Vast indeed must be those dismal regions, if it be true, as conjectured (Kircher.  Mund.  Subt.  I. 202), that Etna, in her eruptions, has discharged twenty times her original bulk.  Well might she be called by Euripides (Troades, v. 222) the Mother of Mountains; yet Etna herself is but ’a mere firework, when compared to the burning summits of the Andes.’

NOTE p.

Where PLATA and MARAGNON meet the Main.

Rivers of South America.  Their collision with the tide has the effect of a tempest.

NOTE q.

Of HURON or ONTARIO, inland seas,

Lakes of North America.  Huron is above a thousand miles in circumference.  Ontario receives the waters of the Niagara, so famous for its falls; and discharges itself into the Atlantic by the river St. Lawrence.

NOTE r.

Hung in the tempest o’er the troubled main;

The dominion of a bad angel over an unknown sea, infestandole con sus torbellinos y tempestades, and his flight before a Christian hero, are described in glowing language by Ovalle.  Hist, de Chile.  IV. 8.

NOTE s.

He spoke; and all was silence, all was night!

These scattered fragments may be compared to shreds of old arras, or reflections from a river broken and confused by the oar; and now and then perhaps the imagination of the reader may supply more than is lost.  Si qua latent, meliora putat.

Illud vero perquam rarum ac memoria dignum, etiam suprema opera artificum imperfectasque tabulas, sicut Irin Aristidis, Tyndaridas Nicomachi, Medeam Timomachi, et quam diximus Venerem Apellis, in majori admiratione esse, quam perfecta.

NOTE t.

The soldier, &c.

In the Lusiad, to beguile the heavy hours at sea, Veloso relates to his companions of the second watch the story of the Twelve Knights.  L. vi.

NOTE u.

So Fortune smil’d, careless of sea or land!

Among those, who went with Columbus, were many adventurers, and gentlemen of the court.  Primero was the game then in fashion.  See Vega, p. 2, lib. iii. c. 9.

NOTE x.

Yet who but He undaunted could explore

Many sighed and wept; and every hour seemed a year, says Herrera. 
I. i. 9 and 10.

NOTE y.

While his dear boys—­ah, on his neck they hung,

’But I was most afflicted, when I thought of my two sons, whom I had left behind me in a strange country....before I had done, or at least could be known to have done, any thing which might incline your highnesses to remember them.  And though I comforted myself with the reflection that our Lord would not suffer so earnest an endeavour for the exaltation of his church to come to nothing, yet I considered that, on account of my unworthiness,’ &c.—­F.  Columbus, c. 37.

NOTE z.

Roc of the West! to him all empire giv’n!