In the latter part of this volume are put certain relations of John De Verarzana,[69] a Florentine, and of a great captain, a Frenchman, and the two voyages of Jaques Cartier, a Briton,[70] who sailed into the land set in fifty degrees of latitude to the north, which is called New France: and the which lands hitherto it is not thoroughly known whether they do join with the firm land of Florida and Nova Hispania, or whether they be separated and divided all by the Sea as Islands: and whether by that way one may go by sea into the country of Cathaio:[71] as many years past it was written unto me by Sebastian Gabot, our countryman Venetian, a man of great experience, and very rare in the art of Navigation and the knowledge of Cosmography: who sailed along and beyond this land of New France, at the charges of King Henry the seventh, King of England. And he told me that having sailed a long time West and by North beyond these islands unto the latitude of sixty-seven degrees and a half under the North Pole, and at the 11 day of June, finding still the open sea without any manner of impediment, he thought verily by that way to have passed on still the way to Cathaio, which is in the East and would have done it, if the mutiny of the shipmaster and mariners had not rebelled, and made him to return homewards from that place. But it seemeth that God doth yet reserve this great enterprise for some great Prince to discover this voyage of Cathaio by this way: which for the bringing of the spiceries from India into Europe were the most easy and shortest of all other ways hitherto found out. And, surely, this enterprise would be the most glorious, and of most importance of all other, that can be imagined, to make his name great, and fame immortal, to all ages to come, far more than can be done by any of all these great troubles and wars, which daily are used in Europe among the miserable Christian people. This much concerning Sebastian Gabot’s discovery may suffice for a present cast: but shortly, God willing, shall come out in print, all his own maps and discourses, drawn and written by himself, which are in the custody of the worshipful master William Worthington, one of her Majesty’s Pensioners, who――because so worthy monuments should not be buried in perpetual oblivion,――is very willing to suffer them to be overseen and published in as good order as may be, to the encouragement and benefit of our countrymen.[72] III.――VERRAZZANO’S LETTER TO THE KING. [This letter is said to have been written at Dieppe, July 8, 1524, being addressed to King Francis I. of France. This narrative, if authentic, is the earliest original account of the Atlantic coast of the United States. Its authenticity has been doubted; and Mr. Bancroft, in the new edition of his History, does not refer to it at all. But, as the question is still unsettled, the letter is included here.] Illustration: VERRAZZANO.