90 SANDFOED FLEMING ON 



I— MARITIME EXl»EI>ITI03fS. 



(1) Early Voyages of Discovery in the North Atlantic. 



Columbus had formed the belief that the earth had less dimeusiou than it really 

 possesses, and that the continent of Asia extended farther to the eastward. This opinion 

 was the ground of his being confident of reaching Cathay by a western voyage. So 

 firmly was this belief held, that when Columbus set sail in 1402, he was the bearer of 

 a letter from the Spanish court to the Great Kaan of the mighty oriental empire. 



More than one European nation was stimulated to activity by the prospects of pro- 

 fitable trade with Asia. As Cathay was the aim of Columbus, so likewise it became the 

 goal of Cabot, who induced Henry VII of England to enter the field of maritime enter- 

 prise. The expedition fitted out under the command of Cabot obtained for him the 

 fame of preceding Columbus in the first actual discovery of the new continent. John 

 Cabot sighted the coast of Labrador June 24th, 149*7, thirteen months before Columbus 

 beheld any part of the mainland. It was not until August 1st, 1498, on his third voyage, 

 that Columbus for the first time looked upon the shores he had long sought. ' 



Columbus discovered the Bahamas in 1492, and the other "West Indian Islands in 

 subsequent years, believing them to be outlying islands of Asia. The Archipelago 

 received the name it still bears under the belief that it was within the limits of the 

 Indian Ocean. The great captain did not live to kuow that another continent, and another 

 ocean, the broadest expanse of water on the surface of the globe, intervened between the 

 "West Indies and the shores visited by Marco Polo two centuries earlier. To the day of 

 his death, Columbu.s was firm in the conviction that the islands and lands, he had 

 discovered, were in proximity to the domain of the Great Kaan. 



The two Cabots, John and Sebastian, equally with Columbus, were imbued with 

 the idea, that the shores of Asia were washed by the waters of the Atlantic and they 

 each displayed great activity in pursuing the object of their search. They were each 

 distinguished by lofty enthixsiasm, extraordinary courage, and indomitable perseverance, 

 in the work of discovery which they had undertaken. 



While it cannot be doubted that Columbus was the first who conceived the idea of a 

 western route to the East, it is certain that he was not the first who discovered the new 

 continent. Christopher Columbus, the Genoese, kindled the flame of western maritime 

 adventure, and the result of his first voyage filled Europe with wonder and admiration ; 

 it was, however, John Cabot the Venetian and Sebastian, his English-born son, who 

 discovered America. The record shows that the great Columbus never beheld any portion 

 of the North American continent, and that he did not come within sight of South America, 

 until the year in which Sebastian Cabot had made a voyage of discovery along the whole 

 coast between Virginia and the entrance to Hudson Strait. In that year, 1498, Sebastian 

 Cabot, with a fleet of five ships under the English flag, bent upon the effort to find an 



' Columbus landed on an island named by the Indians Guanahani, October 12, 1192, believed to be San 

 Salvador, one of the Bahamas. The first view lie had of the mainland was at the mouth of the Orinoco in South 

 America on August 1, 1498. He died May 20, 1506. 



