The liberty which Ramusio took with these passages in his version of the letter, demands notice, and adds his testimony again to the absurdity of the account.  He doubtless knew, from the numerous descriptions which had been published, of the uniformity of the physical characteristics of the American Indians; and he certainly knew of it as regarded the natives of this coast; as is proven by his publication of Oviedo’s account of the voyage of Gomez, made there in 1525, in which they are described, in the same volume with the Verrazzano letter. [Footnote:  Tom.  III. fol. 52, (ed. 1556).] His own experience, as to the climate of Venice, taught him also that grapes could not have ripened in the latitude and at the time of year assigned for that purpose.  He had therefore abundant reason to question the correctness of the letter in both particulars.  As in the case of the representation of the extent of the discovery, before mentioned, he did not hesitate to make them conform more to the truth.  He amended the original in regard to the complexion of the natives represented as those first seen, by inserting in place of the words, applied to them, of “black and not much different from Ethiopians,” the phrase, “brownish and not much unlike the Saracens” (berrettini & non molto dalli Saracini differenti) [footnote:  Berrettini is derived from beretta, the Turkish fez, a red cap, designating also the scarlet cap of the cardinals & the church of Rome.] by which they are likened to those Arabs whose complexion, “yellow, bordering on brown,” is of a similar cast; [Footnote:  Pritchard, Natural History of Man, p. 127 (2d edition).] and in regard to the grapes, by substituting instead of, “tasting the fruit many times we perceived it was sweet and pleasant,” the passage, “having often seen the fruit thereof dried, which was sweet and pleasant,” (havedo veduto piu volte il frutto di quelle secco, che era suave & dolce,) by which he apparently obviates the objection, but in fact only aggravates it, by asserting what has never yet been heard of among the Indians of this coast, the preservation of the grape by drying or otherwise.

It is evident that whatever may have been the motives of Ramusio in making these repeated alterations of the statements in the letter, they not only show his own sense of their necessity, but they have had the effect to keep from the world the real character of this narrative in essential particulars, until its exposure now, by the production of the Carli version.

VII.

The extrinsic evidence in support of the claim.  I. Discourse of the French sea-captain of dieppe.