Cll NOTES. 



was not commenced until 1527, 15 years after the death of Amerigo, and 

 was completed in 1559, 7 years before the death of the aged author in his 92d 

 year. Praise and bitter censure are mingled in it in an extraordinary mannor. 

 We see that dislike and suspicion augmented progressively as the fame of the 

 Florentine navigator spread. In the preface (Prologo) which was written 

 first, Las Casas says, " Amerigo relates what he did in two voyages to oar 

 Indies, but he appears to me to have passed over many circumstances in silence, 

 whether advisedly (a saviendas) or because he did not attend to them ; this 

 has led some to attribute to him that which is due to others, and which ought 

 not to be taken from them." The sentence pronounced in the 1st book (chap. 

 140) is still equally moderate : " Here I must notice the injustice towards 

 the Admiral which appears to have been committed by Amerigo, or perhaps by 

 those who printed (16s que imprimieron) his Quatuor Navigationes. To him 

 alone, without naming any other, the discovery of the continent is attributed. 

 He is also said to have placed in maps the name of America, thereby sinfully 

 failing towards the Admiral. As Amerigo was eloquent, and an elegant 

 writer (era latino y eloquente), he makes himself appear in the letter to 

 King Renatus like the leader of Hojeda's expedition : yet he was only one of 

 the pilots, although experienced in seamanship and learned in cosmography 

 (hombre entendido en las cosas de la mar y docto en cosmographia) . , , . In 

 the world the belief prevails that he was the first at the main land. Il he 

 purposely gave currency to this belief, it was great wickedness j and if it was 

 not really intentionally done, yet it looks like it (clara pareze la falsedad : y 

 si fue de industria hecha, maldad grande me ; y ya que no lo fuese, al menoa 



parezelo) Amerigo is represented as having sailed in the year 7 (1497) : 



which seems indeed to have been only an error of the pen and not an inten- 

 tional false statement (pareza aver avido yerro de pendola y no malicia), be. 

 cause he is made to have returned at the end of 18 months. "She foreign 

 writers call the country America. It ought to be Columba." This passage 

 shews clearly that up to that time Las Casas had not accused Amerigo 

 having himself brought the name America into usage. He says, " an 

 tornado los escriptores extrangeros de nombrar la nuestra Tierra firme America, 

 conio si Americo solo y no otro con el y antes que todos la oviera descubier- 

 to.** Farther on in the work, lib. i. cap. 164169, and lib. ii. cap. 2, 

 violent animosity breaks out : nothing is now attributed to erroneous dates, 

 or to the partiality of foreigners for Amerigo ; all is intentional deceit of 

 which Amerigo himself is guilty (" de industria lo hizo . . . persistio en el 

 engaio . . . de falsedad esta claramente convencido"). Bartholome de laa 



