Note (return) — Chapter XIII · VOYAGE ROUND THE WORLD, BY COMMODORE ROGGEWEIN, is 1721-1723.1

Continuing their voyage, they had sight of Madeira on the 15th November, and in the neighbourhood saw a desert island which is much frequented by the pirates, for wood and water and other refreshments. They afterwards had sight of the Peak of Teneriffe, which is generally esteemed the highest single mountain in the world, on which account the geographers of Holland adopt it as the first meridian in their maps and charts; while the French and English of late incline to fix their first meridians at their respective capitals of Paris and London. These differences are apt to create much confusion in the longitudes of places, when not explained by the writers who use these several modes of reckoning; on which account Lewis XIII. of France, by edict in 1634, endeavoured to obviate this inconvenience, by directing the first meridian to be placed in the island of Ferro, the most westerly of the Canaries.2 From these islands they directed their course for the islands of Cape Verde, so named from Cabo Verde, or the Green Cape, a point or mountain on the coast of Africa, called Arlinarium by Ptolemy.