[Footnote 55: The learned and ingenious author of the "Memoirs of Sebastian Cabot" has brought forward strong arguments against the discovery of the Continent of America by Jean Vas Cortereal in 1494.--Humboldt's _Geog. du Nouveau Continent_, vol. i., p. 279; vol. ii., p. 25. "The discoverer of the territory of our country was one of the most extraordinary men of his age. There is deep cause for regret that time has spared so few memorials of his career. He gave England a continent, and no one knows his burial-place."--Bancroft, vol. i., p. 14.] [Footnote 56: Ramusio, vol. iii., p. 417. This discovery is also attributed to Jacques Cartier, who entered the gulf on the 10th of August, 1535, and gave it the name of the saint whose festival was celebrated on that day.--Charlevoix.] [Footnote 57: In an old map published in 1508, the Labrador coast is called Terra Corterealis.] [Footnote 58: It has been conjectured that the name Terra de Laborador was given to this coast by the Portuguese slave merchants, on account of the admirable qualities of the natives as laborers.--_Picture of Quebec_.] [Footnote 59: It was an idea entertained by Columbus, that, as he extended his discoveries to climates more and more under the torrid influence of the sun, he should find the productions of nature sublimated by its rays to more perfect and precious qualities. He was strengthened in this belief by a letter written to him, at the command of the queen, by one Jayme Ferrer, an eminent and learned lapidary, who, in the course of his trading for precious stones and metals, had been in the Levant and in various parts of the East; had conversed with the merchants of the remote parts of Asia and Africa, and the natives of India, Arabia, and Ethiopia, and was considered deeply versed in geography generally, but especially in the nature of those countries from whence the valuable merchandise in which he dealt was procured. In this letter Ferrer assured Columbus that, according to his experience, the rarest objects of commerce, such as gold, precious stones, drugs, and spices, were chiefly to be found in the regions about the equinoctial line, where the inhabitants were black, or darkly colored, and that until the admiral should arrive among people of such complexions, he did not think he would find those articles in great abundance.--Navarrete, _Coleccion_, tom. ii., Document 68.] [Footnote 60: Ramusio, vol. iii., p. 347; Charlevoix, vol. i., p. 36; see Osorio, History of the Portuguese, b. i.; Barrow's Voyages, p. 37-48; Herrera, Dec. 1., lib. vii., cap. ix.; Ensayo Chronologico para la Historia general de la Florida. En Madrid, 1723.--Quoted by Murray.]