enious writer advance, but my limits prevent its
insertion here, and the subject is not exactly in accordance with the
tenor of my task. Suffice it for the present, that upon this day, the
18th of June, we have passed over this equatorial current, and are now
heading for our native shores, and are in the waters made classic by the
glorious endeavors of the early navigators. Strange is it that of all
those who sought this coast, the name of John Cabot, the first
adventurer who landed upon it, should be so seldom mentioned: and
History, called by a philosopher a Splendid Lie, should prove its title
to mendacity, by giving all the glory of the land, "_primum visa_" to
his son, Sebastian. To John Cabot, a Venetian, then a merchant of
Bristol, England, in the reign of the Seventh Henry, is all the honor to
be ascribed of setting the first European foot upon the then desert
wilds that now bloom, the Garden of the United States; and if a name
must be derived from the discoverer, without reference to its euphony,
to descend as a patronymic, by such a rule, we should be called
Cabotians, instead of Yankees, United Staters, or by the Vespucian title
of Americans.

But to Columbus attaches all the fame of the original idea of navigating
the Western Seas, and if he did not set foot upon the shores towards
which we are now sailing, his voyage incited others to undertake what
perhaps would never otherwise have been dreamed of, and the tropics
would long after have remained painted in their imaginations as a circle
of fire in which the Salamander sported. About a year after the Genoese
had returned from his first voyage--I quote from an Italian,
Tiraboschi--the merchant of Bristol appears to have embraced the idea
that new lands might be discovered in the North West, and a passage to
India might be brought to light by this course. And, in answer to his
application, on the 5th of March, 1495, King Henry the Seventh granted a
commission to John Cabot and his three sons, Louis, Sebastian, and
Sanchez. And on the 24th of June, 1497, he discovered that part of this
Continent, which he called "_Terra primum Visa_" nearly a year previous
to the discovery of the country south of the Isthmus of Darien. But,
_satis superque_, we have had almost enough of ships and the sea. Our
prow is directed towards our own loved shores; the southern gales waft
us propitiously on them; with each swell of the ocean, our bosoms heave
in unison, our hearts leap