[270-2] See Journal, [November 12], and [note]. The Seignory was the government of Genoa to which Chios [Scio] belonged at this time.
[271-1] Such writers, for example, as Pierre d’Ailly, Marco Polo, and the author of the Book of Sir John Mandeville, from whom Columbus had derived most of his preconceptions which often biassed or misled him in interpreting the signs of the natives.
[271-2] According to the Journal, Columbus thought he was off the Azores, [February 15].
[272-1] The storm of [March 3d]; see Journal.
[272-2] The time of the return voyage, like that of the outgoing voyage, is reckoned as that consumed in making the Atlantic passage from the last island left on one side to the first one reached on the other. Just how the twenty-three days is to be explained is not altogether clear. The editor of Quaritch’s The Spanish Letter of Columbus supposed Columbus to refer to the time which elapsed from February 16, when he arrived at the Azores, to March 13, when he left Lisbon.
[272-3] Columbus arrived at Lisbon March 4, and he is supposed by R. H. Major to have written the postscript there, but not to have despatched the letter until he reached Seville, March 15, when he redated it March 14.
[272-4] The Escrivano de Racion in the kingdom of Aragon was the high steward or controller of the king’s household expenditures. In Castile the corresponding official was the contador mayor, chief auditor or steward. Navarrete, I. 167.
[272-5] No longer extant. These lines are a memorandum appended to the text by Santangel or the printer, and might have been used as a title, as the similar memorandum was used in the publication of the Latin letter. The Admiral’s name is spelled as in the Articles of Agreement “Colom.”