Chapter XII: Part VI: is the "grand pageantry of Columbus' reception at Barcelona. A (2)

"A great deal of data of very varied character has been obtained, but nothing that would give the exact details sought, because, doubtless, the vessels of that time varied greatly, not only in the form of their hulls, but also in their rigging, as will be seen by an examination of the engravings and paintings of the fifteenth century; and as there was no ship that could bear the generic name of 'caravel,' great confusion was caused when the attempt was made to state, with a scientific certainty, what the caravels were. The word 'caravel' comes from the Italian _cara bella_, and with this etymology it is safe to suppose that the name was applied to those vessels on account of the grace and beauty of their form, and finally was applied to the light vessels which went ahead of the ships as dispatch boats. Nevertheless, we think we have very authentic data, perhaps all that is reliable, in the letter of Juan de la Cosa, Christopher Columbus' pilot. Juan de la Cosa used many illustrations, and with his important hydrographic letter, which is in the Naval Museum, we can appreciate his ability in drawing both landscapes and figures. As he was both draughtsman and mariner, we feel safe in affirming that the caravels drawn in said letter of the illustrious mariner form the most authentic document in regard to the vessels of his time that is in existence. From these drawings and the descriptions of the days' runs in the part marked 'incidents' of Columbus' log, it is ascertained that these vessels had two sets of sails, lateens for sailing with bowlines hauled, and with lines for sailing before the wind.

"The same lateens serve for this double object, unbending the sails half way and hoisting them like yards by means of top ropes. Instead of having the points now used for reefing, these sails had bands of canvas called bowlines, which were unfastened when it was unnecessary to diminish the sails."

AT PALOS.

From the _Saturday Review_, August 6, 1892.

It was a happy notion, and creditable to the ingenuity of the Spaniards, to celebrate the auspicious event, which made Palos famous four hundred years ago, by a little dramatic representation. The caravel Maria, manned by appropriately dressed sailors, must be a sight better than many eloquent speeches. She has, we are told, been built in careful imitation of the flagship of Columbus' little squadron. If the fidelity of the builders has been thorough, if she has not been coppered, has no inner skin, and has to trust mainly to her caulking to keep out the water, we hope that she will have unbroken good weather on her way to New York. The voyage to Havana across the "Ladies' Sea" is a simple business; but the coast of the United States in early autumn will be trying to a vessel which will be buoyant enough as long as she is water-tight, but is not to be trusted to remain so under a severe strain. She will not escape the strain wholly by being towed. We are not told whether the Maria is to make the landfall of Columbus as well as take his departure. The disputes of the learned as to the exact spot might make it difficult to decide for which of the Bahamas the captain ought to steer. On the other hand, if it were left to luck, to the wind, and the currents, the result might throw some light on a vexed question. It might be interesting to see whether the Maria touched at Turk Island, Watling's Island, or Mariguana, or at none of the three.

The event which the Spaniards are celebrating with natural pride is peculiarly fitted to give an excuse for a centenary feast. The complaints justly made as to the artificial character of the excuses often chosen for these gatherings and their eloquence do not apply here. Beyond all doubt, when Columbus sailed from Palos on August 3, 1492, he did something by which the history of the world was profoundly influenced. Every schoolboy of course knows that if Columbus had never lived America would have been discovered all the same, when Pedro Alvarez Cabral, the Portuguese admiral, was carried by the trade-winds over to the coast of Brazil in 1500. But in that case it would not have been discovered by Spain, and the whole course of the inevitable European settlement on the continent must have been modified.

When that can be said of any particular event there can be no question as to its importance. There is a kind of historical critic, rather conspicuous in these latter days, who finds a peculiar satisfaction in pointing out that Columbus discovered America without knowing it--which is true. That he believed, and died in the belief, that he had reached Asia is certain. It is not less sure that Amerigo Vespucci, from whom the continent was named, by a series of flukes, misprints, and misunderstandings, went to his grave in the same faith. He thought that he had found an island of uncertain size to the south of the equator, and that what Columbus had found to the north was the eastern extremity of Asia. But the world which knows that Columbus did, as a matter of fact, do it the service of finding America, and is aware that without him the voyage from Palos would never have been undertaken, has refused to belittle him because he did not know beforehand what was only found out through his exertions.

