218 KANSAS CITY REVIEW OF SCIENCE. 



CABOT'S MAP OF THE WORLD. 



CAPT. E. L, BERTHOUD. 

 ( I^anslaied from No. sji, June 12, 1882. of U Exploration. ) 



Twenty years ago my learned and venerable friend Mr. Ferdinand DeniSy 

 my father and myself, had with a genuine geographical appetite of choice selec- 

 tion, studied closely the great world map of the National Library. We had al- 

 ready finished a commentary of it, when we resolved not to pass over one line of 

 a very long " Legend" which accompanies this map. Suddenly one of us cried 

 out, a discovery \ that is no longer doubtful. Effectively we read in the first col- 

 umn on the left. Note 8, thus written : 



'** This land was discovered by John Cabot, a, Venetian, and Sebastian Cabot, 

 his son, in the year of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, MCCCCXCIV (1494), 

 the 24th day of June, at 5 o'clock in the morning. To this land has been given 

 the name of ' First Land Seen,' and to a big island near the said land, has been 

 given the name of ' Saint John,' for having been discovered that same day. 



Thus we see, only two years after the discovery of Columbus, in 1494, and 

 not in 1497, that John and Sebastian Cabot, had reached terra firm a at the north- 

 east, extremity of the New World, not far from the Tierra de los Baccalaos (Land 

 of codfish, New Foundland.) 



We did not make much of a fuss over our little discovery ; we did not think 

 there was great glory in reading and interpreting a legend that many others could 

 have known also. We, however, communicated our discovery to a savant of 

 the French Institute, who a little less modest than ourselves, took the honor of 

 the discovery upon himself. 



Sebastian Cabot's map merits a more critical and deeper study. The date 

 of its publication reaches back to the year 1544. The contour of South America 

 is almost wholly shown, except a portion of Western Patagonia, and the south 

 shore of Tierra del Fuego, whose name is not indicated. The eastern shore of 

 America is pretty well drawn ; the western shore stops at California. 



The discoveries gathered up in the several expeditions of John and Sebastian 

 Cabot are well indicated in this world chart, which was in course of preparation 

 for many years, and which was given to the engraver only about 1541. 



The first expedition of Cabot (after several failures) dates thus : the 24th day 

 of June, 1494. The second one of 1497 was a 300 league cruise along the east 

 coast of North America, that from the region first seen, "Tierra Prima Vista" 

 in the first voyage, to the end of that sea " Mar descubierta par Yngleses " whose 

 littoral was not landed upon. 



