A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels - Volume 18 / Historical Sketch of the Progress of Discovery, Navigation, and / Commerce, from the Earliest Records to the Beginning of the Nineteenth / Century, By William Stevenson

by Robert Kerr; William Stevenson

For some time after the discovery of America it was supposed to be part of India: and hence, the name of the West Indies, still retained by the islands in the Gulph of Mexico, was given to all those countries. There were, however, circumstances which soon led the discoverers to doubt of the truth of the first conceived opinion. The Portuguese had visited no part of Asia, either continent or island, from the coast of Malabar to China, on which they had not found natives highly civilized, who had made considerable progress in the elegant as well as the useful arts of life, and who were evidently accustomed to intercourse with strangers, and acquainted with commerce. In all these respects, the New World formed a striking contrast: the islands were inhabited by savages, naked, unacquainted with the rudest arts of life, and indebted for their sustenance to the spontaneous productions of a fertile soil and a fine climate. The continent, for the most part, presented immense forests, and with the exception of Mexico and Peru, was thinly inhabited by savages as ignorant and low in the scale of human nature as those who dwelt on the islands.

The natural productions and the animals differed also most essentially from those, not only of India, but also of Europe. There were no lemons, oranges, pomegranates, quinces, figs, olives, melons, vines, nor sugar canes: neither apples, pears, plumbs, cherries, currants, gooseberries, rice, nor any other corn but maize. There was no poultry (except turkeys), oxen, sheep, goats, swine, horses, asses, camels, elephants, cats, nor dogs, except an animal resembling a dog, but which did not bark. Even the inhabitants of Mexico and Peru were unacquainted with iron and the other useful metals, and destitute of the address requisite for acquiring such command of the inferior animals, as to derive any considerable aid from their labour.

In addition to these most marked and decided points of difference between India and the newly discovered quarter of the globe, it was naturally inferred that a coast extending, as America was soon ascertained to do, many hundred miles to the northward and to the southward of the equator, could not possibly be that of the Indies. At last, in the year 1513, a view of the Grand Ocean having been attained from the mountains of Darien, the supposition that the New World formed part of India was abandoned. To this ocean the name of the South Sea was given.

In the mean time, the Portuguese had visited all the islands of the Malay Archipelago, as far as the Moluccas. Portugal had received from the Pope a grant of all the countries she might discover: the Spaniards, after the third voyage of Columbus, obtained a similar grant. As, however, it was necessary to draw a line between those grants, the Pope fixed on 27-1/2° west of the meridian of the island of Ferro. The sovereigns, for their mutual benefit, allowed it to 370 leagues west of the Cape Verd islands: all the countries to the east of this line were to belong to Portugal, and all those to the west of it to Spain. According to this line of demarcation, supposing the globe to be equally divided between the two powers, it is plain that the Moluccas were situated within the hemisphere which belonged to Spain. Portugal, however, would not yield them up, contending that she was entitled to the sovereignty of all the countries she could discover by sailing eastward. This dispute gave rise to the first circumnavigation of the globe, and the first practical proof that India could be reached by sailing westward from Europe, as well as to other results of the greatest importance to geography and commerce.

During the discussions which this unexpected and embarrassing difficulty produced, Francis Magellan came to the court of Spain, to offer his services as a navigator, suggesting a mode by which he maintained that court would be able to decide the question in its own favour. Magellan had served under Albuquerque, and had visited the Moluccas: and he proposed, if the Spanish monarch would give him ships, to sail to these islands by a westerly course, which would, even according to the Portuguese, establish the Spanish right to their possession. The emperor Charles, who was at this period king of Spain, joyfully embraced the proposal, although a short time previous, Solis, who had sailed in quest of a westerly passage to India, had, after discovering the Rio de la Plata, perished in the attempt.

It is maintained by some authors that Magellan's confidence in the success of his own plan arose from the information he received from a chart drawn up by Martin Behaim, in which the straits that were afterwards explored by Magellan, and named after him, were laid down; and that he carried the information he derived from it to Spain, and by means of it obtained the protection of Cardinal Ximenes, and the command of the fleet, with which he was the first to circumnavigate the world.