The learned who have written very largely about Columbus have their serious doubts as to the truth of the stories told of his connection with Palos. Not that there is any question as to whether he sailed from there. The dispute is as to the number and circumstances of his visits to the Convent of Santa Maria Rábida, and the exact nature of his relations to the Prior Juan Perez de Marchena. There has, in fact, been a considerable accumulation of what that very rude man, Mr. Carlyle, called the marine stores of history about the life of Columbus, as about most great transactions. He certainly had been at La Rábida, and the prior was his friend. But, with or without Juan Perez, Columbus as a seafaring man would naturally have been in Palos. It lies right in the middle of the coast, which has always been open to attack from Africa and has been the starting point for attack on Africa. It is in the way of trade for the same reason that it is in the way of war. What are now fishing villages were brisk little trading towns in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. Palos did not only send out Columbus. It received Cortez when he came back from the conquest of Mexico. Palos does very well to remember its glories. And Spain does equally well to remember that she sent out Columbus. In spite of the platitudes talked by painfully thoughtful persons as to the ruinous consequences of the discovery to herself, it was, take it altogether, the greatest thing she has done in the world. She owes to it her unparalleled position in the sixteenth century, and the opportunity to become "a mother of nations." The rest of the world has to thank her for the few magnificent and picturesque passages which enliven the commonly rather colorless, not to say Philistine, history of America.

A REMINISCENCE OF COLUMBUS.

RANDALL N. SAUNDERS, Claverack, N. Y., in the _School Journal_.

* * * What boy has not felt a thrill of pride, for the sex, at the dogged persistence with which Columbus clung to his purpose and to Isabella after Ferdinand had flung to him but stony replies.

* * * * *

Methinks I am starting from Palos. I see the pale, earnest face set in its steadfast resolution from prophetic knowledge. I see the stern lines of care, deeper from the contrast of the hair, a silver mantle refined by the worry; the "midnight oil" that burned in the fiery furnace of his ambition. I see the flush of pleasure at setting out to battle with the perilous sea toward the consummation of life's grand desire. I feel the waverings between hope and despair as the journey lengthens, with but faint promise of reward, and with those around who would push us into the overwhelming waves of defeat and remorse. Amid all discouragements, amid the darkest gloom, I am inspired by his words, "Sail on, sail on"; and sailing on with the grand old Genoese, I yet hope to know and feel his glorious success, and with him to return thanks on the golden strand of the San Salvador of life's success.

THE DENSE IGNORANCE OF THOSE DAYS.

The Reverend MINOT JUDSON SAVAGE, an American clergyman. Born at
Norridgewock, Maine, June 10, 1841. Pastor of Unity Church, Boston.
From his lecture, "The Religious Growth of Three Hundred Years."

Stand beside Columbus a moment, and consider how much and how little there was known. It was commonly believed that the earth was flat and was flowed round by the ocean stream. Jerusalem was the center. With the exception of a little of Europe, a part of Asia, and a strip of North Africa, the earth was unknown country. In these unknown parts dwelt monsters of every conceivable description. Columbus indeed cherished the daring dream that he might reach the eastern coast of Asia by sailing west; but most of those who knew his dreams regarded him as crazy. And it is now known that even he was largely impelled by his confident expectation that he would be able to discover the Garden of Eden. The motive of his voyage was chiefly a religious one. And, as a hint of the kind of world in which people then lived, the famous Ponce de Leon searched Florida in the hope of discovering the Fountain of Perpetual Youth. At this time Copernicus and his system were unheard of. The universe was a little three-story affair. Heaven, with God on his throne and his celestial court about him, was only a little way overhead--just beyond the blue dome. Hell was underneath the surface of the earth. Volcanoes and mysterious caverns were vent-holes or gate-ways of the pit; and devils came and went at will. Even after it was conceded that the earth revolved, there were found writers who accounted for the diurnal revolution by attributing it to the movements of damned souls confined within, like restless squirrels in a revolving cage. On the earth's surface, between heaven and hell, was man, the common battleground of celestial and infernal hosts. At this time, of course, there was none of our modern knowledge of the heavens, nor of the age or structure of the earth.

Copyright, 1892, by Harper & Brothers.

THE COLUMBUS MONUMENT, NEW YORK CITY.
Presented by the Italian Citizens.
(See page 243.)]

SENECA'S PROPHECY.

