between them a depression covered with trees. The fact that this resembles
the general form of Palma, one of the Canary Islands, has led to the
belief that it may have been an ocean mirage, reproducing the image of
that island, just as the legends themselves reproduce, here and there, the
traditions of the "Arabian Nights."

In a map drawn by the Florentine physician, Toscanelli, which was sent by
him to Columbus in 1474 to give his impression of the Asiatic coast,--
lying, as he supposed, across the Atlantic,--there appears the island of
St. Brandan. It is as large as all the Azores or Canary Islands or Cape de
Verde Islands put together; its southern tip just touches the equator, and
it lies about half-way between the Cape de Verde Islands and Zipangu or
Japan, which was then believed to lie on the other side of the Atlantic.
Mr. Winsor also tells us that the apparition of this island "sometimes
came to sailors' eyes" as late as the last century (Winsor's "Columbus,"
112).

He also gives a reproduction of Toscanelli's map now lost, as far as can
be inferred from descriptions (Winsor, p. 110).

The following is Matthew Arnold's poem:--

SAINT BRANDAN

Saint Brandan sails the northern main;
The brotherhoods of saints are glad.
He greets them once, he sails again;
So late!--such storms!--the Saint is mad!

He heard, across the howling seas,