138 CONCEPTIONS OF COLUMBUS 



Isabella is well north of the tropic; but then it has 

 been shown above that he was trying as best he 

 might to interpret conflicting information. The 

 northward shifting of the Cuban coast was evidently 

 a compromise. The Cabot east-and-west coast was 

 interpreted to be the same mainland as the Cuban 

 coast of the second voyage of Columbus : the one far 

 to the north, the other far to the south, but the 

 Columbus coast more in accord with the theoretical 

 southern coast of Mangi, as shown on the Behaim 

 globe^^ and the Henricus Martellus Germanus^^ map. 

 One of the main difficulties in accepting the first 

 voyage of Vespucius has been the supposed dis- 

 covery by him of the mainland before Columbus. 

 That difficulty, however, disappears if his mainland 

 was merely the supposed mainland — the coast of 

 Cuba — and the voyage then becomes little more than 

 a repetition of the first and second voyages of Colum- 

 bus. In this event, the northwestern navigation of 

 Vespucius was on the northern coast of Cuba, and 

 the Indian raid at the close was somewhere in the 

 Bahama group of islands. 



Geographical Theories Determining the 

 Position of the Continental Land 



It remains to discuss the reason for the great in- 

 terv^al on the Cantino map between Espanola and the 

 C. do fim do abrill, which was filled by the insertion 

 of the island of Isabella. 



68 Ravenstein, op. cit., facsimile of gores of globe. 

 •» Nordenskiold, Periplus, p. 123. 



