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many days, until the boat containing himself and six com panions was cast upon an island called Estotiland, about one thousand miles from Friseland. They were taken by the inhabitants, and carried to a fair and populous city, where the king sent for many interpreters to converse with them, but none that they could understand, until a man was found, who had likewise been cast away upon the coast, and who spoke Latin. They remained several days upon the island, which was rich and fruitful, abounding with all kinds of metals, and especially gold.* There was a high mountain in the centre, from which flowed four ri vers, which watered the whole country. The inhabitants were intelligent, and acquainted with the mechanical arts of Europe. They cultivated grain, made beer, and lived in houses built of stone. There were Latin books in the King’s library, though the inhabitants had no knowledge of that language. They had many cities and castles, and car ried on a trade with Greenland for pitch, sulphur and peltry. Though much given to navigation, they were ignorant of the use of the compass, and finding the Friselanders ac quainted with it, held them in great esteem ; and the King sent them with twelve barks to visit a country to the south, called Drogeo. They had nearly perished in a storm, but were cast away upon the coast of Drogeo. They found the people to be cannibals, and were on the point of being killed and devoured, but were spared on account of their great skill in fishing. “ The fisherman described this Drogeo as being a coun try of vast extent, or rather a new world; that the inhabi tants were naked and barbarous ; but that far to the south west there was a more civilized region, and temperate cli mate, where the inhabitants had a knowledge of gold and * This account is taken from Hackluyt, ginal Italian of Ramusio, (T. 2, p. 23,) and vol. 3, p. 123. The passage about gold and is probably an interpolation, other metals is not to be found in the ori-
