ad. THE ENGLISH VOYAGES 



1576. 



beyond the Equinoctiall line, he was ignorant of all 

 passages Northward from the elevation of 63. degrees: 

 he knewe no Ocean sea beyond Asia, yet have the 



[III. 27.] Portugals trended the cape of Good hope at the South 

 point of Afrike, and travelled to Japan an Island in 

 the East Ocean, betweene Asia & America : our mer- 

 chants in the time of king Edward the sixt discovered 

 the Moscovian passage farther North then Thyle, & 

 shewed Groenland not to be continent with Lappeland 

 & Norway : the like our Northwesterne travellers have 

 done, declaring by their navigation that way, the ignor- 

 ance of all Cosmographers that either doe joyne Groen- 

 land with America, or continue the West Indies with 

 that frosty region under the north pole. As for Virgil 

 he sang according to the knowledge of men in his 

 time, as an other Poet did of the hot Zone. 



Ovid. 1. Quarum quae media est, non est habitabilis aestu. 



Meta. Imagining, as most men then did, Zonam torridam, 



the hot Zone to be altogether dishabited for heat, 

 though presently wee know many famous and woorthy 

 kingdomes and cities in that part of the earth, and 

 the Island of S. Thomas neere ^Ethiopia, & the 

 wealthy Islands for the which chiefly all these voyages 

 are taken in hand, to be inhabited even under the 

 equinoctiall line. 



So/. 3. To answere the third objection, besides Cabota and 



all other travellers navigations, the onely credit of M. 

 Frobisher may suffice, who lately through all these 

 Islands of ice, and mountaines of snow, passed that 

 way, even beyond the gulfe that tumbleth downe from 

 the North, and in some places though he drewe one 

 inch thicke ice, as he returning in August did, yet 

 came he home safely againe. 



So/ 4. The fourth argument is altogether frivolous & vaine, 



for neither is there any isthmos or strait of land 

 betweene America and Asia, ne can these two landes 

 joyntly be one continent. The first part of my answere 

 is manifestly allowed of by Homer, whom that excellent 



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