[s. E. DAwsox] THE VOYAGES OF THE CABOTS 13 



are all French authorities. We may dispute their theses, but not their 

 nationaUty ; and I wish particularly to insist on the fact that D'Avezac — 

 a Frenchman to the innermost core — accepts in the fullest degree the 

 authenticity of the so-called Cabot map of 1544, which I, as well as 

 many others wdio have written upon the subject, could not accept to the 

 same extent. 



Again, Cartier did not discover Cape Breton, nor Newfoundland, nor 

 Labrador. They were discovered thirty-five years before he came on 

 the coast. He came to a coast mapped and named. He first touched at 

 Bonavista and although he named a few places not (Appendix E, Jacques 

 Cartier) on the maps, he found the coast named on his course as far, at 

 least, as Old Fort Bay on the Canadian Labrador. The Strait of Belle- 

 Isle was then, and for 200 years after, known as La Grande Bale ; and 

 Old Fort Bay (Esquimaux Bay on some maps) was a port frequented by 

 French and Basque fishermen. It was known to Jacques Cartier, as well 

 as to all sailors of that day, as Brest, and after he had touched there on 

 his first voyage inwards he says himself that on proceeding further 

 inwards, he found at Shecatica a vessel from LaRochelle looking for the 

 port of Brest, her destined harbour, which she had oversailed in the night. 

 Cartier expresses no surprise at meeting her as if it were anything un- 

 common. 



Then again Cartier did not discover Cape Breton, for, as earl3"asl504, 

 Bretons, and Basques, and Portuguese fishermen began to swarm all along 

 these shores. On his first voyage Carder sailed in and out by Belle-Isle. 

 On his second he sailed in by Belle-Isle but he sailed out by St. Paul's and 

 when he arrived at St. Pierre Miquelon he sWply remarks that he found 

 many fishing vessels there. These are Cartier's own statements and 

 surely he must be permitted to know more about the matter than anyone 

 else, nor can we doubt either his nationality or his patriotism. 



Three localities of first discovery are alone before us, Labrador, Xew- 

 foundland and Cape Breton, and no person ever asserted that Cartier dis- 

 covered any one of them. The fact is patent that the whole east coast of 

 North America was well known lone; before Cartier. Puttinff aside all 

 the work of the Corte Eeals and other Portuguese mariners, Verrazano 

 sailed along it in 1524 and the mappe monde of Hieronimus de Verrazano 

 of 1529 still exists in the Museo Borgiano at Eome. That map shows the 

 w*hole coast with a closed line. There is no Gulf of St. Lawrence, but 

 there is the cape of Cape Breton, named and in its right place. Then 

 there was Estevan Gomez in 1525— beyond all doubt he sailed along the 

 coast and saw Cape Breton and he followed along the coast of the island 

 and saw Cape Enfumé, with its smoke like mists rising, as now, up 

 the face of the cliffs, a sight never to be mistaken for anything else ; and 

 he crossed the strait, supposing it to be a bay, from St. Paul to Cape Ray, 

 and sailed along the south shore of Newfoundland homewards. All these 



