Newfoundland and the Micmacs of Cape Breton and Nova Scotia. It was
from the use of red ochre for this purpose that the natives of
Newfoundland obtained their designation of red Indians. The Micmacs
used blue and other colors; hence it would appear from the
circumstance of the marks upon these Indians being livid (LIVIDAE)
or blue, like veins, that they belonged to the tribes of Cape
Breton. (Hind's Labrador II, 97-110. Purchas, III. 1880-1. Denys.
(HIST. NAT. DE L'AMERIQUE SEPT. II, 887.))]

That the French and especially the Normands had soon afterwards
resorted to Newfoundland for the purpose of taking fish, and were
actually so engaged there at the time of the Verrazzano voyage, is
evident from the letter of John Rut, who commanded one of the ships
sent out on a voyage of discovery by Henry VIII of England in 1527.
That voyager states that, driven from the north by the ice, he
arrived at St. Johns in Newfoundland on the third of August in that
year, and found there eleven Normand, one Breton and two Portuguese
vessels, "all a fishing." [Footnote: Purchas, III, 809. Memoir of
Sebastian Cabot, pp. 108, 268, and the authorities there cited.]
This was at a single point on the coast, and in latitude 47 Degrees
30' N.; and so large a number of vessels there denotes a growth of
many years, at that time, of those fisheries.

These facts not only prove that Newfoundland and Cape Breton were
well known in France and Portugal before the Verrazzano voyage and
therefore that he did not discover them, but that he must have known
of them before, and that the letter is intentionally false in that
respect. It might perhaps be insisted with some plausibility under
other circumstances, that he ran along the coast, believing that it
was a new land, and therefore made the representation of having