Page:American Historical Review, Volume 12.djvu/880

 870 Rei'ieivs of Books was a surprising facility and abundance of commercial and diplomatic reciprocity. With the marvellous riches of the East disclosed to the West trade was not slow in entering the field. In the extended consid- eration of missions and mission travel, in which are discussed the life, writings, and journeys of such men as Odoric of Pordenone and Mari- gnolli of Florence it is shown how the way was opening for commercial enterprise. In a third part of the chapter on The Great Asiatic Travellers, we are told of the later explorations of commerce, diplomacy and adventure. The Crusaders' Manual of Marino Sanuto the Venetian is assigned a place of importance not so much because of the purpose for which it was written — to revive the crusading spirit — but rather because of the attempt made by Sanuto to show how Christians could get the Oriental products without recourse to the land of the Cairo sultan, because of the sketch he gives of the great trade-routes which passed through Egypt and Persia, and because his outlook was wide, " almost prophetic ". The Book of Sir John de Mandeville of course could not be passed over; it receives a true rating as in very large part a compilation. The author has undertaken in a foot-note, p. 322 seq. to point out " the sources for each section of this marvellous imposture ". In Pegelotti's Book of Descriptions of Countries. . . we have something more substantial and meritorious; the book undertakes to point out " what relations the merchandise of one land or one city bears to that of others; and how one kind of goods is better than another, and whence come the various wares ". Out of the many accounts which have come down to us from this time indicating how geographical knowledge was gradually expanding Mr. Beazley has selected well, and has throughout analyzed well the significance of each. He has shown clearly how the barriers in the overland connections between the East and the West were broken through and then how in time the European found it increasingly dififi- cult to penetrate Asia, until at last, as he is shut out from overland communication, a " flank movement " is attempted around Africa. Here follows, as I have said, one of the most interesting and most important chapters, treating of Maritiriie Explorations. This is partic- ularly the author's period as he has shown in other publications, and we venture to express the hope that we are yet to have the published results of his continued studies in this field. How failure in_overland exploration led to maritime exploration is carefully traced, at least as carefully as space will allow. In the often repeated story of Prince Henry the Navigator and his enterprises we have almost forgotten, if we ever knew, how great was the part taken by the Italian sailors in the earliest maritime adventures down the coast of Africa. We can get on more rapidly in our understanding of this pre-Columbian period of maritime exploration if we will but discard the great majority of the monastic and Moslem tales of a fiery zone and