“78. A little book, with parchment cover, in octavo, having the form of a pocket-book, entitled, ‘The History or Description of the great Empire of China’. This was first written in Spanish by Juan Gonzales de Mendoza, monk of the Order of St. Augustin, and then translated from the Italian into Dutch by Corn. Taemsz, and printed for Cornelis Claesz, book-seller, living at the Gilt Bible, in North Street, Hoorn, by Jacob de M——, printer, in the town of Alkmaar. The date of the edition of this copy cannot be given with exactitude, by reason of the mouldering away of the lower part of the title-page. The origin of the work can be deduced from the following facts: In the address to the Good Willing Reader, verso of the title-page, is written that ‘this little book was edited after Jan Huyghen van Linschoten had returned to the Netherlands, but somewhat before the publication of the account of his voyage’. Jan Huyghen van Linschoten returned to Holland in the autumn of 1592, and the account of his voyage was published by Cornelis Claesz in 1595. Thus the translation of Mendoza must have been published somewhere between 1592 and 1595. I even believe that we can fix the date of the publishing to be 1595; for the copy found at Novaya Zemlya is exactly similar, both in form and type, to another copy still extant, published in Amsterdam by Cornelis Claesz in 1595. The edition of Amsterdam is exactly similar to the edition of Hoorn, except the title and the first twelve pages of the preface, which in the edition of Amsterdam are of the same purport, but printed in another type. The only difference between the two works consists in the type of the preface.” On the 17th of August, 1875, M. Gundersen, commander of the Norwegian schooner Regina, was the first after Carlsen who visited Barendsz’s Ice Harbour. In a chest, the upper part of which was quite mouldered, he found an old journal, two charts, and a grapnel with four flukes, three of which seemed to have been purposely broken off. The charts, pasted upon sail-cloth, are much injured. The words “Germania inferior” may be read on them. The journal has proved to be a manuscript Dutch translation of the narrative of the English expedition of Pet and Jackman, 1580. For the numerous abridgements and summaries of De Veer’s work, I refer to the learned book of Mr. P. A. Fiele, at Leyden, entitled Mémoire Bibliographique sur les journaux des Navigateurs Néerlandais: Amsterdam, 1867. INTRODUCTION TO THE FIRST EDITION. BY CHARLES J. BEKE, Phil.D.