s, wishing to
become better informed concerning these maps, in order to pronounce
better and more truly upon this case, for the greater assurance of
our consciences, and for the purpose of securing the most indubitable
knowledge in regard to this matter, summoned before us certain pilots
and men, skilled both in navigation and in making maps, globes, and
mappamundos. These men have always tried to inform themselves with
great care, concerning the distances and routes of the said voyage,
both of those who made the voyage, and of those who delineated and
located the lands comprehended in the voyage. They stated under oath
and before two notaries and the secretary of this case, that they knew
that the said navigation and the location of these lands comprised
more degrees than was declared and demonstrated by the said deputies
of the King of Portugal, by their globes and maps. So much greater
was the distance that it was evident they were now trying to shorten
the said voyage again by more than twenty-five degrees of longitude
of the distance until now declared by them.

Therefore, as is apparent from the said information of modern
navigators and cosmographers, both Portuguese and those of other
nations, and from the relation of the said pilots and sailors, it has
been proved completely that the said distances and routes, declared
by the said deputies of Portugal, are neither just nor true, and that
the deputies have reported them much shorter than, in sober truth,
they are. From this it can be presumed, that inasmuch as they shorten
the said route each day, the said mistake of fifty degrees proceeds
doubtless from their eastern part and not from our western part.

_Item:_ it is to be observed that, notwithstanding the said distances,
expressed, as is shown by the said pilots who determined them, as
they should, on a spherical body, the said Malucos fall many degrees
within the limits of our lord, the Emperor, and that they lie a much
greater number of degrees east of the island of La Sal, than they had
declared, inasmuch as, according to geometrical reasoning, the lands
situated along the said eastern voyage, placed on a plane surface,
and the number of leagues being reckoned by equinoctial degrees,
are not in their proper location as regards the number and quantity
of their degrees, for it is well known in cosmography that a lesser
number of leagues along parallels other than the equinoctial, occupy
a greater quantity o