so DISCOVERIES OF 1467- 



extracted from pretended letters of Behaim himself, 

 written in j486, and preserved in the archives of 

 Nuremberg; and from these, it would further 

 appear, that ^' Martin Behaim, traversing the Atlan- 

 tic ocean for several years, examined the American 

 islands, and discovered the strait which bears the 

 name of Magellan, before either Christopher Colum- 

 bus or Magellan sailed those seas; whence he 

 mathematically delineated, on a geographical chart, 

 for the king of Lusitania, the situation of the 

 coast around every part of that famous and re- 

 nowned strait, long before Magellan thought of his 

 expedition." It would require better support, than 

 that they have hitherto met with, to make such 

 clumsy fabrications pass current in the world. ^ It 

 was not at all necessary for Columbus to receive 

 any information from Behaim ; he was too well 

 acquainted with the nature of the sphere not to 

 know that India could be approached by proceed- 

 ing to the wxst as well as to the east, if no other 

 land should be found to intervene; and it is quite 

 evident, from all his endeavours to pass to the East 

 Indies by a western route, that the continuity of 

 the continent of America was entirely new to, and 

 wholly unexpected by, him. His hope had been- to 

 find a direct passage to Cathay and Zipangu, names 



feet the hairy skin of the guanaco, which gave them the appear- 

 ance of bears' feet." 



* Paper by Citizen Otto, in Amer. Phil. Trans, vol. ii. Nichol- 

 son's Journals, vol. ii. and iii. Sup. to Ency. Britt. 



