4 SMITHSONIAN MISCELLANEOUS COLLECTIONS VOL. 102 



Antarctic polar regions, N. and S. ; the two temperate, where the 

 sun reaches the Tropics of Cancer and Capricorn, keeping them as its 

 Hmits, without being able to go beyond them ; and the median zone 

 of the earth, which is the equinoctial and is called the Torrid Zone. 

 Since these are so well known and obvious, as are the parts of the 

 world included in them which are inhabited, I would say that from 

 the Torrid Zone to either of the Poles, Arctic or Antarctic, there are 

 90 degrees, of 17I leagues each ; from one Pole to the other, 180 de- 

 grees ; another 180 degrees from E. to W., measured in a straight 

 line. Thus the universe contains 360 degrees, of 17^ leagues each, 

 making on a great circle 6,300 leagues from one Pole to the other, 

 and from E. to W. ; as for the circumference, God alone can measure 

 it, and not human understanding. 



10. I asserted that in all the countries which His Majesty holds 

 under his empire, continually, at every hour, and without pause, the 

 Holy Sacrifice is being celebrated ; that is certain of the Mass, con- 

 sidering the course of the sun and its retardation over the great dis- 

 tance which separates some countries from others ; e.g., when it is 

 midday in Spain, in the Indies, which are 2,000 leagues from Spain 

 to the W., it is between 5 and 6 a.m., because there the sun rises above 

 the horizon, on account of the remoteness, that length of time later 

 than in Spain, which is to the E. with reference to the West Indies ; 

 and so it goes with the rest, according to the greater or lesser dis- 

 tance between one country and another. In fact, if one considers the 

 countries in the Indies from Cartagena, which is at 10° N., to the city 

 of Castro in the Kingdom of Chile, in the Chiloe Islands, which are 

 at 43° S., there is a distance of over 1,400 leagues, in which there is a 

 retardation of the sun in its rising and setting, not only with regard 

 to our hemisphere but also to Cartagena for another fraction of time ; 

 so that with the Kingdom of Chile, which is on the same parallel with 

 Spain but toward the other Pole, one has to consider that in a gen- 

 eral way it is nearly at the antipodes of Spain, and that consequently 

 when it is day in Spain, it is night down there. 



11. And if we consider the distance from Chile to New Mexico, 

 which is likewise in the latitude of Chile, but in the opposite direc- 

 tion, and the great distance from New Spain to the Philippine 

 Islands — over 2,000 leagues of navigation to Manila, which is at 

 14° N., — we have likewise to admit that in this vast expanse the sun 

 has to suffer great retardation, with many hours of difference ; then 

 come the Moluccas, 400 leagues to the S., and India, which is 500 E. ; 

 so that if one makes the reckoning and computation in fine detail of 

 the path traced successively by the sun in the countries held by His 



