat rashly, to be a transcript of it. There the 
 discovery is attributed to John Cabot and to Sebastian his son and that has reference to the 
 first voyage. 25 
 
 From these considerations it would appear that those who place the landfall at Labrador 
 are right ; but it is the landfall of the second voyage the voyage Sebastian was always 
 talking about not the landfall of John Cabot in 1497. For Sebastian manifested no 
 concern for any person's reputation but his own. He never once alluded to his two brothers 
 who were associated in the first patent and the preceding slight notice of his father is all 
 that can be traced to him, although contemporary records of unquestionable authority 
 indicate John Cabot as the moving spirit and do not mention the son. 
 
 Since that period the point of interest has changed. "Wile we are chiefly exercised 
 about the voyage of 1497, in Cabot's day that of 1498 was of paramount importance ; for it 
 alone had political significance. We approach the question as antiquarians ; but then it was 
 a question in practical politics. The public and official voyage in the usage of that time 
 gave a prescriptive right to the lands discovered. So little had the first voyage of a formal 
 possession for England alone that Cabot planted the banner of St. Mark r< beside that of St. 
 George and any public right arising from that ceremony might accrue to Venice as well as 
 to England. The existence of land across the ocean within easy distance having thus been 
 demonstrated the cautious and politic Henry was induced to give the fullest national 
 sanction to the second voyage. These new lands were supposed to be part of eastern Asia ; 
 and there everything was possible. Upon Toscanelli's map and Behaim's globe the region 
 of Cathay and the great cities of Quinsay and Cambaluc lay in the same latitudes as the 
 new-found-land ; therefore the mere touching at a point on the coast and immediate return 
 was of little importance compared with the range of the second voyage. Then again, to do 
 Sebastian Cabot justice, he seems, like Juan de la Cosa, very soon to have apprehended the 
 fact that those western lands were a barrier to Cathay, and that a passage would have to be 
 found through or around them. Columbus died without admitting that fact, but it is remark- 
 able that the coast line of so many of the very earliest charts is continuous. Hence, in all 
 his reported conversations, Sebastian Cabot dwelt upon a passage by the north, on a great 
 circle, to Cathay. We on the contrary care for none of these things. The northwest 
 passage to Cathay and the nationality of America have been settled in the lapse of time 
 beyond all cavil, and what we are concerned to solve is the historical problem : who first 
 discovered the mainland of America? For that reason John Cabot and his little vessel the 
 " Matthew of Bristol " a have to us a paramount interest. 
 
VOYAGES OF THE CABOTS IN 1497 AND 1498. 57 
 
 In this portion of my paper, then, Peter Martyr, Gomara, Ramusio and Ilakluyt are of 
 minor importance. I am to concern myself first with those Spanish and Italian envoys 
 whose letters and despatches from England in that same year are almost the only contem- 
 porary evidence we possess of John Cabot's achievement. As these were all written before 
 the return of the second expedition, in studying them we. are sure of having the only extant 
 information concerning the first voyage absolutely free from any intermixture with the 
 details of the second. 
 
 IV. VARIATION OF THE COMPASS IN 1497. 
 
 Thus far I have been considering the two Cabot voyages together, in their contrasts ; 
 and now I shall endeavour to detach them the one from the other in all the details which 
 remain of record ; but, before doing so, some attention must be devoted to the mariner's 
 compass as then in use, for it was then, as now, the reliance of all sailors in unknown seas. 
 I should never have attempted even to refer to so difficult a question, had it not been for the 
 reports of the United States Coast and Geodetic Survey for 1880 and 1888 which contain 
 papers by Mr. Chas. A. Schott and Capt. Fox. By the aid of those very valuable papers it 
 became possible to form an intelligent opinion as to what can and what cannot be known 
 about the variation of the compass in the North Atlantic in 1497. 
 
 The mariner's compass had been in use in Europe since the middle of the 12th century. 
 At the time of Columbus and dibot it was, in all essential parts, like that now in use. The 
 card was divided into 32 points of 11 J degrees each. It had been observed that the needle 
 did not point exactly to the pole star ; but the variation was then very slight ; in southern 
 and western Europe only about 5 ; or less than half a point. What variation there was 
 was to the east of north and it was supposed to be constant ; hence, when, on his first voyage 
 to America in 1492, Columbus noticed that the needle crossed over to the west, one-half 
 point in the evening and another half point the next morning, he was very much astonished ; 
 and when, four days later, on September 17th, his pilots noticed it their hearts sank with 
 apprehension at entering a world of waters where even the magnetic needle might become a 
 treacherous guide. This observation by Columbus we may well understand was a very 
 serious and solemn one ; and it fixes beyond all doubt the meridian of no variation at a point 
 west of the Azores, in latitude 28 N". and longitude about 28 W. At the present time the 
 variation at the point of first notice is 25 degrees or nearly double that observed by 
 Columbus and it therefore follows that all over the Xorth Atlantic, the compass marked in 
 1497 a much less westerly variation than it does now. From this first observation, and 
 from the long series of observations since made with increasing accuracy and frequency, it 
 has been ascertained that, subject to local conditions, there is a slow swing of the magnetic 
 meridian from east to west and vice versa extending over centuries of time. This has been 
 called the secular variation of the compass. Its cause is not known, its laws are not. fully 
 ascertained, but it is a fertile source of confusion among students who plot out early voyages 
 in northern seas solely with the aid of modern maps. 
 
 While Columbus, sailing on the latitude of 28 3 , was proceeding always in the direction 
 where the variation was slight, Cabot's course in the north was in a region of greater 
 variation ; being so much the nearer to the magnetic pole. For Columbus was sailing on a 
 west course which he scarcely deviated from, because although on the last three days of the 
 voyage he steered S. W., and W. S. W., there were previous days when he made a little 
 
 Sec. 11., 1894. 8. 
 
58 SAMUEL EDWARD DAWSON ON THE 
 
 northing. Nevertheless when he reached land the admiral had dropped 240 miles to the 
 south of Gomara his point of departure. 
 
 If the laws of the secular variation of the compass were known it would be easy to 
 calculate the variation at any given period ; but they are not known, and so we are driven 
 to argue empirically from the observations recorded, and these do not commence on our 
 coast until the time of Champlain. But that is two hundred and fifty years nearer to Cabot's 
 time and, as the secular magnetic swing is very slow, his observations, of which a few arc- 
 recorded, are of great importance. These all confirm the opinion stated that the variation 
 was considerably less then than now. Tbe variation at Sydney, Cape Breton, is at present 
 25 "W., at Cape Race it is 30 "W. and at Halifax it stands at 25 ; the extreme westerly limit 
 lias been reached this year. 
 
 The officers of the Geodetic Survey think that Chaniplain's observations an- from 1 to 
 3 out, and moreover it is hard to see how the progression of westerly variation could 
 increase in a southwest direction. It is contrary to the magnetic curves of the present time 
 that the variation should be 14 50' at Cape Breton ; 16 15' at La Heve near Halifax ; 
 17 8' at Port Royal on the Annapolis Basin ; 17 16' at Petit Passage ; 19 12' at, the 
 Kennebec and 18 40' at MaUebarre in Massachusetts (Nausct). 28 Still there is a progres- 
 sion in these figures which does not look like careless observation and Champlain (see 
 appendix A) was by no means careless in anything he undertook. That, however, is a 
 question in magnetism which fortunately it is not necessary to discuss. Other observations 
 were made by Hendrick Hudson about the same time which run more in accord with 
 present theories ; and, in the "Arcano del Mare" published at Florence in 1646, a numb T 
 of observations are recorded which give unquestionable evidence of accuracy; those taken 
 for Cape Breton, and St. Johns, Newfoundland, agree in assigning to these localities a 
 magnetic variation of 15 degrees west of north. The bearing of these considerations upon 
 the present question is, shortly, this : If Columbus on a direct western course dropped 240 
 miles from Gomara his point of departure to his landfall in the Antilles in 1492 with a 
 variation of one point west, it is altogether probable that John Cabot with a variation of a 
 point and a half would have dropped, in 1497, 360 miles to the south on his western course 
 across the Atlantic ; and, again, if John Cabot laid his course to the west by compass from 
 latitude 53 north the variation, so much greater than that observed by Columbus, would have 
 carried him clear of Cape Race and to the next probable landfall, Cape Breton. In any case, 
 Labrador as a landfall, is excluded. 
 
 V. THE FIRST VOYAGE, 1497. 
 
 In the despatch of Pedro de Ayala dated July 25th, 1498, to the court of Spain he 
 asserts that John Cabot had previously been in Seville and in Lisbon trying to obtain 
 assistance for a voyage to the west, and, it would appear, that, failing there, he had gone to 
 Bristol. The people of Bristol, one may gather from the despatch, stimulated by him, hail 
 been for seven years sending out vessels to look for the island of Brasil in the western 
 ocean but without success until 1497, when land was found. Of these previous efforts ami 
 previous voyages no other traces have been found and the first we hear of John Cabot is in 
 the letters patent of March 5th, 1496, upon the petition of himself and his three sons, 
 Lewis, Sebastian and Sancio, empowering them, at their own expense, to fit out an expedition 
 to discover new lands and take possession thereof for the English crown. The jealousy ot 
 
VOYAGES OF THK CABOTS IN 1497 AND 1498. 59 
 
 the Spanish envoy was awakened before the letters were granted, and a rescript of the 
 Catholic sovereigns to Dr. de Puebla dated March 28th, 1496, instructs him to represent to 
 the king of England that such enterprises could not be undertaken without prejudice to the 
 rights of either Spain or Portugal. Doubtless de Puebla had anticipated his sovereigns' 
 command, for the wording of the letters patent limits the scope of the projected discoveries 
 to the north, the east and the west, without mentioning the south. A year passed before 
 the preparations could be made and, early in May, 1497, Cabot sailed from Bristol, the port 
 prescribed in the patent. That port is in latitude 51 30' N., and the objective point of 
 Cabot's voyage was Cathay the capital city of which kingdom was Cambaluc in latitude 51 
 N., according to Toscanelli's map. 2 " Upon that map Columbus had plotted his course only 
 five years before, and he sailed first south to Gomara, in the Azores, in order to get upon the 
 parallel of Cipango his objective point, which he thought he had reached by following that 
 parallel on an undcviating western course. In like manner John Cabot sought Cathay. 
 He could not then have had a thought of a northwest passage for he knew, then, of no 
 barrier. For him, as for Columbus, the western ocean was open to the coast of Asia. 
 Columbus had attained Cipango, on a parallel of latitude ten degrees to the south of Spain. 
 Cabot sailing from a port eleven degrees to the north of Spain would reach the mainland of 
 Asia at Cathay twenty degrees north of Cipango, for Quinsay the southernmost city of that 
 great country was in latitude 45 N., and he would have, moreover, the advantage of sailing 
 on a parallel where the degrees of longitude are much shorter. This could be done without 
 approaching by 20 degrees of latitude the regions claimed by Spain. John Cabot had there- 
 fore no object in going north. Why should he be supposed to have wished to go north when 
 his course was open across the western ocean ? The only northing he needed was what might 
 be sufficient to keep his true west in sailing on a sphere. He had no occasion to make 
 more. The importance of keeping this objective point in mind cannot be too much insisted 
 upon. What Cipango was to Columbus, Quinsay and Cambaluc * were to Cabot. There- 
 fore he sailed south of Ireland which he would not have done had any idea of a northern 
 voyage been in his mind. If Sebastian Cabot had not been so much wrapped up in his own 
 vain glory we might have had a full record of the eventful voyage which revealed to Europe 
 the shores of our Canadian dominion first of all the lands on the continents of the western 
 hemisphere. Fortunately, however, there resided in London at that time a most intelligent 
 Italian, Raimondo di Soncino, envoy of the duke of Milan, Ludovico Sforza, one of those 
 despots of the Renaissance who almost atoned for their treachery and cruelty by their thirst 
 for knowledge and love of arts. Him Soncino kept informed of all matters going on at 
 London and specially concerning matters of cosmography to which the duke was much 
 devoted. From his letters we are enabled to retrace the momentous voyage of the little 
 " Matthew of Bristol " across the western ocean not the sunny region of steady trade-winds 
 by whose favouring influence Columbus was wafted to his destination, but the boisterous 
 reaches of the northern Atlantic over that " still vexed sea" which shares with one or 
 two others the reputation of being the most storm tossed region in the world of ocean. 
 Passing Ireland he first shaped his course north, then, turning westwards 3I and having the 
 pole star on his right hand, he wandered for a long time and at length he hit upon land. 
 The letter indicates that after he changed his course his wandering was continuously west- 
 wards, in the same general direction, as far as the regions of the Tanais. No certain 
 meaning can be found for the word Tanais ; but inasmuch as in those days the Tanais was 
 
6O SAMUEL EDWAED DAWSON ON THE 
 
 held to separate Europe from Asia K it may be taken as a vague term for Asiatic lands. 
 That the land discovered was supposed to be a part of Asia appears very clearly from the 
 same letters. It was in the territory of the Grand Cam. 3 ' The land was good and the 
 climate temperate 34 and Cabot intended on his next voyage, after occupying that place, to 
 proceed further westwards until he should arrive at the longitude of Japan which island he 
 evidently thought to be south of his landfall and near the equator. 
 
 It should be carefully noted that in all the circumstances on record which are indisput- 
 ably referable to this first voyage nothing has been said of ice or of any notable extension of 
 daylight. These are the marks of the second voyage ; for if anything unusual had existed 
 in the length of the day it would have been at its maximum on midsummer's day, June 24, 
 the day he made land. Nothing is reported in these letters which indicates a high latitude. 
 The shore of Labrador is a waste region of rocks, swamps and mountains. Lieut. Gordon 
 steaming along the coast in the "Alert" passed, on June 30th, 1886, large numbers of 
 small icebergs. He met the field ice on July 2nd at lat. 56 and from lat. 58 to Cape 
 Chidley it was packed tight all along for fifteen miles out to sea. Even inside the straits of 
 Belle-Isle it is so barren and forbidding as to call forth Carrier's oft-cited remark that " it 
 was like the land God gave to Cain." The coast of Labrador is not the place to invite a 
 second voyage, if it be once seen ; but the climate of Cape Breton is very pleasant in early 
 summer and the country is well wooded. 
 
 From the contemporary documents relating specially to the first voyage it is beyond 
 question that Cabot saw no human being on the coast though he brought back evidences of 
 their presence at some previous time. It is beyond doubt also on the same authority that 
 the voyage lasted not longer than three months and that provisions gave out so that he had 
 not time to land on the return voyage. It was, in fact, a reconnoitering expedition to 
 prepare the way for a greater effort and establish confidence in the existence of land across 
 the ocean easily reached from England. The distance sailed is given by Soncino at 400 
 leagues ; but Pasqualigo, writing to Venice, gives it at 700 leagues, equivalent to 2,226 
 miles, which is very nearly the distance between Bristol and Cape Breton as now estimated. 
 
 All these circumstances concerning the first voyage are derived from John Cabot's own 
 reports and are extracted from documents dated previous to the return of the second 
 expedition and therefore are, of necessity, free from admixture with extraneous incidents. 
 I have not referred to the map of 1544 because I propose to consider it by itself. The 
 early historians who are usually cited throw no light upon the first voyage. Peter Martyr 
 in 1516, Gomani in 1542 and Ramusio in 1550 are exclusively concerned with Sebastian 
 Cabot. They know nothing of John Cabot and his voyage and whatever dates they give, 
 the particulars they recite stamp their narratives as relating solely to the second voyage. 
 They, in fact, seem to know only of one. Antonio Galvano an experienced Portuguese 
 sailor and cosmographer writing in 1563, like the others, knows of one voyage only which 
 he fixes in 1496. He interweaves, like them, in his narrative many circumstances of the second 
 voyage, but it is important to note that from some independent source is given the landfall at 
 45, the latitude very nearly of Cape Breton on the island of Cape Breton. Another point is 
 also recorded in the letters that, on the return voyage, Cabot passed two islands to the right 
 which the shortness of his provisions prevented him from examining. This note should not 
 be considered identical with the statement recorded by Soncino in his first letter ; for this 
 last writer evidently means to indicate the land which Cabot found and examined he says 
 
VOYAGES OF THE CABOTS IN 1497 AND 1498. 61 
 
 that Cabot discovered two large and fertile islands ; but the two islands of Pasqualigo were 
 passed without examination. They were probably the islands of St. Pierre and Miquelon ; 
 but that John Cabot had no idea of a northward voyage at that time in his mind would 
 appear from his intention to sail further to the east on his next voyage until he reached the 
 longitude of Cipango. Moreover, the reward recorded in the king's privy purse accounts 
 " to hym that founde the new ile " and the wording, thrice repeated, of the second letters 
 patent, " the land and isles of late found by the said John " indicate that it was .not at that 
 time known whether the mainland of Cathay had been reached or, as in the discoveries of 
 Columbus, islands upon the coast of Asia. 
 
 From the preceding narrative, based solely upon documents written within twelve 
 months of the event ; which documents are records of statements taken from the lips of 
 John Cabot, the chief actor, at the very time of his return from the first voyage, it will, I 
 trust, appear that in 1497, at a time of year when the ice was not clear from the coasts of 
 Labrador, he discovered a part of America in a temperate climate ; and that this was done 
 without the name of Sebastian Cabot once coming to the surface, excepting when it appears 
 in the patent of 1496, together with the names of Lewis and Sancio, his brothers. While 
 the circumstances recorded are incompatible with a landfall at Labrador they do not exclude 
 the possibility of a landfall on the eastern coast of Newfoundland, which is so varied in its 
 character as to correspond with almost any conditions likely to be found in a landfall on the 
 American coast ; but inasmuch as, from other reasons, it will, I think, appear that the land- 
 fall was at Cape Breton it will be a shorter process to prove by a positive argument where 
 it was than to show by a negative argument where it was not ; and now, before passing to 
 another branch of my subject it will be proper to notice a theory which Humboldt based on 
 Juan de la Cosa's map that John Cabot passed in between St. Paul's Island and Cape Ray, 
 circumnavigated the gulf of St. Lawrence and returned to England through the straits of 
 Belle-Isle. 
 
 Juan de la Cosa's map is a document of such prime importance that it merits separate 
 consideration, but I think, that every one who knows the gulf will share Kohl's astonish- 
 ment that such a theory should have been held by so eminent a cosmographer. Henry 
 Stevens 3:> follows Humboldt, and Dr. Deane doubtingly says, " If the statement about coast- 
 ing 300 leagues be true he (Cabot) may have made a periplus of the gulf returning by 
 Belle-Isle." The statement is based on a remark made by Pascpaaligo, and if there had been 
 time sufficient to sail so far we might be bound to accept it ; but there was not. The log of 
 Columbus "' sailing in a southern latitude with a steady northeast trade-wind behind him 
 shows an average of 4-4 miles an hour. Cabot sailed in the region of variable winds, there- 
 fore the log of John Cabot could not have shown such an average progress, and it did not on 
 the outer voyage for he left Bristol early in May say the fifth and saw land on June the 
 24th, thus making good on a straight course 2,200 miles in 50 days or 44 miles 37 a day, almost 
 two miles an .hour. If he delayed only four days to examine the land he had found, and 
 then sailed straight for home he would have made the passage in 30 days, for he certainly 
 arrived at Bristol about the end (say the 28th) of July. That would give a log of 75 miles 
 a day or 3 miles an hour on a straight continuous course. But he did not make such a 
 course, for Juan de la Cosa's map shows that he coasted along and named the south shore 
 of Newfoundland a distance of 300 miles, not leagues. He could not have coasted 935 miles 
 more along the continent of America and have returned home in the time specified, still less 
 
62 SAMUEL EDWARD DAWSON ON THE 
 
 was it possible for him to sail around the gulf and return. To Canadians who know the 
 gulf, it is impossible, even if there had been time to do it that he could have sailed round 
 it and not have left some indication of its unique geographical features. He could 
 not have passed the grand estuary of the river opening to the southwest to the very 
 direction of Cathay without mentioning it and without returning to it on his second 
 voyage. If he saw, as he must have seen according to that theory, such an avenue opening 
 towards the heart of Asia some tradition of it could not fail to have reached us some trace 
 of it could not fail to have been recorded on the maps. Of all the theories of John Cabot's 
 voyages that one will appear to a Canadian the most astonishing ; as it did to Kohl who 
 had travelled in Canada and knew something of what the name river St. Lawrence implies. 
 Markham, in his introduction to the Hakluyt Society volume for 1893, makes some 
 excellent observations in relation to the voyage of 1497, and no one could be a better 
 authority than he on such a subject. He thinks that Cabot was compelled by contrary 
 winds to make the northing of the first few days. That north course might be supposed to 
 have brought him to the latitude of 53 or 54, well north upon the west coast of Ireland, 
 then turning to the west he would have struck for the coast of Cathay. For a good 
 portion of the distance the drift of the ocean is to the northeast as far at least as longitude 
 40 W. Then he would enter the Arctic or Labrador current which sets south 011 the banks 
 off Newfoundland at the rate of one mile an hour, but the lee-way assumed by Markham 
 across the ocean would not be always south ; for southwest and southerly winds are very 
 common in June, and his lee-way would as often be north as south. The fact, however, 
 which seems to have passed unnoticed is that, in longitude 23 W., he would have passed 
 the point of no variation 38 and have quickly reached a region where the variation of the 
 compass has been shown to be 15 W. On a supposed western course from thence he would 
 be actually steering a point and a half south of west. In those days the incidents of the voy- 
 age of Columbus recorded in his journal could not have quickly spread throughout Europe, 
 and Cabot would have had to make his own experiences with the absolutely new pheno- 
 menon of magnetic variation. All these circumstances render it in the highest degree 
 probable that he passed Cape Race without seeing it. Then his course would bring him 
 certainly not to Cape North, but to the eastern point of the island, to Cape Breton itself; 
 so that Harrisse in his work on the Cabots was far more nearly right than in his later book 
 on the discovery of America. If Cabot passed Cape Race and the islands of St. Pierre and 
 Miquelon without seeing them he would have been obliged to change his course sharply to 
 the northwest 3 ' J to reach Cape North ; and, in fact, the land both of Cape Breton and 
 Newfoundland is so high that, to make Cape North, without first seeing one coast or the 
 other, would require a good deal of nautical skill and a good modern chart ; moreover the 
 current out of St. Paul strait sets on the starboard bow of an approaching vessel sometimes 
 as strongly with the prevailing westerly wind as two miles an hour. 40 Cape Breton, as may 
 be seen by Hore's voyage in 1536, was a natural landfall for a vessel missing Cape Race ; 
 and so generally recognized as such that in the sailing directions for Sir Humphrey Gilbert's 
 fleet it was laid down as the next rendezvous in case the ships should not meet at Cape Race. 
 