LUCIUS ANNÆUS SENECA, an eminent Roman stoic, philosopher, and
moralist. Born at Corduba, Spain, about 5 B. C.; committed suicide
65 A. D.

_Venient annis
Sæcula seris, quibus Oceanus
Vincula rerum laxet, et ingens
Pateat teilus, Tethysque novos
Detegat orbes, nec sit terris
Ultima Thule._

THE TOMB IN SEVILLE.

The following inscription is placed on the tomb of Hernando Columbus in the pavement of the Cathedral of Seville, Spain:

Aqui yaze el. M. Magnifico S. D. Hernando Colon, el qual aplicó y gastó toda su vida y hazienda en aumento de las letras, y juntar y perpetuar en esta ciudad todas sus libros de todas las ciencias, que en su tiempo halló y en reducirlo a quatro libros.

Falleció en esta ciudad a 12 de Julio de 1539 de edad de 50 años 9 meses y 14 dias, fue hijo del valeroso y memoráble S. D. Christ. Colon primero Almirante que descubrió las Yndias y nuevo mundo en vida de los Cat. R. D. Fernando, y. D. Ysabel de gloriosa memoria a. 11 de Oct. de 1492, con tres galeras y 90 personas, y partió del puerto de Palos a descubrirlas á 3 de Agosto antés, y Bolvió a Castilla con victoria á 7 de Maio del Año Siguente y tornó despues otras dos veces á poblar lo que descubrió. Falleció en Valladolid á 20 de Agosto de 1506 anos--[56]

Rogad á Dios por ellos.

(_In English._) Here rests the most magnificent Señor Don Hernando Colon, who applied and spent all his life and estate in adding to the letters, and collecting and perpetuating in this city all his books, of all the sciences which he found in his time, and in reducing them to four books. He died in this city on the 12th of July, 1539, at the age of 50 years, 9 months, and 14 days. He was son of the valiant and memorable Señor Don Christopher Colon, the First Admiral, who discovered the Indies and the New World, in the lifetime of their Catholic Majesties Don Fernando and Doña Isabel of glorious memory, on the 11th of October, 1492, with three galleys and ninety people, having sailed from the port of Palos on his discovery on the 3d of August previous, and returned to Castille, with victory, on the 7th of May of the following year. He returned afterward twice to people that which he had discovered. He died in Valladolid on the 20th of August, 1506, aged ----.

Entreat the Lord for them.

Beneath this is described, in a circle, a globe, presenting the western and part of the eastern hemispheres, surmounted by a pair of compasses. Within the border of the circle is inscribed:

_Á Castillo, y á Leon
Mundo nuevo dió Colon._

(To Castille and Leon, Columbus gave a new world.)

ONWARD! PRESS ON!

JOHANN CHRISTOPH FRIEDRICH SCHILLER, one of Germany's greatest
poets. Born at Marbach (about eight miles from Stuttgart), November
11, 1759; died, May 9, 1805, at Weimar.

COLUMBUS.

(1795.)

Steure, muthiger Segler! Es mag der Witz dich verhöhen
Und der Schiffer am Steur senken die lässige Hand.
Immer, immer nach West! Dort muss die Küste sich zeigen,
Liegt sie doch deutlich und liegt schimmernd vor deinen Verstand.
Traue dem leitenden Gott und folge dem schweigenden Weltmeer!
War sie noch nicht, sie stieg' jetzt aus dem Fluten empor.
Mit dem Genius steht die Natur in ewigem Bunde
Was der Eine verspricht leistet die Andre gewiss.

Metrically translated (1843) by SIR EDWARD GEORGE EARLE LYTTON,
BULWER-LYTTON, Baronet (afterward first Lord Lytton. Born at Heydon
Hall, Norfolk, May 25, 1803; died, January 18, 1873), in the
following noble lines:

COLUMBUS.

STEER on, bold sailor! Wit may mock thy soul that sees the land,
And hopeless at the helm may droop the weak and weary hand,
YET EVER, EVER TO THE WEST, for there the coast must lie,
And dim it dawns, and glimmering dawns before thy reason's eye;
Yea, trust the guiding God--and go along the floating grave,
Though hid till now--yet now, behold the New World o'er the wave.
With Genius Nature ever stands in solemn union still,
And ever what the one foretells the other shall fulfill.

