The island of St. John
No island of St. John is to be found on La Cosa’s map, but there is a Cauo S. Johan not far from Cauo de Ynglaterra and close to the island that is called Illa de la trinidat. That the name is attached to a cape instead of to an island may be due to a transposition in the course of repeated copyings. On the Portuguese map of Pedro Reinel, of the beginning of the sixteenth century (that is, only a few years after 1497), Cape Breton is marked without a name, but an island lies off it, called “Sam Johã” [St. John]; on Maggiolo’s map of 1527 there is “C. de bertonz,” with an island, “Ja de S. Ioan,” in the same place; and on Michael Lok’s map, in Hakluyt’s “Divers Voyages,” 1582, we have “C. Breton” with the island of “S. Johan,” lying off it, and on Cape Breton Island (or Nova Scotia), called Norombega, is written “J. Cabot, 1497” (see [p. 323]). There seems thus to have been a definite tradition that it was here that John Cabot made the land, and St. John may then be the little Scatari Island which lies on the outside of Cape Breton Island [cf. Dawson, 1897, pp. 210, ff.]. That the “I. de S. Juan” on the map of 1544 lies on the inside of “Prima tierra vista” and answers to the Magdalen Islands is of minor importance; we do not even know whether Sebastian Cabot can be made responsible for it, as it may be due to a confusion on the part of the draughtsman. More importance must be attached on this point to the agreement between the earlier maps of 1500, 1527, and that of Reinel (compared with Lok’s map in Hakluyt), than to the map of 1544.[314]
Portion of Pedro Reinel’s map, beginning of the sixteenth century
Cabot’s return
John Cabot returned to Bristol at the beginning of August, probably about the 6th (15th, N.S.). He naturally hastened to London to tell the King of his discovery, and we know that he must have been there on the 10th (20th) August, for there is an entry in the accounts of the King’s privy purse:
“10 August, 1497. To hym that found the new isle, £10.”
This cannot be called an exaggerated regal payment for discovering a new continent, even though £10 in the money of that time corresponds to about £120 now. Later in the same autumn Cabot was granted a pension from the King of £20 a year.
Meanwhile, as the letters already quoted show, his discovery attracted much attention in England, and gave rise to great expectations.
