Gulf. The other maps give no more information than this one, and the
identity of their origin is obvious. One, however, has been found in the
British Museum the features of which are different. It is a rough copy of
an old map showing the north west portion of a continent to the south of
"Java Major." It bears a legend in Portugese, of which the following is a
translation:--"Nuca Antara was discovered in the year 1601 by Manoel
Godinho Eredia, by command of the Viceroy Ayres de Soldanha." This would
point to a Portugese discovery of Australia immediately preceding the
Dutch one.

In Cornelius Wytfliet's "Descriptionis Ptolemaicae Augmentum," Louvain,
1598, the following passage is to be found:--

"The Australis Terra is the most southern of all lands; it is
separated from New Guinea by a narrow strait; its shores are hitherto
but little known, since, after one voyage and another, that route has
been deserted, and seldom is the country visited unless when sailors
are driven there by storms. The Australis Terra begins at two or three
degrees from the equator, and is maintained by some to be of so great
an extent that if it were thoroughly explored it would be regarded as
a fifth part of the world."

The above is so vague and suppositious that it would scarcely be worth
quoting, were it not for the singular mention of the narrow strait
separating Australis Terra from New Guinea; for at this time Torres had
not sailed through the straits, nor was the fact of his having done so
known to the world until the end of the eighteenth century, when
Dalrymple discovered his report amongst the archives of Manila, and did
justice to his memory.