Señor EMILIO CASTELAR, the talented Spanish orator and statesman,
in the fourth of a series of most erudite and interesting articles
upon Christopher Columbus, in the _Century Magazine_ for August,
1892, thus masterly refers to the above passages:

He who pens these words, on reading the lines of the great poet Schiller upon Columbus, found therein a philosophical thought, as original as profound, calling upon the discoverer to press ever onward, for a new world will surely arise for him, inasmuch as whatever is promised by Genius is always fulfilled by Nature. To cross the seas of Life, naught suffices save the bark of Faith. In that bark the undoubting Columbus set sail, and at his journey's end found a new world. Had that world not then existed, God would have created it in the solitude of the Atlantic, if to no other end than to reward the faith and constancy of that great man. America was discovered because Columbus possessed a living faith in his ideal, in himself, and in his God.

THE NORSEMAN'S CLAIM TO PRIORITY.

Mrs. JOHN B. SHIPLEY'S "Leif Erikson."

Father Bodfish, of the cathedral in Boston, in his paper, read a year ago before the Bostonian Society, on the discovery of America by the Northmen, is reported to have quoted, "as corroborative authority, the account given in standard history of the Catholic Church of the establishment of a bishopric in Greenland in 1112 A. D., and he added the interesting suggestion that as it is the duty of a bishop so placed at a distance to report from time to time to the Pope, not only on ecclesiastical matters, but of the geography of the country and character of the people, it is probable that Columbus had the benefit of the knowledge possessed. It is [he said] stated in different biographies of Columbus that when the voyage was first proposed by him he found difficulty in getting Spanish sailors to go with him in so doubtful an undertaking. After Columbus returned from a visit to Rome with information there obtained, these sailors, or enough of them, appear to have had their doubts or fears removed, and no difficulty in enlistment was experienced."

COLUMBUS BEFORE THE UNIVERSITY OF SALAMANCA.

LYDIA HUNTLEY SIGOURNEY, an American poet and miscellaneous writer.
Born at Norwich, Conn., September 1, 1791; died, June 10, 1865.

St. Stephen's cloistered hall was proud
In learning's pomp that day,
For there a robed and stately crowd
Pressed on in long array.
A mariner with simple chart
Confronts that conclave high,
While strong ambition stirs his heart,
And burning thoughts of wonder part
From lip and sparkling eye.

What hath he said? With frowning face,
In whispered tones they speak;
And lines upon their tablet's trace
Which flush each ashen cheek.
The Inquisition's mystic doom
Sits on their brows severe,
And bursting forth in visioned gloom,
Sad heresy from burning tomb
Groans on the startled ear.

Courage, thou Genoese! Old Time
Thy splendid dream shall crown.
Yon western hemisphere sublime,
Where unshorn forests frown;
The awful Andes' cloud-rapt brow,
The Indian hunter's bow.
Bold streams untamed by helm or prow,
And rocks of gold and diamonds thou
To thankless Spain shalt show.

Courage, world-finder, thou hast need.
In Fate's unfolding scroll,
Dark woes and ingrate wrongs I read,
That rack the noble soul.
On, on! Creation's secrets probe.
Then drink thy cup of scorn,
And wrapped in fallen Cæsar's robe,
Sleep like that master of the globe,
All glorious, yet forlorn.

COLUMBUS A MARTYR.

SAMUEL SMILES, the celebrated British biographer. Born at
Haddington, Scotland, about 1815. From his volume, "Duty."

Even Columbus may be regarded in the light of a martyr. He sacrificed his life to the discovery of a new world. The poor wool-carder's son of Genoa had long to struggle unsuccessfully with the petty conditions necessary for the realization of his idea. He dared to believe, on grounds sufficing to his reason, that which the world disbelieved, and scoffed and scorned at. He believed that the earth was round, while the world believed that it was flat as a plate. He believed that the whole circle of the earth, outside the known world, could not be wholly occupied by sea; but that the probability was that continents of land might be contained within it. It was certainly a Probability; But the Noblest Qualities of the Soul Are Often Brought Forth by the Strength of Probabilities That Appear Slight To Less Daring Spirits. In the Eyes of His Countrymen, Few Things Were More Improbable Than That Columbus Should Survive the Dangers of Unknown Seas, and Land On The Shores of a New Hemisphere.

DIFFICULTIES BY THE WAY.

ROYALL BASCOM SMITHEY, in an article. "The Voyage of Columbus," in
_St. Nicholas_, July, 1892.

