On this trip Sebastian landed several times on different parts of the north-eastern coast of America, and penetrated as far north as 67½°, in his vain quest for that ignis fatuus of his day—the North-west Passage to India; but at last, his provisions failing him, he was compelled to return to Bristol, bringing with him, as his only trophies, some of the natives of districts visited.
This undoubted discovery of the mainland of America, the date of which is variously given by different authorities, important as it in reality was, led to no very definite results. In 1500, a trip was made from Portugal to the North-east by a certain Gaspar Cortereal, who, though nominally in quest of the north-west passage, seems to have made the acquisition of slaves his main object. He penetrated as far north as 50°, and landed on the shores of what is now New Brunswick, naming it Terra de Labrador, or the “land of laborers,” a title subsequently transferred to a strip of the seaboard further north. Enticing some fifty-seven of the natives—who are described as “like gipsies in color, well-made, intelligent, and modest”—on board his vessels, he returned with them to Portugal, and, having sold them, started on a new trip shortly afterward, from which he never returned; but history is silent as to whether he fell a victim to the perils of the sea or to the vengeance of those he wronged.
In 1502, Miguel Cortereal, a younger brother of the inhuman Gaspar, started in search of the missing vessel, but he too disappeared, leaving no trace behind him; and when an expedition, sent out by the King of Portugal to ascertain the fate of the voyagers, returned with no tidings of either ship, it was resolved that the fatal latitudes should henceforth be avoided. For the next few years the north-east coasts of the western continent were visited by none but certain venturesome fishermen of Brittany, whose memory still lives in the name of Cape Breton, but who, thinking only of securing to themselves the harvest of the new-found seas, added next to nothing to our geographical knowledge; though John Denys of Honfleur is said to have explored the whole of the present Gulf of St. Lawrence.
INDIAN BOATS.
CHAPTER II.
THE DISCOVERY OF THE PACIFIC, AND THE EARLY EXPLORATION OF FLORIDA.
BALBOA DISCOVERING THE PACIFIC OCEAN.