64 THE QUEST FOR INDIA BY SEA Portugal objected to this line as too near to the African coast. After much negotiation, a dividing line between the two nations was fixed at 370 leagues west of the Cape Verde Islands by the Treaty of Tordesillas in 1494, and sanctioned by a Bull of Julius n in 1506. The final Bull of Leo X in 1514, while confirming the pre- vious one, gave to Portugal an exclusive right of dis- covery throughout the rest of the globe. To Protestant writers these Papal proceedings have appeared in a somewhat distorted light as the parti- tion of an mi known world by a pontiff who had himself no title to it. In point of fact, they exhibit the normal action of international law and diplomacy as then estab- lished in Europe, and they formed the only course that could have been adopted, short of war. The Pope, if he no longer stood forth as the conscience of Christen- dom, represented after the fashion of that age what we now call the concert of Europe. It is not needful to explore the pretensions of medi- aeval Rome to the sovereignty of the world. By the time of Columbus such secular claims of Papal suprem- acy had narrowed themselves to two main functions: the settlement of disputes or the sanction of treaties between Christian princes, and the ratification of con- quests or discoveries made in non-Christian lands. The annals of Spain and Portugal afford many examples of the exercise of this authority. Indeed, the recog- nition of the Portuguese as a political entity dates from the Bull of Alexander HI in 1179 affirming their inde- pendence. Their exclusive right to the discoveries
