the two monarchs in the treaty of Tordesillas,―ratified June 7, 1494,-wherein the line of demarkation was removed to a point three hundred and seventy leagues west of the Cape Verde islands. The mainland of South America thus far opened up by the Spaniards, thus became legally part of Portugal's domain, while the east coast of Central America and the West Indian islands remained under the crown of Spain.1

to be an Island.

In the meantime Portugal made good her legal claim to the eastern peninsula of South America by § 18. The actual discovery and conquest, though her New World explorers came upon the shores of the Thought New World as unwittingly as Columbus himself. In the year 1500 a Portuguese sea-captain, Peter Cabral, following the course of the famous da Gama, who two years before had completed the work of Dias and reached the Indies by circumnavigating Africa, was driven off the coast by adverse winds and, getting caught in the great equatorial current, came finally to the shores. of Brazil at modern Santa Cruz, near the spot where Pinzon had landed shortly before. Finding this newly discovered land to lie within the sphere of his dominion, King Emanuel lost no time in press

1 M. Creighton, “History of the Papacy during the Reformation,” Bk. V., Chap. VI., London, 1892-94.

E. G. Bourne, "The Demarkation Line of Pope Alexander VI.," Yale Review, May, 1892.

L. L. Dominguez, "The Conquest of the River Plate," Hakluyt Soc. Pubs., No. 81.

John Fiske, loc. cit., Vol. I., pp. 454-460.

ing his claim, and as a result of the expeditions he at once sent out, the coast line of South America was still further developed toward the south to the thirty-second degree.

Thus during the years that had elapsed between the first land-fall of Columbus in 1492 to his death in 1506, a continuous coast line of what he had supposed to be Asia, was opened up for 7000 miles, extending from the northern shores of Honduras eastward and southward to the southern extremity of Brazil as we know the land to-day. This was a staggering blow to the earlier Columbian Hypothesis, and ideas had now to be fitted in with the facts as thus revealed. Peter Martyr as early as 1494 had spoken of the islands of the West Indies discovered by Columbus, as the "New World," and now Vespucci, in the account of his voyages published in 1503, again concluded from the extent of coast line then developed on the mainland, that "we are justified in calling this a 'New World." In the eyes of the Europeans of that day, this "New World," called "America," after him who had thus dignified it as an independent land-mass, was not a great continent as we know it now; but rather was it a huge island lying diagonally across the equator, with an unknown extent to the north and south, and divided longitudinally between the crowns of Spain and Portugal.1

1 E. J. Payne, loc. cit., Vol. I., pp. 198-212. John Fiske, loc. cit., Vol. II., Chap. VII.

Two incentives now led discoverers and explorers on one the desire to round the island of the New World either to the north or to the south $ 19. Span- and thus reach the Indies beyond; and

ish Colonial

to the

Northwest.

Expeditions the other the hopes of finding gold in the New World itself. It was the latter impulse which led to most of the expeditions to the north now undertaken by the Spanish colonists in the West Indies. Their early settlements in these islands, and on the shores of the mainland opposite, had proven somewhat disappointing and were soon exploited of their meagre supply of gold and slaves. Rumors of rich lands farther west continually reached their ears and induced them to undertake further discoveries in this direction. Cuba was first proved to be an island in 1508 and almost immediately colonized by the Spaniards. Ponce de Leon in the same year opened up the island of Porto Rico to Spanish colonization, and subsequently fitted out an expedition there for further discovery to the northwest in the Florida Sea. On Easter day of 1512 he sighted the peninsula of Florida, and, having landed at modern St. Augustine, he then made a survey of the entire coast to the south. Rounding the cape and seeing the broad waters of the gulf beyond, de Leon thought his newly discovered land of Florida to be but another island of the group, and now the belief gained credence that, from the main island across the equator, groups of smaller islands dotted the seas to the northwest, including 1 By Sebastian de Campo.

those discovered by the English and Portuguese farther north, and ending with Iceland and the British Isles.

King Ferdinand in the meantime had provided for the further conquest and colonization of that part of the main island lying within the sphere of his dominion, and discovered by Columbus, Bastidas, Hojedo, Vespucci, and Pinzon. The district lying to the north of the Gulf of Darien he assigned, in 1508, to Diego de Nicuesa, one of his courtiers and colonial agents, as the Province of Castilla del Oro. All south of the gulf, and within the line of demarkation, he granted at the same time to Alonzo de Hojedo, the discoverer, as Nueva Andalucia. Through shipwreck and starvation Nicuesa's colony was reduced to a mere handful of forlorn wretches settled at Nombre de Dios; and, indeed, Hojedo's colony, on the southern shores of the Gulf of Darien, fared not much better for the time. Unable to cope with the natives, Hojeda sailed away for aid, leaving his little colony to shift for themselves. It was then that Vasco Nuñez Balboa, the adventurer and companion of Bastidas on his early voyage to these parts, assumed control. Being familiar with this region, Balboa easily persuaded the colonists to emigrate across the gulf to the northern shore on account of its greater fertility and salubrity. He then calmly informed the new governor, Encisco, that they were in Nicuesa's province now and no longer under Hojedo's or his control. Nicuesa's authority was next disposed of by a rebellion on the part of his

new subjects, and Balboa was unanimously elected Alcade of Santa Maria de la Antigua, the new city now founded there. From the King's Treasurer at Santo Domingo Balboa then received a commission to act as governor of Castilla del Oro, and at once. set about his plans of further discovery. Hearing from the natives of a great sea to the south of him, and, still farther to the south, of a country rich in gold, Balboa determined to learn the truth for himself. Having organized an expedition for the purpose, he accordingly set sail from Antigua on September 1, 1513, and soon after landed at Caledonian Bay. Thence, with a party of one hundred and ninety men and a number of fierce dogs, Balboa pushed over the dividing range, beset by swamps, jungles, and hostile natives. On the 25th his labors were rewarded by the first glimpse of the Pacific, and on the 29th he reached the coast at Gulf San Miguel.' Balboa took possession at once in the name of the Crown of Castile, but the real significance of his discovery could not be duly appreciated at that time, as America was still thought to be an island. The shores of Honduras were then regarded as the northern limits of this great island, and this other sea, discovered by Balboa, would therefore seem to be but part of that same body of water which washed it, and the other smaller islands to the northwest.

This fallacy was soon to be exposed, however, and the magnitude of Balboa's discovery revealed. A