Spanish, so that M. Amoretti saw in it rather a copy than the original of the relation presented to the Pope or to the Grand Master; these defects M. Amoretti removed by translating them into good Italian: also that the French edition of Fabre, though stated to be a translation from the Italian, was used in 1536 to publish an Italian edition; whereas if an Italian edition had existed before, that of Fabre would not have been required. Fabre's edition, moreover, is very imperfect: and he puts what Pigafetta says in the third person. M. Thomassy concludes, therefore, that the version of Fabre was made from some Italian resumé.
In addition to the motives urged by M. Thomassy for believing that Pigafetta himself composed the French manuscripts, there is evidence of it in the phraseology of the MSS.; had these been translations from the Italian, every word would have been translated into French, whereas, instead of that, we find a great many Italian words used, especially in the vocabularies, also some Italian idioms. It was natural that Pigafetta, if he had not the French word at command, should write down an Italian one, such as "calcagno" for "talon".
For the same reason, I should be inclined to believe that the Ambrosian MS., with its mixture of Spanish words, was composed by Pigafetta himself, in whom such a mixture of words would be more natural after so long a voyage in a Spanish ship, than in an Italian scribe.
That Pigafetta did compose a work in Italian appears
