These facts not only prove that Newfoundland and Cape Breton were well known in France and Portugal before the Verrazzano voyage and therefore that he did not discover them, but that he must have known of them before, and that the letter is intentionally false in that respect. It might perhaps be insisted with some plausibility under other circumstances, that he ran along the coast, believing that it was a new land, and therefore made the representation of having discovered it in good faith. But admitting that it was even possible for him to have sailed along those shores without encountering a single fishing craft which would have assured him that he was not in unknown waters, it is impossible that he could have sailed from Dieppe and returned to that port where, of all the places in France or Europe, the knowledge of these facts most existed, and where they were as familiar as household words, and where they must have entered into the thoughts and hopes of many of its inhabitants, without their being known to him; and that he could have written the letter from that same port, claiming the discovery of the country for himself, without intending a fraud. It was the port to which Aubert belonged and where he landed the Indians he brought from Newfoundland. It was the principal port of Normandy from which the fishing vessels made their annual voyages to that country. It was the port from whence he manned and equipped his own fleet of four ships, with crews which must have been largely composed of Normand sailors who were familiar with the navigation and the coast. And there was not a citizen of Dieppe, probably, who had not an interest of some nature in one or more of the fishing vessels, and could have told him what country it was that he had explored. It bears unequivocal testimony to the fictitious character of this claim, that Ramusio thought it necessary to interpolate in his version a passage representing the discovery of Verrazzano as terminating where the discoveries of the Bretons began, and to omit the cosmography which states it was at the point where those of the Portuguese towards the Arctic circle commenced. By this alteration the letter is made to acknowledge the prior discoveries by the Bretons, which are entirely excluded in the original version, and to adopt the latitude of 50 Degrees N. for the Verrazzano limit thus making the false statement, as to the extent of the discovery, a mistake as it were of nautical observation. The following parallel passages in two versions will best explain the character and effect of the alteration. VERSION OF CARLI, Narrative. Navicando infra 'l subsolano ed aquilone in spatio di leghe CL et de gia avendo consumato tutte le nostre substantie navale et vettovaglie, avendo discopruto leghe DII cive leghe 700, piu do nuova terra fornendoci di acque et legne deliberammo di tornare in Francia. * * * * * * * * * * * * Cosmography.