Harrisse prints this interesting letter of Cantino in his _Jean et Sébastian Cabot_ (pp. 262-264). Cantino appears to have also sent his master a map showing the new discoveries. This map Harrisse has since reproduced with a commentary, in his work on the Cortereals, as explained in the second volume of the present history. It should be noted that Harrisse counts three voyages of Gaspar Cortereal,—the first, without result, before May, 1500; the second, between May and December of that year; and a third, sailing in January, 1501,—the return of two of whose vessels in the following October is related by Pasqualigo and Cantino.[19] The confusion of the voyages continued. The Spanish historians and those of Italy, knowing, perhaps, of only one, or getting their information from the _Paesi_ and the maps, speak of but one expedition. Gomara, whose work was published at Saragossa in 1552-1553,[20] says that Cortereal was seeking a northwest passage, but failed to find it; that he gave his name to the islands at the mouth of the St. Lawrence in 50° N.; and that, dismayed at the snow and ice, he returned home with about sixty of the natives whom he had captured.[21] Herrera, who published his History early in the next century,[22] gets his information from Gomara. Peter Martyr does not mention the Cortereals. Turning to Italy, we find in Ramusio an account of Cortereal in the third volume of his great collection of voyages,[23] published in 1556, at fol. 417. Here, in an introductory discourse, written by Ramusio himself, “sopra la terra ferme dell’ Indie Occidentali,” it is stated that Gaspar Cortereal was the first captain who went to that part of the New World which “runs to the north,” in 1500, with two ships, in search of a shorter passage to the Spice Islands; that he penetrated so far north as to get into a region of great cold, discovering at 60° a river filled with snow, which was called the “Rio Nevado;” that he found inhabited islands to which he gave names, etc.