126 THE DISCOVERY OF AUSTRALIA 



a large part of which, at any rate, was shown even by 

 the Portuguese to be on' the Spanish side of the line. The 

 thought of the Spanish navigator, as he looked at these 

 maps, would be Let, us at once form a colony at Cape de 

 Fremose ! But as a matter of fact there seems no evidence 

 either that the Spaniards were acquainted with these 

 maps, or that the Portuguese ever sought to make them 

 acquainted. The probability seems to be that the maps 

 were made for the use of Portuguese seamen, and according 

 to the best Portuguese knowledge. 



(2) I find it almost equally difficult to see convincing 

 resemblance in the two East coasts. If we accept Mr. 

 Collingridge's view that the Northern part of this coast 

 is the Northern part of the coast of Queensland, how are 

 we to explain the multitudinous rivers ? 1 What, again, 

 are we to say about the remarkable peninsula which 

 ends in Cape de Fremose ? It seems quite unlike anything 

 on the coast of East Australia, and even Mr. Major calls 

 it a " manifest blunder and exaggeration." On the 

 other hand, it seems to be like the most prominent feature 

 on the Eastern coasts of Africa and South America, and 

 makes one wonder whether the map-maker was not guessing 

 that the unknown continent of the South took the shape 

 of the two known continents. 



Moreover, the only map that brings this Eastern coast- 

 line to an end the map by Rotz makes it end at 60, 

 immensely further to the South than Tasmania, so far 

 South indeed that one begins to think about the land 

 of which Varthema had heard, where the days were so 

 short and the cold so extreme. In fact, the contour 

 of the Eastern coast of Jave la Grande seems so unlike 

 the contour of the Eastern coast of Australia that it seems 

 useless to go into detail, and to discuss, for example, whether 

 the " Baye des herbaiges " is Botany Bay, or whether 

 the " coste dangereuse " is the coral reef on which the 



1 Mr. Major points out that " from Cape York all along the coast 

 of Australia to the 22nd or 23rd degree there is not even an indication 

 of a river emptying itself into the sea." He concludes that the coast 

 must be the coast, not of Queensland, but of the Gulf. 



