CHAPTER V. - TO PROVE THAT THESE INDIANS, AFORENAMED, CAME NOT BY THE
SOUTH-EAST, SOUTH-WEST, NOR FROM ANY OTHER PART OF AFRICA OR
AMERICA.
1. They could not come from the south-east by the Cape of Good
Hope, because the roughness of
The seas there is such - occasioned by
the currents and great winds in that part - that the greatest armadas
the King of Portugal hath cannot without great difficulty pass that
way, much less, then, a canoe of India could live in those
outrageous seas without shipwreck, being a vessel but of very small
burden, and the Indians have conducted themselves to the place
aforesaid, being men unexpert in the art of navigation.
2. Also, it appeareth plainly that they were not able to come from
along the coast of Africa aforesaid to those parts of Europe,
because the winds do, for the most part, blow there easterly or from
the shore, and the current running that way in like sort, would have
driven them westward upon some part of America, for such winds and
tides could never have led them from thence to the said place where
they were found, nor yet could they have come from any of the
countries aforesaid, keeping the seas always, without skilful
mariners to have conducted them such like courses as were necessary
to perform such a voyage.
3. Presupposing also, if they had been driven to the west, as they
must have been, coming that way, then they should have perished,
wanting supply of victuals, not having any place - once leaving the
coast of Africa - until they came to America, north of America, until
they arrived upon some part of Europe or the islands adjoining to it
to have refreshed themselves.
4. Also, if, notwithstanding such impossibilities, they might have
recovered Germany by coming from India by the south-east, yet must
they without all doubt have struck upon some other part of Europe
before their arrival there, as the isles of Madeira, Portugal,
Spain, France, England, Ireland, etc., which, if they had done, it
is not credible that they should or would have departed undiscovered
of the inhabitants; but there was never found in those days any such
ship or men, but only upon the coasts of Germany, where they have
been sundry times and in sundry ages cast ashore; neither is it like
that they would have committed themselves again to sea, if they had
so arrived, not knowing where they were, nor whither to have gone.
5. And by the south-west it is impossible, because the current
aforesaid, which cometh from the east, striketh with such force upon
the Straits of Magellan, and falleth with such swiftness and fury
into Mare de Sur, that hardly any ship - but not possibly a canoe,
with such unskilful mariners - can come into our western ocean
through that strait from the west seas of America, as Magellan's
experience hath partly taught us.
6. And further, to prove that these people so arriving upon the
coast of Germany were Indians, and not inhabiters of any part either
of Africa or America, it is manifest, because the natives, both of
Africa and America, neither had, or have at this day, as is
reported, other kind of boats than such as do bear neither masts nor
sails, except only upon the coasts of Barbary and the Turks' ships,
but do carry themselves from place to place near the shore by the
oar only.
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