The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques and Discoveries of the English Nation — Volume 01

The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques and Discoveries of the English Nation — Volume 01

A preface to the Reader as touching the principall Voyages and discourses in this first part. Hauing for the benefit and honour of my Countrey zealously bestowed so many yeres, so much trauaile and cost, to bring Antiquities smothered and buried in darke silence, to light, and to preserue certaine memorable exploits of late yeres by our English nation atchieued, from the greedy and deuouring lawes of obliuion: to gather likewise, and as it were to incorporate into one body the torne and scattered limmes of our ancient and late Nauigations by Sea, our voyages by land, and traffiques of merchandise by both: and hauing (so much as in me lieth) restored ech particular member, being before displaced, to their true ioynts and ligaments; I meane, by the helpe of Geographie and Chronologie (which I may call the Sunne and the Moone, the right eye and the left of all history) referred ech particular relation to the due time and place: I do this second time (friendly Reader, if not to satisfie, yet at least for the present to allay and hold in suspense thine expectation) presume to offer vnto thy view this first part of my threefold discourse. For the bringing of which into this homely and rough-hewen shape, which here thou seest; what restlesse nights, what painefull dayes, what heat, what cold I haue indured; how many long & chargeable iourneys I haue trauailed; how many famous libraries I haue searched into; what varietie of ancient and moderne writers I haue perused; what a number of old records, patents, priuleges, letters, &c. I haue redeemed from obscuritie and perishing; into how manifold acquaintance I haue entered; what expenses I haue not spared; and yet what faire opportunities of priuate game, preferment, and ease I haue neglected; albeit thyselfe canst hardly imagine, yet I by daily experience do finde & feele, and some of my entier friends can sufficiently testifie. Howbeit (as I told thee at the first) the honour and benefit of this common weale wherein I liue and breathe, hath made all difficulties seeme easie, all paines and industrie pleasant and all expenses of light value and moment vnto me. For (to conteine myselfe onely within the bounds of this present discourse and in the midst thereof to begin) wil it not in all posteritie be as great a renowme vnto our English nation to haue bene the first discouerers of a Sea beyond the North cape (neuer certainly knowen before) and of a conuenient passage into the huge Empire of Russia by the bay of S. Nicholas and the riuer of Duina; as for the Portugales to haue found a Sea beyond the Cape of Buona Esperanza, and so consequently a passage by Sea into the East Indies; or for the Italians and Spaniards to haue discouered vnknowen landes so many hundred leagues Westward and Southwestward of the streits of Gibraltar, & of the pillers of Hercules? Be it granted that the renowmed Portugale Vasques de Gama trauersed the maine Ocean Southward of Africke: Did not Richard Chanceler and his mates performe the like Northward of Europe? Suppose that Columbus that noble and high-spinted Genuois escried vnknowen landes to the Westward of Europe and Africke: Did not the valiant English knight sir Hugh Willoughby; did not the famous Pilots Stephen Burrough, Arthur Pet, and Charles Iackman accoast Noua Zembia, Colgoieue, and Vaigatz to the North of Europe and Asia? Howbeit you will say perhaps, not with the like golden successe, not with such deductions of Colonies, nor attaining of conquests. True it is that our successe hath not bene correspondent vnto theirs: yet in this our attempt the vncertaintie of finding was farre greater, and the difficultie and danger of searching was no whit lesse. For hath not Herodotus (a man for his time, most skilfull and iudicial in Cosmographie, who writ aboue 2000. yeeres ago) in his 4. booke called Melpomene, signified vnto the Portugales in plaine termes; that Africa, except the small Isthmus between the Arabian gulfe and the Mediterran sea, was on all sides enuironed with the Ocean? And for the further confirmation thereof, doth he not make mention of one Neco an gyptian King, who (for trials sake) sent a fleet of Phoenicians downe the Red sea, who setting forth in Autumne and sailing Southward till they had the Sunne at noonetide vpon their sterbourd (that is to say hauing crossed the quinoctial and the Southerne tropique) after a long Nauigation directed their course to the North and in the space of 3. years enuironed all Africk, passing home through the Gaditan strait and arriuing in gypt. And doth not [Footnote: Lib. 2. nat. hist. cap. 67.] Plinie tell them that noble Hanno in the flourishing time and estate of Carthage sailed from Gades in Spaine to the coast of Arabia foelix, and put down his whole iournall in writing? Doth he not make mention that in the time of Augustus Csar the wracke of certaine Spanish ships was found floating in the Arabian gulfe? And, not to be ouer tedious in alleaging of testimonies, doth not Strabo in the 2. booke of his Geography, together with Cornelius Nepos and Plinie in the place beforenamed, agree all in one, that one Eudoxus fleeing from King Lathyrus, and sailing downe the Arabian bay, sailed along, doubled the Southern point of Africk, and at length arriued at Gades? And what should I speake of the Spaniards? Was not diuine [Footnote: In Timo] Plato (who liued so many ages ago and plainely described their West Indies vnder the name of Atlantis) was not he (I say) instead of a Cosmographer vnto them? Were not those Carthaginians mentioned by Aristotle lib. [Footnote: [Greek: peri thaumasion akousmaton]] de admirabil. auscult. their forerunners? And had they not Columbus to stirre them vp and pricke them forward vnto their Westerne discoueries; yea to be their chiefe loads man and Pilot? Sithens therefore these two worthy Nations had those bright lampes of learning (I meane the most ancient and best Philosophers, Historiographers and Geographers) to shewe them light; and the load starre of experience (to wit those great exploits and voyages layed vp in store and recorded) whereby to shape their course: what great attempt might they not presume to vndertake? But alas our English nation, at the first setting foorth for their Northeasterne discouery, were either altogether destitute of such cleare lights and inducements or if they had any inkling at all it was as misty as they found the Northren seas, and so obscure and ambiguous, that it was meet rather to deterre them then to giue them encouragement. ......Buy Now (To Read More)

Product details

Ebook Number: 7182
Author: Hakluyt, Richard
Release Date: Dec 1, 2004
Format: eBook
Language: English