quently there the southern end of the versorium does
not yet face exactly to the pole.

* * * * *

CHAP. XVI.

On the variation in Nova Zembla.

Variations in parts near the pole are greater (as has been shown before)
and also have sudden changes, as in former years the Dutch explorers
observed not badly, even if those observations were not exact--which indeed
is pardonable in them; for with the usual instruments it is with difficulty
{180} that the truth becomes known in such a high latitude (of about 80
degrees). Now, however, from the deviation of the compass the reason for
there being an open course to the east by the Arctick Ocean appears
manifest; for since the versorium has so ample a variation toward the
north-west, it is demonstrable that a continent does not extend any great
distance in the whole of that course toward the east. Therefore with the
greater hope can the sea be attempted and explored toward the east for a
passage to the Moluccas by the north-east than by the north-west.

* * * * *

CHAP. XVII.

Variation in the Pacifick Ocean.

Passing the Strait of Magellan the deviation on the shore of Peru is toward
the south-east, _i.e._, from the south toward the east. And a similar
deflection would be continued along the whole coast of Peru as far as the
aequator. In a higher latitude up to 45 deg. the variation is greater than
near the aequator; and the deflection toward the south-east is in nearly
the same proportion as was the deviation from the south toward the west on
the eastern shore of South America. From the aequator toward the North
there is little or no variation until one comes to New Galicia; and thence
along the whole shore as far as Quivira the inclination is from the north
toward the east.

* * * * *

CHAP. XVIII.

On the variation in the Mediterranean Sea.

Sicilian and Italian sailors think that in the Sicilian Sea and toward the
east up to the meridian of the Peloponnesus (as Franciscus Maurolycus
relates) the magnetick needle "graecizes," that is, turns from the pole
toward what is called the greek wind or Boreas; that on the shore of the
Peloponnesus it looks toward the true pole; but that when they have
proceeded further east, then it "mistralizes," because it tends from the
pole toward the mistral or north-west wind: which agrees with our rule for
the variation. For as the