6s ACCOUNT OF THE ARCTIC REGIONS- 



Near the close of the fourteenth century, Nicho- 

 las and Antonio Zeno, two Italians, made voy- 

 ages of discovery 4n the north and west, from 

 the islands of Shetland or Faroe, as is generally 

 believed. Nicholas, it appears, visited Greenland, 

 and Antonio, according to Forster, sailed to a 

 country supposed to have been that of ancient Win- 

 land, and afterwards visited Greenland and Ice- 

 land. 



After this period, a new stimulus was offered to 

 the enterprising trader, which was the well-found- 

 ed hope then entertained, of performing the passage 

 from Europe to India by sea, from whence immense 

 riches were expected to be derived. 



The celebrated navigator Columbus, conceiving 

 India, to be much more extensive than it really is, 

 calculated, from the known spherical form of the 

 earth, that he should soon reach it by sailing to the 

 westward, and was very anxious to make the at- 

 tempt. After a number of disappointments and 

 much tedious delay, he was employed, for the purpose 

 of putting his project into execution, by the Queen of 

 Spain. He sailed from Palos in August 1492; 

 and the result of his voyage was the discovery of 

 the West Indies, the islands of which were so 

 named, from the supposition that they lay contigu- 

 ous to the coast of India. Soon after Columbus's 

 voyages, the Portugueze navigator, Vasquez de Ga- 

 ma, succeeded in reaching India by sailing round 

 tlie Cape of Good Hope ; but before this successful 



