13 DECEMBER 1946, Page 28

The Suma Oriental of Tome Pires and The Book of

Francisco Rodrigues. (Hakluyt Society. Bernard Quaritch 0 15s. Od.)

FOR geographers and others interested in early accounts of the East by European travellers this translation from the Portuguese of Tome Pires' account of the East from the Red Sea to Japan, written in Malacca and India in 1512-1515, is an invaluable record. Accompanying it is the Book of Francisco Rodrigues or Rols, who discovered the Moluccas, with nautical rules, almanack and map written and drawn in the East before 1515. The Codex containing both these MSS. was found by Sefihor Armando Cortesfio, who has edited it, in Paris in 1937, and this is the first English translation.