IN NORTHERN MISTS 



old document, was in London on June 6, 1501, when he and 

 three others whose names are given (perhaps his sureties) 

 were "bounden in ij obligations to pay" £20 to the King 

 before next Whitsuntide. Possibly it was this loan received 

 from the King for the voyage, which he then had to repay. If 

 he really started, it may be supposed that his ship was the one 

 that put back to Ireland; and this document is therefore no 

 certain proof of any of the other four ships having ever returned. 

 For that matter they may all have been lost in the same gale. 

 But, in the year 1501, the ship that returned from Caspar Corte- 

 real's expedition is reported to have brought back to Lisbon a 

 broken gilt sword of Italian workmanship from the east coast 

 of North America; and it is also stated that two Venetian 

 silver rings had been saen on a native boy from that country. 

 It has been assumed that these objects may have belonged to 

 some of the participators in John Cabot's expedition of 1498, 

 which in that case must have reached America, and there 

 met with some disaster. 



It is difficult to say more of this voyage. That John 

 Cabot should have returned after having reached America, 

 and after having sailed a greater or less distance along the 

 coast without finding the riches he was in search of, appears 

 to me unlikely. Such an assumption would provide no 

 explanation of the complete silence about him. As the 

 foreign ministers had followed this expedition with so much 

 attention, we might surely expect - them to say something 

 about its having disappointed the great expectations that 

 were formed of it; and in any case it was unlikely that the 

 whole should be buried in complete silence, which, on the 

 other hand, is easily comprehensible if nothing more was heard 

 of the expedition, since it may all have been forgotten for 

 other things which claimed attention. Thus the story of 

 Giovanni Caboto, the discoverer of the North American conti- 

 nent, ends, as it began, in obscurity. He was too early with 

 his discovery. England had not yet developed her trade and 

 navigation sufficiently to be able to follow it up and avail 

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