So the voyage progressed without further incident worthy of remark till the 13th of September, when the magnetic needle, which was then believed always to point to the pole-star, stood some five degrees to the northwest. At this the pilots lost courage. "How," they thought, "was navigation possible in seas where the compass, that unerring guide, had lost its virtue?" When they carried the matter to Columbus, he at once gave them an explanation which, though not the correct one, was yet very ingenious, and shows the philosophic turn of his mind. The needle, he said, pointed not to the north star, but to a fixed place in the heavens. The north star had a motion around the pole, and in following its course had moved from the point to which the needle was always directed.

Hardly had the alarm caused by the variation of the needle passed away, when two days later, after nightfall, the darkness that hung over the water was lighted up by a great meteor, which shot down from the sky into the sea. Signs in the heavens have always been a source of terror to the uneducated; and this "flame of fire," as Columbus called it, rendered his men uneasy and apprehensive. Their vague fears were much increased when, on the 16th of September, they reached the Sargasso Sea, in which floating weeds were so densely matted that they impeded the progress of the ships. Whispered tales now passed from one sailor to another of legends they had heard of seas full of shoals and treacherous quicksands upon which ships had been found stranded with their sails flapping idly in the wind, and manned by skeleton crews. Columbus, ever cheerful and even-tempered, answered these idle tales by sounding the ocean and showing that no bottom could be reached.

DESIGN FOR THE SOUVENIR COINS.[57]

A decision has been reached by the World's Fair management in relation to the designs for the souvenir coins authorized by Congress at its last session, and a radical change has been determined upon regarding these coins. Several days ago Secretary Leach of the United States Mint sent to the Fair officials a copy of the medal struck recently at Madrid, Spain, in commemoration of Columbus' discovery of America. This medal was illustrated in a Spanish-American paper of July, 1892, and showed a remarkably fine profile head of the great explorer. It was deemed superior to the Lotto portrait previously submitted for the obverse of the coin, and the Fair directors have concluded that the Madrid medal furnishes the best head obtainable, and have accordingly adopted it. For the reverse of the coin a change has also been decided upon by the substitution of a representation of the western continent instead of a fac-simile of the Government building at Jackson Park, as originally intended. It was suggested by experts, artists, and designers at the Philadelphia mint that the representation of a building would not make a very good showing on a coin, and in consequence of these expressions of opinion it was decided to make the change proposed. Now that the Director of the Mint knows what the Fair management wishes for a souvenir coin, he will inaugurate the preparations of the dies and plates as promptly as possible. Just as soon as the designs are finished, work will be begun on the coins, which can be struck at the rate of 60,000 daily, and it is quite likely that the deliveries of the souvenir coins will be completed early in the spring.

Copyright, 1892, by Harper & Brothers.

BAS-RELIEF--THE SIGHTING OF THE NEW WORLD. From the Columbus Monument in New York City. (See page 244.)]

The announcement that the Director of the Mint has decided upon the Madrid portrait of Columbus for the obverse side of the souvenir coin, with this hemisphere on the reverse, was a surprise to many interested in the designs. When the design was first presented, C. F. Gunther's portrait, by Moro, and James W. Ellsworth's, by Lotto, were also presented. Then a controversy opened between the owners of the two last-named portraits, and, rather than extend this, Mr. Ellsworth withdrew his portrait, with the suggestion that whatever design was decided upon should first be submitted to the artists at the World's Fair grounds. This was done, and they severely criticised the Madrid picture. Notwithstanding this, the design was approved and sent to Washington to be engraved. While Mr. Ellsworth, who is a director of the Fair, will not push his portrait to the front in this matter, he regrets that the Madrid portrait was selected. He said, "I think that the opinion of the World's Fair artists should have had some weight in this matter and that a portrait of authenticity should have been selected."

THE DARKNESS BEFORE DISCOVERY.

CHARLES SUMNER, an American lawyer and senator. Born in Boston,
Mass., January 6, 1811; died, March 11, 1874. From his "Prophetic
Voices Concerning America." By permission of Messrs. Lee & Shepard,
Publishers, Boston.

Before the voyage of Columbus in 1492, nothing of America was really known. Scanty scraps from antiquity, vague rumors from the resounding ocean, and the hesitating speculations of science were all that the inspired navigator found to guide him.

GREATEST EVENT.

