_Melfius_, who liv’d in such a juncture of time for Mathematical Learning, that few Ages boasted the like: For then flourish’d in _England_, and were Contemporaries, besides others abroad, _Richard Wallingford_, _Nicolas de Lynna_, _John Halifax_, _Walter Britte_, _John Duns_, and _John de Lignarys_, all eminent in Astronomical Arts, belonging to Navigation, and doubtless, no small helps to _Melfius_ in this his happy Invention. Lastly, We will relate what hath been held as a seeming Testimony, (that _America_ was known to the _Europeans_ before the Birth of our Saviour) by an antique Meddal of the Emperor _Augustus_, digg’d out of the Ground in _Peru_, and sent to his Holiness at _Rome_, which may well be reckon’d with the like Cheat contriv’d by _Hermicus Cajadus_, _Anno 1505._ near _Syntra_, a Town in _Portugal_, where three Marbles Ingraven with antient Characters, concerning a Prophecy of discovering the _East-Indies_ by the _Portuguese_, in the Reign of King _Emanuel_, were privately bury’d under Ground, and not long after, by a pretended accident digg’d out, which made such a bustle amongst the Learned, that several tired themselves about the explanation of the suppos’d Sibylline Prediction. [Illustration] CHAP. II. _Of the Original of the_ Americans, _whence they came, when, how, and from what People Planted_. [Sidenote: The original of the _Americans_ much disputed on.] About the Original of the _Americans_, the Learned Dispute so much, that they find nothing more difficult in Story, than to clear that Point; for whether inquiry be made after the time, when the _Americans_ first settled themselves where they now inhabit, or after what manner they came thither, either by Shipping or by Land; on purpose, or accidentally; driven by Storm, or else forc’d by a more powerful People, to remove from their old Plantations, and seek for new? or if any one should be yet more curious, asking the way that directed them out of another Countrey to this New World? or else enquire for those People, from whom the _Americans_ deriv’d themselves? He will find several Opinions, and the Learned still Jangling. [Sidenote: Voyage l. 1. c. 8.] [Sidenote: The time when _America_ was first Peopled.]