Page:Early voyages to Terra Australis.djvu/87

 Rh been naturally written by French mapmakers, in that language. We can but throw out this suggestion for quantum valeat. All positive evidence, in spite of laborious research, is wanting. The Portuguese names are but few, but there they are, and bear their stubborn evidence. The earliest Portuguese portolani which have met the editor's eye are those of Joham Freire, of 1546, and of Diego Homem, of 1558. Both these are silent on the subject. That of Lazaro Luis and of Vas Dourado, later in the century, both examined by Dr. Martin in Lisbon, are equally so. But this has been already accounted for. It is true that, in a mappemonde of the date of 1526, by one Franciscus, monachus ordinis Franciscanorum, copied into the atlas to the "Géographie du Moyen Age" of Joachim Lelewel, the great Terra Australis, extending along the south of the globe from Tierra del Fuego, is laid down with the words "Is nobis detecta existet," and "haec pars ore nondum cognita;" but this is plainly nothing more than a fanciful extension of Magellan's discovery of the north coast of Tierra del Fuego, combined with the old supposition of the existence of a great southern continent.

A similar remark occurs in the manuscript portolano of Ioan Martinez, of Messina, of the date of 1567, in the British Museum; and in the fifth map of the portolano of the same hydrographer, of the date of 1578, is laid down "Meridional discoperta novamente," with no names on it, and only shewing the north part. The extent of what is seen is twice as long as Java Major, which seems here to be