coast of Paria and the Pearl Islands by Columbus; as it was maintained that unless he had discovered them, the claim of his heir with respect to them would be of no validity.

In the course of this suit a particular examination of witnesses took place in 1512-13 in the fiscal court. Alonso de Ojeda and nearly a hundred other persons were interrogated on oath; that voyager having been the first to visit the coast of Paria after Columbus had left it, and that within a very few months. The interrogatories of these witnesses and their replies are still extant in the archives of the Indies at Seville, in a packet of papers entitled “Papers belonging to the Admiral Don Luis Colon about the conservation of his privileges, from ann. 1515 to 1564." The author of the present work has two several copies of these interrogatories lying before him. One made by the late historian, Muñoz, and the other made in 1826, and signed by Don Jose de la Higuera y Lara, keeper of the general archives of the Indies of Seville. In the course of this testimony, the fact that Amerigo Vespucci accompanied Ojeda in this voyage of 1499, appears manifest, first from the deposition of Ojeda himself. The following are the words of the record: "In this voyage which this said witness made he took with him Juan de la Cosa and Morego Vespuche [Amerigo Vespucci] and other pilots."* Secondly, from the

"En este viage que este dicho testigo hizo trujo consigo a Juan de la Cosa piloto, e Morego Vespuche, e otros pilotos

coincidence of many parts of the narrative of Vespucci with events in this voyage of Ojeda. Among these coincidences one is particularly striking. Vespucci in his letter to Lorenzo de Medici, and also in that to René or Soderini, says that his ships after leaving the coast of Terra Firma stopped at Hispaniola where they remained about two months and a half procuring provisions, during which time, he adds, “we had many perils and troubles with the very Christians who were in that island with Columbus, and I believe through envy.'

Now it is well known that Ojeda passed some time on the western end of the island victualling his ships; and that serious dissension took place between him and the Spaniards in those parts, and the party sent by Columbus under Roldan to keep a watch upon his movements. If then Vespucci, as is stated upon oath, really accompanied Ojeda in this voyage, the inference appears almost irresistible, that he had not made the previous voyage of 1497, for the fact would have been well known to Ojeda; he would have considered Vespucci as the original discoverer, and would have had no

"Per la necessita del mantenimento fummo all' Isola d' Antiglia [Hispaniola] che é questa che descoperse Cristoval Colombo piú anni fa, dove facemmo molto mantenimento, e stemmo due mesi e 17 giorni; dove passammo moti pericoli e travagli con li medesimi christiani que in questa isola stavanno col Colombo (credo per invidia).”—Letter of Vespucci Edit. of Canovai.

motive for depriving him of the merit of it to give it to Columbus with whom Ojeda was not upon friendly

terms.

Ojeda, however, expressly declares that the coast had been discovered by Columbus. On being asked how he knew the fact, he replied, because he saw the chart of the country discovered which Columbus sent at the time to the King and Queen, and that he came off immediately on a voyage of discovery and found what there was therein set down as discovered by the Admiral was correct.*

Another witness, Bernaldo de Haro, states that he had been with the Admiral, and had written (or rather copied) a letter for the Admiral to the King and Queen, designating in an accompanying sea-chart the courses and steerings and winds by which he had arrived at Paria; and that this witness had heard that from this chart others had been made, and that Pedro Alonzo Niño and Ojeda and others who had since visited these countries, had been guided by the same.†

Francisco de Molares, one of the best and most credible of all the pilots, testified that he saw a sea-chart

*Preguntado como lo sabe; dijo que lo sabe porque vió este testigo la figura que el dicho Almirante al dicho tiempo embió á Castilla al Rey e Reyna neustros Señores de lo que habia descubierto, y porqua este testigo luego vino a descubrir y halló que era verdad lo que dicho tiene que el dicho Almirante descubrio." MS. Process of D. Diego Colon, pregunta 2.

Este testigo escrivió una carta que el Almirante escriviera al Reya Reyna N. N. S. S. haciendo les saber las perlas e cosas

which Columbus had made of the coast of Paria, and he believed that all governed themselves by it.*

Numerous witnesses in this process testify to the fact that Paria was first discovered by Columbus. Las Casas, who had been at the pains of counting them, says that this fact was established by twenty-five eyewitnesses and sixty ear-witnesses. Many of them testify also that the coast south of Paria, and that extending west of the island of Margarita, away to Venezuela, which Vespucci states to have been discovered by himself in 1497, was now first discovered by Ojeda, and had never before been visited either by the Admiral "or any other Christian whatever."

Alonzo Sanchez de Carvajal says that all the voyages of discovery which were made to the Terra Firma, were made by persons who had sailed with the Admiral, or been benefited by his instructions and directions, following the course he had laid down†; and the same

que habia hallado, y le embió señalado con la dicha carta, en una carta de marear, los rumbos y vientos por donde habia llegado á la Paria, e que este testigo oyó decir como pr. aquella carte se habian hecho otras e por ellas habian venido Pedro Alonzo Merino [Niño] e Ojeda e otros que despues han ido á aquellas partes." -Idem, pregunta 9.

* Process of D. Diego Colon, pregunta 10.

+"Que en todos los viages que algunos hicieron descubriendo en la dicha tierra, ivan personas que ovieron navegado con el dicho Almirante, y a ellos mostró muchas cosas de marear, y ellos por imitacion é industria del dicho Almirante las aprendian y aprendieron e seguendo ag°. que el dicho Almirante les habia mostrado, hicieron los viages que descubrieron en al Terra Firma."-Process, pregunta 10.

is testified by many other pilots and mariners of reputation and experience.

It would be a singular circumstance, if none of these witnesses, many of whom must have sailed in the same squadron with Vespucci along this coast in 1499, should have known that he had discovered and explored it two years previously. If that had really been the case, what motive could he have for concealing the fact? and why, if they knew it, should they not proclaim it? Vespucci states his voyage in 1497 to have been made with four caravels; that they returned in October, in 1498, and that he sailed again with two caravels in May, 1499 (the date of Ojeda's departure). Many of the mariners would therefore have been present in both voyages. Why, too, should Ojeda and the other pilots guide themselves by the charts of Columbus, when they had a man on board so learned in nautical science, and who, from his own recent observations, was practically acquainted with the coast? Not a word however is mentioned of the voyage and discovery of Vespucci by any of the pilots, though every other voyage is cited; nor does there even a seaman appear who has accompanied him in his asserted voyage.

Another strong circumstance against the reality of this voyage is, that it was not brought forward in this trial to defeat the claims of the heirs of Columbus. Vespucci states the voyage to have been undertaken with the knowledge and countenance of King Ferd