Page:History of merchant shipping and ancient commerce (Volume 2).djvu/565

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joyneth with the Occident, as there without the lines it is described and figured.

And for more declaration of the said Card, your Lordship shall understand, that beginning on the part occidental within the line, the first land that is set out is the maine land, and islands of the Indies of the Emperour. Which maine land or coast goeth northward, and finisheth in the land that we found, which is called here Terra de Labrador. So that it appeareth the said land that we found, and the Indies, to be all one maine land.

Now called the straight of Magelane. The sayd coast from the sayd Indies southward, as by the Card your Lordshippe may see, commeth to a certaine straight sea, called Estrecho de Todos Santos: by which straight sea the Spainiards goe to the Spiceries, as I shall declare more at large; the which straight sea is right against three hundred fifteene degrees of longitude, and is of latitude or altitude from the Equinoctiall three and fifty degrees. The first land from the sayd beginning of the Card toward the Orient are certaine islands of the Canaries, and islandes of Capo Verde. But the first maine land next to the line Equinoctial is the sayd Capo Verde, and from thence northward by the straight of this sea of Italie. And so followeth Spayne, France, Flanders, Almaine, Denmarke, and Norway, which is the highest part toward the north. And over against Flanders are our islands of England and Ireland. Of the landes and coastes within the streights I have set out onely the regions, dividing them by lines of their limits, by which plainely I thinke your Lordship may see, in what situation everie region is, and of what highnesse, and with what regions it is joyned. I doe thinke few are left out of all Europe. In the parts of Asia and Affrica I could not so well make the sayd divisions: for that they be not so well knowen nor need not so much. This I write because in the said Card be made the said lines and strikes, that your Lordship should understand wherefore they doe serve. Also returning to the aforesaid Capo Verdo, the coast goeth southward to a cape called Capo de buona Speransa, which is right over against the 60 and 65 degree of longitude. And by this cape go the Portingals to their Spicerie. For from this cape toward the Orient, is the land of Calicut, as your Lordship may see in the headland over against the 130 degree. Fro the sayd Cape of Buona Speransa the coast returneth toward the line equinoctiall, and passing forth, entreth the Red Sea, and returning out, entreth again into the gulfe of Persia, and