 VI. THE SECOND VOYAGE, 1498. 
 
 I might here borrow the quaint phrase of Herodotus and say " now I have done speaking 
 of" John Cabot. He has, beyond doubt, discovered the eastern coast of this our Canada, 
 
VOYAGES OF THE CABOTS IN 1497 AND 1498. 63 
 
 and he has organized a second expedition, and he has sailed in command. Forthwith, upon 
 such sailing, he vanishes utterly and his second son, Sebastian, hoth of his brothers having 
 in some unknown way, also vanished, emerges and from henceforth becomes the whole 
 Cabot family. It behooves us, therefore, if we wish to grasp the whole subject, to inquire 
 what manner of man he was. 
 
 Sebastian Cabot was born in Venice, and, when still very young, was taken to England 
 with the rest of his family by his father. 41 He was then, however, old enough to have 
 learned the humanities " and the properties of the sphere, and to this latter knowledge he 
 became so addicted that he, early in life, formed fixed ideas. He is probably entitled to the 
 merit of having urged the practical application of the truths that the shortest course, from 
 point to point upon the globe, lies upon a great circle ; and also that the great circle uniting 
 western Europe with Cathay passes, over the north pole. As a matter of fact the shortest 
 line from England to Japan is by Spitsbergen. We know that as a barren fact ; because 
 we know also that the Polar sea is, for practical purposes, impassable ; but that Cabot did 
 not. know. He could not learn it from the properties of the sphere and he had not learned 
 it in the way of experience. At first it was a very promising route of sailing to India. 
 Robert Thorne, an English merchant living at Seville, points out, in 1527, in representations 
 made privately to the English king, that there is no more reason to suppose the sea to be 
 impassable at the north from cold than there had been to suppose it impassable at the 
 equator from heat. All authorities had concurred in the existence of a southern zone of 
 intolerable heat, and sailors had even brought home reports of having encountered a boiling 
 sea." This had been shown by recent discoveries to be false, and why should not the same 
 authorities be also wrong in their theories of a frozen zone !" So reasoned Robert Thorne 
 who lived at Seville when Sebastian Cabot held there a high position as grand pilot of 
 Spain, and thus insisted Sebastian Cabot from his youth to his extreme old age, and this 
 fixed idea of his became also the fixed idea of the English people ; so that they have 
 scarcely recovered from it within our own recollection. Biddle and ISTicholls laud him as 
 the "discoverer of great circle sailing and founder of the English mercantile marine." The 
 English marine existed before him, but England owes to him the initiation of the long 
 weary struggle with the frozen ocean which for three centuries has strewn the Arctic wastes 
 with the bodies of her noblest sailors ; from Sir Hugh Willoughby who perished with all 
 his gallant crew on the shores of Lapland in 1554, the first fruits of great circle sailing by 
 the north, to Sir John Franklin who perished almost in our own days. Nordenskiold in 
 the Vega in the two years of 1878-9 made the passage Cabot dreamed of in his later years 
 to Japan by way of Spitzbergen, that passage upon which Sir Hugh Willoughby sailed in 
 1554, and now in this very year ISTansen has thrown himself into the ice pack in the hope of 
 drifting across the Polar ocean. 
 
 This fixed idea of the younger Cabot pervaded all his life and shows in all his reported 
 conversations. He adhered to it with the pertinacity of a Columbus and, in his later life 
 after his return to England, his efforts which in youth were directed to a northwest passage 
 went out towards a northeast passage to Cathay. John Cabot's genius was more practical, 
 as the second letter of Raimondo di Soncino shows. His intention was to occupy on the 
 second voyage the landfall he had made and then push on to the east (west as we call it 
 now) and south. The diversion of that expedition to the coast of Labrador would indicate 
 that the death of the elder Cabot and the assumption of command by his son occurred early 
 
64 SAMUEL EDWARD DAWSON ON THE 
 
 in the voyage. Sebastian Cabot seems to have been, not so much a great sailor, as a great 
 nautical theorizer. Gomara says he discovered nothing for Spain ; and beyond doubt his 
 expedition to La Plata cannot be considered successful ; for it was intended to reach the 
 Moluccas. One fixed idea of his life was the course to Cathay by the north. That idea he 
 monopolized to himself. He overvalued its importance and thought to be the Columbus of 
 a new highway to the east. Hence he may have underrated his father's achievements as he 
 brooded over what he considered to be his own great secret. He theorized on the sphere 
 and he theorized on the variation of the compass and he theorized on a method of finding 
 longitude by the variation of the needle ; so that even Richard Eden, who greatly admired 
 him, wrote as follows : " Sebastian Cabot on his death-bed told me that he had the know- 
 " ledge thereof (longitude by variation) by divine revelation, yet so that he might not teach 
 " any man. But I thinke that the goode olde man in that extreme age somewhat doted 
 " and had not, yet even in the article of death, utterly shaken off all worldlye vaine glorie." 
 These words would seem to contain the solution of most of the mystery of the suppression 
 of John Cabot's name in the narratives of Peter Martyr, Ramusio, Gomara and all the other 
 writers who derived their information from Sebastian Cabot during his long residence in 
 Spain. The remainder of the mystery may be solved in the succeeding portion of this paper. 
 And now we may pass on to the consideration of the second voyage ; and first among 
 the writers, in order of time as also in order of importance, is Peter Martyr of Anghiera, 
 who published his " Decades of the New World" in 1516. Sebastian Cabot had then been 
 in Spain for four years, high in office and in royal favour. Peter Martyr was his "familiar 
 friend and comrade," and tells the pope, to whom these "Decades" were addressed as 
 letters, that he wrote from information derived from Cabot's own lips. Here, I venture to 
 think, many of the writers on this subject have gone astray ; for the whole question changes. 
 Martyr knows of only one voyage, and that was beyond doubt the voyage of 1498 ; he 
 knows of only one discoverer, and that the man from whose lips he writes the narrative. 
 The landfall is far north, in a region of ice and perpetual daylight. At the very outset the 
 subject is stated to be " those northern seas," and then Peter Martyr goes on to say that 
 Sebastian Cabot furnished two ships at his own charges ; and that, with three hundred 
 men, he sailed towards the north pole, where he saw land ; and that then he was com- 
 pelled to turn westwards ; and after that he coasted to the south until he reached the lati- 
 tude of Gibraltar ; and that he was west of the longitude of Cuba. In other words, he 
 struck land far in the north, and from that point he sailed south along the coast as far as 
 Cape Hatteras. That Labrador was the landfall seems clear ; for he met large masses of ice 
 in the month of July. These were not merely the bergs of the western ocean, but masses 
 of field-ice, which compelled him to change his course from north to west, and finally to 
 turn southwards. The same writer states that Cabot himself named a portion of the great 
 land he coasted Baccalaos, because of the quantity of fish, which was so great that thev hin- 
 dered the sailing of his ships, and that these fishes were called bucculaos by the natives. 
 This statement has given rise to much dispute. As to the quantity of fish all succeeding 
 writers concur that it was immense beyond conception ; and probably the swarming of the 
 salmon up the rivers of our Pacific coast may afford a parallel ; but that Cabot did not so 
 name the country is abundantly clear. A very exhaustive note on the word will be found 
 at page 131 of Dr. Bourinot's " Cape Breton." He gives the Miemac name as peg on, on the 
 authority of Dr. Rand. Richard Brown gives it as pahshoo in his " History of Cape Breton." 
 
VOYAGES OF THE CABOTS IN 1497 AND 1498. 65 
 
 Lescarbot gave it in his time as apege. Kohl derives the word, by a parallel evolution, 
 from the Dutch word kabeljaaw, but, as pointed out by Dr. Bourinot, the word is Basque. 
 It may be called Iberian, for the Basque bacailaba became in Spanish baccalao and in Portu- 
 guese bacalhas, 45 and this last name is found on Pedro Reinel's map of 1505. It is not likely 
 that Cabot, in an English ship with an English crew, would have given the country an 
 Iberian name. The probability is that the Portuguese, who flocked upon the coast after 
 the Corte Reals, first gave the name " codfish land " to the country ; and Cabot's claim to 
 the name is no more true than his claim to having fitted out the expedition at his own 
 expense. I have read somewhere in the books that Sebastian Cabot was a great sailor and 
 also a great liar, but I think Richard Eden's naive account of his last illness is the best 
 explanation of his very comprehensive claims. 
 
 The letter from Cabot which Ramusio 48 quotes had been lost, and we have only 
 Ramusio's recollection of it. That tells us, in general terms, of a voyage to the far north, 
 when a latitude of 67 30' was attained. In the various accounts which have come down 
 to us as on Cabot's authority different latitudes are given, 56, 58, 60, and here 67 30". 
 A very high latitude was no doubt attained ; but here, in the recollections of this letter, is 
 a surprising statement that Cabot was on the llth of June at that latitude, and the sea was 
 then clear 46 and without any manner of impediment, and that he would have sailed straight 
 on to the east at Cathay, but a mutiny of the masters and sailors prevented him, and he had 
 to return. This is not only contradictoi'y to his statements elsewhere, but it is well known 
 that the Labrador coast and Hudson's straits are not accessible, on account of ice, so early 
 in the summer. 
 
 It is much to be regretted, for Cabot's own sake as well as for ours, that nothing from 
 his own hand has been preserved either in print or in manuscript ; because his reputation 
 has been entirely at the mercy of the memories of his friends, and, at this distance of time, 
 it is impossible to say whether he was phenomenally addicted to inaccuracy of expression 
 or his friends were phenomenally endowed with treacherous memories. The much quoted 
 conversation in Ramusio is a case in point. Ramusio has recorded, from memory only some 
 years after it occurred, a conversation at the house of his learned friend Frascator. A 
 stranger, whose name is not given, was present among the guests. He was evidently a man of 
 distinction and of learning. The conversation turned upon cosmography, the favourite topic 
 then of cultivated society, and all present were speculating upon the possibility of sailing to 
 Cathay by the north. They were wondering whether Greenland joined with Norway at 
 the north, or whether there was a strait there, and some one present told the story of the 
 Indians who, a long time before, had been storm-driven to the coast of Germany ; where- 
 upon the stranger turned and related the substance of a conversation he had held with 
 Cabot at Seville. He told them that, having been at Seville some years previously, he had 
 called on their own countryman, Cabot, to learn from his lips the truth of these matters. 
 If this guest's memory was good, and Ramusio correctly reported him, Cabot not only sup- 
 pressed that which was true, but suggested that which was false. He said that his father 
 died at the time when the news of Columbus's discovery reached England. That was 
 untrue, for the second letters patent were made out solely to his father in 1498. He told 
 him that he (Sebastian) first proposed the expedition to king Henry VII., another plain 
 falsehood. He told him that the expedition was in 1496, an error of a year. He conveyed 
 the impression that the whole series of events happened after his father's death, and made 
 
 Sec. II., 1894. 9. 
 
66 SAMUEL EDWARD DAWSON ON THE 
 
 himself the sole originator and commander of the expedition, which was clearly false. He 
 said that he found land on a westerly course ; that has been shown to be true of the first 
 expedition, but he suppresses the fact that there were two, and that not he but his father 
 found the land. He adds to this westerly landfall an exploration as far as 56 north and 
 Florida on the south, whereas in the short period of three months it was impossible that 
 such an extensive voyage could have been made. He said that when he returned to Eng- 
 land there was great confusion because of a war with Scotland, whereas the war with 
 Scotland had been concluded by a seven years' truce in 1497, and the second expedition sailed 
 in 1498. He stated that the voyage was not repeated on account of the confusion caused 
 by rebellion, whereas the rebellion was quelled in 1497, and in 1498 the pretended Richard 
 of York was a prisoner in the Tower. He said that he went to Spain at that time, whereas 
 he did not go until 1512, fourteen years later; and he stated that he took service under 
 Ferdinand and Isabella, while Isabella died in 1504, eight years before he removed to Spain. 
 If Cabot had said there were two voyages, and if he had mentioned John Cabot's name, the 
 guest would probably have remembered it, and Ramusio would have recorded facts so 
 salient. 
 
 The account given by Gomara is short, and it also attributes to Sebastian Cabot the 
 sole conception and conduct of the enterprise. Gomara knows of one voyage only, and that 
 was the voyage in 1498. It was a northern voyage, " by way of Iceland " ; and the con- 
 tinuous daylight, the immense masses of ice, and the number of men (three hundred) taken 
 leave no room for doubt. 
 
 In Galvano's " Discourse of the World," before cited, the two voyages are also con- 
 fused into one ; although, as he wrote in 1563, he followed previous writers, excepting in the 
 latitude of the landfall, and did not, like his predecessors, take his information from Sebastian 
 Cabot. In one version of the Portuguese text, that used by Hakluyt, John Cabot's name 
 even appears ; but the indefatigable Harrisse has turned up an original copy which does not 
 contain it, so Hakluyt would appear to have had another edition or to have glossed his 
 original from other authorities. 
 
 I have now gone over all the authorities for the second voyage. Their testimony is 
 irreconcilable in many respects, but, nevertheless, some firm ground can be found. These 
 points are established : That the expedition was a large and important one ; that it sailed to 
 the north, and that the landfall was far in the north in a region of ice and continual day- 
 light ; that from the extreme north it coasted south to latitude 38 in search of an open 
 ocean to Cathay ; that having been provisioned for a year, the expedition was fitted for 
 such an exploration, and had the time to perform it. 
 
 There is, beside the above, a passage from Fabyan's " Chronicle," cited in Stow's 
 " Chronicle," published in 1580, and, with variations, copied into Hakluyt's " Divers Voy- 
 ages," published in 1582; but, on reference to all the editions of Fabyannow extant, not only 
 can the originals of these citations not be found, but no mention whatever of the Cabot s is 
 made. I have referred the consideration of this matter to appendix C. The passage 
 contains no additional particulars of importance. 
 
 VII. MAPS AND MAP DRAWING IN THE 16TH CENTURY. 
 
 In Hakluyt's time there was at Westminster, in the private gallery of the queen, a 
 copy of a map attributed to Sebastian Cabot engraved by (or under the supervision of) 
 
VOYAGES OF THE CABOTS IN 1497 AND 1498. 67 
 
 Clement Adams, which indicated the landfall of the first voyage. Hakluyt has preserved 
 the inscription but the map has disappeared with all other papers and maps from Cabot's 
 hand. The inscription preserved by Hakluyt is found, in substance, upon the world map of 
 1544 (see appendix H) as well as elsewhere, but, at present, I have to do with the map 
 Hakluyt saw. No doubt there were upon this lost map other inscriptions (as on the map 
 of 1544) of the nature of notes giving information as to the different parts of the world 
 portrayed upon it. That one pertaining to the subject, translated from the original Latin, 
 is as follows : 
 
 " In the year of our Lord 1497 John Cabot a Venetian and Sebastian his son opened 
 " up this country w T hich no one had previously attempted to go to, upon the 24th day of 
 " June, early in the morning about five o'clock. 
 
 " Moreover he called this land terram primam visam I believe, because he first from 
 " sea-wards had set eyes upon that region. 
 
 " And, as there is an island situated opposite, he called it the island of St. John, I 
 " think, for the reason that it was discovered upon St. John the Baptist's day." 
 
 The inscription on the map was in Latin and the above is a close translation. Hakluyt 
 gives an English translation ("Principal Navigations") but he has inserted explanatory 
 glosses. (See appendix H.) 
 
 Then follows a description, not certainly of the island, but of the whole region, Labrador 
 included. There is a colon and the next word, Hujus, commences with a capital letter. 
 Hujus must refer to the country generally ; for, if not, there would be no description of the 
 country, but only of that one island, and it would have been irrational for the writer to 
 have branched off into a dissertation upon an accessory point ; as absurd as it would be to 
 commence to describe Canada and confine the description to Anticosti. This view is 
 confirmed by the corresponding Latin inscription on the Paris map of 1544, where it is given 
 Hujus terrce incolce, &c. Then follows immediately a description of the inhabitants, their 
 dress and mode of living and of making war, a description of the soil, of the animals on 
 land and the fishes in the sea. It has however been shown, in a previous part of this paper, 
 that on the first voyage Cabot saw no man. The description therefore is a general one 
 applicable to all that region as explored afterwards by successive voyagers up to the date of 
 the map. It is therefore unnecessary to inquire whether white bears ever existed in Cape 
 Breton or Prince Edward island ; they existed in Labrador which is sufficient. Nor is it 
 necessary to allocate the great abundance of fishes at any one spot. The description is 
 applicable to the whole region to Newfoundland and Labrador as well as to Cape Breton. 
 Only the prima vista is indicated specially, and opposite to it, so near that it was discovered 
 the same day, was an island. The Paris map of 1544 says a large island but Clement 
 Adams's map merely says it was an island, and he adds that on the island were hawks as 
 black as crows, black eagles and partridges. I think this inscription has been misunder- 
 stood to apply strictly to the landfall and the island at the time of discovery. 
 
 Nevertheless the landfall was marked by an island opposite, which was named St. John's 
 island. By opposite ex adverso cannot be meant an island 100 miles off. Some idea 
 of adjacency must be intended. My task therefore will be to examine all the extant maps 
 and see if they bear any evidence of a probable landfall identified by an island called St. 
 John. The maps however are in many cases strangely distorted and before taking them up 
 some preliminary inquiries are requisite. 
 
68 SAMUEL EDWAED DAWSON ON THE 
 
 Mr. Harrisse, until the publication of his "Discovery of North America" in 1892. used 
 to maintain that the Spanish and Portuguese governments were very jealous of imparting to 
 foreigners any information concerning their colonial enterprises and discoveries, and in that 
 belief all other writers concurred and still concur. Moreover, it agrees with all that is 
 known of the manners and methods of that period, and especially with the genius of those 
 two governments." This last volume, however, 49 gives a kaleidoscopic turn to the whole 
 picture. We are now informed that map-making was freely taught in Spain and practised 
 by all ; that there was no tendency, at any time, to concentrate map-making in the hands of 
 government ; that Spain never made a secret of its maritime discoveries ; that any one might 
 buy the official charts. The general impression conveyed is that these governments, while 
 they had colleges of cosmographers and official standard charts, were no more chary of dis- 
 seminating their manuscript maps than the British Admiralty and the United States Hydro- 
 graphical Survey are now. " It is impossible to follow Mr. Harrisse in this new departure. 
 His own learned researches forbid it. When Robert Thome, resident in Seville in 1527, 50 
 sent a map to the English ambassador, he was careful to add " that it is not to be showed 
 " or communicated there " (in England) " with many of that court. For though there is 
 " nothing in it prejudiciall to the emperor, yet it may be a cause of paine to the maker ; as 
 " well for that none may make these cardes but certayne appointed and allowed for masters." 
 The patent fact exists that no maps of these discoveries were printed in Spain ; all the 
 Spanish maps are in manuscript. The exceptions of the small map of the West Indies 
 found in a few copies of an edition of Peter Martyr in 1511, and the sketch map in Medina's 
 " Arte di Xavegar" in 1545, prove the rule ; for in 1511 an edict was issued forbidding the 
 communication of charts to foreigners, and the later and complete editions of Martyr are 
 without the map. Columbus in 1503 seized all the maps in the possession of his crew. In 
 1527 an edict was issued by Charles V. excluding all strangers from the positions of pilot 
 or mate. It could not have been a mere form, when the official charts were kept in a coffer 
 with two locks, one of which was kept by the pilot major and the other by the junior cos- 
 mographer. The Portuguese government decreed the penalty of death to any one who 
 should communicate a map of their discoveries in the east. It is irrational to suppose that 
 no restrictions existed in other directions. These facts cannot be explained away, and they 
 are important to remember, or we shall not be able to account for the intermittent character 
 of the progress of geographical knowledge as shown upon the maps. 
 
 Another important point to be borne in mind is that the sailors of those days sailed by 
 dead reckoning. They had no means of checking their longitudes, while their latitudes 
 might be fairly accurate. Distorted as the maps may appear, there is, however, on American 
 maps one point clear and unmistakable, which serves as a point of reference, namely, Cape 
 Race. It is the pole star of the early maps, as it still is and always has been the great 
 beacon of the ocean highway. The name appears first on the King chart as Cape Raso 
 about the year 1502, and as Raz, Razzo, Rasso, and in our English corrupted form Race it 
 has persisted to the present day. The name signifies the " flat cape," and whoever gave so 
 suitable a name must have seen the locality. 
 
 The distortion of some of these early maps is, however, due to a much more influential 
 cause, and I should not have ventured to treat of so difficult a matter if I had not had the 
 shelter of so great an authority as Champlain. At the present day maps are drawn to their 
 true meridian, irrespective of the magnetic meridian. This is indicated by a subsidiary 
 
VOYAGES OF THE CABOTS IN 1497 AND 1493. 69 
 
 point or by a note. The card of the mariner's compass is now so attached that the fleur-de- 
 lis is over the north pole of the needle, and always indicates the magnetic north, and as a 
 vessel sails from one magnetic zone to another the local variation is obtained from the charts 
 and allowed for in the course steered. In these early days now under review the science of 
 magnetism was undreamed of, and the magnetic variation was almost uniform through- 
 out Europe at one point east of north. No observations existed then as now, and only in 
 1492 had the variation from east to west first been noticed. Sailors in those days sailed each on 
 the compass corrected for his own country, and the card was attached with the fleur-de-lis, not 
 over the pole of the needle, but over that point west of it which was conceived to be the 
 true north ; for the needle, to adopt Champlain's word, easted. But when the needle 
 crossed over and wested a point or a point and a-half, the two quantities of variation were 
 added and the fleur-de-lis pointed two or two and a-half points west of north, 51 and the west 
 point was therefore two and a-half points south of west, and consequently the continual ten- 
 dency of vessels, as elsewhere stated, was to drop to the south on a westerly course. In 
 order to obviate this tendency they did not change the compasses, but the sailing charts 
 were so drawn as to throw up the coast to the required degree of northing to correspond 
 with the lay of the compass-card. Hence upon a sailing chart the east point of Cape Breton 
 would be represented due west of Cape Race, whereas it is really a full point south of it. 
 
 As an illustration of the confusion which has crept into this question, from not noticing 
 this peculiarity of the old sailing charts, I would cite Kohl (" Doc. His.," p. 178) ; he is dis- 
 cussing Reinel's chart of 1505, and he says that " there is one indication of latitude along a 
 " perpendicular line, and another indication along an oblique or transverse line which is 
 " shorter. This latter line is nearer the truth, and perhaps was added to the map by a later 
 " hand." But Reinel meant to indicate that his map was drawn on the meridian shown by 
 the compass of his own country, and that it was twenty degrees or nearly two points out. 
 The oblique line is the true meridian, and if it be placed to point north the east point of 
 Cape Breton will be not west of Cape Race but about true west-southwest. 
 
 In order to put this matter beyond doubt I have translated the chapter of Champlain 
 (see appendix A) in which he explains the two maps at the end of his voyages of 1613. 
 The text explains the principle and the maps illustrate it. The small map is drawn to its 
 true meridian and the large map is drawn to the compass in use by sailors, which was set 
 to the variation of France. On this latter map the coast, from Cape Race to Cape Breton 
 east point, is shown as lying east and west, as in the maps of Juan de la Cosa and Reinel 
 and very many others. On this map also is shown the oblique line which Kohl supposed a 
 later hand had added to Reinel's map. If a line be drawn from 47, the latitude of Cape 
 Race, at right angles to that shorter line, the latitude on the marginal line will coincide. 
 
