Sayling northeast for the space
of 150 leagues WE APPROACHED TO
THE LANDE THAT IN TIMES PAST WAS
DISCOVERED BY THE BRITONS, WHICH IS
IN FIFTIE DEGREES. Having now
spent all our provision and
victuals and having discovered
about 700 leagues and more of
newe countries, and being
furnished with water and wood we
concluded to returne into Fraunce.
(Hakluyt, Divers voyages).

(Cogswell, Coll. of N. Y. Hist.
Society, Second series, I.)

Ramusio in omitting the cosmography and confining his version to the
narrative would have left the letter without any designation of the
northerly limit reached by Verrazzano, had he not transferred to the
narrative, the statement of the latitude attained, namely, the
fiftieth degree, from the cosmographical part; which was therefore
properly done; though as an editor he should have stated the fact.
But he transcended his duty entirely in asserting, in qualification
of the latitude, what does not appear in the letter, that it was
near where the Bretons had formerly made discoveries, and omitting
all reference to the Portuguese. The Bretons are not mentioned or
even alluded to in either portion of the original letter. The effect
of this substitution therefore is to relieve the original from
making a fake claim to the discovery north of Cape Breton, by