to his island ruler, whom the elder Zeno served. Obviously, the chances of lapse from truth are multiplied. Either the later Nicolò or his ancestor of more than a century and a half before may have wholly invented or more or less transformed it; or the first narrator may have created his tale out of no real happenings or have so distorted it by mistake or willful imposture as to render it wholly unreliable. In its general outlines it is by no means impossible; but neither would it have been very difficult to compose such a yarn out of nothing but fancy and the American information at the command of the younger Nicolò. It comes to us through the medium of an alleged letter of his ancestor Antonio, written home to the latter's brother Carlo near the end of the fifteenth century. With some slight compression, the narrative runs as follows:
Six and twenty years ago four fishing boats put out to sea, and, encountering a heavy storm, were driven over the sea in utter helplessness for many days; when at length, the tempest abating, they discovered an island called Estotiland, lying to the westwards above one thousand miles from Frislanda. One of the boats was wrecked, and six men that were in it were taken by the inhabitants, and brought into a fair and populous city, where the king of the place sent for many interpreters, but there were none could be found that understood the language of the fishermen, except one that spoke Latin, and who had also been cast by chance upon the same island. . . They . . . remained five years on the island, and learned the language. One of them in particular visited different parts of the island, and reports that it is a very rich country, abounding in all good things. It is a little smaller than Iceland, but more fertile; in the middle of it is a very high mountain, in which rise four rivers which water the whole country.
The inhabitants are a very intelligent people, and possess all the arts like ourselves; and it is to be believed that in time past they have had intercourse with our people, for he said that he saw Latin books in the king's library, which they at this present time do not understand. They have their own language and letters. They have all kinds of metals, but especially they abound with gold. Their foreign intercourse is with Greenland, whence they import furs, brimstone and pitch. . . They have woods of immense extent. They make their buildings with walls, and there are many towns and villages. They make small boats and sail them, but they have not the loadstone, nor do they know the north by the compass. For this reason these fishermen were held in great estimation.
