Vlll INTRODUCTION. 



to the Archbishop of Lima. 1 Shortly after the close of 

 the last session of the Council, Acosta embarked, with 

 all his valuable manuscripts, representing the literary 

 labours of about fifteen years, and commenced his voy 

 age to Mexico. He shows himself, in his remarks 

 during the passage, to be a shrewd observer of nature, 

 and an eager seeker after knowledge. 2 During this, or 

 the subsequent voyage home, he learnt from an expert 

 Portuguese pilot that there were four points of no 

 variation on the earth, and that one of them was the 

 island of Corvo in the Azores. 3 Acosta landed, after a 

 long voyage, at the port of Guatulco, 4 at the western 

 end of the Gulf of Tehuantepec, in the Oaxaca province, 

 whence he journeyed by land to Mexico, where he 

 resided in 1586. 5 In this country he had opportuni- 



1 There are two lives of Archbishop Toribio Mogrovejo. One is 

 by the learned Don Antonio Leon-Pinelo, entitled Vida del Ilus- 

 trissimo Reverendissimo D. Torijjio Alfonso Mogrovejo, Arcobispo de 

 la ciudad de los Reyes (1653). The other is by Dr. Juan Francisco 

 A. de Montalvo, and has a quaint title-page El Sol del Nuevo 

 Mundo idea Jo y compuesto en las esclarecidas operadones del Biena- 

 venturado Toribio Arcosbis2)o de Lima (Rome, 1683). Leon Pinclo 

 gives very full particulars of the Archbishop s family and ancestry. 

 The work of Montalvo is valuable because it contains notices of 

 the lives of many Peruvian authors. 



2 Page 127. 3 Page 52. 



4 Page 400. Sir Francis Drake, during his famous voyage of 

 circumnavigation, arrived at Guatulco on April 15th, 1579. Here 

 he got provisions, and also &quot; a certaine pot full of rials of plate 

 which \ve found in the towne, together with a chain of gold, and 

 some other jewels, which we intreated a gentleman Spaniard to 

 leave behind him, as he was flying out of towne.&quot; (Drake s Worlde 

 Encompassed, p. 113.) Here Drake landed a Portugal pilot whom 

 he had captured out of a vessel at the Cape Verde Islands. This 

 man is mentioned by Acosta; sec page 140. 5 Page 454. 