 Bearing in mind the preceding considerations, the study of the early maps will become 
 much more profitable, and I would now direct attention to them to ascertain what light 
 they may throw upon the landfall of John Cabot and the island of St. John opposite to it. 
 It must be remembered that John Cabot took the time to go on shore at his landfall and 
 planted the banners of England and St. Mark there. At that time of year and in that lati- 
 tude it was light at half-past three, but it was five when he saw land, and he had to reach 
 it and perform the ceremonies appropriate for such occasions ; so the island opposite could 
 not be far away. The island, then, will be useful to identify the landfall if we find it 
 occurring frequently on the succeeding maps. 
 
70 
 
 SAMUEL EDWARD DAWSON ON THE 
 
 
 
 ^ 
 
 /rp^^cr* 
 
 J V VtV>.V>tUtrtn W 
 
 _=: a> C a 
 
 H to "5! H -? i> 
 
 O "* .fa* J!i S g 5 ^ 
 
 S 
 1-5 
 
VOYAGES OF THE CABOTS IN 149V AND 1498. 71 
 
 Juan de la Cosa's Map, A.D. 1500. Don Pedro de Ayala, joint Spanish ambassador at 
 London, wrote, on July 25th, 1498, to his sovereigns that he had procured and would send 
 a copy of John Cabot's chart of his first voyage. This map of Juan de la Cosa is evidence 
 that Ayala fulfilled his promise. It is a manuscript map 52 made at the end of the year 1500, 
 by the eminent Biscayan pilot who, if not the equal of Columbus in nautical and cosmo- 
 graphical knowledge, was easily the second to him. Upon it there is a continuous coast- 
 line from Labrador to Florida showing that the claim made by Sebastian Cabot of having 
 coasted from a region of ice and snow to the latitude of Gibraltar was accepted as true by 
 La Cosa, whatever later Spanish writers may have said. Recent writers of authority have 
 arrived at the conclusion that, immediately after Columbus and Cabot had opened the way, 
 many independent adventurers visited the western seas ; for there are a number of geo- 
 graphical facts recorded on the earliest charts not easy to account for on any other 
 hypothesis. Dr. Justin Winsor shows that La Cosa, and others of the great sailor? of the 
 earliest years of discovery, soon recognized that the} 7 had encountered a veritable barrier to 
 Asia consisting of islands, or an island of continental size, through which they had to find a 
 passage to the golden east. Their views were not however generally accepted, and it soon 
 got to be a maxim of the schools, Quicquid prwter Africam et Europam est, Asia est. Without 
 however stopping to discuss this point I would again call attention to the fact that the coast 
 line is continuous. If, as Stevens and Humboldt thought, Cabot had made a periplus of the 
 gulf of St. Lawrence if he had got embayed in our waters if he had sailed round Prince 
 Edward island (and beyond question he could never have suspected it to be an island unless 
 he had sailed round it) if he had sailed along the north shore of the St. Lawrence from 
 Quebec to the straits of Belle-Isle and thence into the ocean and proved Newfoundland 
 to be an immense island it is impossible but that some trace of so remarkable an achieve- 
 ment should have been recorded on some early map. On this map there is no lurking place 
 for Prince Edward island no gulf no inner sea and what islands are laid down are very 
 small and are in the ocean. That La Cosa based the northern part of his map upon Cabot's 
 discoveries is demonstrated by the English flags marked along the coast and the legend, Mar 
 descubierto por Ingleses ; because no English but the Cabot expeditions had been there; 
 and what is evidently intended for Cape Race is called Cavo de Ynglaterra. The English 
 flags mark off the coast from that cape to what may be considered as Cape Hatteras. 
 Cabot, as before stated, confidently expected to reach Cathay. He sailed for that as his 
 objective point and he was looking for a broad western ocean, so that narrow openings were 
 to him simply bays of greater or less depth. The sailors of those early voyages coasted from 
 headland to headland as plainly appears from many of the maps upon which the recesses of 
 the sinuosities of the coast are not completed lines, and it must be borne in mind that in 
 sailing between Newfoundland and Cape Breton the bold and peculiar contours of both can 
 be seen at the same time. This is possible in anything like clear weather, but, in the bright 
 weather of midsummer day, Cape Ray would necessarily have been seen from St. Paul's and 
 the opening might well have been taken for a deep indentation of the coast. Between 
 Cavo descubierto and Cavo St. Jorge such an indentation is shown on the map but the line is 
 closed showing that Cabot did not sail through. 
 
 In studying this remarkable map attention is at once aroused by the fact that from 
 Cavo de Ynglaterra to Cavo descubierto the coast is continuously named. In other words that 
 the south coast of Newfoundland is named, but not the east coast ; whereas, in ReinePs 
 
72 SAMUEL EDWARD DAWSON ON THE 
 
 map five years later, the east coast is named but not the south and Reinel's names are 
 Portuguese, many of which still cling to the localities 51 in a more or less corrupted form. 
 It is very unlikely that, sailing 2,000 miles over an utterly unknown sea, Cabot should have 
 made -precisely the point of Cape Race. It is made always now, but it is aimed at. To 
 suppose Cabot hit it is like supposing a man to make a chance-medley shot across a rifle 
 range in a fog and to hit the bull's-eye. It is within the limit of possibility but the chances 
 are many thousands to one it will not be done. Now on looking at the row of names on 
 La Cosa's map it will be seen that they commence with Cape of England (Cavo de Yngla- 
 terra) on the east point and stop with Cavo deseubierto on the west. At one of these two 
 points the discovery must have been made and the coasting commenced. Either Cabot 
 exactly hit Cape Race and coasted westward to Cape Discovery, or he discovered land at 
 Cape Discovery and, his object having been attained and his provisions falling short, he 
 turned and coasted eastwards giving the name Cape of England to the last spot of western 
 land he saw as he set his course on the return voyage to England. When we consider the 
 force of the names themselves we feel that the latter alternative must be the true one, and 
 Juan de la Cosa's map therefore becomes conclusive evidence for the priority of the flag of 
 England on the northeastern coast of the North American continent. John Cabot must 
 have been very clear in his report, because Raimondo di Soncino in his second letter 70 to the 
 Duke of Milan says that Cabot had constructed a globe and had pointed out the place where 
 he had been. This was in the winter between the two voyages so that no confusion between 
 them was possible. 
 
 Cavo deseubierto ! the discovered cape and close to it, Mar deseubierto por Ingleses ! 
 What can be more evident than that the spot where Europeans first touched the American 
 continent is thus indicated ? Why otherwise should it especially be called " the discovered 
 cape" if not because this cape was first discovered ? It is stated elsewhere that on the same 
 day, opposite the land, an island was also discovered ; and in fact upon the Madrid fac- 
 simile two small islands arc found, one of which is near Cavo deseubierto. The name tin' 
 discovered cape at the extreme end of a series of names tells its own story. Cabot overran 
 Cape Race and went south of St. Pierre and Miquelon without seeing them, and continuing 
 on a westerly course hit Cape Breton at its most easterly point. An apt illustration occurs 
 in a voyage made by the ship " Bonaventure " in 1591 recorded in Hakluyt. She overshot 
 Cape Race without knowing it and came to the soundings on the bank 54 south of St. Peter's, 
 where they found 20 fathoms, and then the course was set N. W. by N., for Cape Ray. The 
 course was sharply altered towards a definite and known point but, if he did not see Cape 
 Race, not knowing what was before him Cabot would have had no object in abruptly alter- 
 ing his course but, continuing his westerly course, would strike the east point of Cape 
 Breton. That point then, and not Cape North, would be the "discovered cape" the 
 prima vista and there not far off " over against the land " " opposite the land " (ex adverso) 
 he would find Scatari island which would be the island of St. John so continually attendant 
 on Cape Breton upon the succeeding maps. If this theory be accepted all becomes clear, and 
 the little Matthew, having achieved success, having demonstrated the existence of Cathay 
 within easy reach of England returned home ; noticing and naming the salient features of 
 the south coast of Newfoundland. She had not too much time to do it, for she was back in 
 Bristol in 34 days at most. This theory is further confirmed by the circumstance recorded 
 by Pasqualigo that as Cabot returned he saw two islands on the right, which he had not time 
 
VOYAGES OP THE CABOTS IN 1497 AND 1498. 73 
 
 to examine being short of provisions. These islands would be St. Pierre and Miquelon ; for 
 there are two, and only two, important islands possible to be seen at the right on the south 
 coast of Newfoundland on the homeward course. La Cosa beside the two small islands 
 above noted has marked on his map three larger islands, I. de la Trinidad, S. Grigor, and I. 
 Verde but they are not laid down on the map in the places of St. Pierre and Miquelon nor 
 are there any islands existing in the positions shown. I. de la Trinidad is doubtless the 
 peninsula of Burin, as would appear by its position almost in contact with the land and its 
 very peculiar shape. In coasting along it would appear as an island for the isthmus is very 
 narrow, and St. Pierre and Miquelon would be clearly seen as islands on the right. As for 
 the bearings of the coast it will appear by a comparison with Champlain's large map that 
 they are compass bearings for they are the same on both. 
 
 I have dwelt at length upon the map of La Cosa because, for our northern coasts, it is 
 in eftect John Cabot's map. After the return of the second expedition, the English made a 
 few voyages but soon fell back into the old rut of their Iceland trade. The expedition was 
 beyond question a commercial failure, and therefore, like the practical people they are, they 
 neglected that new continent which was destined to become the chief theatre for the expan- 
 sion of their race. Their fishermen were for many years to be found in small numbers only 
 on the coast, and, as before, their supply of codfish was drawn from Iceland where they 
 could sell goods in exchange. 
 
 Meantime the Bretons and Normans, and the Basques of France and Spain, and the 
 Portuguese, grasped that which England practically abandoned. That landfall which Cabot 
 gave her in 1497 cost much blood and treasure to win back in 1758. The French fishermen 
 were on the coast as early as 1504, and the names on La Cosa's map were displaced by 
 French names still surviving on the south coast and on what is called the French shore of 
 Newfoundland. Robert Thorne in 1527 (and no doubt others unrecorded) in vain urged 
 upon the English Government to vindicate its right. According to the papal bulls and the 
 treaty of Tordesillas the new lands were Portuguese east of a meridian 370 leagues west of 
 the Cape de Verde islands and Spanish to the west of it. Baccalaos and Labrador were 
 considered to be Portuguese and, upon the maps, when any mention is made of English 
 discoveries they are accordingly relegated to Greenland or the far north of Labrador. The 
 whole claim of England went by abandonment and default. The Portuguese as the Rev. Dr. 
 Patterson has shown, named all the east coast of Newfoundland and their traces are even 
 yet found on the coasts of Nova Scotia and of Cape Breton. 
 
 Therefore it is that the maps we have now to refer to are not so much Spanish as 
 Portuguese. They will tell us nothing of the English, nor of Cabot, but we shall be able to 
 follow his island of St. John the only one of his names which survived. The outlines of 
 some very early maps are given by Kunstmann, Kretschmer and "Winsor, but until 1505 
 they have no bearing upon our problem. In that year Reinel's map was made, and although 
 Newfoundland forms part of terra Jirma, the openings north and south of it are plainly 
 indicated by unclosed lines. Cape Race has received its permanent name Raso and although 
 only the east coast of Newfoundland is named there is no possibility of mistaking the 
 easternmost point of Cape Breton. Just opposite, (ex adverso) is laid down and named the 
 island of Sam Joha, in lat. 46, the precise latitude of Scatari island. Here, then, in 1505 is 
 in this island of St. John an independent testimony to the landfall of 1497 not off Cape 
 North, which does not yet appear, nor inside the gulf for it is not even indicated but in the 
 
 Sec. II., 1894. 10. 
 
74 
 
 SAMUEL EDWARD DAWSON ON THE 
 
 y-a ormenio 
 C.domarco 
 'am JoKa-n 
 'Sam Pedro 
 
 y. dos faves 
 
 c. das gam* 
 . deboaventura 
 ,v. de l)oa- ve-nt-ura, 
 
 c. do mttrco 
 \)y. defrey luis 
 ti.de santa ciria 
 
 ,y. das Jtacalhas 
 
 b. dacamceica 
 
 c. da. efpera 
 
 ~ > . dots pafas 
 T Sfunfr&'ncisfi 
 
 Pedro Reinel, A.D. 1505 (from Kohl). 
 
 Atlantic ocean, at the cape of Cape Breton 78 the cavo descubierto of La Cosa. All La Cosa's 
 names are omitted. This map of Reinel is very accurately drawn and is evidently based on 
 direct and original knowledge. The island he lays down is not of the conventional shape 
 but triangular like Scatari. We shall find the triangular island he placed at 46 degrees will 
 
 persist there. It may not retain its correct shape. 
 It may move a little further out or may deviate 
 somewhat from the true latitude ; but always we 
 shall find it, with or without its name, in the ocean 
 opposite ex adverse the easternmost point of Cape 
 Breton. We shall find, for a long time, subsequent 
 maps not so accurate, but for forty years upon the 
 majority of maps an island, which whon named will 
 be called the island of S. Johan, Joa, Joha, 77 Joam, 
 will be found to attend upon that point of land. 
 The straits will be closed up north and south and 
 Cape Breton and Newfoundland will be welded firmly to the mainland ; but St. John's 
 island will remain in the ocean where Cabot found it, until, in the map of 1544, some one, 
 availing himself of the information upon the French maps, attached that name to the Mag- 
 dalen group which Cartier had discovered in 1534 ; not to Prince Edward island as of late 
 commonly supposed. 
 
 Ilarrisse in discussing this question (throughout his work on the Cabots) is perplexed by 
 his theory, based on the erroneous reading of the map of 1544, that Prince Edward is the 
 island of St. John ; and asks how it is possible, in that case, that Newfoundland should for 
 
 CA 
 I 
 
 1. Outline of Scatari Island on a large scale 
 
 from Gisborne's Map. 
 
 2. Outline of Sam Joha from Kretschmer on a 
 
 larger scale than Kohl's facsimile. 
 
VOYAGES OF THE CABOTS IN 1497 AND 1498. 
 
 75 
 
 so long a time after appear as part of the firm land. There is no answer to his question but 
 one. It is impossible ; arid any theory identifying Cabot's St. John with Prince Edward island 
 will lead to endless contradictions. It may be observed here, however, that about 1520 there 
 began to appear, south of Cape Race and often in the same meridian, an imaginary island of 
 St. John Estevan ; one of those flying islands which "had no real existence and which 
 disappeared off the maps about A.D. 1600. This must not be confounded with the island 
 of St. John opposite the east point of Cape Breton often marked on the same maps with it. 
 
 The next map having relation to the 
 subject is Ruysch's found in the Ptolemy 
 published at Rome in 1508 and the first 
 -printed map containing any notice of Amer- 
 ica. Cape Race is called Cabo di Portugesi ; 
 Labrador, Newfoundland and Greenland 
 are parts of the solid continent of Asia and 
 the great Southern ocean joins the Atlantic 
 and separates them from the Spanish dis- 
 coveries at the south, but a deep bay marks 
 the separation of Newfoundland from Cape 
 Breton, and off a point south of the bay a 
 little island (Biggetu a name never occur- 
 ring again) keeps the place of St. John. 80 
 
 The same mark of the landfall appears on 
 a map in Knnstmann's atlas. It is assigned 
 to the date of A.D. 1514-20. This follows Reinel's type and indicates by unclosed lines the 
 passages north and south of Newfoundland. The coasts are however part of the solid con- 
 tinent. Off the extreme point mark- 
 ing Cape Breton is a legend stating 
 that it was discovered by the Bretons 
 and opposite to it in the ocean is a 
 small island, unnamed, marking the 
 place of St. John's island of Reinel. 
 In 1527 Robert Thome sent a map 
 to the English ambassador as pre- 
 viously observed. It is valuable 
 only as vindicating for the English 
 the same extent of coast as was marked 
 A.D. 1514-20 (from Kunstmann.) by English flags on La Cosa's map a 
 
 claim which Sebastian Cabot, then also at Seville as pilot major to Spain, was letting go 
 to Portugal without one recorded remonstrance. 
 
 The next map calling for notice is a very important one in the Ambrosian library at 
 Milan. It is by Vesconte de Maggiolo and is dated 1527. We still have the contour of a 
 solid continent and, in the ocean, south and opposite to C. de Bertoni is the I. de S. Juan in 
 its proper place and named. Neither the gulf nor Cape North are indicated. This map is 
 plate XIV. of Kretschmer's collection. The French flag now begins to appear, showing 
 evidences of Verrazano's presence on the coast of New England and the Middle states. The 
 
 Ruycsh AD 1508. 
 
76 
 
 SAMUEL EDWAKD DAWSON ON THE 
 
 XlAVORADORE. 
 
 oo.i 
 
 
 
 1UW- 
 
 4*atAt 
 
 Vesconte de Maggiolo, A.D. 1527. 
 
 official map of Ribero made at Seville in 1529 does not show an island near Cape Breton but 
 no sign of the gulf of St. Lawrence appears upon it. 
 
 In the same year 1529, was made the celebrated mappemonde of Hieronimus de 
 Verrazano now in the Propaganda at Rome. It embodies the claims based upon his 
 brother's voyage in 1523 and the whole coast of New England, which Cabot in 1498 had 
 sailed along, is marked with French flags. The southern opening into the gulf is widened 
 and named G. di St. Joanne and, in this single instance, north of the east point of Cape 
 
 Verrazano, A.D. 1529. 
 
 Breton is marked Isla de Sancto Joanni, but still there are no signs of any knowledge of the 
 gulf of St. Lawrence.. The Ptolemy of 1530 Basle Ed., shows Cape Breton with its satellite 
 still in the Atlantic but the coast is a continuous line ; nor does the least sign of the gulf 
 appear upon the globe of Orontius Finseus in 1531. 
 
VOYAGES OF THE CABOTS IN 1497 AND 1498. 
 
 77 
 
 "We have arrived at the year 1531, thirty-four years after Cabot's first voyage, and 
 while the island of St. John has been indicated it is always in the Atlantic and in crosc 
 contiguity with what would appear to be the landfall of 1497, namely the east point of Cape 
 Breton. "We have found openings to the north and south of Newfoundland but they lead 
 nowhere and sometirn.es the lines are closed at a greater or less depth and the coast is con- 
 tinuous. The gulf of St. Lawrence is, so far, non-existent and Prince Edward island is yet 
 unborn into the world. 
 
 Fishermen were, however, moving all around the coast. A map in the Ptolemy of 1511, 
 although most fragmentary and incomplete, seems to indicate a vague knowledge of the 
 
 1 Grand Bay in the north at an early per- 
 T iod. It was there that Cartier found the 
 I port of Brest on his first voyage. A fre- 
 quented port evidently ; because he met 
 on the coast a vessel from Rochelle look- 
 ing for it. The Portuguese were then 
 working more on the east coast of New- 
 foundland and to the south at Cape Bre- 
 ton and Nova Scotia, for in 1534 the gulf 
 of St. Lawrence commenced to appear in 
 embryo upon a group of Portuguese 
 maps ; and that same year Jacques Car- 
 tier sailed into it through the straits of 
 Belle-Isle. Of this group of maps Viegas' 
 (1534) is a type, showing a small round 
 gulf with a few rivers opening into it. 
 
 > irtfi 
 
 Caspar Viegas, A. D. 1534. 
 
 ' J 
 
 Viegas' map separates Cape Breton island from the mainland by a narrow strait and Cape 
 Breton, the headland itself, is the neighbouring point of Nova Scotia now Cape Canso, and 
 there is, out in the ocean off the coast, a small island called do Breta. A map in an atlas in 
 
 the Riccardiana library at Florence given 
 in Kretschmer as plate XXXIII. illustrates 
 this by naming the island of Cape Breton 
 (unnamed in Viegas') as Sam Joa. From 
 Harrisse's description of the Wolfenbuttel 
 map of 1534 M the same features are 
 shown upon it. These maps display a 
 much fuller knowledge of the coast 
 around the strait of Canso ; while to the 
 north, Newfoundland still forms part of 
 the solid continent. In commenting 
 upon them Harrisse falls into an error 
 resulting, probably, from his not having 
 sailed in those waters or studied them 
 on local maps of large scale. He is 
 unable to recognize the square island 
 at the mouth of the gulf as Cape Breton 
 Portuguese Map from Kretschmer. island, because the passage between it and 
 
78 
 
 SAMUEL EDWAED BAWSON ON THE 
 
 the mainland is marked as running north and south, whereas he says the strait of Canso lies 
 ea*t and west ; moreover, he thinks that any one sailing through the strait could not fail at 
 once to see Prince Edward island. This very north and south direction of the strait is, to a 
 Canadian, an evidence of knowledge, for, although Chedabucto bay has its greater axis 
 east and west, the strait of Canso lies exactly north and south by the compass or true 
 N.N.W. and S.S.E.. and on passing in, by the Lennox or by the southern channel from the 
 ocean, there is a sharp and sudden turn to the right at Bear island, which is probably the 
 cause why the through passage was so long concealed. The strait is only a mile wide, and 
 the bold outline of Cape Porcupine interlocking with the high lands of the opposite coast bar 
 the view and form an apparent bay. In old days it was the resort of vessels seeking 
 concealment, and the railway ferry is near a place formerly called Pirate's harbour. Again, 
 because of that very north and south direction a vessel might continue on a straight course 
 north to the Magdalens or Labrador, without suspecting the existence of Prince Edward 
 island. The coast of Cape Breton is lofty, but that of Prince Edward island is very low and 
 cannot be seen further than twenty miles in the very clearest weather, and, if seen, would be 
 taken as part of the mainland, because of the interlocking headlands of Nova Scotia and the 
 high lands in rear of them. These are points which Mr. Harrisse may well be excused for 
 missing from defect of that intimate knowledge which those very much inferior to him in 
 learning may obtain by familiarity with the localities. One point must still be noted, that, 
 although in these Portuguese maps the gulf has commenced to reveal itself, no islands are 
 shown in it, and Prince Edward island will yet remain for sixty years firmly adherent to the 
 mainland in all succeeding maps. 
 
 The voyages of Jacques Carder open a new era in the geography of the northeast 
 coast of America. They have been so thoroughly elucidated by Canadian writers, notably 
 by Ferland, Laverdiere, Ganong and Pope, 50 that scarcely anything remains to be said. 
 Cartier sailed to the northern entrance of the gulf confidently, as to a well-known place, 
 and passed into the expanse between Newfoundland and Labrador, then, and long after, 
 
 called La Grande Baye. He found the 
 coasts named, and the harbour of 
 Brest (now Old Fort bay) a well 
 known rendezvous of fishermen from 
 France. He passed through La Grande 
 Baye and sailed into the main gulf. 
 As well shown by Pope and Ganong, 
 he sailed across it, discovering the 
 islands in his course (the Magdalen 
 group including Brion island and 
 the Bird rocks), and he touched at 
 the north point of Prince Edward 
 island, without recognizing it as an 
 island. For, in fact, as is well 
 known to those who have sailed in 
 those waters, the long projecting capes 
 of the island and of the adjacent pro- 
 vinces of New Brunswick and Nova 
 Scotia so overlap that capes Egmont 
 
 Map of the Gulf of St. Lawrence to show the relative position 
 of Prince Edward and the Magdalen islands. 
 
