It was
their constant hope that at some point the land would be
found to roll back and disclose an ocean pathway round
Africa to the East, the goal of their desire. Year after
year they advanced farther, until at last they achieved
a momentous result. In 1487, Bartholomew Diaz sailed
round the southern point of Africa, which received the
significant name of the 'Cape of Good Hope,' and entered
the Indian Ocean. Henceforth a water pathway to the Far
East was possible. Following Diaz, Vasco da Gama, leaving
Lisbon in 1497, sailed round the south of Africa, and,
reaching the ports of Hindustan, made the maritime route
to India a definite reality.
Thus at the moment when the Spaniards were taking
possession of the western world the Portuguese were
establishing their trade in the rediscovered East. The
two nations agreed to divide between them these worlds
of the East and the West. They invoked the friendly
offices of the Pope as mediator, and, henceforth, an
imaginary line drawn down the Atlantic divided the
realms. At first this arrangement seemed to give Spain
all the new regions in America, but the line of division
was set so far to the West that the discovery of Brazil,
which juts out eastward into the Atlantic, gave the
Portuguese a vast territory in South America.
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