At that time the continent lying between the Atlantic and the Pacific was regarded as a narrow strip of land; and as late as 1651 it was estimated that it was only ten days’ journey on foot from the headwaters of the James to the Pacific.[439] In 1609 the country was called Nova Britannia. It would seem, therefore, according to present indications, that Smith was entitled to the credit given him by Rich. At all events the importance of Smith’s work in New England cannot be questioned. Smith himself was not backward in asserting the value of his services, declaring in one place that he “brought New England to the Subjection of the Kingdom of Great Britain.”[440] After the publication of his map, Norumbega well-nigh disappeared from the pages of travellers,[441] and a new series of observation of the territory was begun by the authors of works like those which chronicled the doings of the Leyden Adventurers in New England.
[EDITORIAL NOTES.]
A. Earliest English publications on America.—The backwardness of the English in all that related to the extension of American discovery is distinctly apparent in the comparatively few publications from the London press in the sixteenth century which conduced to spread intelligence of the New World on the land and incite rivalry on the ocean. The following list will show this:—
1509. When Alexander Barclay put Sebastian Brant’s Ship of Fools into English verse and published it in folio in London, he disclosed one of the earliest references to the Spanish discoveries which the English people could have read. This book is very rare; a copy brought £120 at the Perkins sale in London in 1873,—Carter-Brown Catalogue, p. 245. This edition has of late been reprinted in England, edited by Jamieson.
1511.(?) A book Of the newe Lādes, printed about this time at Antwerp, but in English, is thought to have been the earliest original treatise in the English tongue which makes any mention of America. The New World is supposed to be meant by “Armenica.” Harrisse, however, assigns 1522 as its date,—Bibl. Amer. Vet. p. 196. There is a copy in the British Museum.
1519, though put by some as early as 1510. A new Interlude of the iiij. Elements. This has been already described in Mr. Deane’s chapter.
1517. Wynkyn de Worde printed Watson’s English prose translation of Brant’s Ship of Fools.
A half century and more slipped away without the English press taking heed, except in such chance notices as these, of what was so closely engaging the attention of the rest of Europe. But in