From England to go to all the east parts of the world, which he
endeavoured to prove three ways.
The first was, that he heard a fisherman of Tartary say in hunting
the morse, that he sailed very far towards the south-east, finding
no end of the sea, whereby he hoped a through passage to be that
way.
Whereunto I answered that the Tartars were a barbarous people, and
utterly ignorant in the art of navigation, not knowing the use of
the sea-card, compass, or star, which he confessed true; and
therefore they could not (said I) certainly know the south-east from
the north-east in a wide sea, and a place unknown from the sight of
the land.
Or if he sailed anything near the shore, yet he, being ignorant,
might be deceived by the doubling of many points and capes, and by
the trending of the land, albeit he kept continually along the
shore.
And further, it might be that the poor fisherman through simplicity
thought that there was nothing that way but sea, because he saw mine
land, which proof (under correction) giveth small assurance of a
navigable sea by the north-east to go round about the world, for
that he judged by the eye only, seeing we in this clear air do
account twenty miles a ken at sea.