The discovery of America by Christopher Columbus is the greatest event of secular history. Besides the potato, the turkey, and maize, which it introduced at once for the nourishment and comfort of the Old World, and also tobacco--which only blind passion for the weed could place in the beneficent group--this discovery opened the door to influences infinite in extent and beneficence. Measure them, describe them, picture them, you can not. While yet unknown, imagination invested this continent with proverbial magnificence. It was the Orient, and the land of Cathay. When, afterward, it took a place in geography, imagination found another field in trying to portray its future history. If the golden age is before, and not behind, as is now happily the prevailing faith, then indeed must America share, at least, if it does not monopolize, the promised good.--_Ibid._

THE DOUBTS OF COLUMBUS.

Prof. DAVID SWING, a celebrated American preacher. Born in
Cincinnati in 1830; graduated at Miami University in 1852; was for
twelve years Professor of Languages at this university. In 1866 he
became pastor of a Presbyterian church in Chicago. He was tried for
heresy in 1874, was acquitted, and then withdrew from the
Presbyterian church, being now independent of denominational
relations.

Columbus was not a little troubled all through his early life lest there might be over the sea some land greater than Spain, a land unused; a garden where flowers came and went unseen for ages, and where gold sparkled in the sand.

THE ERROR OF COLUMBUS.

From a sermon by Prof. SWING, printed in Chicago _Inter
Ocean_,1892.

The present rejoices in the remembrance that Columbus was a student, a thinker; that he loved maps and charts; that he was a dreamer about new continents; but after enumerating all these attractive forms of mental activity, it comes with pain upon the thought that he was also a kind of modified pirate. His thoughts and feelings went away from his charts and compasses and touched upon vice and crime. Immorality ruins man's thought. Let the name be Columbus, or Aaron Burr, or Byron, a touch of immorality is the death of thought. "Whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are beautiful, whatsoever things are of good report," these seek, say, and do, but when the man who would discover a continent robs a merchant ship or steals a cargo of slaves, or when a poet teaches gross vulgarity, then the thinker is hemmed and degraded by criminality. It is the glory of our age that it is washing white much of old thought. What is the emancipation of woman but the filtration of old thought? Did not Columbus study and read and think, and then go out and load his ship with slaves? Did not the entire man--man the thinker, the philosopher, the theologian--cover himself with intellectual glory and then load his ship with enslaved womanhood? Was not the scholar Columbus part pirate? What was in that atmosphere of the fifteenth century which could have given peculiar thoughts to Columbus alone? Was he alone in his piracy? It is much more certain that the chains that held the negro held also all womanhood. All old thought thus awaited the electric process that should weed ideas from crime. Our later years are active in disentangling thought from injustice and vulgarity.

THE TRIBUTE OF TASSO.

TORQUATO TASSO, a celebrated Italian epic poet. Born at Sorrento
March 11, 1544; died in Rome, April, 1595.

Tu spiegherai, Colombo, a un novo polo
Lontane sì le fortunate antenne,
Ch'a pena seguirà con gli occhi il volo
La Fama ch' hà mille occhi e mille penne
Canti ella Alcide, e Bacco, e di te solo
Basti a i posteri tuoi ch' alquanto accenne;
Chè quel poco darà, lunga memoria
Di poema degnissima e d'istoria.[58]

--Gerusalemme Liberata, canto XV

KNOWLEDGE OF ICELANDIC VOYAGES.

BAYARD TAYLOR, a distinguished American traveler, writer, and poet.
Born in Chester County, Pa., in 1825; died at Berlin, December 19,
1878. From a description of Iceland.

It is impossible that the knowledge of these voyages should not have been current in Iceland in 1477, when Columbus, sailing in a ship from Bristol, England, visited the island. As he was able to converse with the priests and learned men in Latin, he undoubtedly learned of the existence of another continent to the west and south; and this knowledge, not the mere fanaticism of a vague belief, supported him during many years of disappointment.

GLORY TO GOD.

The Rev. GEORGE L. TAYLOR, an American clergyman of the present
century. From "The Atlantic Telegraph."

Glory to God above,
The Lord of life and love!
Who makes His curtains clouds and waters dark;
Who spreads His chambers on the deep,
While all its armies silence keep;
Whose hand of old, world-rescuing, steered the ark;
Who led Troy's bands exiled,
And Genoa's god-like child,
And Mayflower, grandly wild,
And _now_ has guided safe a grander bark;
Who, from her iron loins,
Has spun the thread that joins
Two yearning worlds made one with lightning spark.

