e translated here is the one sent by
Rawdon Brown to the Public Record Office in London. Both are printed in
Weare, _Cabot's Discovery_, pp. 142-143. The translation given here is by
Rawdon Brown as printed in the _Calendar of State Papers, Venetian
Series_, I. 259-260.

[425-1] The Seven Cities was a legendary island in the Atlantic. They are
all placed and named on the legendary island of Antilia on the map of
Grazioso Benincasa in 1482. See E.G. Bourne, _Spain in America_, pp. 6
and 7, and Kretschmer, _Die Entdeckung Amerikas_, Atlas, plate 4.
Columbus reported in Portugal that he had discovered Antilia (see p. 225,
note 1); hence the deduction either of John Cabot or of Raimondo that the
region explored by Cabot, being far to the west in the ocean, was the
same as that visited by Columbus. _Cf._ also art. "Brazil, Island of,"
_Encyclopaedia Britannica_.

[425-2] This letter is preserved in the Archivio di Stato in Milan. It
was first published in the _Annuario Scientifico del 1865_ (Milan, 1866).
It was first printed in English in Winsor, _Narrative and Critical
History of America_, III. 54-55 (Boston, 1884), in the chapter by Charles
Deane, entitled "The Voyages of the Cabots." This translation was revised
by Professor B.H. Nash of Harvard University and is given here with only
one or two slight changes.

[425-3] In this passage Cabot's immediate impulse is attributed to the
voyages of Columbus and their results.

[426-1] No satisfactory explanation of this can be given. Bellemo, in the
_Raccolta Colombiana_, pt. III., vol. I., p. 197, interprets this
sentence to mean that Cabot showed on the globe the place he had reached
on the voyage and then to that statement the remark is added, referring
to earlier journeys, "and going toward the east he has passed
considerably beyond the land of the Tanais." Tanais is the Latin name for
the Don, and at the mouth of the Don was the important Venetian trading
station of La Tana. _Cf._ Biggar, _Voyages of the Cabots and
Corte-Reals_, pp. 33-34, note. Biggar dissents from this interpretation.
I would offer the conjecture that "the land of the Tanais" stands for the
land of Tana. In Marco Polo the kingdom of Tana, on the western side of
India, is described as powerful and having an extensive commerce. See
Marco Polo, pt. III., ch. XXX. Raimondo, if unfamiliar with Marco Polo,
would understand La Tana by Tana and then naturally assume that "the
country of Tana" was a slip for