He made, or he claimed to have made,—assuming the letters attributed to him to be his,—four voyages, of each of which he wrote a narrative. According to the dates given in these letters, he twice sailed from Spain by order of Ferdinand,—in May, 1497, and in May, 1499; and twice from Portugal, in the service of King Emanuel,—in May, 1501, and in May, 1503. He was absent, as we learn from the same letters, about seventeen months on the first voyage, about sixteen each on the second and third, and on the fourth eleven months. If he went to sea, then, for the first time in May, 1497, and the last voyage ended, as the narrative says, in June, 1504, the whole period of his seafaring life was eighty-four months, of which sixty were passed at sea, and twenty-four, at reasonable intervals, on shore. As the dates of departure and of return are carefully given, obviously the period from May, 1497, to June, 1504, must be allowed for the four expeditions. But here we come upon an insurmountable obstacle. If to the first voyage of 1497 the wrong date was given,—if, that is, the actual first voyage was that of 1499, which Vespucci calls his second,—then he could not have gone upon four expeditions. From May, 1499, to June, 1504, is a period of sixty months; and as the aggregate length he gives to the assumed four voyages is sixty months, they could not have been made in that time, as that would have compelled him to be at sea the whole five years, with no interval of return to Spain or Portugal to refit,—which is manifestly absurd.