1. 1520. Luke Vas quez's ex in the year 1520, two ships were fitted out from St. SECT. Domingo, under the command of a Spaniard whose name was Luke Vasquez. He proceeded to that part of the continent of North America which was then supposed by the Spaniards to be a part of Ponce pedition. de Leon's discoveries, and as denominated by him Florida: but the place at which Vasquez arrived, was, it seems, that now called St. Helena, a small island at the mouth of Port Royal harbour, in the southern part of South Carolina, in about 32°, 15′ north latitude. The natives, it is said, seeing his ships as they drew near the land, with expanded sails, never having seen the like before, took them for two monstrous fishes driving towards the shore, and ran in crowds to view them; but on a nearer view of the Spaniards, after they had landed, these simple natives were so struck with their clothing and appearance, that they fled with the greatest marks of consternation. Two of them, however, were taken; and the Spaniards carrying them on board gave them victuals and drink, and sent them back on shore clothed in Spanish dresses. This insidious kindness had its desired effect with the unsuspecting savages. The king of the country admired the Spanish dresses and hospitality so much, that he sent fifty of his subjects to the ships with fruits and provisions; ordered his people to attend the Spaniards, wherever they had a mind to visit the country; and made them rich presents of gold, plates of silver, and pearls. The Spaniards, having learned all they could concerning the country, watered, and re-victualled their ships, and inviting a large number of their generous landlords on board, after ply SECT. ing them with liquor, they weighed anchor and sailed off with them. This scheme, however, had 1520. not all the success its perpetrators expected. Most of the unhappy savages either pined themselves to death, or were lost in one of the ships that foundered at sea; so that only a very few survived for the purposes of slavery. Vasquez, notwithstanding his loss, having acquired some reputation from the expedition, renewed, in the years 1524 and 1525, his attempts to carry on a slave-trade from that part of the continent. But, one of his ships being wrecked near St. Helena, and two hundred of his men being cut off by the natives, he was so discou raged, that he returned to Hispaniola, and died, it is said, of a broken heart.* Some schemes for discovery and settlement in America, were now again revived in France. After a lapse of about fifteen years since the expedition of Aubert to Canada, in 1508, before mentioned, and the accession of Francis the first to the throne of France, that excellent monarch began to think of making establishments on the American coast. 1524. With this view he fitted out, in the year 1523, Gioni's Voy. vanni (or John) Verazzini, a Florentine, to proseage. cute further discoveries in the northern parts of Verazzi America. History has recorded but little worth mentioning of any of the three several and successive expeditions undertaken by him, except the considerable extent of his voyage along the coast of North America. He is said to have explored, with considerable accuracy, a part of the coast of Flori *Mod. Univ. Hist. Vol. 40, p. 379. 1. 1524. da; and the whole extent of his discoveries was SECT. * This assertion of Verazzini himself, is extracted by Mr. Holmes in his Annals, Vol. 1, p. 68, from Hackluyt's Voyages, where Verazzini's own account, which he sent to the king of France, immediately on his return to Dieppe, in July 1524, is published. It is some presumptive proof that Cabot, in the voyage in which he discovered North America, did not sail so low to the southward as Georgia, much less to Cape Florida as before mentioned. As twenty years had then elapsed since Cabot's voyage, it is not probable that Verazzini was ignorant of the extent of it. It may be said, indeed, that Cabot might have coasted the continent down to Cape Florida, and not have seen nor mentioned the Savannah river, or its adjacent lands. But Verazzini's expression, as above, seems to imply that Cabot never could have seen it, and therefore never passed it. It must be acknowledged, however, that there is considerable probability that the Savannah river must have been discovered by or known to Vasquez, in some one of his voyages before mentioned, he being under a necessity of passing close by it in going to St. Helena, which is but a little further to the northward of it. But as these voyages of Vasquez were about the same time with this of Verazzini, and the French and Spaniards were then at war, it is not probable that Verazzini had any knowledge of them. SECT. towards the east;" here (which is supposed to be on I. the coast of New Jersey or Staten Island) he at1524. tempted to send his boat ashore, but was prevented by the roughness of the sea. In latitude 40° he About this time also a voyage was made by the Spaniards, which is said to be the first performed by that nation, in which the whole of that part of the coast of North America, now composing the United States, was attempted to be explored by them. Gomez's One Estevan Gomez, (called by the English Stevoyage. phen Gomez,) a Portuguese by birth, who, on ac 1525. Stephen count of the great reputation he had acquired as an able navigator, had been selected to accompany Ferdinand Magellan, then in the service of Spain, in his remarkable voyage in the year 1520, wherein he discovered the Straits which have ever since borne his name; and who, perfidiously deserting Magellan, soon after they had entered the South * Harris's Voyages, Vol. 2, p. 348. Mod. Univ. Hist. Vol. 39, p. 406. Holmes's Annals, Vol. 1, p. 68. .1. Seas through those Straits, had returned back to SECT. Spain, probably jealous of the honour which he perceived Magellan was about acquiring, proposed, 1525. soon after his return to the emperor Charles V, the discovery of a more direct passage into the South Seas than that found by Magellan, through the northern part of America. But the emperor, for many reasons which appear to have induced him at that time to discountenance an opposition to the Portuguese claim of the Moluccas, and at the same time, perhaps, disgusted with Gomez's base desertion of Magellan, did not listen to his application in so favourable a manner as he expected. He therefore made proposals of the same nature to the count de Aranda, a Spanish nobleman, and some others, to induce them to send him by this supposed passage to the Moluccas. Less tender of the Portuguese rights than the emperor, and willing to avail themselves of this man's abilities as a pilot, they agreed to furnish him with a ship for that purpose. cordingly (in the year 1525, as it appears,) Gomez sailed to Cuba, and thence in search of this passage he coasted the continent northward, as high as Cape Ras, at Newfoundland. His heart now failing him, as it is said, or more probably chagrined at not succeeding in finding the much-desired passage, he returned to Corunna, carrying with him only some of the unhappy natives, whom he had captured somewhere on the coast. An unlucky jest, which occurred immediately on his return, injured both his reputation and the credit of the famed north-west passage. When the ship came into port, somebody asked, what they had on board? Ac |