The fate of Loaysa’s armada was still more disastrous.  A short description of it will be given in the next chapter.

Notwithstanding all these drawbacks, the period was one of great maritime activity, and many unauthorised and clandestine voyages were also performed, in the course of which Australia may have been discovered, for the western and eastern coasts were charted before the year 1530, as we shall see by and by.

CHAPTER II.

Voyages to the spice islands and discovery of Papua.

Whilst the Portuguese and Spaniards were fighting for the possession of the “Spicery,” as they sometimes called the Moluccas, the old dispute about the line of demarcation was resumed in Spain and Portugal.  It was referred to a convocation of learned geographers and pilots, held at Badajoz, on the shores of the Guadiana.

Those learned men talked and argued, and their animated discussions extended over many months; but no decision was arrived at.

Sebastian del Cano, who had been appointed commander after Magellan’s death at the Philippines, and had returned to Spain with the remnant of the expedition, had been called upon to report his views at the meetings, but he, also, had not been able to prove under what longitude the Spice Islands were situated; and now another fleet was ordered to be fitted out to make further investigations.

It was entrusted to Garcia Jofre de Loaysa, with del Cano as pilot-major, and other survivors of Magellan’s armada.

They sailed from Coruna in July, 1525, with an armament of seven ships.  Every precaution was taken to ensure the success of the voyage, but the expedition proved a most disastrous one notwithstanding.  During a fearful storm del Cano’s vessel was wrecked at the entrance to Magellan’s Straits, and the captain-general was separated from the fleet.

Francisco de Hoces, who commanded one of the ships, is reported to have been driven by the same storm to 55 deg. of south latitude, where he sighted the group of islands which became known at a later date under the name of South Georgia and South Sandwich Islands.

It was April before the rest of the fleet entered Magellan’s Straits, and the passage was tedious and dismal, several of the sailors dying from the extreme cold.  At last, on the 25th of May, 1526, they entered the Pacific Ocean, where they were met by another storm, which dispersed the fleet right and left.

On this occasion an extraordinary piece of good luck befel one of the small vessels of the fleet—­a pinnace or row boat, of the kind called pataca, in command of Joam de Resaga, who steered it along the coast of Peru, unknown at the time, and reached New Spain, where they gave an account to the famous conquerer of Mexico, Fernand Cortez, telling him that Loaysa was on his way to the islands of cloves.*