Alfonso de Alburquerque sailed from Lisbon April 6, 1503, with four vessels for India; but shaping his course far to the south-west, after twenty-four (or twenty-eight) days he reached an island previously discovered by Vespucci; thence he touched the main-land of Brazil, after which he proceeded around the Cape of Good Hope to India, and returned to Lisbon September 16, 1504. _Viaggio fatto nell'India per Giovanni di Empoli_, in _Ramusio_, tom. i. fol. 158; _Purchas_, _His Pilgrimes_, vol. i. pp. 32-3. _Bergomas_, _Nouissime historiarũ omniũ_, etc., Venetiis, 1503, a book of chronicles published with frequent additions to date, contains, for the first time, in this edition, a chapter on the newly found islands of Columbus. In my copy, which is dated ten years later, this chapter is on folio 328. At least nine editions of the work appeared before 1540.
[1504.] Soon after the return from his third voyage, Vespucci wrote a letter to Piero de' Medici, setting forth its incidents. This letter, which bears no date, was probably written in corrupt Italian, and after circulating to some extent in manuscript, as was the custom at the time, it may have been printed, but no copies are known to exist, and the original is lost. Translations were made, however, into Latin and German, which appeared in small pamphlet form in at least seventeen different editions before 1507, under the title of _Mundus Novus_, or its equivalent. The earliest edition which bears a date is that of 1504, but of the nine issues without date, some undoubtedly appeared before that year. It is probable that other editions have disappeared on account of their undurable form. None of Vespucci's other accounts are known to have been printed before 1507.
This same year the _Libretto de tutta le Navigazione del Re di Spagna_ is said to have been printed at Venice, being the first collection of voyages, and containing, according to the few Italian authors who claim to have seen it, the first three voyages of Columbus and those of Niño and Pinzon. If authentic, it was the first account of the voyage of Columbus to the Pearl Coast; but no copy is known at present to exist, and its circulation must have been small compared with Vespucci's relations. _Humboldt_, _Exam. Crit._, tom. iv. pp. 67-77; _Harrisse_, _Bib. Am. Vet._, nos. 22-41.