The Spanish legend to which Gomara refers is, with respect to America, chiefly remarkable for its surprising concurrence in date and other circumstances with the Toltec legend of the arrival of strangers wearing cassocks. It is therefore necessary to ascertain if there are sufficient reasons for placing any confidence in statements that appear to be founded upon tradition, and whether the event that was believed to have taken place could have been possible. The tradition did not escape the attention of Washington Irving. In his “Life of Columbus”[115] he states that “It was recorded in an ancient legend, that at the time of the conquest of Spain and Portugal by the Moors, when the inhabitants fled in every direction to escape from slavery, seven bishops, followed by a great number of their people, took shipping, and abandoned themselves to their fate on the high seas. After tossing about for some time, they landed upon an unknown island in the midst of the ocean. Here the bishops burnt the ships to prevent the desertion of their followers, and founded seven cities.”[116] In the principal maps published during the fifteenth century, before the discovery of America, the island of Antilia was usually given a position in the middle of the western Atlantic, south of the Azores. In the chart of the geographer Toscanelli, which was sent to Columbus, Antilia was placed in the direct track by sea from the Canary islands to Cipango (Japan), the large and prosperous country supposed at that time to be situated in the extreme west, near the eastern limits of Asia. It is evident that Columbus firmly believed in the existence of Antilia, for when he left the Canaries on his outward voyage, he shaped his course for that island and steered due west for about sixteen hundred miles. Upon reaching the latitude and longitude where he expected to see land, the admiral conferred with his captains, but as nothing had been observed it was thought that the ships must have passed the island. At sunset, the captain of the Pinta hailed the admiral and reported that land was in sight to the south-west. The course of the ships was accordingly altered towards that direction. On the next day it was found that what had been seen was cloudland. The ships resumed their course and proceeded until the landfall was made upon the island of Guanahani. The belief in the existence of the legendary island was, however, not then dispelled and it is remarkable, as a proof of the opinions of geographers, that in the important map of the world by Ruysch, published in 1508, in which were placed the latest discoveries in the west; Antilia still retained its position.[117] [Illustration: FROM RUYSCH’S MAP OF THE WORLD (1508). (NORDENSKIÖLD’S FACSIMILE ATLAS.)]