238 



HISTORY OF THE SEA. 



between Spain and Portugal, the two monopolists of commerce 

 and discovery. He declared by a bull, or papal decree, that all 

 hew countries which should be thereafter discovered to the east 

 of the Azores were to belong to the crown of Portugal, while 

 all that were discovered to the west should be the property of 

 Spain. Thus, a potentate who claimed to be infallible issued a 

 decree based upon the pontifical conviction that the world was 

 flat, even after the very solid arguments to the contrary of 

 Columbus, and da Gama. His Holiness, in his wisdom, imagined 

 that one nation might sail to the right, the other to the left, and 

 go on forever : he did not foresee, what was now almost palpable 

 to every eye but that of Roman infallibility, that the Spaniards 

 and the Portuguese would at last meet at the antipodes. There, 

 in time, they did meet, and the very pretty dispute which arose 

 in consequence we shall narrate in the sequel. But a more 

 immediate effect of the decree was this: — a Spaniard, if he felt 

 himself neglected or maltreated by his own sovereign, would 

 offer his services to the Portuguese king, confident of employment 

 at his hands, as the latter would thus weaken Spain and profit 

 by discoveries made by her subjects. A Portuguese, if similarly 

 aggrieved, would in the same way desert to the Spanish king 

 and accept service from the Spanish crown. 



It so happened that one Fernao Magalhaens, known in 

 English as Ferdinand Magellan, a Portuguese by birth, and 

 who had served with distinction in the East Indies under Albu- 

 querque, addressed himself to the court of Lisbon for the re- 

 compense which was his due. His application was treated with 

 disdain. He forthwith withdrew to Spain with a learned man 

 who had been similarly neglected, one Ruy Falero, an astronomer, 

 whom the Portuguese regarded as a conjurer and charlatan. 

 Magellan made overtures for new discoveries to Cardinal 

 Ximenes, then Prime Minister of Spain, and in reality its ruler 

 during the absence of Charles V. The Portuguese ambassador 

 sought by every means in his power to baffle his designs, and 



