LOST COLONIES OF NORTHMEN AND PORTUGUESE. 47 



that the eastern portion of British North America was the first part of 

 the New World that was constituted a colony, that from 1500 to 1579 

 commissions were regularly issued to the Corte Reals as governors of 

 Terra Nova, and that by virtue of this claim on the part of the Portu- 

 guese at least three settlements were made by the Portuguese them- 

 selves, and later by the Spaniards (after they had annexed Portugal), 

 one of these colonies being the earliest European settlement in North 

 America after the discovery of the New World by Cabot. 



A flood of light has been shed upon this early colonization by Senhor 

 Ernesto do Canto, of San Miguel, Azores, whose most recent publica- 

 tion on early Portuguese exploration consists mainly of a selection of 

 documents connected with the family of the Corte Reals, the explor- 

 ers and first governors of Northeastern America. 



The information contained in Senhor do Canto's work enables me to 

 claim for the northeastern parts of America almost a century of his- 

 torical existence prior to the seventeenth century. This colony, em- 

 bracing Labrador, Newfoundland, and Nova Scotia, and, under the 

 grant to Fagundes, probably a large portion on the east coast of the 

 present United States, was far the earliest European colony (except- 

 ing perhaps Vinland) not only in North America, but also in the 

 New World, for the commissions of the Corte Reals date in regular 

 succession from 1500 (i. e., two years after America had been dis- 

 covered by Columbus, and six years after its discovery by Cabot) 

 until 1579, soon after which Portugal and its possessions were annexed 

 to Spain. 



This colony of the Corte Reals was not merely a nominal one, for 

 in the course of the sixteenth century the Portuguese made a settle- 

 ment in Cape Breton in 1521, and another in 1567, while the Spaniards 

 their successors sent a third to the same country. Of these three 

 colonies little or nothing is known ; even the colony of Terra Nova 

 has lost its place in history, which begins the annals of British North 

 America a century later with the arrival of French settlers in La Nou- 

 velle France. 



In 1500 Gaspar Corte Real explored the coast of Labrador, proba- 

 bly nearly as far north as Hudson Strait, and also Newfoundland and 

 Nova Scotia. He brought back several of the natives, who resembled 

 the present Micmac Indians. He went there again, in 1501, with 

 three vessels, but that in which he sailed never returned. In 1502 his 

 brother, Miguel, sailed in search of Gaspar, and met with the same 

 fate. Again, in 1503, an expedition was sent out to try to get some 

 tidings of the two gallant brothers, but without success, and the king, 

 discouraged by these disasters, refused to allow Vasco Annes, the 

 elder brother, and one of the ornaments of his court, to continue the 

 search. 



In early charts of this continent the Portuguese flag is frequently 

 represented as waving over Labrador, Newfoundland (Bacealaos), and 



