into an examination of its merits with impressions in its favor, we have nevertheless been compelled to adopt the conclusion of a late American writer, that it is utterly fictitious. [Footnote:  An Inquiry into the Authenticity of Documents concerning a Discovery in North America claimed to have been made by Verrazzano.  Read before the New York Historical Society, Tuesday, October 10, 1864.  By Buckingham Smith.  New York, 1864. pp. 31, and a map.] The grounds upon which our conviction rests we propose now to state.  Some documents will be introduced, for the first time here brought to light, which will serve further to elucidate the question, and show the career and ultimate fate of Verrazzano.

The letter, in which the pretension is advanced, professes to be addressed by Verrazzano to the king of France, at that time Francis I, from Dieppe, in Normandy, the 8th of July (O.  S.), 1534, on his return to that port from a voyage, undertaken by order of the king, for the purpose of finding new countries; and to give an account of the discoveries which he had accordingly made.  He first reminds his majesty that, after starting with four ships, originally composing the expedition, he was compelled by storms, encountered on the northern coasts, to put into Brittany in distress, with the loss of two of them; and that after repairing there the others, called the Normanda and Delfina (Dauphine), be made a cruize with this fleet of war, as they are styled, along the coast of Spain.  He finally proceeded on the voyage of discovery with the Dauphine alone, setting sail from a desolate rock near the island of Madeira, on the 17th of January, 1524, with fifty men, and provisions for eight months, besides the necessary munitions of war.  This voyage, therefore, is to be regarded, according to the representations here made, to have been begun with the sailing of the four ships, from Dieppe, in the preceding year they fell upon a “country never before seen by any one either in ancient or modern times.” [Footnote:  Some writers have regarded this introductory as referring to two voyages or cruises, one with the four ships before the disaster, and the other with the Dauphine afterwards.  But it seems clear from their being described as assailed by tempests in the north, which compelled them to run into Brittany for safety, that they were not far distant from Dieppe when the storms overtook them; and must have been either on their way out or on their return to that port.  If they were on their return from a voyage to America, as Charlevoix infers (Fastes Chronologiques 1523-4), or simply from a cruise, as Mr. Brevoort supposes, they would, after making their repairs, have proceeded home, to Dieppe, instead of making a second voyage.  They must, therefore, be regarded as on their way from Dieppe.  The idea of a voyage having been performed before the storms seems to be due to alteration which Ramusio made in this portion of the letter, by introducing the word “success,”