VOYAGES OP THE CABOTS IN 1497 AND 1498. 79 
 
 and Tormentine seem to inclose a large bay. It \s not strange, then, that Cartier passed on 
 westward to the New Brunswick coast without suspecting the existence of Northumberland 
 strait. Any one who has crossed to Summerside and to Charlottetown will have observed 
 how the island lies, as it were, in the lap of the sister provinces, and all sailors know, 
 what in fact is evident upon the chart, that it is far out of the way of vessels sailing 
 into the gulf by any entrance but the strait of Canso. The entire coast is low and not 
 visible at any great distance, and it is not surprising that for sixty years after Cartier the 
 existence of the separating strait of Northumberland is unrecorded, and without doubt was 
 unsuspected. 
 
 Cartier's two voyages attracted no attention in Spain ; but the preparations of 
 Roberval in 1540 were jealously watched by spies and reported to the Emperor Charles V. 
 Finding that the expedition was destined for some part of Baccalaos, he endeavoured to in- 
 cite the Portuguese to follow 57 and crush it. That part of America had fallen to Portugal 
 under the bull of demarcation, and the French were looked upon as trespassers ; but 
 Portugal was not in a position to take such high ground as Spain. Gomez, in 1525, is the 
 only Spaniard who is recorded as having sailed along our coasts in these. early years. 
 
 In 1536 the Spanish Padron Real, or standard official map, would seem to have fallen 
 into arrears, and Charles V. commissioned Alonzo de Chaves to include all the latest 
 discoveries and bring it down to date. The map which resulted from his labours has been 
 lost ; but Oviedo has given so detailed a description of it that it might almost be repro- 
 duced. It contained the results of Gomez' explorations, and upon it was traced the strait of 
 Canso under the name of the passage of St. Julian. The point of Cape Breton is noted as 
 being upon the island of St. John, and this transfer of the name St. John from the small 
 satellite island to the larger one will be found repeated later in several important maps. 
 Gomez gives the size of the island as 56 leagues long by 20 leagues wide, and in passing it 
 he said that he saw much smoke, which led him to think it was inhabited. This little 
 observation gives reality to the narrative ; for the appearance of Smoky Cape Cape Enfume 
 (Baia des Fumos of the Portuguese) is very remarkable, and might well mislead any 
 stranger sailing along the coast. "With singular reiteration Harrisse insists, even against 
 this clear evidence, upon pronouncing the island of St. John to be fictitious like the islands of 
 Santa Cruz and St. Brandan. His objections are based, as pointed out previously, upon 
 misconceptions arising from want of local knowledge of the gulf and its approaches. 
 Enough is recorded of De Chaves' map to show that, for him, the island of Cape Breton 
 was, itself, the island of St. John. 
 
 "Whatever the Portuguese (appendix E) may have done on the Atlantic coast, to the 
 French is due the entire credit of revealing the gulf of St. Lawrence. In the wake of 
 Cartier followed Bretons, Normans, and Basques, both French and Spanish, but it was long 
 before his discoveries passed into the maps. The map of Agnese (1536), that of Munster 
 (1540), that of Mercator (1541), and the Ulpius globe of 1542 show no indication of the 
 gulf of St. Lawrence ; but all show the east point of Cape Breton and its satellite island in 
 the Atlantic, evidently the St. John of former and later maps. The delusion that America 
 was, at the north, a part of eastern Asia died hard. It lingered on until about 1548, when 
 it may still be found in Ptolemy. The great western ocean was supposed to wash the south- 
 ern shores of a vast northern continent stretching from Cathay to Baccalaos, and it was 
 therefore called the Great South sea. 58 The name lingers still in our ordinary speech ; for 
 
8O SAMUEL EDWARD DAWSON ON THE 
 
 when we call the seal-skins which come from Bearing's sea South sea seal we are uncon- 
 sciously re-echoing the delusions of three hundred years ago. But the dream that this great 
 southern ocean swept far eastwards and inwards towards the Atlantic in a great buy was 
 dominant in Cartier's day, and for more than a hundred and twenty years after. In some maps 
 it seems to reach within a hundred miles of the Atlantic coast ; sometimes in the latitudes of 
 the Carolinas, and sometimes further north. No wonder Cartier sailed up our great river 
 expecting every headland would reveal the great secret. Jolliet paddled down the western 
 rivers with the same hope. Lake after lake raised the same anticipations as they opened out 
 their wondrous chain ; and even still, in these prosaic times, in imagination we can picture 
 the figure of the brooding La Salle gazing wistfully over the waters of our familiar Lake St. 
 Louis, where it stretches away to the west from the bluff bank of his seigniory, at the rise 
 of the road near the present village of Lachine. 
 
 By the year 1542 the contour of the gulf began to get into the maps, and the map of 
 Rotz w of that year shows the whole outline of the gulf and the strait of Canso, but no indica- 
 tion of Northumberland strait. The globe of Rotz (A.D. 1543) is the first to show the Magda- 
 len group, but it does not show Prince Edward island. The 
 peculiar curve, concave to the east, and the lay of the island 
 marked, as well as its situation in the direct course through 
 the gulf, render a mistake impossible. The Vallard map of 
 1543 shows the same group changed in shape, but Ganong's 
 reasons for identifying it with the great Magdalen are unan- 
 swerable. The island of Cape Breton is drawn out of place 
 and made to lie parallel with the coast of Nova Scotia, a dis- 
 tortion repeated on a few later maps ; among others, on the 
 mappemonde Harleyenne, as described by Mr. Harrisse. 60 
 In that map, however, Cape Breton island is called the island 
 
 of St. Johan a transfer of name from the satellite to the main island (appendix D) occur- 
 ring likewise in the rhymed routier of Jean Allefonsce by Mallart, as well as in that com- 
 piled by Secalart, but still retaining the island on the Atlantic coast. By the year 1543 
 the gulf had received on Vallard's map the name of Rio de Canada. The Spaniards called 
 it Golfo Quadrado (the square gulf) ; and yet Prince Edward island had not been developed 
 on the maps, while we find the island of St. John still in the Atlantic, whether the name 
 be attached to the large or the small island, and wherever the words Cape Breton arc found 
 a small island is always near (ex adverso). 
 
 The celebrated " Cabot" map of 1544 would come in here in order of date ; but I pass 
 it for the present, and proceed to the Dauphin map of 1546. This map has a paramount 
 interest to Canadians, for upon it first appear the names Canada, Ochelaga, Sagnay, 
 L'Assomption, Belle Isle, Franciroy. It was drawn by Pierre Deceliers, at Arques, a town 
 which is almost a suburb of Dieppe, the centre of maritime activity in Normandy, 61 and its 
 author was a contemporary of Jacques Cartier. For the present inquiry the chief import- 
 ance of this map is the delineation of the island which Cartier discovered in the gulf, and 
 which, in the so-called Cabot map of 1544, is called St. John. An inspection of this map 
 ;i map, moreover, made in Cartier's lifetime ; identifies it with the Magdalen. The name 
 group of islands is misleading, for the Magdalens (appendix F) consist of one large island 
 formed by a double line of sandbanks with three outlying islands Entry island, in the 
 
VOYAGES OF THE CABOTS IN 1497 AND 1498. 
 
 81 
 
 Dauphin, or Henry II. Map, A.D. 1516. 
 
 bosom, as it were, of the long, straggling main island, and the Bird rocks and Brion island 
 to the northeast. This is the precise arrangement on the Dauphin map. First, Isle aux 
 Margaulx, then Isle Brion, then the long, straggling main island, and an island in the centre 
 which may well be Entry island. Further, at the southwest end, is Alezay, which Pope 
 and Ganong have identified as Deadman's island. It is evident, therefore, that Jacques 
 Cartier did not know of Prince Edward island as an island, but thought the point he 
 touched a headland of the main shore. This group of connected islands is fifty-six miles 
 long ; it was discovered in 1534, and the compiler of the map of 1544, finding that it was 
 being inserted in the new maps, and that it was next to the prima vista of Cabot, without 
 any authority whatever and ignorant of the distance and physical facts, assumed that it was 
 the island of St. John of the legend N/o. 8 of the map. 
 
 In connection with the Dauphin map, a mappemonde described by Harrisse" in the 
 British Museum, by the same Deceliers, 32 is worthy of careful consideration. It purports to 
 embody the results of the voyages of Cartier and Roberval, and this island, which Harrisse 
 takes to be Prince Edward island, is named isle des arenes isle of sands. 63 No one who ever 
 saw the "garden of the gulf " would call it " isle of sands," for the forest comes down to 
 the beaches even of the northern coast. 
 
 The maps of Gastaldi, 1550 of Nicolay, 1553, and one in Eamusio of 1556, do not show 
 the gulf. The point of Cape Breton, with its attendant island, is, however, given. Some- 
 times, on the maps of this period, the island is called Breton, as well as the cape. In an 
 atlas by Guillaume le Testu, dated 1555, described by Harrisse, 61 the island inside the gulf 
 is called lie Gazeas, which he says is a corruption of Alezay, while he yet erroneously 
 supposes it to be Prince Edward island. The map of Diego Homem, 1558, shows the 
 island in the gulf as Me de Sablote (isle of sands Sable island), but the position as well as 
 the name precludes the supposition that it is Prince Edward island. 
 
 Sec. II., 1894. 11. 
 
82 
 
 SAMUEL EDWARD DAWSON ON THE 
 
 I have now gone over all the list of maps given by Harrisse in his work on the Cabots 
 and some others besides, and Prince Edward island has not yet emerged from its hiding 
 place in the lap of Nova Scotia ; but I have continually found the island of St. John 
 always in the Atlantic, and always near the eastern cape of Cape Breton the prima vista of 
 John Cabot. It will, however, be well to follow down the chain of maps until our island 
 province is born into that independent position which, in our days, it so greatly values; and, 
 upon the Jomard map of about the same date, the gulf will be found fairly drawn, but with- 
 
 1. Baye des Chasteaux. 
 
 2. Cap de Raso. 
 
 3. Cape Breton. 
 
 4. I. de St. John. 
 
 5. Rio Grand. 
 
 6. R. de Isles. 
 
 Bellero, A.D. 1554. 
 
 Jomard, A.D. 155 . 
 
 out islands, while the island of St. John is marked in the Atlantic in its accustomed place. 
 The same remark is applicable to the Bellero map of 1554. Ruscelli's 
 map of 1561 seems to be largely drawn from imagination ; but even 
 that gives the cape with its island ; but he calls the island Breston. 
 Zaltieri's map, 1566, does the same; as also Des Liens' map of the 
 same year, and that of Ortelius in 1570. The map of Gerard Mer- 
 cator, dated 1569, is the first in our series of maps to give its present 
 name to the gulf, which appears as Sinus S. Laurentii. The name which Cartier gave to a 
 bay on the north shore was thenceforth (no one knows how) extended over the whole gulf."' 
 The island in the centre reappears without a name ; but now we meet a cape St. John sl on 
 the mainland, where Prince Edward island is to be born, and the name appears now first 
 
 inside the gulf, at some point on the north 
 h r> \ Y5 i~ ' , i coast of the still adherent Prince Edward 
 
 ft Cabo Bretao ^ J 
 
 island. Two maps by Vaz Dourado 
 (Kunstmann, plates 10 and 11), dated 
 "C between 1573-80, show the coast on a 
 
 Crt 
 
 ? large scale. Both of them mark the 
 island of St. John near the point of Cape 
 Breton, and upon one we meet the name baia des fumos applied to the line of coast called 
 
 Vaz Dourado, A.D. 1573. 
 
VOYAGES OF THE CABOTS IN 1497 AND 1498. 83 
 
 "CapEnfume" Smoky cape. The appropriateness of the name is still manifest to the 
 passing traveller, for the steep cliffs seem ever shrouded in a rising, smoke-like mist. Upon 
 
 the other the gulf is shown, and the island, 
 which has been taken for Prince Edward, 
 is called isle Dorean, a Portuguese corrup- 
 tion of d'arenes, clearly identifying it with 
 the sand heaps of the Magdalens. Michael 
 Lok's map, 1582 (see post), in Hakluyt's 
 " Divers Voyages," though very incorrect 
 j,^ '*& in many respects, is instruct! ve,because it is 
 
 '' the only map, excepting that of 1544, which 
 
 Vaz Dourado, A.D. 1573. 
 
 mentions John Cabot. Upon the coast of 
 
 Cape Breton is marked J. Cabot, 1497 ; and in the ocean near the eastern cape called 
 C. Breton, is the island of St. John. The same position for the island is shown on the 
 map (see posl] in Ilakluyt's "Principal Navigations," dated 1599. On the Molyneux map 
 of 1592 it is a little further west, and more off the east coast of Nova Scotia, although 
 several small unnamed islands appear in the gulf. 
 
 Thus we have come down to the year 1600, when Pontgrave, Lescarbot and, above all, 
 Champlain are about to appear on our coasts, and save on one map, that of 1544, the island 
 of St. John is still on the outside of Cape Breton. Prince Edward island has not yet been 
 born upon the'maps. With Champlain comes a new era. His. voyages and writings, and 
 his ever ready pencil, throw a flood of light over the obscurities of our geography. In the 
 voyage of 1603 he embodies a description, by the Sieur Prevert of St. Malo, of the Acadian 
 coast of the gulf, and mention is made of an island of St. John, undoubtedly our Prince 
 Edward, for he says it is 30 to 35 leagues in length and about 6 leagues from the coast. 
 Mention is also made of the island of Cape Breton, under the name of island of St. Law- 
 rence ; but, on his two first maps, what is now known as Prince Edward island does not 
 appear. On the map with the Voyages of 1613 a very small island appears, marked as I. 
 St. Jean, in the position of its northwestern point, and on the Acadian coast is a legend 
 stating that the author had not examined the coast. Upon the map of 1632 Prince Edward 
 island appears first in its proper place and in its full proportions, and in the volume of that 
 date he makes a full mention of it. 
 
 From these considerations the following conclusions necessarily flow : 
 
 1. That the island called St. John on the map of 1544 is not that now known as Prince 
 Edward island, but is the great Magdalen island, which lies in the course of vessels passing 
 through the strait between Cape Breton and Newfoundland. 
 
 2. That the island of St. John of Cabot is Scatari island, marking the landfall at Cape 
 Breton, the easternmost point of the island called after it, and that that cape is the natural 
 landfall of a vessel missing Cape Race and pursuing a westerly course. 
 
 VIII. THE "CABOT" MAP OF 1544. 
 
 In the previous part of this paper it has been shown that John Cabot made maps of his 
 first voyage which were sent to Spain and were embodied in the map of Juan de la Cosa. 
 
84 SAMUEL EDWARD DAWSON ON THE 
 
 An endeavour was also made to show, quite independently of the map of 1544, that John 
 Cabot, on his first voyage, oversailed Cape Race and made the next natural landfall, the 
 east point of Cape Breton island. It has been also shown that, after the sailing of the 
 second expedition, the whole Cabot family disappeared for ever from history, excepting 
 Sebastian alone. He also disappears for fourteen years, when he emerges in Spain. A few 
 scattered indications survive of voyages meanwhile from England to the " new found 
 islands," but he cannot be positively identified with any of them. What he did in the 
 interim is not known. He probably made maps. Suddenly, in 1512, he appears in the 
 public accounts. Henry VIII. had joined Ferdinand of Spain in a league against France, 
 and was preparing an expedition to assist in an attack from Spain upon the south of France, 
 and, in May, 1512, Sebastian Cabot was employed to make a map of Guienne and Gascony, 
 the projected theatre of war. Then came sudden advancement. In September of the same 
 year Ferdinand wrote to Lord Willoughby, the English commander, to have Cabot sent to 
 him. Under the same date he wrote to Cabot, inviting him to enter his service, with the 
 object, as appears elsewhere, of consulting him concerning the navigation to Baccalaos. In 
 October the king allotted to Cabot an annual salary of 50,000 maravedis, and gave him per- 
 mission to go and fetch his wife and family from England. No objection was raised there. 
 The English thought very little of the new lands. The expeditions thither had not been 
 profitable. No gold had been found, nor had the rich spice regions of Cathay been readied. 
 Three savages, clothed in skins, seem to have been the only returns made certainly the 
 only returns recorded. There was no market for English manufactures with such people as 
 these. The English of Bristol had already a good, steady trade with Iceland, and from 
 thence all the codfish they needed could be procured. Why go further to a distant and 
 unknown country, where no goods could be sold ? So Sebastian Cabot may depart whither 
 he may choose, with his wife, and his family, and his maps, and his theory of the sphere, 
 and his knowledge of Baccalaos. The English merchants will follow the lines of practical 
 common sense business ; and the king will continue to fortify the south coast, and to wage 
 war with France, and has no time for remote and unprofitable enterprises. 
 
 It may well be supposed that Cabot felt himself under no obligation to England. The 
 king of Spain had received him with great kindness, and had given him a large salary and 
 a distinguished position. He would have been more than human if no trace of resentment 
 rankled in his heart. For he was not. in truth, English-born, and had no patriotic obliga- 
 tion to guard English interests. Therefore, when he was made grand pilot of Spain and 
 head of the department of cartography at Seville, he quietly acquiesced in the suppression 
 on the maps he supervised of all traces of his father's voyage and his father's discoveries 
 for England. These were known to Do Ayala and reported in his despatch to Spain. They 
 were known to La Cosa, and they were known to Robert Thome, as shown by his letters 
 from Seville to the English ambassador and to king Henry VIII., and were indicated on 
 his sketch map ; but upon the Spanish maps, made under Cabot's supervision, they were 
 either ignored or thrust (as on Ribero's map) far away north to Greenland. The Pope bad 
 divided these unknown lands between Spain and Portugal, and these powers considered all 
 other nations as interlopers. Cabot was well recompensed by the king of Spain for the use 
 of that very knowledge of Baccalaos, which he, above others, possessed ; and that know- 
 ledge, underrated and even despised in England, was suppressed upon the Spanish and 
 Portuguese maps. That is the answer to Harrisse's question, 1 " 16 " Why, if Cabot's landfall 
 
VOYAGES OF THE CABOTS IN 1497 AND 1498. 85 
 
 had been really at Cape Breton in Baccalaos, did he not record it upon the maps he super- 
 vised while grand pilot of Spain ? " 
 
 No doubt there was a want of candour in this course ; but candour was not a virtue in 
 those days, especially not in an Italian of the Renaissance which Cabot was to the very 
 core. Mr. Nicholls, the city librarian of Bristol (appendix G), has written a book exalting 
 him as a paragon of all virtue and knowledge. He pictures him, as in after years, " home- 
 sick for his native England " as " flying from the tyranny, cruelty and superstition of 
 Spain into the light of freedom and the gospel" ; and he triumphantly points to the instruc- 
 tions drawn up for the northeast expedition, in which Cabot enjoins the daily reading of 
 the Bible to the crew, as a proof of his evangelical zeal. But Cabot was of the colour of 
 the rock he sat upon, and Edward VI. was then reigning. In the service of the Grand 
 Turk he would have enjoined the reading of the Koran. "While he was in the service of 
 Spain in the receipt of great emoluments and high honours, he stealthily intrigued with 
 Venice to sell to that state the secret he claimed to possess of a short route to Cathay, and 
 he justified his course to the Venetian ambassador by stating that he was Venetian born, 
 and that his conscience smote him for not doing something on behalf of his native country. 
 This intrigue came to naught ; but when, in his old age, he went to England, he renewed 
 it while he was an English official and in receipt of English pay. At the same time he was 
 maintaining in England that he was English, and born in the city of Bristol. So he told 
 Richard Eden, and sO it is set down in many English books. If, therefore, the map of 1544 
 were the only evidence of the landfall at Cape Breton, it would not, supposing it even to be 
 Cabot's work, be entitled to more acceptance than his maps while grand pilot of Spain. 
 Biddle, in his " Memoir of Sebastian Cabot " (appendix G), had gone very far in suppressing 
 the father in the interest of the son ; but the Bristol librarian, in what d'Avezac 67 rightly 
 calls " parish patriotism " (patriotisme du docker), after mourning over what he fondly thinks 
 was Cabot's only lie, exhausts the language of approval by calling him the " founder of 
 England's mercantile marine "; " the man who gave to England the carrying trade of the 
 world" and he caps the climax of eulogy by calling him "the father of free trade." 
 Henry Stevens, in his characteristic style, vindicates John Cabot's reputation in the formula 
 " Sebastian Cabot John Cabot = Zero," and, of late years, the discovery of fresh documents 
 has re-established the merit of the elder Cabot. The balance is even inclining the other way ; 
 for Mr. Harrisse, in his last book, would seem to maintain that Sebastian Cabot was little 
 more than a pretender to nautical knowledge. This is hard to believe, because Ferdinand 
 and Charles V. were good judges of men, and they trusted him to the last. Indeed, when 
 in 1547, he, without the knowledge or consent of the emperor, transferred his services to 
 England, his salary was running on ; and he drew it, when in England, as long as Charles 
 V. would pay it, although he had no intention of going back to Spain, and with excellent 
 judgment had declined all requests to return to his official duties there. 
 
 While Sebastian Cabot was thus sitting as grand pilot at the centre of Spanish carto- 
 graphy, the French and Portuguese and Basques were diligently opening up the fisheries of 
 Baccalaos and following the whales down the Labrador coast through the straits of Belle-Isle 
 and into the Grand bay. All this Cabot must have known, but on the Spanish maps he 
 certified it was ignored. The first indication of a knowledge of the gulf appeared, as has 
 been already shown, on the Portuguese maps in the same year that Jacques Cartier -sailed 
 into it from the north. The second voyage of Cartier revealed to the world the gulf and 
 
86 
 
 SAMUEL EDWARD DAWSON ON THE 
 
 river in their full extent up to Hochelaga. It is true that the narrative of his voyages was 
 not printed until 1545 ; but the Dieppe school of cartographers had commenced their 
 labours of making known the achievements of French mariners while preparing charts to 
 assist them in their further ventures ; and on Rotz' map and the mappemonde Harleyenne 
 in 1542, the main features of Cartier's voyages were given. Whoever compiled the map of 
 1544 had abundance of material in the French and Portuguese maps, as for the Spanish 
 maps they had been far in arrears ; but in 1537 the Padron Real, or royal standard map, 
 as before stated was revised by a commission, and from the description given by Oviedo 
 of its main features, it is clear that the map of 1544 was not based upon it, and was there- 
 fore not of Spanish origin, and not by Sebastian Cabot, the grand pilot of Spain. 
 
 ijmi/j IP 
 
 w Jws? l^.ilS J _j JL jkl*sr 
 
 The North American Portion of the (Cabot ?) Mappemonde of 1544. 
 
