bounded by the eastern parts of Asia, this being the commencement of the western part of the continent;" he spoke of having discovered "a very large country of Asia ;" and he promised in his next voyage to discover "the Island of Taprobane, between the Indian Ocean and the Gulf of the Ganges." Orontius Finæus, in 1531, upon a geographical globe, indicated Florida as the eastern coast of Asia, and Mexico, Central America, and South America as an enormous peninsula extending south and east from the continent of Asia.

Centuries afterward, the illustrious scientist, Alexander von Humboldt, in his "Personal Narrative," spoke of the oldest existing map of America as that of John Ruysch; a map of the world, annexed to a Roman edition of Ptolemy in 1508. "We there," said Humboldt, "find Yucatan and Honduras figured as an island, by the name of Culicar. There is no Isthmus of Panama, but a passage, which permits of a direct navigation from Europe to India. The great southern island bears the name of Terra de Parias." That map was dated two years after the death of Columbus, and probably embodied the best conception of American geography which he and his contemporaries had been able to form.

Since Humboldt's time, however, there has come to light another map, of an earlier date. This is a map of the world drawn by Martin Waldseemüller (also known as Ilacomilus, or Hylacomylus, his own translation of his name into Greek), in 1507. This map follows in general the theories of Ptolemy, but of course shows much that was unknown to that earlier geographer. It is especially interesting in connection with the subject now in hand, for the reason that it indicates North America and South America as entirely separate continents, with a broad seaway between them, connecting the Atlantic with the Pacific. The North American continent is called on it Parias, and the southern continent bears the name of America. This map apparently accompanied a little Latin book, written by Waldseemüller and published in April, 1507, in which it was suggested that the New World

THE NAME "AMERICA"

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should be named for Amerigo Vespucci. "Quarta orbis pars, quam quia Americus invenit Amerigen, quasi America terram, sive American, nuncupare licet;" or, "the fourth part of the world, which it is proper to call America, or American Land, since Amerigo discovered it." Again, in another chapter: "Alia quarta pars per Americum Vesputium, ut in sequentibus audietur, inventa est: quare non video, cur quis jure vetet ab Americo inventore sagacis ingenii viro Amerigen, quasi Americi terram, sive Americam, dicendam ;" or, "the other fourth part (of the world) was discovered, as will appear in what follows, by Amerigo Vespucci; wherefore I do not see why any one can lawfully object to its being called the Land of Amerigo, or America, after Amerigo or Americo, the man of genius who discovered it by his sagacity." (It will be recalled that Amerigo Vespucci is said to have accompanied Ojeda to the Isthmus of Panama in 1499, and to have been the first European to set foot upon Terra Firma, as the mainland of the American continent was then called.) Nevertheless, the error of his conceptions and of his conclusions in no way detracts from the glory of Columbus. He went to seek a new road to a known continent. Instead, he found two hitherto unknown continents, and to their colonised inhabitants in after centuries he left the lesser work of creating by artifice the water highway which he had sought, but which he had sought in vain because nature had failed to create it.

CHAPTER II

THE SECRET OF THE STRAIT

COLUMBUS Sought the "Secret of the Strait." He was not, however, the first European to visit the American Isthmus. Galvano, deriving his authority from Gomara, records that "in the year 1502, one Alfonso Ojeda went to discover Terra Firma, and followed his course till he came to the Province of Uraba. The next year following also one Rodrigo Bastidas, of Seville, went out with two caravels. . . They took their course toward the west to Santa Martha, and Cape de la Vela, and to Rio Grande, or the Great River; and they discovered the haven of Zamba, the Coradas, Carthagena, and the islands of St. Bernard, of Baru, and Islas de Arenas; and went forward unto Isla Fuerta, and to the point of Caribana, standing at the end of the Gulf of Uraba, where they had sight of the Farallones, standing on the other side, hard by the river of Darien; and from Cape de la Vela unto this place are two hundred leagues, and it standeth in nine degrees and two parts of latitude." There are other records bearing upon these adventures, and it is difficult to determine with confidence the true story.

According to some, Alfonso, or Alonzo, de Ojeda landed at Darien as early as 1499; having with him as his pilots Amerigo Vespucci and Juan de Cosa, the latter being the Biscayan navigator and cartographer who was the owner and master of the Santa Maria and the companion of Columbus on his first voyage. The weight of testimony, however, inclines to the belief that in that voyage Ojeda and his famous comrades visited only the coast of Venezuela and did not go west of Cape Gallinas, and that we should give the credit of discovering the mainland of the Isthmus to another, who has