[s. K DAWSON] THE LINES OF DEMARCATION 509 



It was in use, in early times, by the sailors of the Mediterranean, as la 

 sea measure exactly equivalent to four Roman or Italian miles. The 

 writers of the period of expansion had, therefore, no need to qualify or 

 translate their nautical distances, for they were understood by all, at the 

 simple ratio of eight stades to a mile and four miles to a league. Notions 

 concerning "fancy stades" and "fancy leagues'' are anachronistic stumb- 

 ling blocks in the way of a student. The early writers did indeed 

 speculate much as to how many leagues went to a degree ; but not as 

 to the length of a stade, a mile or a league. These latter were their 

 standards, in which they were trying to work out the length of a great 

 circle of the earth and of its three hundred and sixtieth part, to wit, — 

 a degree. They were the known elements — the a 'and h of the problem; 

 the length of a degree was the x and y — the unknown quantity. The 

 league was an absolute measure — ^any man might pace it oS on any ro'ad 

 — the degree depended upon the circumference of the earth, and it is 

 evident that the 370 leagues of the treaty of Tordesill'as would extend 

 to a far greater western longitude on the shrunken globe of Columbus 

 tlian on the expanded globe of Jaime Ferrer's imagination. 



As "fancy stades" of 1111 'I, 833 %, 700 and 500 to a degree were 

 invented by geographers, from Don Jaime Ferrer down to recent times, 

 in order to harmonize the theories of Aristotle, Archimedes, Eratos- 

 thenes and Ptolemy as to tlie earth's circumference, so, these being ex- 

 ploded, similar illusions sprang up concerning leagues and, even in the 

 present day, are befogging the nautical history of the fifteenth and six- 

 teenth centuries. None of the old authors or navigators suspect they 

 are dealing with a variable measure. The Pope and the treaty-makers, 

 as well las the seamen, give tlieir distances, their sailing directions, in 

 leagues — just only leagues — ^v/ithout a qualifying adjective. In late 

 works, however, we read of leagues 1-1 ^| a, 15, 16 ^la, 16 ^[3, 17 ^[2 and 

 21 ^Is to a degree, "Merveilleux procédé" writes D'Avezac, "qui, pour 

 "assurer l'exactitude du mesurage, crée la mesure même d'après l'objet 

 " bien ou mal mesuré." 



It is in this respect that Mr. Harrisse's Diplomatic History -svill be 

 apt to mislead the imwary reader, and the danger is the greater because 

 of the mathematical top-dressing which gives a semblance of solidity to 

 what is really a quicksand of hypotheses. Thus we read — (p. 93) : 



" Fen-er s above stated data result in four different lengths for his 

 "league, viz., 31-353, 31-813, 31-635 and 31-875 to the degree of the 

 " equator of his sphere. For reasons given in our notes we select from 

 " among these four valuations 31;875 to his equatorial degree upon which 

 " to base our calculations." Mr. Harrisse selected the right valuation 

 according to Eratosthenes, but, not according to Ferrer, for a reference 



