original
discovery of this island of Madeira, all of whom concur in asserting that
it was first discovered by an Englishman. Juan de Barros, the Livy of
Portugal, mentions it briefly in the first decade of his Asia. The
history of this discovery was written in Latin, by Doctor Manoel Clemente,
and dedicated to Pope Clement V. Manoel Tome composed a Latin poem on the
subject, which he intitled _Insulana_. Antonio Galvano mentions it in a
treatise of discoveries, made chiefly by the Spaniards and Portuguese
previously to the year 1550[2]. Manoel de Faria y Sousa, the illustrious
commentator of Camoens, cites Galvano in illustration of the fifth stanza
in the fifth book of the immortal Lusiad, and likewise gives an account
of this discovery in his Portuguese Asia. But the earliest and most
complete relation of this discovery was composed by Francisco Alcaforado,
who was esquire to Don Henry the _infant_ or prince of Portugal, the
first great promoter of maritime discoveries, and to whom he presented
his work. No person was more capable of giving an exact account of that
singular event than Alcaforado, as he was one of those who assisted in
making the second discovery. His work was first published in Portuguese
by Don Francisco Manoel, and was afterwards published in French at Paris
in 1671[3]. From this French edition the following account is extracted,
because the original Portuguese has not come to our knowledge, neither
can we say when that was printed; but as the anonymous French translator
remarked, that "Don Francisco _keeps_ the original MS. with great care,"
it may be concluded, that the Portuguese impression did not long precede
the French translation. The French translator acknowledges that he has
altered the style, which was extremely florid and poetical, and has
expunged several useless and tedious digressions, etymologies,
reflections, and comparisons; but declares that he has strictly presented,
the truth and substance of the history, so as not to vary from it in the
least, or to omit the smallest material circumstance.

It is remarkable that there is no mention whatever in any of the English
histories of Machin, Macham, or Marcham, the supposed author of this
discovery; so that Hakluyt was beholden to Antonio Galvano for the
imperfect account he gives of that transaction[4]. By the following
abstract the complete history becomes our own, and we shall be no longer
strangers to an event which has for several a