WHO DISCOVERED AMERICA?

Star (Christchurch), Issue 5655, 28 August 1896, Page 6 (Supplement)

WHO DISCOVERED AMERICA?

Preparations are now in active progress for the celebration of the four-hundredth anniversary of the discovery of Nova Scotia by John Cabot, the Venetian Englishman,, ■who was granted a patent by Henry VII. empowering him, his three sons — Louis, Sebastian and Sancia — and those associated with them, at their own expense, to discover any new lands not hitherto claimed by any Christian monarch, and to take possession of them for England. In connection with this celebration the claim is advanced that Cabot was the first to discover the American continent, which was named after Amerigo Vespucius, because of the latter having landed on the continent eighteen days before Columbus. The evidence in favour of Cabot seems to be convincing. He is shown by Dr S. E. Dawson, of the Royal Society of Canada, to have landed on the easternmost point of Nova Scotia on June 24, 1497, or more than one year before Columbus set foot on the mainland of America. It is not disputed that Columbus only discovered the ~ American continent in 1498, when he sighted land in the neighbourhood of Venezuela. The honour of discovering the great continent of North America is therefore justly due to the enterprise of King Henry VII., in availing himself of the offer of the adventurous Venetian who set sail in one small vessel, the Matthew, with a crew of eighteen men. There is an i appropriateness iv the fact of English settlement having spread over nearly all North America, where the English flag has never ceased to wave since it was planted there by John Cabot four hundred years ago. The coming celebration ought to be of an interesting character, and it will doubtless be on a scale worthy of the occasion. ' '•