Commercial intercourse of adventuresome European traders began with the region in the early fourteenth century, and continued fairly to flourish for about fifty years. Then, with changes in dynasties and tribal wars, the ways of approach were closed and it fell again into darkness. It was long supposed to be a separate country, distinct from the Indies, lying to the north of what we now know as China, and stretching to the Arctic sea. It was not until 1603 (after the publication of the final volume of the _Principal Navigations_) that it was found to be identical with the then vaguely known empire of China, of which similar marvels had for some time been recited. Its identity was the discovery by a lay Jesuit, Benedict Goës, sent out through Central Asia by his superiors in India for the specific object of determining whether Cathay and China were or were not separate empires. Goës died upon the completion of his mission, at Suhchow, the frontier city of China. Cathay was the aim of Columbus. He was possessed by the conviction that the fabled riches of this wondrous region lay directly across the trackless Atlantic “over against” the coast of Spain. Believing the world to be a sphere, he conceived his design of reaching Asia by sailing west. This was the project that he carried for weary years from court to court, seeking the patronage of a favouring prince. But for a mischance England, instead of Spain, would have had the glory and the advantage of his first discovery of 1492. Hakluyt recalls the circumstances in these two “testimonies”: (1) "The offer of the discovery of the West Indies by Christopher Columbus to king Henry the seventh in the yeere 1488 the 13 of February: with the kings acceptation of the offer, & the cause whereupon he was deprived of the same: recorded in the thirteenth chapter of the history of Don Fernand Columbus of the life and deeds of his father Christopher Columbus.