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world to have been known to the Phoenicians and Egyptians,and to have been the island Atlantis , mentioned by Plato .Cornelius Nepos relates that the king of the Suivi presentedto the Roman Consul of Gaul certain Western Indians, whohad been shipwrecked on the coast of Germany ; and it isalso said, that Hanno and Hamilcar having acquainted theSenate of Carthage of the discovery of a large island, farwest of the Old Continent , the Senate determined upon sup-pressing the information, lest their people should be inducedto migrate thither, and thereby depopulate the Carthaginianstate. The Welch historians also contend for the honour ofthe discovery; they state that Madoc , a younger son of OwenGuyneth, prince of North Wales , about the year 1170,embarked in a ship from the north-west part of Ireland , andsailing westward, came to a country where he observed manystrange things. On his return to Wales , he provided him-self with ten ships, and prevailed upon a number of peopleof both sexes to accompany him, for the purpose of forminga settlement in that land, from whence neither he nor any ofhis company ever returned. Some relations of the Spaniards,who affirm that on their first arrival in America , they foundthe native Indians paid honour to the Cross, would seem togive some slight appearance of credit to this story. Thereare also Welch writers, who conjecture they have found anaffinity between several words in the native Indian languageof the Americans and those of the Welch tongue.

It is, however, now generally admitted, that America wasfirst discovered by Christopher Columbus , a Genoese , onFriday, the twelfth day of October, 1492, he himself beingthe first European who set foot in the New World. Robert-son in his history of the country relates, that he landed in arich dress, with a naked sword in his hand, followed by hismen, and all of them kneeling down kissed the ground whichthey had so long desired to see ,■ they next erected a crucifix,and prostrating themselves before it, returned thanks to God