Page:A Comprehensive History of India Vol 1.djvu/231

 Chap. IX.] CASPAR CORTEREAL. 197

About the same time when EughuiJ wa.s attempting, though with slow ad i.mh. and faltering steps, to follow Columbus in liis career of discovery, Portugal was not so entirely absorbed in the prosecution of discoveries in the direction of Africa

•^ rortugiese

as to be insensible to the vast changes which might be anticipated from the dis- attempts to

^, , , discover the

covery of a western world. If, according to the idea then generally entertained north-west by geographers, the northern extremity of America formed a rocky headland, ^"^^® with an open sea beyond it, then all the efforts which Portugal had made to iliscover a passage to India by the south-east must prove in a great measure abortive, because a much nearer passage would enable the maritime nations of Western Europe to secure sill the advantages for which she had been striving. This was a danger too obvious and imminent to be overlooked ; and therefore the Portuguese no sooner were acquainted with the discovery of the New World, than they determined on an exploratory voyage to the north-west, for the purpose of ascertaining whether such a practicable passage existed, and if it did, of securing a monopoly of it on the grovunl of priority of discovery.

The only Portuguese navigators wliose names figure in the voyages under- Caspar

•ii'- /> 11 1 ^ • I'll- C'ortereal.

taken with this view, were a father and three sons, belonging to the illustrious house of Cortereal. Of the ftither, Jolin Vaz Cortereal, scarcely anything is known, and hence, probalily because fiction has been employed as a substitute for fact, it has been confidently maintained that he reached the shores of New- foundland even before Columbus made his first voyage. The proceedings of his son Caspar are better authenticated. In 1500, having been furnished by King Emanuel with two ships, he touched, first at Terceira, one of the Azores, and then sailed north-west, in the ho]ie of finding an open ocean, by which he could penetrate directly to India. Having reached land in tlie ^jarallel of 50°, he pursued his course northwards along the coast. Both fi-om its po.sition, and the description given of it, it must have formed part of Labrador, which, accord- ingly, in the earliest maps, bears not this name, but that of Corterealis. He advanced to latitude 60°, but being deterred b}' the rigour of the climate an<l fioating mountains of ice from proceeding farther, he seized fifty-seven of the natives, and canned them off to Portugal, whei*e, to his disgrace and that of his sovereign, they appear to have been employed as slaves. He arrived at Li-sbon on the 8th of October, 1501, and immediately resolved on another voyage. Early in spring, having completed his preparations, he again set sail with his two vessels, and steered directly for the most northerly point he had previously reached. So far the voyage was prosperous; but immediately after, a 'iolent storm, in a sea covei'ed with icebergs, obliged the vessels to separate. That in which Ga.spar sailed Wivs never heard of

As .soon as tidings of tlie disaster reached Lisbon, a younger brother, of the Miguel name of Miguel, hastily fitted out three vessels, and set sail, with the double object of searching for the missing ship, and following up the course of discovery which Gaspar had began On arriving at that arm of the Atlantic which