A keen controversy has raged as to the exact landfall of John Cabot in his 1497 voyage, and it cannot be said that a decisive conclusion has followed. A long tradition (fondly repeated by Mr Justice Prowse) finds the landfall in Cape Bonavista, Newfoundland. It is difficult to say more than that it may have been so; it may too have been in Cape Breton Island, or even some part of the coast of Labrador. In any case, whether or not Cabot found his landfall in Newfoundland, he must have sighted it in the course of his voyage. It may be mentioned here by way of caution that the name Newfoundland was specialized in later times so as to apply to the island alone, and that it was at first used indifferently to describe all the territories discovered by Cabot. As no true citizen of Newfoundland will surrender the belief that Cape Bonavista was in fact the landfall of Cabot, it seems proper to insert in the story of the island, for what they are worth, the nearest contemporary accounts of Cabot's voyage. They are more fully collected in Mr Beazley's monograph,[10] to which I am indebted for the translations which follow. The first account is contained, as has already been pointed out, in a letter written by Raimondo di Raimondi to the Duke of Milan: "Most illustrious and excellent my Lord,--Perhaps among your Excellency's many occupations, you may not be displeased to learn how His Majesty here has won a part of Asia without a stroke of the sword. There is in this kingdom a Venetian fellow, Master John Cabot by name, of a fine mind, greatly skilled in navigation, who, seeing that those most serene kings, first he of Portugal, and then the one of Spain, have occupied unknown islands, determined to make a like acquisition for His Majesty aforesaid. And having obtained Royal grants that he should have the usufruct of all that he should discover, provided that the ownership of the same is reserved to the Crown, with a small ship and eighteen persons he committed himself to fortune. And having set out from Bristol, a western port of this kingdom, and passed the western limits of Hibernia, and then standing to the northward, he began to steer eastwards [meaning westwards], leaving, after a few days, the North Star on his right hand. And having wandered about considerably, at last he fell in with _terra firma_, where, having planted the Royal banner and taken possession in the behalf of this King; and having taken several tokens, he has returned thence. The said Master John, as being foreign-born and poor, would not be believed, if his comrades, who are almost all Englishmen and from Bristol, did not testify that what he says is true.