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Page 20
"Departing from thence, we kept along the coast, steering northeast,
and found the country more pleasant and open, free from woods, and
distant in the interior, we saw lofty mountains but none which
extended to the shore. Within fifty leagues we discovered thirty-two
islands, all near the main land, small and of pleasant appearance,
but high and so disposed as to afford excellent harbors and
channels, as we see in the Adriatic gulf, near Illyria and Dalmatia.
We had no intercourse with the people, but we judge that they were
similar in nature and usages to those we were last among. After
sailing between east and north one hundred and fifty leagues MORE,
and finding our provisions and naval stores nearly exhausted, we
took in wood and water, and determined to return to France, having
discovered (avendo discoperto) VII, [Footnote: "The MS. has
erroneously and uselessly the repetition VII, that is, 700 leagues."
Note, by M. Arcangeli. It is evident that VII is mistakenly rendered
502 in the transcription used by Dr. Cogswell.] that is, 700 leagues
of unknown lands."
The exact point at which they left the coast, and to which their
discovery is thus stated to have extended, is given in the
cosmography which follows the narrative, in these words:
"In the voyage which we have made by order of your majesty, in
addition to the 92 degrees we ran towards the west from our point of
departure (the Desertas) before we reached land in the latitude of
34, we have to count 300 leagues which we ran northeastwardly, and
400 nearly east along the coast before we reached the 50TH PARALLEL
OF NORTH LATITUDE, the point where we turned our course from the
shore towards home. BEYOND THIS POINT THE PORTUGUESE HAD ALREADY
SAILED AS FAR AS THE ARCTIC CIRCLE, WITHOUT COMING TO THE
TERMINATION OF THE LAND."
That this latitude must be taken as correctly determined follows
from the representation of the letter, that they took daily
observations of the sun and made a record of them, so that no
material error could have occurred and remained unrectified for over
twenty-four hours; and from the presumption that they were as
capable of calculating the latitude as other navigators of that
period, sent on such purposes by royal authority, like Jacques
Cartier, whose observations, as the accounts of his voyage to this
region show, never varied half a degree from the true latitude. The
fiftieth parallel strikes the easterly coast of Newfoundland three
degrees north of Cape Race, and to that point the exploration of
Verrazzano is therefore to be regarded as claimed to have been made.
[Footnote: Damiam de Goes, Chronica do felicissimo rei Dom Emanuel
parte I. C. 66. (Fol., Lisboa, 1566)]
This intention is made positively certain by the remark which
follows the statement of the latitude, that "beyond this point the
Portuguese had already sailed as far north as the Arctic circle
without coming to the termination of the land." The exploration of
the Portuguese here referred to, and as far as which that of
Verrazzano is carried, was made by Gaspar Cortereal in his second
voyage, when according to the letter of Pasqualigo the Venetian
embassador, he sailed from Lisbon on a course between west and
northwest, and struck a coast along which he ran from six to seven
hundred miles, "without finding the end." [Footnote: Paesi novamente
ritrovati. Lib. sexto. cap. CXXXL. Venice, 1521. A translation into
English of Pasqualigo's letter, which is dated the 19th of October,
1501, is given in the memoir of Sebastian Cabot, p. 235-6.] No other
exploration along this coast by the Portuguese, tending to the
Arctic circle is known to have taken place before the publication of
the Verrazzano letter. The first voyage of Cortereal, was, according
to the description of the people given by Damiam de Goes, among the
Esquimaux, whether on the one side or the other of Davis straits it
is unnecessary here to inquire, as the Esquimaux are not found south
of 50 Degrees N. latitude. The land along which he ran in his second
voyage, was, according to the same historian, distinctly named after
him and his brother, who shared his fate in a subsequent voyage. It
is so called on several early printed maps on which it is
represented as identical with Newfoundland. It appears first on a
map of the world in the Ptolemy of 1511 edited by Bernardus Sylvanus
of Eboli, and is there laid down as extending from latitude 50
Degrees N. to 60 Degrees N. with the name of Corte Real or Court
Royal, latinized into Regalis Domus. [Footnote: Claudii Ptholemaei
Alexandrini liber geographiae, cum tabulis et universali figura et
cum additione locorum quae a recentioribus reporta sunt diligenti
cura emendatus et impressus. (Fol., Venetiis, 1511.)] The length of
the coast, corresponds with the description of Pasqualigo, and its
position with the latitude assigned by the Verrazzano letter for
their exploration. Its direction is north and south. There can be no
question therefore as to the pretension of the Verrazzano letter to
the discovery of the coast by him, actually as far north as the
fiftieth parallel.
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