 The map now under discussion, the celebrated map of 1544 (so called) of Cabot, has been 
 described by Dr. Bourinot in his history of Cape Breton, where also the sketch here repro- 
 duced of the North American part of it may be found. It is unique, only one copy being 
 known to exist, and was secured for the National Library of Paris. It was found in the 
 year 1843 by Von Martius in the house of a Bavarian curate. It is engraved on copper ; 
 
VOYAGES OF THE CABOTS IN 1497 AND 1498. 87 
 
 but on the sides are descriptive legends in letter press, divided into two tables numbered one 
 and two and attached after the plate was struck off. There can be no doubt but that the 
 legends form part of the original publication, because upon the map proper are numbered 
 references which identify them with it. There are twenty-two legends, seventeen of which 
 are in two languages, Latin with a Spanish translation, and five in Spanish alone. 
 
 Although reproductions of the American portion are frequent enough, the whole map 
 (for it is a mappemonde, or map of the world) has not often been reproduced. It is access- 
 ible to us in the facsimile in Jomard's " Monuments de la Geographic." It professes to 
 embody all discoveries down to the date of its publication, and to that end gathers materials 
 from all sources, even as far back as Pliny's Natural History. 
 
 In 1544 Cabot had got through the law-suits and troubles consequent upon the 
 unfortunate expedition to the Eio de la Plata and had been restored to his high position ; 
 still the map was not published in Spain. It bears no publisher's name nor place of publi- 
 cation. The map, when it mentions Cabot, speaks in the third person, thus : " Sebastian 
 Cabot made this figure " ; " the said Sebastian Cabot, my author " ; " discovered by John 
 Cabot and himself; " " that most honest man, John Cabot, and his son ; " " my author, the 
 most learned of all in knowledge of astronomy and navigation " ; but in the 16th legend 
 the compiler speaks in the first person, " How Ptolemy places it (Trapovana) is, I think, 
 known to all " ; and, in the Latin version of the legend No. 17, the relation of Cabot is 
 more precisely stated ; not, as in the Spanish, " made this figure," but " laid the last 
 touch to me (the map)," thus modifying very much the force of the argument founded on 
 the Spanish version alone. 
 
 The geographical basis of the map is Portuguese, upon which is grafted information 
 from French sources. Most of Cartier's names are given, as well as the results of his second 
 voyage, thus demonstrating the existence of charts made by Cartier to which the compiler 
 had access, and, although the names are much corrupted in translation and transcription, 
 they can be, for the most part, identified by a reference to other charts of about that date 
 and later. 
 
 The map appears to be the work of some very careless person, and the proofs could 
 never have been corrected by such a man as Cabot. The Latin of the legends is rough and 
 incorrect, as corvi for cervi. The Spanish inscriptions are admitted to be ungrammatical, and 
 could not have passed a Spaniard ; nor would it have been necessary in the legends for 
 Cabot to explain to Spaniards that " Seville was a famous city of Andalusia." Still it must 
 have been published in some part of the dominions of Charles V., and Winsor is probably 
 correct in supposing Antwerp to be the place. The editing is careless ; for instance, the 
 reference in the body of the map to the legend No. 8, concerning Baccalaos, is given as 
 No. 3 ; on the right hand margin of the map the latitude reads 90 degrees instead of 80 
 degrees; 68 the year 1494 is given instead of 1497. The Latin version of the legend No. 8 
 gives July 24 as the date of the landfall, while the Spanish version gives the correct date, 
 June 24 ; the reference to Pliny at No. 18 cites the wrong chapter; at the Orcades there is 
 a reference to a legend No. 30, whereas there are only twenty-two legends in all ; the spell- 
 ing is inconsistent and is twisted so as to be inaccurate in any language ; Lake St. Peter, 
 called Lac d'Angouleme, is, of course, translated into Spanish, but it is spelled Laaga de 
 Golesme, and, just underneath, on the lake is a place called Golosme, as if there were some 
 town there of that name this same error is found on Homem's map, which is undoubtedly 
 
88 SAMUEL EDWABD DAWSON ON THE 
 
 Portuguese ; the town or station called Brest, on Old Fort Bay, is given twice on the 
 Labrador coast; Cap Tiennot is twisted into de tronot, while in another place is laid down 
 y' de tronot. The Saguenay river is given as B. de 8. quenain, and near it is another evident 
 double, Saqui. Then there are unmeaning names, such as tttttonaer, on the River St. Law- 
 rence above Lake St. Peter; this is evidently a corruption of some French name on Cartier's 
 charts ; probably ttittonaer estadas means " Country of the Tudemans 8J " of Carrier. Baie de 
 S. Laurent becomes baya de S. loreme. Cartier's Baie de S. Lunaire is C. del maro. These 
 errors and corruptions would imply a compilation of material by an unskilful hand from 
 all the authors then extant. I have confined my remarks to errors in the Canadian names 
 only. Kohl and Harrisse point out many others elsewhere. 
 
 There is also another class of errors ; e. g., Ireland is drawn too large, as being almost 
 equal to England and Scotland combined ; in England, Dover and Yarmouth are laid down, 
 but not Bristol, the second city of the kingdom, and the place from whence both the Cabot 
 expeditions sailed, and, moreover, which Cabot, when in an English mood, claimed as his 
 birthplace. All the Labrador coast is fringed with conventional islands in rows exactly four 
 deep ; Newfoundland is broken up into many detached islands that is not remarkable, for 
 many later maps do the same ; but in this map little conventional islands are strung all 
 through the interstices. All the islands on the coast are laid down in the most symbolic 
 way, as if from some narrative which simply stated that the coast was studded with many 
 islands. 
 
 The information contained in the legends is collected from all treatises on cosmography, 
 ancient and modern, and represents the current popular belief of the time. But many of 
 them contain stories of fabulous monsters which Cabot must have been too well informed to 
 believe. Men with pigs' heads, who cannot talk but only grunt of these monsters not only 
 descriptions on the margin but drawings are given upon the map itself. Then there are 
 people with ears so large as to cover their bodies, and men without joints in their knees 
 or feet ; there are men who whistle their communications to each other but cannot speak ; 
 there are birds which pick up an ox or a ship ; there are lampreys which attack ships. 
 These last might be gigantic octopods ; but when it is related, on the authority of Pliny, 
 that there is a fish called the echinis or remora, only half a foot long, which can stop a ship 
 under full sail, and when a drawing of this Avonderful creature is given, it becomes clear 
 that such matter could never have been revised by Cabot. Yet whoever compiled this 
 map must have had some communication, direct or indirect, with Cabot ; because there are 
 some particulars noted in legends Nos. 8 and 17, about the first voyage to America and the 
 variation of the compass, which would seem to have come from him ; but even they are 
 stated obliquely in the third person, as if the map were itself speaking. The theory which 
 seems most plausible is a modification of Mr. Harrisse's latest view. It is that Cabot was 
 at that time meditating a transfer of his services to England. The negotiations must have 
 been secret, since in 1545 Cabot, with Gutierez and Alonzo de Chaves, was appointed on 
 a commission to examine De Medina's Arte de Navegar. That is the last record of him in 
 Spain. Suddenly, in 1547, an entry in the minutes of council of King Edward VI. to pay 
 the expenses of his removal, shows his presence in England. Cabot covered his hand so 
 successfully in his intrigues with Venice in 1523 and 1551 that it was only during very 
 recent researches in the Venetian archives that his methods came to light. As pilot major 
 of Spain he would not dare either to publish in Spain or to contribute to the publication 
 
VOYAGES OF THE CABOTS IN 1497 AND 1498. 89 
 
 elsewhere of information from the Spanish official documents, it was that which caused the 
 deprivation of Diego Gutierez the younger ; but he would not be indisposed to communicate 
 information concerning himself to a third party for use by this anonymous compiler, the 
 more especially as publication was to be made at a distance from Spain and near to England. 
 It was characteristic of his oblique methods, for he could not be held responsible for such a 
 publication. The map was based on Portuguese and French documents ; and, as pointed 
 out above, he could not have seen the proofs ; but still upon the map appeared information 
 bearing on his English plans. The name of John Cabot alone stood in the English archives, 
 to the knowledge and within the memory of many then living, as the discoverer of 
 the new found land over the Atlantic. Sebastian could have no status in England save in 
 so far as he could associate his name with that of John Cabot ; therefore the elder Cabot 
 after a suppression of forty years, was suddenly resurrected as the discoverer of America, 
 precisely at the juncture when it became the interest of his son that such should be the case. 
 
 It is abundantly evident that there were at the end of the century many maps ascribed 
 to Cabot extant, and it is also beyond question (appendix H) that they were not alike. They 
 differed in the date of publication, some being dated 1544, two years before Cabot left Spain ; 
 some dated 1549, two years after he settled in England. A comparison of the legends is 
 made in appendix H ; but it would appear evident from Purchas that the map referred to 
 by Hakluyt in the queen's gallery as having been cut by Clement Adams, was dated 1549. 
 Copies of this map were in the merchants' houses, 69 and that version of the map might well 
 be supposed to have Cabot's approval, so far as that was .of value. Referring to appendix 
 H a number of interesting questions which would be confusing here, it would be well to 
 concentrate attention upon the inquiry whether there is any clue to indicate the features of 
 that map which Adams engraved and Hakluyt saw. It would appear that such a clue 
 exists. 
 
 Whatever information Clement Adams's map contained must have been common infor- 
 mation in Hakluyt's time ; because it is expressly recorded that the map was in " many 
 ancient merchants' houses." The reason for supposing the landfall of 1497 to have been at 
 Cape Breton east point have been given, .and rests upon other foundations ; but if the island 
 of St. John had been our Prince Edward island, all the merchants would have known that 
 fact, and it would have come out in some of the many narratives given in Hakluyt but DO 
 mention is made of any such island in the gulf. 
 
 Again, all the merchants knew (and Hakluyt records some of their ventures in that 
 direction) of the island of Ramea in the gulf. That island was much frequented, and is 
 mentioned in many places in Hakluyt. It is identified as the great Magdalen, not only by 
 its physical features, but by its attendant islands the two Birds and Bryon island. The 
 island of Ramea lies across the path of vessels sailing through the strait at St. Paul, and no 
 other island is met or laid down until Anticosti is reached. The island in the Paris map is 
 identified as Ramea, or the great Magdalen ; first, by its position in the track of vessels 
 sailing through the strait, and second, by the three little islets at the northeastern extremity, 
 which are Bryon island and the two Bird islands, and by a little island at the other extremity 
 which is Deadman's island the Alezay of Cartier. The thickened form of the island betrays 
 the Portuguese origin of the map, for the same shape is given in Vallard's and Homem's 
 maps ; while on the Dauphin map, which is wholly French, the same position is occupied 
 by an island of the correct shape of the great Magdalen. 
 
 Sec. II., 1894. 12. 
 
90 
 
 SAMUEL EDWAKD DAWSON ON THE 
 
 Again, it has been shown l>y Ganong and Pope that the only islands discovered hy Cartier, 
 as islands, were (what were afterwards called) the great Magdalen and its satellites. These 
 must, therefore, first he found upon any map hefore we can commence to look for Prince 
 Edward island ; hut, when the Magdalen group is abstracted, no other island is left, either 
 on Cabot's or on any other map, until Champlain's large map of 1632. 
 
 Again, Michael Lok's map of 1582, in Hakluyt's "Divers Voyages," illustrates the 
 
 Michael Lok's Map, A.D. 1582. 
 
 same thesis. It is given as based on Verrazano's map, but the information current at the 
 time is added, for Hochelaga and Saguenay are laid down, and, what is beyond question, the 
 great Magdalen (or Ramea) is shown in its proper place. This map reveals the information 
 current among merchants. It must be held to indicate in a general way the features of the 
 gulf as laid down on the map of Clement Adams which Hakluyt- saw. Upon it at Cape 
 Breton is marked J. Gabot, 1497, and off Cape Breton is marked the island of St. John, 
 near where it has been shown to have been on the long series of maps we have been following. 
 Again in a few copies (twelve in all) of the second edition of Hakluyt's " Principal 
 Navigations," published 1598-1600 in three volumes folio, is a map celebrated by having 
 been identified as the map alluded to by Shakespeare (Twelfth Night, Act III., Sc. 2) as the 
 " new map with the augmentation of the Indies." This map bears the following inscription 
 upon the northern part of Labrador (near an opening in the continent marked " a furious 
 overfall," intended for Hudson's strait) : " This land was discovered by John and Sebastian 
 " Cabot for King Henry VII., 1497." In this respect the map favours the theory of a land- 
 fall far north at Labrador by the two Cabots in 1497, and not in 1498, thus contradicting 
 Lok's map, which places the landfall at Cape Breton hy the inscription there, " John 
 Gabot, 1497." The question of the landfall of the first voyage has been argued in the first 
 
VOYAGES OF THE CABOTS IN 1497 AND 1498. 
 
 91 
 
 >* 
 
 ^ J '</Xv> - 
 
 I ^fK.gi\ T Ll **&&$ G**uuiyt 
 
 Hakluyt's Map, A.D. 1598-1000. K ' 
 
 part of this paper on other grounds, and Hakluyt in his translation of Galvano gives it at 45, 
 but this map is conclusive as to the position of the island of St. John, for it is placed in the 
 Atlantic, on the coast of Cape Breton and south of the east cape. An island in the gulf is 
 given, but its position and its shape, concave with attendant islets, mark it unmistakably as 
 the island of Ramea (Magdalen), so frequently mentioned in the text of Hakluyt's work, 
 while the deep in dentation s~of the Nova Scotia coast show the commencement of the 
 separation of Prince Edward island from the mainland. 
 
 L as tiy Lescarbot's map in his history of New France demonstrates the truth of the 
 
 preceding argument. He was in Nova Scotia with Champlain, and retained his interest in 
 the country after his return to France. His map was published in 1609, and he shows 
 beyond all doubt the island of Prfnce Edward still adherent, but commencing to detach it- 
 self from Nova Scotia. The water is creeping inwards east and west in deep bays, but the 
 passage through Northumberland strait is still blocked ; and, out in the gulf, in their 
 and named with Cartier's names, are the islands of the Magdalen group. 
 
92 SAMUEL EDWARD DAWSON THE VOYAGES OF THE CABOTS, ETC. 
 
 I have not considered it necessary to prove that if Cabot's landfall were Cape North he 
 could not have discovered the low-lying shore of Prince Edward island on the same day. I 
 have preferred to show that Prince Edward island was not known as an island and did not 
 appear on any map for one hundred years after John Cabot's death. If Cabot had possessed 
 a modern map, and had been looking for Prince Edward island, and had pushed on without 
 landing at the north cape of Cape Breton, and had shaped his course southward, he might 
 have seen it in a long midsummer day ; but Cabot did not press on. He landed and 
 examined the country, and found close to it St. John's island, which lie also examined. 
 Upon that easternmost point of this Nova Scotian land of our common country John Cabot 
 planted the banner of St. George on June 24, 1497, more than one year before Columbus 
 set foot upon the main continent of America, and now, after almost four hundred years, 
 despite all the chances and changes of this western world, that banner is floating there, a 
 witness to our existing union with our distant mother land across the ocean. May the cavo 
 descubierto por Ingleses ever be thus adorned ; and, meantime, when in 1897 St. John the 
 Baptist's day arrives, what shall Canadians do to commemorate the fourth centenary of that 
 auspicious day when the red cross was planted on the mainland across the western sea, 
 and when on a point of land in our own Dominion the English tongue was heard, of all 
 the languages of Europe the first, upon this great continent from the desolate shores of the 
 Arctic ocean on the north to the silent wastes of the Antarctic on the south ? 
 
APPENDIX A. 
 
 Champlain's explanation of two maps of New France in his " Voyages " (1613) at p. 413 of the 
 
 edition edited by the Abbe Laverdiere. 
 
 " I have thought proper to say a few words, also, touching the two maps, so as to make them 
 understood ; for though one is the counterpart of the other so far as ports, bays, capes, headlands and 
 rivers running inland are concerned, they differ as to the situations. The small one is in its true 
 meridian, according to the method demonstrated by Sieur de Castelfranc in his book on the ' Me"co- 
 me'trifi of the Magnetic Needle,' wherein I have remarked several declinations which have been most 
 useful to me, as will be seen by the said map, with all the altitudes, latitudes and longitudes, from the 
 forty-first to the fifty-first degree of latitude towards the north pole, which are the limits of Canada 
 as far as the Grand bay, in which the Basques and Spaniards generally carry on their whale fishery. 
 I have also noticed at certain places in the great river St. Lawrence, at the forty-fifth degree of latitude, 
 as much as twenty-one degrees of variation of the magnetic needle, which is the greatest that I have 
 seen. The small map may well be used in navigating, provided one knows how to set the needle 
 to the compass card. For example, to use it, it is necessary, for greater facility, to take a com- 
 pass card whereon the thirty-two points are equally marked, and fix the point of the magnetic 
 needle at 12, 15 or 16 degrees from the fleur-de-lis on the northwest side, which is nearly a point and 
 
 Part of Cham plain's small map in its true meridian. 
 
 a half; that is, one point from the northwest towards the north, or a little more than a point from 
 the fleur-de-lis of the card, and place the card in the compass on arriving at the Grand bank where 
 the fishery is carried on. By this means one can find with certainty all the altitudes of the capes, 
 ports and rivers. I know that a great many will not use the small map, and will rather resort to the 
 large map, more especially as it is based on the compass of France, where the magnetic needle points 
 northeast, because they are so well accustomed to that method that it is difficult to induce them to 
 do otherwise. On this account I have prepared the large map in that way, for the benefit of the 
 majority of pilots and navigators to New France, fearing that if I had not done so I would have been 
 charged with a fault they could not account for, because the small charts or maps of the new lands 
 mostly disagree as to the situations and altitudes of the coasts, and if there are a few who possess 
 some small maps which are pretty correct, they consider them so valuable that they do not make 
 them publicly known so as to put them to good use Map making is done in such a way that north- 
 northeast is taken as the meridian line, and west-northwest as west. It is contrary to the true 
 meridian of this place to call north-northeast the north ; because instead of the needle being taken to 
 
94 
 
 SAMUEL EDWAKD DAWSON ON THE 
 
 point to the northwest, it is taken as pointing to northeast, as if it were in France. The error has 
 therefore continued and will continue, for they cling to thoir old customs, though it leads to grave 
 errors. A compass set north and south is also in use, 73 in which the point of the magnetic needle is 
 fixed right under the fleur-de-lis. A good many prepare their small maps according to this compass, 
 which seems to me to be the best, and to approach nearer to the true meridian of Now Prance than 
 the compasses of Eastern France set to northeast. Thus it happened that the early navigators who 
 sailed to parts of Now France in the west, thought they would not be more astray in goiug thither 
 than when going to the Azores, or other places near France, where the variation is almost insensible 
 in navigation, and where the pilots have no other compasses than those of France set to north-oast, 
 and representing the true meridian there. And .so, when sailing continually towards the wost and 
 wishing to keep on a certain latitude, they would shape their course straight towards the west by 
 their compass, thinking they were sailing on the parallel they wished to go upon. 8 * But continuing 
 on in a straight line, and not in a circle, like all parallel lines oti the globe, after a long distance 
 when in sight of land, they sometimes found themselves throe, four or five degrees more southerly 
 than necessary, and thus they were deceived in their latitude and reckoning. It is very true, how- 
 ever, that with fine weather and the sun shining, the} 7 would correct their latitude, but it was not 
 without wondering why the course was wrong, which was, because instead of sailing in a circular, 
 line according to the parallel, they ran in a straight line, and, thus, as the meridian changed the 
 points of the compass changed, and consequently the course. It is then most necessary to know the 
 meridian and the variation of the magnetic noodle, and it is of service for all pilots sailing round the 
 world, and specially at the north and south, whore tho greatest variations of the magnetic needle 
 occur, and also where the circles of longitude are smaller, since their error would then be greater 
 
 Part of Champlain's large map (1612) drawn to the compass of Eastern France. 
 
 if they did not know the variation of the magnetic needle. The error then having thus originated, 
 and sailors being unwilling, or not knowing how, to correct it, it has remained as it is to this day, so 
 that it is difficult to alter this system of navigating in these parts of New France. This is why I 
 have prepared this large map, both on account of its being more full than the small one, and because 
 it will be more satisfactory to sailors, who will be able to sail by it in the same manner as by their 
 small charts. They must forgive me if I have not made the maps better or more in detail, as the 
 lifetime of a man would hardly suffice to learn anything so thoroughly but in time he will find some- 
 thing omitted. Observant persons of an inquiring mind will see during their travels things that are 
 not set down on this map, and they can insert them, so that in the course of time doubts will be 
 cleared up about such matters. I think that I have done my duty as far as I could, for I have for- 
 gotten nothing that I have seen worthy to be put on my said map, and I have given clear information 
 
VOYAGES OF' THE CABOTS IN 1497 AND 1498. 95 
 
 to the public concerning things which had never before been described or discovered so exactly, for 
 although in years past some one may have written about them, it was trifling in comparison with what 
 we have discovered in the last ten years." 7< 
 
 CHAMPLAIN'S NOTES ON THIS MAP. 
 
 " I have made this map for the convenience of the majority of those who sail on these coasts, for 
 many use compasses sot for the hemisphere of Asia, 03' which they navigate. If I had made this map 
 like the small one, most sailors would have been unable to use it, through being unacquainted with 
 the variations of the needle." 
 
 "Note that on this map north-northeast stands for north, and west-northwest for west; this will 
 help you to get the elevations of the degrees of latitude as if it were the tivue east and west and north 
 and south ; inasmuch as the said map is made on the compass of Franco set to northeast." 
 
 APPENDIX B. 
 
 VARIATION OF THE COMPASS. 
 
 The fact of the variation of the compass having once been observed it occurred to Columbus to 
 use it as a means of determining longitudes at sea. In those days dead reckoning was the only 
 method known and, while the latitudes of old maps are fairly correct, the longitudes are far, often 
 absurdly far, astray. The log line was not used until after Magellan's voyage in A.D. 1521, and the 
 speed of sailing was estimated by the eye with the aid of a half-hour sand-glass. In his second 
 voyage, Columbus attempted to put to practical use his observations upon the variation of the needle, 
 and Sebastian Cabot was all his lifetime haunted by a similar idea. He is erroneously supposed by 
 many to have first observed the variation and ho seems to have claimed it (see p. 64). Livio Sanuto 
 (Geogralia Distinta, Venice, 1588) states that he was informed by Sebastian Cabot that the point 
 of no variation was 110 miles to the westward of the meridian of Flores. The latitude is not recorded 
 but it was probably 46 north. Cabot told the Venetian ambassador to Spain (Contarini) that he 
 alone knew of a way to determine longitude by variation. The same idea is met in Champlain's 
 voyages, and, in the " Arcano del Mare," a method is proposed for the purpose. The line of demarcation 
 drawn by the bull of Alexander VI. was a meridian 100 leagues west of the Azores, and the idea that 
 the needle changed to the west at that point had an influence in fixing the lino, but not long after, by 
 the treaty of Tordesillas, the line was, for other reasons, moved to a meridian 370 leagues west of the 
 Cape de Verde islands. Longitude was for a long time calculated from Pico, an island in the Azores 
 28 28' west from Greenwich. Captain John Davis (in his "Seamen's Secrets," London, 1607,) says 
 that longitude was calculated from St. Michael's, one of the Azores as the meridian of no variation, 
 and English sailors continued to reckon from that point until the establishment of Greenwich obser- 
 vatory. On the latest charts the point of no variation is at 24 west. 
 
