28 ^TRANSACTIONS iSqQ-'oO 



east corner is the foundation of the claim that England made in 

 after years to the proprietorship of this country including 

 Hudson Bay and the islands forming "our northern fringe." 



The Cabots' voyages were the first of those westerly sailings 

 which are the title deeds of Canada as the Empire's TrUvStee. 



When the union of the provinces after many years of dis- 

 cussion, more or less polemic and academical, came within the 

 sphere of practical politics by the assembling in 1865 in the city 

 of Quebec of the body of public men known to us of the present 

 generation as "The Fathers of Confederation" — a sadly minished 

 body to-day — there was much talk and much writing in the 

 newspapers about the name by which the young auxiliary nation 

 should be known. Among many suggested, Cabotia seemed, 

 especially in the east, to be the favourite. Other considerations 

 rather than historic justice dominated the minds of the 

 "Fathers," and the place-name "Canada" was selected and given 

 the wider application to suit the new conditions. 



We have not altogether slighted the memory of the first 

 navigator who sailed along the eastern sea-front of this 

 country. In the more recent maps of the Dominion the name 

 Cabot Strait, to designate the passage connecting the gulf of St. 

 Lawrence and the Atlantic Ocean between Cape Breton and New- 

 foundland, fittingly commemorates the earliest discoveror of this 

 country. It is, I believe, the only Cabot place-name in Canada. 



Perhaps when the United States take their place within the 

 Empire the part of the continent staked off for the Britishers — 

 Canada included — may receive the general name of Cabotia. 

 Who knows ? 



To go back to our story. In 1500-01 a Portuguese explorer, 

 Gaspar Cortereal, moved thereto by knowledge of the Cabots' 

 voyages of 1497 and 1498 and by desire to see if some of the land 

 visited by Cabot lay east of Borgia's Meridian"^' and could there- 



*Borsfia's Bull was a decree issued by Rodriofa Borg-ia, Pope Alexander 

 VI., by virtue of which Spain had conferred on her Sovereigns the possession 

 of all lands discovered or to be discovered lying west of a meridian looleag-ues 

 to the west of the Azores and Cape Verd Islands. A year after (1494) the 

 line was removed to a distance 370 leagues west of the Cape Verd Islands. 

 This would correspond to a line between the 41st and the 44th meridians west 

 of Greenwich. East of this line lands discovered, or to be discovered, be- 

 longed to Portugal and west of it to Spain. 