As this is a point which has been a good deal discussed, and as it is of importance, not only to the fame of Magellan, but to a right understanding of the actual state of geographical knowledge, with respect to the New World, at this era, it may be proper briefly to consider it.

The claim of Behaim rests entirely on a passage in Pigafetta's journal of the voyage of Magellan, in which it is stated that Magellan, as skilful as he was courageous, knew that he was to seek for a passage through an obscure strait: this strait he had seen laid down in a chart of Martin Behaim, a most excellent cosmographer, which was in the possession of the king of Portugal. In describing the nature of the maps and charts which, during the whole of the middle ages, were drawn up, we observed that it was very usual to insert countries, &c. which were merely supposed to exist. The question, therefore, is--allowing that a strait was laid down in a chart drawn up by Behaim, whether it was a conjectural strait or one laid down from good authority? That Behaim himself did not discover such a strait will be evident from the following circumstances: in the Nuremberg globe, formed by Behaim, it does not appear: there is nothing between the Azores and Japan, except the fabulous islands of Aulitia and St. Brandon; no mention of it is made in the archives of that city or in his numerous letters, which are still preserved. The date of the Nuremberg globe is 1492, the very year in which Columbus first reached the West Indies: Behaim therefore cannot be supposed to have contributed to this discovery. It is said, however, that he made a long voyage in 1483 and 1484: but this voyage was in an easterly direction, for it is expressly stated to have been to Ethiopia; probably to Congo, and the cargo he brought home, which consisted of an inferior kind of pepper, proves that he had not visited America. Besides, if he had visited any part of America in 1483 or 1484, he would have laid it down in his globe in 1492, whereas, as we have remarked, no country appears on it to the west of St. Brandon. We may, therefore, safely conclude that he did not himself discover any passage round the south point of America.

But all the other great discoveries of the Portuguese and Spaniards (except that of Diaz in 1486) were made between 1492, the date of the Nuremberg Globe, and 1506, the date of the death of Behaim, and between these periods, he constantly resided at Fayal. It is much more probable that he inserted this strait in his chart on supposition, thinking it probable that, as Africa terminated in a cape, so America would. That Magellan did not himself believe the strait was laid down in Behaim's chart from any authority is evident, from a circumstance mentioned by Pigafetta, who expressly informs us, that Magellan was resolved to prosecute his search after it to latitude 75°, had he not found it in latitude 52°. Now, as Behaim undoubtedly was the greatest cosmographer of the age, and had been employed to fit the astrolobe as a sea instrument, it is not to be supposed that, if he had good authority for the existence of a passage round South America, he would have left it in any chart he drew, with an uncertainty of 23 degrees.

Magellan sailed from Spain in 1519, with five ships: he explored the river Plate a considerable way, thinking at first it was the sea, and would lead him to the west. He then continued his voyage to the south, and reached the entrance of the straits which afterwards received his name, on the 21st October, 1520, but, in consequence of storms, and the scarcity of provisions, he did not clear them till the 28th of November. He now directed his course to the north-west: for three months and twenty days he saw no land. In 15 south, he discovered a small island; and another in 9 south. Continuing his course still in the same direction, he arrived at the Ladrones, and soon afterwards at the Phillippines, where he lost his life in a skirmish. His companions continued their voyage; and, on the twenty-seventh month after their departure from Spain, arrived at one of the Molucca islands. Here the Spaniards found plenty of spices, which they obtained in exchange for the cloth, glass, beads, &c., which they had brought with them for that purpose. From the Moluccas they returned home round the Cape of Good Hope, and reached Seville in September, 1552. Only one ship returned, and she was drawn up in Seville, and long preserved as a monument of the first circumnavigation of the globe. The Spaniards were surprised, on their return to their native country, to find that they had gained a day in their reckoning--a proof of the scanty knowledge at that time possessed, respecting one of the plainest and most obvious results of the diurnal motion of the earth.