 Euysch, who made the map in the Ptolemy of 1508, (see p. 75) the first engraved map showing 
 America, sailed on one of the earliest voyages to the northeast coast of the new world. He was pro- 
 bably on the second Cabot voyage, and a note upon his map indicates some extraordinary experience 
 on the north of Labrador. " Here a raging sea begins; 'here the compasses of the ships do not retain 
 " their properties and ships having iron are not able to return." He must have been near the 
 magnetic pole of that era. 71 The great problem among sailors and maritime nations then and for 
 two hundred years later was to find a method of determining longitude. Large standing rewards 
 wore instituted by Philip II. and by the state of Holland for the discovery of that secret. 
 
96 SAMUEL EDWARD DAWSON ON THE 
 
 APPENDIX C. 
 FABYAN'S CHRONICLE. 
 
 In the Chronicles of England, by John Stow, published in 1580, the following passage occurs at 
 p. 862, as extracted from the Chronicle of Robert Fabyan : 
 
 "In Anno 14, Henr. VII." (Aug. 22, 1498, to Aug. 21, 1499.) 
 
 " This yeare, one Sebastian Gabato, a genoa's some borne in Bristow professing himself to be 
 " experte in knowledge of the circute of the worlde and Ilandes of the same, as by his Chartes and 
 " other reasonable demonstrations he shewed, caused the King to man and victual a shippo at Bristow 
 " to search for an llande which he knewe to be replenished with rich commodities ; in the ship 
 " diverse merchauntes of London adventured smal stockes, and in the company of this shippe, saylcd 
 " also out of Bristow three or foure smal shippes fraught with slight and grosse wares as course cloth 
 " caps, laces, points and such other " * * * * 
 
 Harrisse conjectures with the greatest probability that Stow meant the current year 1498 and not 
 strictly the regnal year. The voyage then falls in with the letters patent of 14D8 and the date agrees 
 with the following citation which purports to be also extracted from the same work. 
 
 FROM HAKLUYT'S " DIVERS VOYAGES," PUBLISHED 1582. 
 
 " A note of Sebastian Gabote's Voyage of Discoverie, taken out of an Old Chronicle, written by 
 " Robert Fabian, sometime Alderman of London, which is in the custodie of John Stow, Citizen, a 
 " diligent searcher and preserver of Antiquities. 
 
 " In the 13 yere of King Henrie the VII., 1498." (Aug. 22, 1497, to Aug. "21, 1498.) 
 " This yere the King (by means of a Venetian, whicho made himself very experte and cunning in 
 " knowledge of the circuit of the worldo, and Ilandes of the same as by a Garde, and other demonstra- 
 " tions reasonable hee shewed), caused to man and victual! a shippe at Bristowe to search for an 
 " llande, whiche hee saido hee knewo well was riche, and replenished with riche commodities. 
 " Which ship, thus manned and victualed at the Kingc's cost divers merchants of London ventured 
 " in her small stockes, being in her, as chief Patrone, the saide Venetian. And in the companie of the 
 " saido shippe saylcd also out of Bristowe, three or foure small ships, fraught with sleight and grosso 
 " merchandize*, as course cloth, Caps, Laces, points and other trifles, and so departed from Bristowe in 
 " the beginning of May ; of whom in this Maior's time returned no tidings." 
 
 The mayor of London was William Purchas and his time expired on October U8th, 1498. At 
 that date then the expedition had not returned. The words in the extracts printed in italics 
 differ in the two versions. Hakluyt and Stow were quoting from what would appear to be a MS. 
 chronicle in the possession of the latter. Hakluyt's extract says the padrone or commander was a 
 Venetian. In his prefatory note he calls him Sebastian Cabot. Stow says in his extract that he was 
 Sebastian Cabot the son of a Genoese and born in Bristol. John Cabot was in fact born in Genoa but 
 a subject of Venice. Each writer seoms to have taken from the MS. what struck his attention. 
 
 Hakluyt in his Principal Navigations published in 1600, (vol. 12, p. 31, Goldsmith's cd.) repeats 
 the quotati m from Fabyan but, in the intervening eighteen years, ho would seem to have made further 
 researches while preparing his great work. He now inserts the name in the extract " One John 
 Cabot, a Venetian, who made, etc.," but, as if to perplex future historians, he changes the prefatory 
 note only very slightly to " a note of Sebastian Cabot's first discovery taken out of the latter part of 
 Fabian's Chronicle." 
 
VOYAGES OF THE CABOTS IN 1497 AND 1498. 97 
 
 The perplexing part of this question is that Fabyan's Chronicle was printed and published in 
 1516, in 1533, in 1542, and in 1559, (see Lowndes) before Hakluyt and Stow wrote, and in none of 
 these editions is there the slightest notice of the Cabots or their voyages. Harrisse has found in the 
 British Museum a MS. chronicle from which he quotes in his "Jean et Sdbastien Cabot." He thinks 
 it is a copy of Fabyan, but Winsor (Narr. & Grit. Hist.) denies- that it is a Fabyan and says that there 
 is in the museum a genitine MS. Fabyan but it also says not one word of Cabot. 
 
 Harrisse's MS. is as follows : 
 
 " In Anno 13, Henry VII," (Aug. 22, 1497, to Aug. 21, 1498.) 
 
 " This yere the king at the besy request and supplicacion of a Straunger venisian, which by a 
 " Coeart made hym self expert in knowj ng of the world caused the Kyng to manne a ship w' vytaill 
 " and other necessairies for to seche an Ilande wheryn the said Straunger surmysed to be grete com- 
 " modities: w l which ship by the Kynge's grace so Rygged went 3 or 4 moo owte'of Bristowe, the 
 " said Straunger keying Conditor of the saide Flete, whereyn dyuers Merchaunts as well of London as 
 " Bristow adventured goodes and sleight Merchandises, which departed from the West Cuntrey in the 
 " begynning of Somer but to this present moneth came never Knowlege of their exployts." 
 
 The substance of all these extracts is the name, and they in no way affect the conclusions of this 
 paper. The"Patrone," the "Conditor" of the fleet is the "Venetian," the "Stranger Venetian," 
 which indicates that John Cabot sailed in command on the voyage of 1498. Sebastian's name is put 
 forward by Hakluyt in 1582, but withdrawn in 1600. InStow's version in 1580 there is no indication 
 of any other. This would show that ho sailed on the voyage and that in 1580, twenty-three years 
 after his death, the memory of the elder Cabot, who died in 1498, eighty-two years before, had well 
 nigh faded out, and that it is only when Hakluyt made his researches for his great work that he 
 came upon documents perhaps the letters patent which revealed the name of the chief discoverer. 
 All the extracts will be seen to refer to the same, viz., to the second voyage. 
 
 APPENDIX D. 
 
 ESTEVAN GOMEZ. 
 
 The voyage of Gomez was made in 1525 in one small vessel and occupied ten months. He 
 appears to have been in search of an opening into the great southern ocean. When Alonzode Chaves 
 revised the official chart of Spain in 1536 he availed himself of the information brought back by 
 Gomez, and no doubt Gomez himself made a chart and wrote an account of his voyage, but all these 
 documents have been lost. Oviedo gave in 1537 a description of the coast, based upon Do Chaves' re- 
 vised chart which he had before him. A further summary was made by Alonzo de Santa Cruz s "' in his 
 I&lario of 1560, and Harrisse quotes largely from a manuscript Islario by Cespedes compiled in 1598. 
 A very interesting discussion has been carried on for many years over these writings, into which it 
 would be irrelevant to the present purpose to enter. Many of the localities are in dispute and 
 Oviedo's description is far from being easy to follow ; but some points are clear, and among them it 
 should be noticed that Gomez most certainly sailed along the coast of Cape Breton. The island is 
 mentioned by the name of the island of St. John and the strait of Canso, separating it from the main- 
 hind, under the name of the canal of St. Julian/' Passing along the coast Gomez saw columns of 
 smoke and concluded that the country was inhabited. He reported it as well wooded with large 
 rivers opening into the sea. The smoky cliffs of Cap Enfume', and the openings of the Bras d'Or 
 with the pleasant forest land around them plainly mark the locality. There are no indications, either 
 in books or maps, that Gomez sailed into the gulf of St. Lawrence. The description extant follows 
 along the south coast of Newfoundland to Cape Eace. 
 
 Mr. Harrisse (Discovery of America, p. 237) is much exercised about this voyage, but his per- 
 plexity arises from his fixed idea that the island of St. John was a delusion of the Portuguese pilots. 
 
 Sec. II., 1894. 13. 
 
98 SAMUEL EDWARD DAWSON ON THE 
 
 Beinel's or Champlain's map or any other of the older maps drawn to a magnetic meridian will show 
 " the bay of the Bretons " mentioned by Santa Cruz, for it is the sheet of water bounded between Cape 
 Eace and Cape Canso. 
 
 The especial facts bearing on the present inquiry are, that the island of St. John of Gomez, De 
 Chaves, Santa Cruz, and Cespedes, is Cape Breton and not Prince Edward island, and that there are 
 a sufficient number of islands in this " bay of the Bretons " including the 11 ,000 Virgins to fill the require- 
 ments of Fagundes' grant without going up to Anticosti or Crane island in the river St. Lawrence. 
 
 APPENDIX E. 
 JOAM ALVAREZ FAGUNDES. 
 
 The Eev. Dr. Patterson, in the ' Trans. E. Soc. Can.' for 1890, published an exhaustive paper on 
 the movements of the Portuguese on the northeast coast of America in the early part of the sixteenth 
 century. His account of Fagundes and of the grant made to him is as full as the records permit; 
 for, in truth, the details are exceedingly scanty. The maps show that as early as 1505 the openings 
 in the coast at Belle-Isle and at St. Paul's were known, and the same maps also prove that the gulf and 
 its contents were not known until Cartier opened them up to the world. It was not by Canso or St. 
 Paul's but by following the whales down the Labrador coast and into the Grand bay that the French 
 and Basques entered the gulf; and Cartier pushed their enterprises to the limit of navigation at 
 Montreal. It has been shown that Brest (on Old Fort bay) was a rendezvous and a fishing station 
 for the French before 1531 ; in like manner, beyond doubt, on the Atlantic coasts of Acadia the Por" 
 tuguese had similar fishing stations at the favourite resorts of their sailors. No traces remain of 
 what Fagundcs actually accomplished ; the grant made to him in 1521 shows that ho claimed to have 
 discovered the land from the limits of the Spanish discoveries on the south to those of tho Cortereals 
 on the north, and, on the strength of that claim, the crown of Portugal granted him the lordship over 
 that extent of coast. Besides this coast line, certain islands were granted, three of which were said 
 to be in the "Bay of Auguada which is on the northeastern and southwestern coast; " evidently on a 
 sea-coast trending in the general direction of the Atlantic coast. These islands are furthermore 
 specified by name, viz., St. John, St. Peter, St. Ann, St. Anthony, St. Pantaleone, and the archipelago 
 of the 11,000 Virgins. To locate one locates them all. Besides these, the grant mentions the island 
 of the Holy Cross and another island also, called St. Ann, 72 which had been seen but not landed 
 upon. 
 
 Of these islands, St. John is well known and also the archipelago of the 11,000 Virgins. These 
 last are always put down on the early maps on the south coast of Newfoundland. St. Peter is the pre- 
 sent St. Pierre known by that name to Jacques Cartier. The island of Santa Cruz was an imaginary 
 island which haunted tho Atlantic charts far out to sea for nearly one hundred years. The 
 archipelago of the 11,000 Virgins still clings to our charts, in name, as the Virgin rocks ; their place 
 has moved farther out upon the banks although the rocks themselves are said never to be seen but in bad 
 weather when the breaking of the waves reveals them. St. Ann's is shown on the Harleyan map and 
 also by Ortelius on the south coast of Newfoundland. All these islands can thus be located, and it is un- 
 necessary to search for islands for Fagundes away up in the gulf and river St. Lawrence, as if there 
 were no islands ou the coast to which the names belong. There remain many other islands on 
 Fagundes' coast line. There are Miquelon and Langley and Sablo islands and St. Paul's and the 
 present Eamea and numerous others on tho coast. In "Whytfleet's map the " Ylas Fagundez " are laid 
 down south of Newfoundland. The testimony of the maps is unanimous that the gulf was unknown 
 up to 1534, when Viegas gave an embryonic outline of its shape. The map of Lazaro Luis proves 
 nothing; for it was made in 15C3 ; or rather, it proves that Prince Edward island was not the island 
 of St. John nor one of the islands granted to Fagundes, for its northern coastline is still seen as part of 
 the Nova Scotia shore. As for Auguada bay Lescarbot writes that he put into the bay of Canso for 
 
VOYAGES OF THE CABOTS IN 1497 AND 1498. 99 
 
 water on his return home. That may, as well as any other, have been " Watering bay." It was con- 
 venient before starting on the home voyage, but water can be got anywhere where there is a harbour 
 along the coast. The map of Lazaro Luis has an inscription along the coast of Nova Scotia to the 
 effect that it was discovered by Gomez, "Costa que descobrio Estevan Gomez," and yet in the interior 
 of the country is inscribed " Lavrador q descobrio Joam Alvarez, " so that Fagundes would seem, if 
 the words are taken seriously, to have discovered the interior of a continental land in 1521 of which 
 the sea coast was not discovered until 1525, or four years later, by Stephen Gomez. The grant was of 
 a line of coast and of islands all in the Atlantic, and Dr. Patterson's suggestion that Auguada bay was 
 Fortune bay is most probably correct. It is impossible for any one familiar with the gulf to enter- 
 tain Mr. Harrisse's opinion that Anticosti or the Magdalen or Prince Edward islands were known to 
 Fagundes from being seen by him when sailing through the gulf to get fresh water in the St. Law- 
 rence, nor does it seem reasonable to invoke the aid of a map dated 1563 to prove a discovery affirmed 
 to have been made in 1521. 
 
 APPENDIX F. 
 
 THE MAGDALEN ISLANDS. 
 
 As pointed out in the main body of this paper this group of islands, as it is generally considered, 
 ought rather to be treated as one large island after the manner of the early maps. In fact the Henry 
 II. map of 1546 gives a fairly correct idea of the outline of the island. The description given in " The 
 Cruise of the Alice May," p. 51, will make this clear. 76 
 
 " The main group is practically one island ; that is it consists of several islands composed of real 
 " soil or rocks, more or less covered with trees, connected by long stretches of sand which are broken 
 " at intervals by inlets. Between are shallow lagoons, generally not deep enough for a boat. Thus 
 " Amherst is connected with Grindstone island, and Grindstone and Alright are connected with Coffin 
 " island. Were it not for the inlets, one might go continuously dry-shod from Amherst to Coffin 
 " island. But the water in the inlets is so shoal that in places they can be forded not, however, 
 " without some danger, as quicksands abound. Several detached islands lie outside of the main group. 
 " These are Deadman island, the Bird rocks and Bryon island." 
 
 Magdalen island then, is one large island, and a neglect of that fact has led Kohl, Da Costa, and 
 many others to suppose that the large island in the gulf laid down on early maps is of necessity 
 Prince Edward island, and that it is drawn out of its place. Markham in his introduction to the 
 Hakluyt Society volume for 1893 has interpreted the maps correctly, and Ganong in 1889, ' Trans. 
 Eoy. Soc. Can.', resisted the misconception growing out of the map of 1544. These errors have 
 obtained such currency that it is important to check them before the geographical history of the gulf 
 is hopelessly confounded, and with this view it must be borne in mind that only one island is known 
 in all the maps before Champlain's in 1632, and it is placed in the track of vessels sailing to the St. 
 Lawrence river. That island is taken for Prince Edward, and the Magdalen is supposed to be omitted, 
 while in reality it is the Magdalen which is shown and Prince Edward omitted, because this latter 
 island is, in all the maps prior to that date, still adherent to the mainland. The sketch on the 
 following page will make it clear that the Magdalen is the island portrayed. 
 
 Those who have sailed much in the gulf know, what the charts bear witness to, that it is impos- 
 sible to pass in or out of it by St. Paul's without seeing the great Magdalen or one of its attendant 
 islands, usually the Groat Bird. Prince Edward island is never seen, not only because its shores are 
 low and the whole island is very flat, but because it is very much out of the way of vessels (see p. 78) 
 and, unless they steer directly for it, ships might sail in and out of the river St. Lawrence for a hun- 
 dred years (as in fact they did) without suspecting its existence. Even when entering the gulf from 
 the strait of Canso the island, if seen, would appear to be part of the mainland just as it is laid down 
 on the maps of Rotz, Vallard, Henry II., Freire, Jomard, Homem and Lazaro Luis. The last men- 
 tioned map very clearly shows the coast line of the north shore of Prince Edward island considered 
 as part of the mainland ; and that fact alone disposes of the supposition that Fagundes saw it or that 
 
100 
 
 SAMUEL EDWARD DAWSON ON THE 
 
 the Portuguese ever named it." [In passing out from the strait of Canso the very bold promontory of 
 Cape St. George for a long time closes out the open water in rear and when that is passed the more 
 distant high lands of the Nova Scotia coast are opened up until Prince Edward island is seen ; so that 
 unless a vessel were to change its course to the southwest the existence of Northumberland strait 
 would not be suspected, and moreover if the strait were well entered and even half sailed through Cape 
 Tormentine and Cape Egmont overlap so as to give the appearance of a land-locked bay, and the dis. 
 tance between the opposite shores is at one point so small that surveys have been made for a projected 
 tunnel to connect them. In confirmation of the late discovery of this strait the maps of 
 Champlain may be cited. That of the voyage of 1611 lays down the Magdalens under the 
 singular name of Isles aux gros yenx an error of the engraver for Isles aux margaux but no hint 
 is given of Prince Edward island. On the larger map of 1613 appears (see p. 94") a small island with 
 an illegible name, evidently the western section of it nearest the New Brunswick coast, in its proper 
 place as seen from the mainland. A note on this map explains that Champlain had not himself been 
 upon that coast and yet he and his associates had been sailing in and out of the gulf for some years. 
 
 CONTOUR OP THE MAGDALEN ON EARLY MAPS. 
 
 1 
 
 01 
 
 X 
 
 o 
 
 3 
 
 .? 
 
 
 
 i o 
 
 1. Magdalen island correctly drawn. 
 
 2. From the Henry II., or Dauphin, map of 1546. Alezay is Deadman's island, les lies aux Margaux are the 
 two Birds, and Bryon island lias retained its name until now. Entry island is shown. All are iu their relative 
 places and the concave shape of Magdalen island is clearly shown. 
 
 3. From Homem's map (Portuguese) 1558. The'island is identified by its name. Ille de Sabloen isle of sands, 
 and by Bryon island clos^ to it. The concavity is turned the wrong way as in all the Portuguese maps. 
 
 4. From Mercator's map, 1569. Here it is identified by the three small islands on the north. 
 
 5. From the map of 1544. The three small islands on the north and Alezay (Deadman's island) on the west 
 identify the Magdalen. 
 
 6. From the Vallard map of 1543. This map is'.Portuguese. The Magdalen is shown by Alezay on the west 
 and Bryon on the north. The concavity is reversed as in No. 3. 
 
 7. From Rotz' globe, 1543. The author was French and embodied Cartier's discoveries on his maps. The 
 Magdalen is indicated by its shape, concave in the right direction as in the other French map No. 2. 
 
 8. From Hakluyt's map ; the scarce map of 1600. Here the shape marks out the Magdalen and Deadman's I. 
 (Alezay) and Bryon island further' identify it. 
 
 The map of 1632 has Prince Edward island laid down correctly and named Isle St. Jean. In the time 
 of Champlain the islands were known as les isles Eamees or les isles Ramees-brion. To the English 
 the Magdalen was known under the name of the island of Ramea and under that name it is mentioned 
 often in Hakluyt. The name Ramea has in later years been transferred to an island on the south 
 coast of Newfoundland. We find in Hakluyt a " relation of the first voyage and discovery of the Isle 
 Ramea in the Bonaventure 1591," and a " Voyage of the Marigold by Fisher in 1595 to the Isle 
 
VOYAGES OF THE CABOTS IN 1497 AND 1498. 1O1 
 
 Eamea," and again, " A Voyage of Charles Leigh to the Isle of Ramea." From these narratives it 
 appears that the Magdalen was a place of jjreat resort in those days by fishing craft of all the mari- 
 time nations of Europe. Some of the names in the first relation are interesting. The " Isle Duoron " 
 shows that a Portuguese map was referred to. On Vaz Dourado's map (circa 1580) it is " Isle 
 Dorean ; " both are corruptions of the French " Isle d'Arenes " ; then Isle Brion is changed to " Isle 
 Biton " and the " Isles of Aponas " recall Jacques Cartier's first voyage, when ho found a large number 
 of birds he calls apponats on the shores of one of them. The Bird rocks were those he called 
 Isles Margaux, and on the mainland he found an immense number of birds he called godets and grands 
 apponats of which his sailors killed more than a thousand. To this day Alright island is by the inhabi- 
 tants sometimes called isle aux Cormorants. While these islands were thus frequented, the island of 
 Prince Edward was not known excepting as forming part of the coast line of the present Nova Scotia. 
 How the name " Magdalen " was first given does not anywhere appear. The supposition that Cartier 
 gave the name is incorrect, for it is first found in Champlain's large map of 1632, and Lescarbot calls 
 them Isle Colombaires on Ramees. In 1663 the Company of New France, in conjunction with the Miscou 
 Company, conceded these islands to Franois Doublet, and when he sailed to take possession his son 
 Jean Doublet (celebrated afterwards as a corsair and as u naval officer under Louis XIV.) then not 
 eight years old hid himself on board his father's vessel to make the voyage. Jean Doublet states in 
 his " Journal" that his father changed the name of the largest island from Isle Brion to Isle de la 
 Madelaine in honour of his mother. That, however, cannot be true, for the name occurs in the very 
 concession itself, besides being found in Champlain's map. Denys also (in whose jurisdiction all these 
 islands were) gives the name Madelaine to the large island (see map i a Bourinot's Cape Breton.) 
 Doublet's enterprise was unsuccessful and the islands were re-granted to M. de St. Pierre in 1719. Even 
 then the names were not settled for in the grant they are styled the " Magdalen Islands, Brion or 
 Rame'es." 
 
 APPENDIX G. 
 
 Two MEMOIRS OF SEBASTIAN CABOT. 
 
