Volume 1

A collection of voyages and travels, some now first printed from original manuscripts, others now first published in English. To which is prefixed, an introductory discourse (supposed to be written by the celebrated Mr. Locke) intitled, the whole history of navigation from its original to this time / Illustrated with maps and cuts, curiously engraved.

  • Awnsham Churchill
Date:
1744-1746
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A collection of voyages and travels, some now first printed from original manuscripts, others now first published in English. To which is prefixed, an introductory discourse (supposed to be written by the celebrated Mr. Locke) intitled, the whole history of navigation from its original to this time / Illustrated with maps and cuts, curiously engraved. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    lake of Riccia at this time, while I was com¬ piling this work, where it had lain funk and ncgkUed for above thirteen hundred years ; / obferved, that the pine and cyprefs of it had Iqjled moft remarkably. On the outfide it was built with double planks, daubed over with Greek pitch, caulked with linen rags, and over all a fheet of lead faflened on with little copper nails. Raphael VolaterranUs in his geography fays, this fhip was weighed by the order of cardinal Profpero Colonna. Here vve have caulking and fheathing together above fixteen hundred years ago •, for I fup- pofe no man can doubt that the fheet of lead nailed over the outfide with copper nails was fheathing, and that in great perfection, the copper nails being ufed rather than iron, which when once rufted in the water with the working of the fhip, foon lofe their hold and drop out. The other inftance we find Purch. Pil-in Purchase, pilgrims, vol.l. lib. IV. in vo!. r hb. c,ptajn Saris’s voyage to the court of Ja- 4' 37 *’ pan, p. 371. where the captain giving an account of his voyage lays, that rowing betwixt Firando anti Fuccate, about eight or ten leagues on this fide Xemina-feque, he found a great town where there lay in a dock a junck of eight or ten hundred tun burden, fheathed all with iron. This was An. 1613.in the year 1613. about which time the Englifn came firft acquainted with Japan •, and it is evident, that nation had not learned the way of fheathing of them, or the Por- tugufes, who were there before, but were themfelves ignorant of the art of fheathing. Now to return to the magnetical needle, or fea-compafs; its difeoverer, as has been faid, appears to be Flavius, or John Gioia of Amalfi, and the time of its difeovery An. 1300.about the year 1300. The reafon of its tending to or pointing out the north, is what many natural philofophers have in vain laboured to find •, and all their ftudy has brought them only to be fenfible of the imperfection of human knowledge, which when plunged into the inquiry after the fecrets of nature, finds no other way to come off but by calling them occult qua¬ lities, which is no other than owning our ignorance, and granting they are things al¬ together unknown to us. Yet thefe are not all the wonders of this magnetick vir- Variation tue. The variation of it is another as in- of the fcrutable a fecret. This variation is when Needle. t]ie neecne does not point out the true pole, but inclines more or lefs either to the eaft or well; and is not certain, but differs accord¬ ing to places, yet holding always the fame in the fame place, and is found by obferving the fun or ftars. The caufe of this variation lome philofophers aferibe to magnetical mountains, fome to the pole itfelf, fome to the heavens, and fome to a magnetical power even beyond the heavens; but thefe 4 are all blind gueffes, and fond oftentations of learning without any thing in them to Convince one’s reafon. There is nothing of it certain but the variation itfelf. Nor is this variation alone, there is a va¬ riation of the variation, a fubjeCt to be handled by none but fuch as have made it a peculiar ftudy, and which deferving a peculiar volume is daily expeCted from a moft able pen. But let us leave thefe my- fteries, and come, to the hiftorical parr, as the principal fcope of this difcourfe •, where ufeofthe we fhall find, that though the ufe of the Needle needle was fo long fince found out, yet ei- long neg- ther through its being kept private by fome few perfons at firft as a fecret of great va- co lue, or through the dulnefs of Jailors, at firft not comprehending this wonderful phe¬ nomena ; or through fear of venturing too far out of the known fhores ; or laftly, out of a conceit that there could not be more habitable world to difeover: whether for thefe, or any other caufe, we do not find any confiderable advantage made of this wonderful difeovery for above an age after it: nay, what is more, it does not appear how the world received it, who firft ufed it upon the fea, and how it fpread abroad into other parts. This is not a little ftrange in a matter of fuch confequence, that the hi • ftories of nations fhould not mention when they received fo great an advantage, or what benefit they found at firft by it. But fo it is ; and therefore to fhew the advance¬ ment of navigation fince the difeovery of the magnetical needle, it will be abfolute- Jy neceffary to begin feveral years after it, before which nothing appears to be done. This fhall be performed with all poffible brevity, and by way of annals, contain¬ ing a fummary account of all difeoveries from year to year : yet left the diftance and variety of places fhould too much di- ftraft the reader, if all lay intermixed, the European northern difeoveries fhall be firft run through in their order of years ; next to them, as next in order of time, fhall follow the African, and fo the Eaft-Indian or Aftatick, the one being the confequence of the other ; and in the laft place fhall appear the Weft-Indian, or American. The firft part of the northern European difeove¬ ries is all taken out of Hakluyt, beginning with the neareft after the difeovery of the needle, quoting the authors out of him, and the page where they are to be found. An. 1360. Nicholas de Linna, or of Linn, An. 136a, a friar of Oxford, who was an able aftrono- mer, took a voyage with others into the moft northern iflands of the world •, where leaving his company he travelled alone, and made draughts of all thofe northern parts, which at his return he prefented to king Edward III. This friar made five voyages at •
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