88 SAMUEL EDWARD DAWSOX ON THE 



Portuguese ; the town or station called Brest, on Old Fort Bay, is given twice on the 

 Labrador coast ; Cap Tiennot is twisted into de tronof, while in another place is laid down 

 ?/' de tronof. The Saguenay river is given as M. de S. qiienain, and near it is another evident 

 double, Saqui. Then there are unmeaning names, siich as tuftonaer, on the River St. Law- 

 rence above Lake St. Peter ; this is evidently a corruption of some French name on Cartier's 

 charts; probably tuftonaer estadas means "Country of the Tudemans'^" of Cartier. Baie de 

 S. Laurent becomes haija de S. loreme. Cartier's Baie de S. Lunaire is C. del maro. These 

 errors and corruptions would imply a compilation of material by an unskilful hand fi'om 

 all the authors then extant. I have confined my remarks to errors in the Canadian names 

 only. Kohl and Harrisse point out many otliers elsewhere. 



There is also another class of errors ; e. g., Ireland is drawn too large, as being almost 

 equal to England and Scotland combined ; in England, Dover and Yarmouth are laid down, 

 but not Bristol, the second city of the kingdom, and the place from whence both the Cabot 

 expeditions sailed, and, moreover, which Cal)ot, when in an English mood, claimed as his 

 birthplace. All the Labrador coast is fringed with conventional islands in rows exactly four 

 deep ; Newfoundland is broken up into many detached islands — that is not remarkable, for 

 many later maps do the same ; but in this map little conventional islands are strung all 

 through the interstices. All the islands on the coast are laid down in the most symbolic 

 way, as if from some narrative which simply stated tliat the coast was studded with many 

 islands. 



The information contained in the legends is collected from all treatises on cosmography, 

 ancient and modern, and represents the current popular belief of the time. But many of 

 them contain stories of fabulous monsters which Cabot must have been too well informed to 

 believe. Men with pigs' heads, who cannot talk but only grunt — of these monsters not only 

 descriptions on the margin but drawings are given upon the map itself. Then there are 

 people with ears so large as to cover their bodies, and men without joints in their knees 

 or feet ; there are men who whistle their communications to each other but cannot speak ; 

 there are birds which pick up an ox or a ship ; there are lampreys which attack ships. 

 These last might be gigantic octopods ; but when it is related, on the authority of Pliny, 

 that there is a fish called the echinis or rémora, only half a foot long, which can stop a ship 

 under full sail, and when a drawing of this wonderful creature is given, it becomes clear 

 that such matter could never have been i-evised by Cabot. Yet whoever com[iiled this 

 map must have had some communication, direct or indirect, with Cabot ; because there are 

 some particulars noted in legends" Nos. 8 and 17, about the first voyage to America and the 

 variation of the compass, which would seem to have come from him ; but even they are 

 stated ol)liquely in the third person, as if the map were itself speaking. The theory which 

 seems most plausible is a modification of Mr. Harrisse's latest view. It is that Cabot was 

 at that time meditating a transfer of his services to England. The negotiations must have 

 been secret, since in 1545 Cabot, with Gutierez and Alonzo de Chaves, was appointed on 

 a commission to examine De Medina's Arte de Navegar. That is the last record of him in 

 Spain. Suddenly, in 1547, an entry in the minutes of council of King Edward \J. to pay 

 the expenses of his removal, shows his presence in England. Cabot covered his hand so 

 successfully in his intrigues with Venice in 1523 and 1551 that it was only during very 

 recent researches in the Venetian archives that his methods came to light. As pilot major 

 of Spain he would not dare either to jiublisli in Spain or to contribute to the publication 