 There are several points in the discussion of this question which could not be considered in the 
 main portion of the present paper without overloading it with detail, and among them is the singular 
 warmth which some writers have imported into it. Chief among the books of authority is the 
 "Memoirs of Sebastian Cabot," by Richard Biddle, 1831. This is a work of very great research and 
 indispensable to all students ; but it is marred by its manner which is that of a lawyer's brief for 
 Sebastian Cabot against all persons whomsoever. It is impossible to say anything against John Cabot 
 because so few notices of him survive, but he describes him out of his own head as an old merchant 
 who did not go to sea 75 , and then ignores him. That is not surprising for the documents upon which 
 the elder Cabot's reputation is based were found in the Spanish and Italian archives long after Mr. 
 Biddle's death, but all the authors from whom he differs he has treated as if they were hostile wit- 
 nesses in a criminal trial. Thus of " Barrow's Chronological History of Voyages " he writes 
 sarcastically, as being "invaluable, as it not only embodies in a cheap and convenient form all the 
 " mistakes of its predecessors but generally supplies a good deal of curious original error." If the old 
 writers even do not record suitable facts, Mr. Biddle is equally severe; thus, Gomara, in his "General 
 History, 1552," says of the east coast of America " Gomez visited a region which had never before him 
 " been visited by any one though they say that it was first discovered by Sebastian Cabot." Gomara 
 was merely repeating what was said in Spain and what the Spanish maps, authorized by Cabot as 
 Grand Pilot bear witness of to this day, and yet Mr. Biddle adds '' churlish expressions," " despicable 
 temper." If any one was responsible for Gomara's statement it was Mr. Biddlo's own hero who from 
 1512 to 1547 was the chief official in Spain to guarantee the correctness of the very maps which denied 
 his discovery. The Rolls Office in London is censured for " unpardonable carelessness in letting a map 
 become illegible," while in fact the wonder is that so many documents, even trivial entries in the records 
 
1O2 SAMUEL EDWARD DAWSONJOX THE 
 
 of King Henry VII., have been preserved at all, and the public records of England bear favourable com- 
 parison with those of any other nation. His book is full of sneers, and insinuations, and charges of per- 
 versions of plain meaning against every writer whose views do not harmonize with his own. Hakluyt 
 often does not quote exactly the words of the writer he cites, and sometimes supplements the sense by 
 information from other sources. Such was the method in an uncritical age. His work was a collec- 
 tion, not for critical study, but for practical information, and he recorded all he could learn. It was 
 the first attempt to narrate the exploits of English seamen and he spared neither pains or money to 
 do it. Mr. Biddle out of his own fancy describes him as a " sleek well-fed prebendary who would not 
 " likely condescend to speak to a poor antiquary like Stow." Then, he himself, so severe upon others, 
 is incessantly building facts upon hypotheses. He " supposes," continually and repeats " it is impos- 
 sible " and " it is not improbable" and "it is incredible," and when enough of such material is spread 
 he propounds a conclusion which he seems to think proved. So out of "if and "probably" and 
 " doubtless " he weaves a statement that Verrazano was with Rut on his voyage of 1527 and was killed 
 by the Indians on the coast of America. Of this Buckingham Smith, with some of Biddlo's causticity, 
 says, " They who find instruction in speculative history may be gratified with a fine example by turn- 
 " ing to the chapter in the Memoir of Cabot in which he (Verrazano) is supposed to have lost his life 
 " in the service of England." 
 
 But one of the grossest instances of a grave charge made upon a mere hypothesis is his treatment 
 of William Worthington. It will be remembered that Cabot had loft Spain while he was a high 
 official of the emperor Charles. He was in receipt of a salary from the English crown and was at 
 least 83 years of age when, on the 27th May, 1557, he resigned and was reappointed conjointly with 
 one William Worthington. At that date Philip II. was in England and Mr. Biddle, out of his own 
 fancy, calls Worthington " that Worthington probably, a favourite of that dark hour." And then he 
 goes on without the least basis to formulate the charge that Worthington, while an English official, 
 sold to Philip all of Cabot's papers and maps to be taken to Spain. This is very effectively disproved 
 by Hakluyt in his " Divers Voyages," who says that then (in 1582) they were in the possession of the 
 Worshipful Master William Worthington, one of Her Majesty's (Queen Elizabeth's) pensioners, who 
 was willing to have them published. Harrisse's theory is probably correct that Cabot was too old to 
 perform his functions and Worthington was appointed to do the work and divide the salary. 
 D'Avezac, a very high authority on the subject, suggests that Worthington was related to Cabot 
 through his wife and the change was made in Cabot's interest by his friends. One theory is as good 
 as another, but Philip was not so popular in England that a native born officer of the English crown 
 would bo likely to betray his country's interest for a Spaniard, and, if he did, it was not likely that 
 Elizabeth's ministers would have continued him in his office and emoluments. It appears that Worthing- 
 ton had held some office under Edward VI. and that there had been a defalcation in his department. 
 The official discharge shows that " in consideration of his services both in France and Scotland * * * 
 "and for that the debt grew by unfaithfulness of his servant who ran away with the same," he was 
 exonerated. This Mr. Biddle converts, out of his own imagination, into " the king with easy liberality 
 11 forgiving him a large debt on his allegation that a servant had run away with the money." 
 
 Whatever cause of complaint Mr. Biddle may give on account of unjust handling of his materials 
 ho did, in fact, contribute a great deal of valuable original matter to the subject. This, however, can- 
 not be said of Mr. J. F. Nicholls, librarian of the city of Bristol, who, in 1869, published an 
 apotheosis of Cabot under the following title : " The remarkable life, adventures and discoveries of 
 " Sebastian Cabot, of Bristol, the founder of Great Britain's maritime power, discoverer of America, 
 " and its first colonizer." Excepting in its outward appearance this book seoms to be a model of 
 everything a book ought not to be. Here is the author's idea of what the " Matthew " did in the time 
 between June 24 and towards the end of July, in 34 days at most. " The first land made was the Cape 
 " North, the northern extremity of Cape Breton, and the island opposite the same (not lying in front 
 " of the land but further on) was Prince Edward island which was then named by them and long 
 " afterward known as the isle of St. John. They skirted this island and sailed along the southern 
 
VOYAGES OF THE CABOTS IN 1497 AND 1498. . 1O3 
 
 " coast on the gulf of St. Lawrence, beyond the site on which Quebec at present stands, then returning 
 " by the northern shore of the 'gulf still trending eastward they coasted to the latitude of 53 and 
 " then sailing by Newfoundland island, which they took to be and depict as an archipelago, they 
 ' continued their course southward to the Chesapeake and so home. The prima vista then was the 
 " most northerly point of Cape Breton, and the point struck gave them a view at once of Nova Scotia 
 " and Prince Edward island." 
 
 The translation of ex adverse is remarkable, " not lying in front of the land bat further on." The 
 Pisgah-like view of Prince Edward island and of Nova Scotia from Cape North is peculiar to this 
 writer as is likewise Cabot's sailing beyond Quebec. The map called Cabot's of 1544 shows Cartier's 
 discoveries on the St. Lawrence as far as Lake St. Peter. One can hardly believe such to be the case, but 
 Mr. Nicholls writes as if he supposed that map was a map of the voyage of 149Y, and represented the 
 discoveries of that year. 
 
 This book, in the words of D'Avezac, is an excellent example of parish patriotism, and 
 necessarily therefore Sebastian Cabot was born in Bristol, and John Cabot, who had not that privilege, 
 is, as D'Avezac says, "robbed of his glory to aggrandize that of his sin." The disappearance of 
 Cabot's maps is more rhetorically stated than by Mr. Biddle and with more imagination of detail. 
 " This man had the custody of Cabot's maps by virtue of his office. Such documents would bo 
 " secured by Philip at any price. He had put Worthington into the office " * * * " Well, the reader 
 " may draw his own conclusion. We accuse no one; but we have a deep suspicion that they may 
 " yet be found among her (Spain's) archives." Maps of Cabot's might be found there and still Wor- 
 hington be guiltless; for Cabot left Spain so privately that he is much more likely to have left all his 
 maps behind him; but, in fact Philip could not want maps from him, for from the nature of his office 
 in Spain all the Spanish maps were made under his sanction. Worthington could not have stolon the 
 map in the Queen's gallery. Gilbert speaks in the plural and calls them " maps " and many other maps 
 ascribed to him are spoken of (at the Earl of Bedford's and in merchants' houses) as existing in the 
 timeof Queen Elizabeth. All these have also disappeared and yet wore not sold to Philip. Having the 
 Spanish maps, made and issued under the authority of Cabot, as head of the department of cartography 
 for thirty years, Spain needed no more, so far as Cabot was concerned, to invalidate the claims of 
 England in America. 
 
 It has been shown, mainly from the secret archives of Spain and Italy, that John Cabot was the 
 real discoverer, yet Mr. Nicholls says, " Certainly Sebastian gives us no hint of his father's presence 
 " in either voyage; but modest, gentle and unassuming as all his life proves him to have been, speaks 
 " of the discovery ever in the first person and in the singular number." As a good Bristolian Mr. 
 Nicholls will have it Cabot was born is Bristol. Cabot no doubt said so at times in England ; and 
 others beside Mr. Nicholls think so ; but the researches in the secret archives at Venice prove that in 
 his intrigues with the Council of Ten he stated that he was born in Venice. So he told Contarini and 
 so he wrote by his emissary, the Eagusan friar. The Council of Ten were in a position to know, for 
 in Eoman Catholic countries registers of baptism are, and were, carefully kept, and he would not have 
 tried to deceive in a matter so easily disproved. Mr. Nicholls laments this one falsehood of Cabot's 
 blameless life ; but after all he thinks it was venial, for he had a very narrow escape from being born 
 in Venice. No doubt it is hard to go through so long a life without telling one falsehood ; David and 
 Jacob and even Abraham made at least one slip, but the difference between them and Cabot is that he 
 kept it up to the last. Even when residing in the land of " religious liberty " so late as 1551, while an 
 official of England and in receipt of a salary from the crown, he resumed secret negotiations with the 
 Council of Ten at Venice to enter their service and impart to them some secrets of navigation which 
 he professed to have. His heart was then in Venice and the Council style him " our most faithful 
 Gaboto." As the matter appears to Mr. Nicholls " he pined in Spain for his native Bristol. Home- 
 " sickness came over him, he gave up the emoluments of office to live and die where he might have 
 " religious liberty. He left behind him the superstition and tyranny and cruelty of Spain for the light 
 
1O4 SAMUEL EDWARD DAWSON ON THE 
 
 " of the pure gospel." The picture is touching, but truth demands the statement that betook the emolu- 
 ments so long as Spain would pay them. Upon the edifying circumstances surrounding the death-bed of 
 Cabot the religious imagination of Mr. Nicholls dwells with tender eloquence. It is a pity that the 
 only circumstances recorded concerning his death are those given already in this paper (p. 64) from 
 Eden's work. Mr. Nicholls sums up his merits in one comprehensive eulogistic sentence. " He created 
 " our navy, raised England's name high among nations, placed her credit on a solid foundation, and 
 " made her citizens respected ; he was the father of free trade, and gave us the carrying trade of the 
 " world ! 1" 
 
 APPENDIX H. 
 THE MAP OP 1544 AND ITS LEGENDS. 
 
 It will have appeared from the preceding pages that maps were extant in England and on 
 the continent with which Sebastian Cabot's name was, to a greater or less extent, identified, and it 
 will also have been seen that these maps differed among themselves. There exists a wilderness of 
 conflicting comment upon them, and to attempt to travel over it would be tedious and confusing. 
 Grateful as every student must be to Winsor, and Deane, and Kohl, and Harrisse, and many other 
 learned writers upon this much vexed question it will be well to start the inquiry, if possible, anew 
 without attempting to discuss their views. 
 
 In order to gather to a focus all the original information extant concerning these maps a con- 
 cordance of all the early notices will be useful. They are : 
 
 (A) The Hakluyt map ; seen by Hakluyt in the Queen's gallery. 
 
 (B) The Purchas map ; seen by Purchas in the same place. He gives its date as 1549. 
 (c) The DoLaet map ; referred to by DeLaet as existing in England in several copies. 
 
 (D) The Gilbert map; seen by Sir Humphrey Gilbert in the Queen's gallery. 
 
 (E) The Bedford map ; seen by Richard Willes at the Earl of Bedford's at Cheynies. 
 
 (F) The Chytrseus map : seen by Kochaff at Oxford. 
 
 (o) The Ortelius map; in the list of 200 maps given by Ortelius at the beginning of his Atlas, 
 probably seen by him in Belgium. 
 
 (H) The Livio Sanuto map; probably seen in Venice. 
 
 (j) The Paris map; the mappemonde dated 1554, called the Cabot map. 
 
 Of these maps A to F were seen in England, and G to J were seen upon the continent. To 
 narrow the question by gradual elimination I would first exclude the map referred to by Livio Sanuto, 
 as his notice of it affords little information. It is mentioned in his " Geografia Distinta in XII. 
 libri," Venice, 1588, in connection with the variation of the compass. He would seem to refer to 
 legend No. 17 of the Paris map, but no date is given or any other information. 
 
 Ortelius is of more service. The map he saw was engraved on copper and without name of pub- 
 lisher or place of publication. This would indicate that it was like the Paris map. Of 200 maps in 
 his list, mostly engraved, none were printed in Spain and all save this bore indication of place or pub- 
 lisher. It must here be noted that, although Ortolius saw this map, his own map of 1570 does not 
 bear at the north any trace of its influence ; and also that he gives the name Juan, not to an island 
 in the gulf as in the map of 1544, but to a small island south of Newfoundland and in the Atlantic 
 ocean. 
 
 The preceding are continental copies ; coming now to English copies there is the Bedford map. 
 It may be gleaned from this mention that it indicated a northwest passage. It is spoken of as " Cabot's 
 table which the Earle of Bedford hath at Cheynies." The Gilbert map confirms this indication. It 
 was seen by Sir Humphrey Gilbert in the Queen's gallery, and is referred to in his discourse published 
 in 1576. He introduces a little confusion by giving the date of the landfall as June 11, and at 
 Labrador on the north side. This Canadians know to have been impossible at that season, as also 
 is the statement, borrowed probably from Ramusio, that the sea was then open and Cabot might have 
 
VOYAGES OP THE CABOTS IN 1497 AND 1498. 1O5 
 
 sailed to the west. Gilbert speaks in the plural of " charts," but he could not have referred to this 
 mappemonde of 1544 for this contains no such indications as he describes. There is no trace of Hud- 
 son's bay or any such northwest passage to Asia as Sir Humphrey was writing about. It contains 
 no argument for his thesis. 
 
 I come now to the DeLaet map. The author gives in his. work (published in Leyden in 1640) a 
 fair map of the gulf based on Champlain's early map. He does not give any name to Prince Edward 
 island. He speaks of Cabot's maps as existing in England and gives a French translation of the 
 same legend as Hakluyt ; indeed, probably, he merely translated from Hakluyt, only that, by a mis- 
 print, the date of the landfall is July 24th instead of June 24. It must be a misprint, for the legend he 
 gives identifies the day as St. John the Baptist's day. The same mistake occurs in the Latin version of 
 the Paris map, but the form of the quotation proves that DeLaet had the Hakluyt legend before him. 
 Not much can be inferred from this reference. 
 
 Purchas is a more important witness. The map he saw was in the Queen's gallery, and was 
 engraved by Clement Adams, and it bore date 1549. He speaks of it as a "great map," of which 
 Sebastian Cabot "is often called the author," and adds, "this map some say was taken out of Sir 
 " Sebastian Cabot's map by Clem. Adams 1549." The landfall on this map was 1497 not 1494, so here 
 we have ground for concluding that Hakluyt's map was dated 1549, and was not the same as the 
 Paris map of 1544. A difficulty must, however, be noted here that Hakluyt, in his " Discourse on 
 Western Planting," written in 1584, in warm advocacy of the claims of the English crown to the con- 
 tinent of America from the Arctic circle to Florida, gives 1496 a the date of the discovery, and a few 
 pages farther on he quotes Clement Adams as giving 1494 as the date. This " Discourse " is not in 
 Hakluyt's collection of voyages, but is a MS. published for the first time in 1877 by the Maine Histor- 
 ical Society. It was in fact a letter written to advocate the plans of Sir Walter Kaleigh. Hakluyt 
 was beginning then to collect materials for his great work and, as in the case of his " Divers Voyages," 
 the later and completed work must be taken to contain the matured results of his deliberate researches. 
 The real date of the landfall is settled now by the contemporary documents recently discovered and 
 unknown to him. 
 
 The Chytnsus map presents some difficulty. It was seen in England and was dated 1549 like the 
 Purchas map, but the Latin inscription (No. 8) is that of the Paris map of 1541, excepting that he 
 corrects the date to June 24. He puts the year of the discovery as 1494, as in the Paris map, but gives 
 it as 1594 by an evident misprint. Chytraus in his book does not reproduce the map but gives all the 
 Latin legends of the Paris map and makes no mention of the Spanish ones. He gives also headings 
 to the legends ; differing in that respect from the Paris map which has only three headings. He also 
 quotes from Pliny direct, and does not follow the erroneous citation of the Paris map. The conclusion 
 would follow that the map Chytrajus saw was an edition of the Paris map printed in 1549 on which 
 some minor changes had been made. 
 
 There remain now to be compared the Paris map of 1544 and the map cited by Hakluyt in the 
 Queen's gallery and cut by Clement Adams. These two maps differ radically. Hakluyt has pre- 
 served the text of legend No. 8. While the main tenor of the information is the same as that of the 
 map of 1544 the wording differs. Before citing the legends it should be observe! that the Latin ver- 
 sions must be taken as the originals of which the Spanish and English are translations ; for Latin, 
 in that day, was the general international language of cultivated people, and moreover whore the 
 legends on the 1544 map were set up there could have been no Spanish type, for the printer had not 
 " n" with a tilde over it such as was, and is still, used in Spain, and he has doubled the letter and prints 
 mannana and not maflana. The Spanish tongue was therefore not the vernacular of the printer. On 
 Clement Adams's map, as indeed Hakluyt expressly states, the inscription was in Latin, and the con- 
 text implies that no other language was used. Hakluyt translates it but glosses it throughout not, 
 as Biddle suggests, of set purpose to distort his original but to elucidate it, as was the. frequent practice 
 among the early writers. Then the island was ex adoerso, over which phrase many battles have 
 
 Sec. II., 1894. 14. 
 
1O6 SAMUEL EDWARD DAWSON ON THE 
 
 been fought. Brevoort erroneously translates it " even with." Mr. Nicholls makes it " not lying in 
 front of the land but further on," a translation which has the unique merit of flatly contradicting its 
 original. Other translations there are, but the Latin version of the Paris map uses instead of ex adverse 
 the synonym oppositam in which the idea of adjacency is necessarily implied, and appositam recorded 
 by Chytrams intensifies this idea. In the Latin version on tho Paris map the meaning is also clearly 
 expressed that the inscription given is intended to apply generally to the whole region and not solely 
 to the island. A new sentence commences Hujus terra incoUe. All these are indications that the 
 Latin versions are the originals. 
 
 Latin Inscription No. 8 (Copied by the Late Dr. Deane} on Map of 1544. 
 
 Terrain hanc olim nobis clausam aperuit Joannes Cabotus Venetus, nee non Sebastianus Cabotus 
 ejus filius, anno ab orbe redempto 1494 , die vero 24 Julii, (sic) bora 5 subdiluculo, quam ten-am 
 primum visam appellarunt & Insulam quandam magnam ei oppositam, Insulam divi Joannis 
 nominarunt, quippe qure solenni die festo divi Joannis aperta fuit. Hujus terras incolae pellibus ani- 
 malium induuntur, arcu in bello, sagittis, hastis, spiculis, clavis ligneis, & fundis utuntur: sterilis in- 
 cultaque tellus fuit, leouibus, ursis albis, procerisque cervis, piscibus innumeris, lupis scilicet, 
 salmonibus & ingentibus soleis unius ulnse longitudine, aliisque diversis piscium generibus abundat, 
 horum atitem maxima copia est, quos vulgus Bacallios appellat ; ad hrec insunt accipitres nigri cor- 
 vorum similes, aquite, perdicesque fusco colore, aliseque diversas volucrcs. 
 
 The version of Chytrseus is the same as above but 24 Junii instead of Julii 1594 instead of 1494 
 and appositam for oppositam. 
 
 Legend on Clement Adams's Map From Hakluyt. 
 
 Anno Domini 1497, Joannes Cabotus Venetus, et Sebastianus illius filius earn terrain fecerunt 
 perviam, quam nullus prius adire ausus fuit, die 24 Junii, circiter horam quintam bene mauo. Hanc 
 autcm appelavit Terrain primum visam, credo quod ex mari in earn pnrtem primum oculos injecerat. 
 Nam qua; ex adverse sita est insula.eam appellavit insulam divi Joaunis, hac opinor ratione, quod aperta 
 fuit eo die qui est sacer Divo Joanni Baptistse: Hujus incolaj pelles animalium exuviasquo ferarum 
 pro indumentis habent, easque tanti faciunt, quanti nos vestes preciosissimas. Cum bellum gerunt, 
 utuntur arcu, sagittis, hastis, spiculis clavis ligneis et fundis. Tollus sterilis est, neque ullos 
 fructos affert, ex quo fit, ut ursis albo colore, et corvis inusitatas apud nos magnitudinis referta sit ; 
 piscibus abundat iisque sane magnis, quales sunt lupi marini et quos salmones vulgus appellat ; sole 
 autem reperiuntur tarn longse, ut ulnas mensuram excedant. Imprimis autem magna est copia eorum 
 piscium, quos vulgari sermone vocant Bacallaos. Gignuntur in ea insula accipitres ita nigri, ut cor- 
 vorum similitudinem mirum in modem exprimant, perdices autem etaquilae sunt nigri coloris. 
 
 Hahluyt's Translation, Ed. 1600. 
 (Words in italics are interpolated, or changed.) 
 
 In the yeere of our Lord 1497 John Cabot, a Venetian, and his sonne Sebastian (with an English 
 fleet set out from Bristoll) discovered that land which no man before that time had attempted, on 
 the 24 of June, about five of the clocke early in the morning. This land he called Prima Vista, that 
 is to say, first seene, because as I suppose it was that part whereof they had the first sight from sea. 
 That island which lieth out before the land, he called the island of St. John upon the occasion, as I 
 thinke, because it was discovered upon the day of John the Baptist. The inhabitants of this island 
 upe to weare bessts' skinnes, and have them in as great estimation as we have our finest garments. 
 In their warres they use bowes, arrowes, pikes, darts, woodden clubs and slings. Thesoile is barren 
 j'n some places and yieldeth litle fruit, but it is full of white beares, and stagges farre greater than ours. 
 It yeeldeth plenty of fish, and these very great, as seales, and those which commonly we call salmons ; 
 there are soles also above a yard in length ; but especially there is great abundance of that kinde of 
 fish which the savages call Bacalaos. In the same island also there breed hauks, but they are eo 
 blacke that they are very like to ravens, as also their partridges and egles, which are in like sort 
 blacke. 
 
