The Council of the Hakluyt Society has decided upon issuing a translation of the Journal of the First Voyage of Columbus on the four hundredth anniversary of that momentous expedition. It has also been arranged that translations of the documents relating to the voyages of John Cabot and Gaspar Corte Real shall be included in the same volume. Those voyages were direct consequences of the great discovery of Columbus. The Society has to thank Mr. Harrisse, whose exhaustive works on the Cabots and Corte Reals leave little but translation to be done, for his kindness in giving permission for the translation from his texts of some important documents, the originals of which are difficult of access: and also for permission to reproduce portions of the Specified in their places. Cantino and La Cosa maps from his impressions. The thanks of the Society are also due to Mr. H. Welter, the publisher of Mr. Harrisse's last work, for permission to make use of the plates of the maps of Juan de la Cosa and Cantino.

Our late Secretary, Mr. R. H. Major, by his production of the Select Letters of Columbus (1847; 2nd ed., 1870), brought within the reach of members of this Society all the letters written by the Admiral himself on the subject of his four voyages, as well as some other original documents. There remains for the Council to furnish the members with a translation of the Journal of the first voyage, the only one that has been preserved, and this in a mutilated form.