[Footnote 54: A Portuguese pilot, who wrote an account of the voyage of Pedro Alvarez Cabral to India, says that on their return, on reaching the land near Cape Verde, called Beseneque, they met three Portuguese ships sent to discover the new land found by Cabral on the voyage out (_Coleccion de Noticias, etc._, Lisboa, 1812, cap. 21). It is very suspicious that Vespucci should not mention this meeting if he was on board one of these three ships. (_Nav._, iii, 310.)]
[Footnote 55: Varnhagen supposes this land to be South Georgia, in 54° S., discovered by Captain Cook in 1776. Navarrete suggested Tristan d'Acunha.]
[Footnote 56: Goes mentions an expedition to Brazil commanded by Gonzalo Coelho, which sailed from Lisbon on June 10th, 1503, and consisted of six ships. But Coelho returned safely with four out of his six ships, while Vespucci asserts that the commander perished, in the expedition in which he served.]
[Footnote 57: Latin edition: "To the most illustrious René, King of Jerusalem and Sicily, Duke of Lorraine and Bar."]
[Footnote 58: Supposed to be Pietro Soderini, Gonfaloniere of the Republic of Florence in 1504, who had studied with Vespucci. See _Bandini_, p. xxv.]
[Footnote 59: Fernando is never called King of Castille in any document of the period.]
[Footnote 60: The Latin version has 20th.]
[Footnote 61: _Inferno_, Canto 26, l. 116:
"Non vogliate negar l' esperienza Diretro al Sol, del mondo senza gente."]
[Footnote 62: The third climate of Hipparchus was between the parallels of Syene and Alexandria.]
[Footnote 63: The distance shows that, like Columbus, he reckons four miles to a league.]
[Footnote 64: "Ponente figliando una quarta di libeccio." Varnhagen makes this 0-1/4 S. O. A course W.S.W. for 1,000 leagues would have taken him to the Gulf of Paria, which is a little over 900 leagues W.S.W. from Grand Canary. He would not have reached land in 16°[68] N. and 70° W. even if he had steered the right course, and there had been no intervening land, by going 1,000 leagues. Such a distance would have left him 930 miles short of that position.]
[Footnote 65: Twenty-seven days (Latin version).]
[Footnote 66: Equal to 1333-1/3 leagues of three geographical miles.]
[Footnote 67: 70° W. of Canaria, or 85° W. of Greenwich, would be in the Pacific Ocean; but this is a specimen of Vespucci's romancing. There was no observation for longitude with instruments in those days. Columbus observed the time occasionally, when there was an eclipse, comparing it with the time at some place given in his almanac, but the result was too rough to be of any use.]