VOYAGES OF THE CABOTS IN 1497 AND 1498. 1O7 
 
 The phrases on the Adams's map " because as I suppose " and " as I think " mark unerringly that 
 Cabot neither wrote the legend nor personally superintended the writing of it. The hand of the editor 
 is plainly seen not Hakluyt's hand; for, however he might have glossed the translation, he would not 
 have written glosses in Latin, as if copied from the map, and then translated them with additional Eng- 
 lish glosses. Clement Adams beyond doubt had a map engraved, or re-engraved, or did the work himself, 
 which, though it might have been copied from some chart or map of CaboL's,was not based upon the Paris 
 map of 1544 now under review. This is manifest because both Willes and Gilbert saw it and used it to 
 demonstrate the existence of an open northwest passage. Willes says : " The Gulfe " (Northwestern 
 strait, Hakluyt) " is set at 61 to 64" latitude and " neere the 318th meridian " " continuing the same 
 " bredth about 10 degrees west where it openeth southerly, more and more until it come to the 
 " Tropic of Cancer and so runneth to the Mar del Zur." This very precise and definite information 
 Willes saw portrayed upon the Bedford map. Sir Humphrey Gilbert saw the copy Hakluyt describes 
 at the Queen's gallery and upon it were similar indications, for he uses it to reinforce his argument 
 for an open northwest passage. Now the map of 1544 contains no such information no such 
 " gulfe," no such " strait ten degrees wide and widening out until it opens into the southern ocean." 
 
 It cannot be supposed that Cabot ceased to make maps on his arrival in England. It is just here 
 where Michael Lok's map throws light upon the question (see p. 90). It is published in Hakluyt's 
 Divers Voyages with high approbation and in illustration of the same geographical ideas which 
 Willes and Gilbert were advocating. On Lok's map is the very strait in the very place indicated on 
 the reported authority of Cabot's maps widening out into the great southern ocean. Lok's map is 
 dated 1582 and contains later information than the Paris map, but he gives the landfall at Cape Breton 
 by " J. Gabot, 1497," and lays down just opposite the land, in the Atlantic, the island of St. John. 
 The conclusion is irresistible that we have hero the main features of Clement Adams's map, and upon 
 it rather than on the map of 1544 we find^the geographical information drawn by Richard Willes and 
 Sir Humphrey Gilbert from the Bedford map and the Hakluyt map which " were also in so many 
 merchants' houses." On the other hand this map of 1544 has left no trace of its influence upon any 
 other map or in any writer of that period, or any other period, until the last few years. Only one in 
 dication exists that it was ever seen in Spain and that has recently been found. 
 
 The indefatigable research of Harrisse has brought to light a MS. in the Eoyal Library at Madrid 
 purporting to be an " explanation of the sailing chart of Columbus." It is by a Doctor Grajales of whom 
 nothing else is known. It contains the account Columbus wrote of his third voyage, tables of the rising 
 and setting of the sun and the whole of the twenty-two legends of the Paris map of 1544. This confirms 
 the fact stated above that the legends were printed separately and pasted on the sides of the map, 
 and it suggests that the map of 1544 was at some period in the possession of this Doctor Grajales in 
 Puerto de Sancta Maria not far from Seville. Upon this somewhat slight foundation Harrisse builds 
 a theory that Grajales made the map, whereas it can only show that he probably had a copy. 
 
 The conclusions to which all these considerations lead, are : 
 
 1. That the Paris map of 1544 is not Cabot's in any sense which would make him responsible for 
 its accuracy, that it was not published or prepared in Spain, that he never corrected the proofs but 
 that he probably contributed in some measure to the material from which its unknown author com- 
 piled it. 
 
 2. That the map in the Queen's gallery engraved by Clement Adams was essentially different in 
 its American geography from that of 1544 and that it was based on some of Cabot's charts made in 
 England, and that Lok's map, taken with Gilbert's and Willes's statements, affords a useful indication 
 as to what these charts contained. 
 
 3. That in the legends on the maps as well as in the statements recorded in Hakluyt and Eden 
 the incidents of the voyages of 1497 are not distinguished from those of 1498, but both are given to- 
 gether in a general description of the whole northeastern coast. 
 
1O8 SAMUEL EDWARD DAWSON ON THE 
 
 NOTES AND REFERENCES. 
 
 1. Harrisse Discovery of North America, p. 185. 
 
 2. These propositions are abundantly established, mainly on documentary evidence, by Harrisse Jean et 
 Sfbastien Cabot and Discovery of America, an 1 by Deane in Hist, and Crit. History of America, vol. III. ; as well 
 as by many other writers in books and periodicals who treat of some or all of these questions. 
 
 3. Discourse of the anonymous guest at the house of Frascator. Ramusio Navigazioni et Viaggi, vol. I., 
 fol. 374 D, 3rd ed., Venice, 1653 ; cited and translated by the chief writers upon this subject. 
 
 4. Those who hold that the landfall was in Newfoundland generally place it at Cape Bonavista, and the island 
 of Baccalieu, not far off, they maintain by its name to be a further identification with the place called Baccalaos. 
 This island would then be the island of St John, discovered the same day. Foster has no doubt about it 
 Voyages and Discoveries to the North, London, 1786. See also Murray Discoveries and Travels in North America, Lon- 
 don, 1829 ; and, in fact, all the older writers. Among the later writers who have held that view are Suite, Histoire 
 des Canadians; the Right Rev. Dr. Howley, Mag. of American History, Oct., 1891, and it is often met with in popu- 
 lar works. 
 
 5. A great number of names of weight are found in favour of Labrador. Among them are Kohl, Biddle, 
 Humboldt, Harrisse in his last work, Discovery of America, the Abb<j Ferland and Garneau. 
 
 6. The map of 1544 had not been discovered when Biddle wrote. It had a great effect in changing the set of 
 opinion towards Cape Breton and, by a misreading of tlie configuration upon the map, Cape North was taken to 
 be the indicated landfall. Harrisse in 1882 {Jean et Slbastien Cabot) with more reason advocated Cape Percy ; but 
 he changed his mind ten years later in his last book, Discovery of America, 1892. Dr. Bourinot (Cape Breton and 
 its Memorials), while he follows the general current and inclines to the opinion that Cape North was the landfall, 
 does so on the authority of the map of 1544. He, however, alone of all the writers on the question, has hitherto 
 recognized the strong claims of Cape Breton and the conformity of Scatari island with the required conditions. 
 He was not examining this special question and while yielding to the current opinion his local knowledge 
 prevented him from accepting it as proved. 
 
 I have not found Mr. Eben Hereford's arguments for Salem Neck sufficiently strong to lead me to consider his 
 theory separately. 
 
 7. Captain Richard Whitbourne A Relation of the New-found-land, etc., etc., London, 1622. 
 
 8. Cham plain Voyages, 1632 ; ed. Laverdiere, p. 1312, Quebec, 1870. 
 
 9. In appendix to Kohl Doc. History of Maine, and in his writings generally. 
 
 10. Transactions of Royal Society of Canada, vol. IX., 1891. 
 
 11. It would be a small matter if this error were found only in the railway hand-books ; but Deane, the 
 Abb6 Beaudoin, Brevoort, Harrisse and numerous other authors of eminence maintain this view. 
 
 12. Barrett History and Antiquities of Bristol ; Markham Hakluyt Soc. Vol. for 1893, p. xlv. ; Letter of 
 Raimondo di Soncino, Dec. 18, 1497. 
 
 13. Despatches from Dr. de Pnebla, July 28, 1498, and Pedro de Ayala, July 25, 1498, to the Catholic sove- 
 reigns ; Gomara Historia. 
 
 14. Letters patent for both voyages. See also Biddle, page 86. 
 
 15. Letter of Lorenzo Pasqualigo, Aug. 23, 1497. 
 
 16. Despatch of Pedro de Ayala, July 25, 1498. 
 
 17. Letter of Raimondo di Soncino to the Duke of Milan, Dec. 18, 1497. 
 
 18. Peter Martyr (1516), Dec. III. Bk. 6. 
 
 19. Gomara Historia (1552). 
 
 20. Peter Martyr, Gomara, Ramusio, patiim. 
 
VOYAGES OF THE CABOTS IN 1497 AND 1498. 1O9 
 
 21. Letter of Lorenzo Pasqualigo, August 23, 1497. 
 
 22. Peter Martyr Decades, 
 
 23. See the wording of the second letters patent. 
 
 24. This is shown by the second letters patent which are addressed to him alone ; also by the petition of the 
 Drapers' Company to the king in 1521, for which see Harrisse Discovery of America, appendix, where the mer- 
 chants make very little of Sebastian Cabot's achievements. 
 
 25. Sebastian Cabot is not mentioned by Ayala, Puebla, Soncino, nor Pasqualigo. His name occurs only once 
 in the original authorities, and then with the names of Lewis and Sancio, his brothers, in the first patent. This is 
 a cardinal fact in the controversy. 
 
 26. Letter of Lorenzo Pasqualigo, Aug. 23, 1497. 
 
 27. Barrett History and Antiquities of Bristol for the name of the vessel. For the size and number of the 
 crew, Soncino, Dec. 18, 1497. 
 
 28. Champlain's Voyages, ed. Laverdiere; see for Cape Breton, p. 279; La H6ve (Lunenburg, N.S.), p. 156 ; 
 Port Royal (Granville, on Annapolis river), p. 167; Petit Passage (Long island, St. Mary's bay, Digby), p. 162; 
 Kennebec (Maine), p. 197; Mallebarre (a little south of Cape Cod on Champlain's map), p. 213, In a note on 
 Champlain's observation at Cape Breton the Abb6 Laverdiere remarks that " It is probable we should read 24 
 degrees for 14 degrees, as the variation is now about 24 degrees west" This shows how the secular variation of the 
 needle has confused the most learned commentators. A less conscientious editor might have amended Champlain's 
 text to correspond with Bayfleld's charts. See also Routier de Jean Allefonsce for variation at Franciroy. 
 
 29. This map is not extant, but it has been reconstructed from the very detailed accounts of it which survive- 
 See. Hakluyl Soc. Vol. for 1893, p. 1. 
 
 30. It is interesting to note how long the name Cambaluc adhered to the coast. Captain Richard Whitbourne 
 in his relation of New-found-land speaks of " that coast which is called Cambaleu," meaning Labrador. 
 
 31. For the course sailed see the two letters of Eaimondo di Soncino to the Duke of Milan in 1497. 
 
 32. According to Eratosthenes, Ptolemy and Pomponius Mela, the authorities of those days, the Tanais was 
 the eastern boundary of Europe. 
 
 33. Letter of Lorenzo Pasqualigo, Aug. 23, 1497. 
 
 34. Second letter of Raimondo di Soncino. The despatch of De Ayala to the Catholic sovereigns, July 25, 
 1498, shows that the landfall was not far north. The envoy has seen Cabot's map and is sure that Cabot has been 
 trespassing on Spanish ground. That excludes Labrador. 
 
 35. Historical and Geographical Notes, p. 15. Brevoort holds the same view. See Journal of Am. Oeog. Soc. 
 for 1872, p. 213. 
 
 36. Captain Fox, U.S.A., App. 18 to Report of U. S. Coast Survey, 1880. 
 
 37. Markham Hakluyt Soc. Vol. for 1893. 
 
 38. In twenty-four hours Columbus passed from east variation to one point west. 
 
 39. This is evident from the voyage of the Bonaventure in 1591. She sailed from St. Malo with the " Canada 
 fleet" and, having passed Cape Race without seeing it, came upon the St. Pierre bank. Her course for Cape Ray, 
 opposite Cape North, was changed to N. W. } N. 
 
 40. Bay field Sailing Directiong. 
 
 41. Peter Martyr Decades. 
 
 42. Ramusio " Anonymous Guest." 
 
 43. The story of a boiling sea is found in Oviedo and Herrara. The sailors of the Mary of Ouilford reported 
 having sailed through a hot sea which seethed like water in a caldron. 
 
 44. Columbus was combating that idea when he emphasized the fact that he had sailed to Iceland and that 
 the sea was not frozen. 
 
 45. Diez Dictionary of Hie Romance Languages, gives a clue to Kohl's etymology. He cites the word under the 
 old French form cabeliau from Dutch kabeljaauw " whence, too " (he adds), " perhaps with a reference to baculus, the 
 Spanish bacalao, Basque bacailaba, Venetian, Piedmontese bacala." 
 
11O SAMUEL EDWABD DAWSON OX THE 
 
 When an etymology seems so simple as that ofbacalao (stock-fish), from the low Latin baculut, a stick, it is 
 unnecessary to go so far afield as to import such a word as kabeljaauw into the question. There is a precise 
 parallel in the Spanish caballo from the low Latin caballus, and the Basques no doubt borrowed the Spanish word 
 and spelled it in their own way. It is a common saying concerning the Basques that they write Solomon and 
 pronounce Nebuchadnezzer, so difficult is their language. 
 
 46. RamusioVol. III. Introductory Discourse. The whole statement is incredible. We know from Capt.Coats's 
 Geography of Hudson's Bay that the earliest date a sailing vessel can enter the ice-pack outside of Hudson straits is 
 the middle of July. The Canadian expedition under Lieut, Gordon in 1886 reached Cape Mugford on July 2 and, 
 steaming along the coast from a point 60 miles south of Cape Mugford as far as Cape Chidley, found the ice lining 
 the coast tightly packed fifteen miles out from shore and loose for ten miles farther out. 
 
 47. The following is Galvano's notice of the Cabot discovery from the translation in Hakluyl Soc. Vol. 1893. 
 Harrisse Cabot gives the original. Qalvano's Discoveries of the World, 1563 : 
 
 " In the year 1496 there was a Venetian in England called JohnCabota, who having knowledge of such a new 
 "discovery as this was and perceiving by the globe that the islands before spoken of stood almost in the same lati- 
 " tude with his country and much nearer to England than to Portugal or to Castile, he acquainted King Henry 
 " the VII., then King of England, with the same, wherewith the saideKing was greatly pleased and furnished him 
 " out with two ships and 300 men ; which departed and set saile in the spring of the yeere, and they sailed west- 
 '' ward till they came in sight of land in 45 degrees of latitude toward the north, and then went straight northward 
 " till they came into 60 degrees of latitude, where the day is 18 hours long and the night is very cleare and bright. 
 " There they found the air cold, and great islands of ice, but no ground in 70, 80, 100 fathoms sounding, but found 
 " much ice which alarmed them ; and so from thence putting about finding the land to turn eastwards they trended 
 " along by it on the other tack, discovering all the Bay and river named Deseado, to see if it passed on the other 
 " si Je ; then they sailed back again diminishing the latitude till they came to 38 degrees toward the equinoctial line 
 " and from thence returned to England. There be others which say th.it he went as far as the Cape of Florida 
 " which standeth in 25 degrees." 
 
 This extract is a good instance of the way in which the two voyages were mixed up. Although this extract 
 from the Hakluyt Society gives the name of "John" Cabot as found in their Portuguese text, the other Portuguese 
 text in Harrisse's Cabot reads '' Sebastian." John Cabot had a narrow escape from complete suppression. It was 
 the fortunate preservation of the Spanish, Milanese and Venetian correspondence which has given a firm basis to 
 his reputation. Dr. Deane thinks that it was Hakluyt who altered " Sebastian " to " John " Cabot That was (if it 
 be true) an unwarrantable liberty to take with a text, but at that time the information was in Hakluyt's possession 
 which showed that John was the discoverer. He had the patents, the first of which was dated 1496. The laws of 
 literary composition in this respect were not then so strictly drawn as they are now. 
 
 48. The Abb6 Verreau in two papers in the Trans, of ttie Royal Soc. of Canada illustrates the fierceness of this 
 jealousy in Spain. He gives documents showing that the Spanish government sent spies to France to watch the 
 preparations for Roberval's voyage and that it endeavoured to induce the Portuguese government to send an 
 expedition to follow and destroy Roberval's fleet. 
 
 49. Discovery nf America, pp. 14, 257, el seq. 
 
 50. Hakluyt Divers Voyages, p. 52, ed. Hakluyt Soc. 
 
 51. This is the reason why Pope and Ganong in their studies have arrived at true conclusions concerning 
 Jacques Cartier's voyages. Their premises are wrong because the variation was then one point less, but their 
 conclusions are right because Cartier's compass was set to the variation of France nearly a point east. 
 
 52. And never having been published exercised no influence on succeeding maps. Containing conclusive 
 evidence of the English claims it was kept secret and then forgotten. It was discovered by Humboldt in 1832. 
 
 53. See Rev. Dr. Patterson's monograph in Trans. Roy. Soc. Can. for 1890. 
 
 54. This bank is a well known spot to sailors. The soundings are very distinctive, and in thick weather it is 
 usual when near there to heave-to and sound ; the ship's position can be then found with certainty. 
 
 55. Discovery of America, p. 580. 
 
 56. Abbe 1 Ferland Hist, du Canada, vol. I.; Pope Jacques Carlier ; Ganong Trans. Roy. Soc. Canada, 1887 
 and 1839; Laverdiere Notes to Champlain's Voyages; AbbiS Verreau Trans. Roy. Soc. Canada, 1891 and 1892. 
 
 57. Abb< Verreau Trans. Roy. Soc. Canada, 1890 and 1891. 
 
VOYAGES OF THE CABOTS IN 1497 AND 1498. Ill 
 
 58. Sometimes this great bay was called the sea of Verrazano. AVinsor says it cost the French of Canada 
 one hundred and forty years of effort to realize the fact that the way to Cathay was not by the St. Lawrence. 
 
 59. Markham also is clear upon this point. Hakluyt Soc. Vol. for 1893. 
 
 60. Jean et Sebastien Cabot, p. 197. 
 
 61. Vitet Histoire dg Dieppe states that a school of hydrography was established there in the middle of the 
 16th century. 
 
 62. Jean et Sebatlun Cabot, p. 230. 
 
 63. It is clearly identified as the Great Magdalen by Isle Brion close to it. 
 
 64. Jean et Sebaslien Cabot, p. 242. 
 
 65. Gomara was the first writer to-apply the name, conjointly with Golfo Quadrado, in 1553. 
 
 66. Discovery of America, p. 20. 
 
 67. Rewe Critique d'Histoire et de la Litterature, April, 1870. 
 
 68. These observations are based upon the facsimile in Jomard. 
 
 69. Hakluyt Particular Discourse on Western Planting, p. 249, Goldsmith's ed. 
 
 70. The letter is dated 18th December, 1497, in the interval between the first and second voyages, " This 
 " Messer. Zoanne (John Cabot) has the description of the world on a chart and also on a solid sphere which he 
 " has constructed, and on which he shows where he has been." This passage taken with De Ayala's letter to the 
 Catholic sovereigns is of great interest as bearing upon La Cosa's map. The great historical importance of the 
 map has caused many copies to be made. Humboldt, Kohl, Stevens, Jomard, Winsor, Harrisse, Kretsohmer and 
 Markham all give reproductions of it, but some of them have been taken from copies and the photographic repro- 
 ductions of others are very much reduced in size and the details are lost. The copy given here is a tracing from a 
 facsimile published at Madrid in 1892. The coast is not a hard line as in most copies, as if a survey had been 
 made, but a broken line as of a reconnaissance on a coasting voyage. In the facsimile two small islands are 
 shown, not seen on the other copies and some small islands shown on other copies between I. de la Trinidat and 
 the coast are not found. The facsimile must be taken as the best representation extant and is reproduced in all 
 the colours of the original. 
 
 71. Probably the mouth of Hudson's strait, where the tidal currents flow with great rapidity. The rise and 
 fall of the tide at the mouth of Ungava river is 64 feet. (Evidence of Mr. R. Crawford before Committee of House 
 of Commons of Canada, 1884, and Report of Expedition by Capt. Gordon in 1886). On the Hakluyt map the same 
 locality is indicated by the inscription " a furious over-fall." The wind against such tidal currents makes a very 
 heavy sea. 
 
 72. An imaginary island of Santana is shown off the banks of Newfoundland in Ortelius' map. 
 
 73. There was no universal standard of correction but each maker corrected his compasses to the variation of 
 his own country. At La Rochelle the correction was less than in Flanders or eastern France and at Genoa there 
 was no variation and consequently no correction. Champlain refers to compasses of both kinds. 
 
 74. The gut or strait of Canso has had several names. Here it is the channel of St. Julien. Denys calls it 
 " le petit passage de Campseaux " and describes the harbour now called Port Mulgrave under the name of Havre 
 de Fronsac. Charlevoix calls the strait " le passage de Fronsac." The name of Denys, Sieur de Fronsac, ought 
 never to have been allowed to fade off that coast 
 
 75. John Cabot was by no means a stay-at-home merchant. His characteristics show out in the letters of 
 Soncino, and of Pasqualigo who was his fellow townsman. He is called " a distinguished sailor and skilled in the 
 discovery of new islands," " very expert in navigation." He had also travelled in the east. 
 
 76. Benjamin, 8. G. W. Cruise of the Alice May. New York, Appleton, 1885. 
 
 77. These forms apparently different are in reality the same ; for the tilde or the dash over the final a mark 
 the elision of n or m. There is no English type to show it. 
 
 78. Compare the outline of the south coast of Newfoundland in Reinel's map with that of Cham plain's at 
 p. 94. Both are on a magnetic meridian. The relative positions of Cape Race and Cape Breton are the same. 
 
112 SAMUEL EDWAKD DAWSON VOYAGES OF THE CABOTS, ETC. 
 
 79. This cut of Eotz map is taken from Ganong's paper (R. S. C., vol. vii., sec- 2, p. 211). He identifies by 
 the numbers various points in Cartier's narrative. It is also found at p. 83 of vol. 3, Winsor'a Narr. and Critical 
 History without the numbers. The names are not repeated here because Mr. Ganong's theory is not in question 
 and the sketch is used merely to demonstrate the absence in the gulf of anything like an island of Prince Edward. 
 
 80. I have not been able to find any rational explanation of the names Biggetu and Barbatos attached to 
 these islands. The " Plisacus Sinus" found farther east on this map of which Kohl (p. 157) "does not know what 
 to think " is evidently Polisacus Sinus, the gulf into which the Polisacus river of Marco Polo (rlo-ang-ho) dis- 
 charges its waters. That river according to him flows south of Cambaluc (I'ekin). 
 
 81. The Cape St. John of Cartier was on the island of Newfoundland. Pope places it at the present Cape 
 Anguille. 
 
 82. The Toudamani or Trudamans, (Toudarnans r Hakluyt) are described by Cartier as a people dwelling 
 south of Hochelaga who were enemies of the Indians of New France. 
 
 83. There is much dispute about the authorship of this map ; it is ascribed to Edward Wright and to 
 Emmeric Molynenx and Hakluyt is supposed to have assisted in the compilation. It is convenient to cite it as 
 Hakluyt's map. 
 
 84. This is precisely the case of the first voyage of John Cabot. The theory of the present paper could not 
 have a more apt illustration. 
 
 85. In Quaritch's " Rough List" No. 145 is advertised a map of the world by Alonxo de Santa Cruz dated 
 1542 reproduced in 1892 in facsimile from the unique original MS. map at Stockholm. This I have not seen. 
 
 ERRATA. 
 
 P. 66. A reference to Galvano's book is omitted. The passage is given in full in note 47. 
 P. 88. The reference to the Tudemans is to note 82 not 80.