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gold for which they were searching. There were some among his party who objected strongly to the course
proposed by Orellana, to whom he responded by landing them on the edge of the dense forest and there
leaving them to perish of hunger.
It was the last day of 1540 that, having eaten their shoes and saddles boiled with a few wild herbs, they set out
to reach the kingdom of gold. It was truly one of the greatest adventures of the age, and historic, for here we
get the word El Dorado, used for the first time in the history of discovery--the legendary land of gold which
was never found, but which attracted all the Elizabethan sailors to this romantic country. It would take too
long to tell how they had to fight Indian tribes in their progress down the fast-flowing river, how they had to
build a new boat, making bellows of their leather buskins and manufacturing two thousand nails in twenty
days, how they found women on the banks of the river fighting as valiantly as men, and named the new
country the Amazon land, and how at long last, after incredible hardship, they reached the sea in August 1541.
They had navigated some two thousand miles. They now made their rigging and ropes of grass and sails of
blankets, and so sailed out into the open sea, reaching one of the West India islands a few days later.
And the deserted Pizarro? Tired of waiting for Orellana, he made his way sorrowfully home, arriving after
two years' absence in Peru, with eighty men left out of four thousand three hundred and fifty, all the rest
having perished in the disastrous expedition. And so we must leave the Spanish conquerors for the present,
still exploring, still conquering, in these parts, ever adding glory and riches to Spain. Indeed, Spain and
Portugal, as we have seen, entirely monopolise the horizon of geographical discovery till the middle of the
sixteenth century, when other nations enter the arena.
[Illustration: PERUVIAN WARRIORS OF THE INCA PERIOD. From an ancient Peruvian painting.]
CHAPTER XXX 111
CHAPTER XXX
CABOT SAILS TO NEWFOUNDLAND
It was no longer possible for the Old World to keep secret the wealth of the New World. English eyes were
already straining across the seas, English hands were ready to grasp the treasure that had been Spain's for the
last fifty years. While Spain was sending Christopher Columbus to and fro across the Atlantic to the West
Indies, while Portugal was rejoicing in the success of Vasco da Gama, John Cabot, in the service of England,
was making his way from Bristol to the New World. News of the first voyage of Columbus had been received
by the Cabots--John and his son Sebastian--with infinite admiration. They believed with the rest of the world
that the coast of China had been reached by sailing westward. Bristol was at this time the chief seaport in
England, and the centre of trade for the Iceland fisheries. The merchants of the city had already ventured far
on to the Atlantic, and various little expeditions had been fitted out by the merchants for possible discovery
westward, but one after another failed, including the "most scientific mariner in all England," who started
forth to find the island of Brazil to the west of Ireland, but, after nine miserable weeks at sea, was driven back
to Ireland again by foul weather.
Now Columbus had crossed the Atlantic, Cabot got leave from the English King, Henry VII., "to sail to the
east, west, or north, with five ships carrying the English flag, to seek and discover all the islands, countries,
regions, or provinces of pagans in whatever part of the world."
Further, the King was to have one-fifth of the profits, and at all risks any conflict with Spain must be avoided.
Nothing daunted, Cabot started off to fulfil his lord's commands in a tiny ship with eighteen men. We have the
barest outlines of his proceedings. Practically all is contained in this one paragraph. "In the year 1497 John
Cabot, a Venetian, and his son Sebastian discovered on the 24th of June, about five in the morning, that land
to which no person had before ventured to sail, which they named Prima Vista or first seen, because, as I
believe, it was the first part seen by them from the sea. The inhabitants use the skins and furs of wild beasts
for garments, which they hold in as high estimation as we do our finest clothes. The soil yields no useful
production, but it abounds in white bears and deer much larger than ours. Its coasts produce vast quantities of
large fish--great seals, salmons, soles above a yard in length, and prodigious quantities of cod."
[Illustration: PART OF NORTH AMERICA, SHOWING SEBASTIAN CABOT'S VOYAGE TO
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