XVI EOYAL SOCIETY OF CANADA. 



" The arrangements continue for copying in Paris the numerous State papers relative to our 

 history, which are found, for the greater part, in the archives of the new Minister of Colonies (for- 

 merly Minister of Marine and Colonies), where I had the advantage of examining and cataloguing 

 these documents some years ago. 



" I am referring here only to the manuscript section of our archives, and leave out of consider- 

 ation our consulting library of printed books, which ali-eady comprises several thousand volumes. 



" It is much to be desired that the government soon take measures to provide the department 

 with accommodation more suitable for a library, already so important in the way of manuscripts and 

 printed books. The three small rooms set apart for the archives are already so encumbered that we 

 are at straits to place the new collections that we are constantly receiving. Indeed, the dampness of 

 the quarters, which are situated in a basement, is injurious not only to the health of the statf, but also 

 to the preservation of the valuable documents which are under its cai-e." 



The Council hope that the Government of the Dominion will soon find itself in a position to 

 provide suitable accommodation for books and manuscripts collected at such large expense, and so 

 invaluable to the country, and indeed to the world at large. If it were possible to build a national 

 museum worthy of the Dominion, then a section of it could be properly devoted to this service. In 

 the meantime care should be taken to prevent any damage or deterioration lo these valuable manu- 

 scripts, and to enable the staff to make the best possible arrangements for purposes of reference. 



XX. A Cabot Celebration in 1897 suggested. 



The well known historical writer, and a member of this Society, the Eev. Dr. Moses Harvey, of 

 St. John's, Newfoundland, has addressed a letter to the Honorary Secretary requesting him to call the 

 attention of the Council, and through them of the Eoyal Society, to an interesting event in the his- 

 tory of this continent and of the Dominion, the four hundredth anniversary of which will occur three 

 years hence. It was on a June day in 1497, live years after Columbus had landed on an island of the 

 West Indian archipelago, and given a new dominion to Spain, that a Venetian, John Cabot, in a Bristol 

 ship manned by English sailors, sailed under the authority of Henrj' VII. of England, to find a north- 

 westei-n passage to the riches of Asia, in emulation of the discovery of the great Genoese. Much 

 controversy has gone on for years with respect to this memorable voyage, and the landfall actually 

 made in northeastern America by Cabot. For years this landfall was believed to boBonavista on the 

 eastern coast of Newfoundland, but latterly a dispute has grown up between the advocates of Cape 

 North in Cape Breton, as it is shown in a recent monograph on that island in the 'Transactions of the 

 Eoyal Society,' and the advocates of some point between Cape Chidley and the headlands of Sandwich 

 Bay on the coast of Labrador, as it is warmly argued by Henrj' Harrisse in his latest work. In 1498, 

 another voyage was made by John Cabot to North America, also under English auspices, and the best 

 authority goes to show that the landfall on that occasion must be placed south of the first, and the 

 exploration embraced the northeast coast of the present United States as far as Florida. The famous 

 map of 1500 of the Biscayan pilot, Juan de la Cosa — the first map wo have of the new world— clearly 

 gives evidence of these English discoveries in its delineation of a continuous coast line of a continent 

 which at the north contains a line of English flags, and the inscription Mar discubierta por los Tngleses 

 and a cape at the extreme north called Cano de ynglaterra. In the Eibero map of 15-9 we have 

 evidently also a reference to the English discoveries under Cabot, in the inscription applied to a 

 northern country. The planisphere of 1544 ascribed to Sebastian Cabot, and discovered in 1843 in 

 Germany, is the chief authority on which the advocates of Cape North as the landfall of 1497 mainly 

 rest their claim, and it is difiScult to set aside the strength of the claim while the authenticity of this 

 map can be successfully or, at least, strongly defended, as it assuredly appears to be the case so far 

 as the argument has advanced. But this is not the place for an examination of the respective conten- 

 tions in a cartigraphical and historical controversy which waxes very warm at times, and make * 

 Henry Harrisse an advocate rather than a judge. Its natui-e has already been reviewed in the mono- 