TENNYSON'S TRIBUTE.

ALFRED TENNYSON, Baron Tennyson D'Eyncourt of Aldworth, the poet
laureate of England. Born, 1809, at Somerby, Lincolnshire; raised
to the peerage in 1883.[59] From his poem, "Columbus."

There was a glimmering of God's hand. And God
Hath more than glimmer'd on me. O my lord,
I swear to you I heard his voice between
The thunders in the black Veragua nights,
"O soul of little faith, slow to believe,
Have I not been about thee from thy birth?
Given thee the keys of the great ocean-sea?
Set thee in light till time shall be no more?
Is it I who have deceived thee or the world?
Endure! Thou hast done so well for men, that men
Cry out against thee; was it otherwise
With mine own son?"
And more than once in days
Of doubt and cloud and storm, when drowning hope
Sank all but out of sight, I heard his voice,
"Be not cast down. I lead thee by the hand,
Fear not." And I shall hear his voice again--
I know that he has led me all my life,
I am not yet too old to work His will--
His voice again.

Sir, in that flight of ages which are God's
Own voice to justify the dead--perchance
Spain, once the most chivalric race on earth,
Spain, then the mightiest, wealthiest realm on earth,
So made by me, may seek to unbury me,
To lay me in some shrine of this old Spain,
Or in that vaster Spain I leave to Spain.
Then some one standing by my grave will say,
"Behold the bones of Christopher Colòn,
"Ay, but the chains, what do _they_ mean--the chains?"
I sorrow for that kindly child of Spain
Who then will have to answer, "These same chains
Bound these same bones back thro' the Atlantic sea,
Which he unchain'd for all the world to come."

The golden guess is morning star to the full round of truth.--_Ibid._

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 30: Copyright 1892 and by permission of the author.]

[Footnote 31: Lope de Vega has been variously termed the "Center of Fame," the "Darling of Fortune," and the "Phoenix of the Ages," by his admiring compatriots. His was a most fertile brain; his a most fecund pen. A single day sufficed to compose a versified drama.]

[Footnote 32: By permission of Houghton, Mifflin & Co., Publishers.]

[Footnote 33: For the above particulars and inscription the compiler desires to acknowledge his obligation to the Hon. Thomas Adamson, U. S. Consul General at Panama, and Mr. George W. Clamman, the able clerk of the U. S. Consulate in the city of Colon.]

[Footnote 34: Copernicus has also been so styled.]

[Footnote 35: Señor Emilio Castelar, the celebrated Spanish author and statesman, in his most able series of articles on Columbus in the _Century Magazine_, derides the fact of an actual mutiny as a convenient fable which authors and dramatists have clothed with much choice diction.]

[Footnote 36: Galileo, the great Italian natural philosopher, is here referred to by the author.]

[Footnote 37: By permission of Houghton, Mifflin & Co., Publishers.]

[Footnote 38: By permission of Messrs. Ginn & Co., Publishers.]

[Footnote 39: The Rock of Gibraltar is referred to.]

[Footnote 40: The location of the church at Old Isabella has been exactly determined, and a noble monument (fully described in these pages) has been erected there under the auspices of the _Sacred Heart Review_ of Boston.]

[Footnote 41: Since changed to a life-size statue of Columbus.]

[Footnote 42: A replica is erected in Boston.]

[Footnote 43: Copyright, 1892, by permission of the publishers.]

[Footnote 44: Copyright, 1892, by Harper & Brothers.]

[Footnote 45: Copyright, and by permission of Chas. Scribner's Sons, Publishers, New York.]

[Footnote 46: Copyright, 1892, by Harper & Brothers.]

[Footnote 47: Docuit quae maximus Atlas. Hic canit errantem Lernam, Solisque labores. _Virgil, Æneid_, I, 741.]

[Footnote 48: Navarrete thought that Turk Island was the island, the most southern of the Bahama group, because he erroneously assumed that Columbus always shaped a westerly course in sailing from island to island; and Turk Island, being farthest east, would give most room for such a course. This island has large lagoons, and is surrounded by a reef. So far it resembles Guanahani. But the second island, according to Navarrete, is Caicos, bearing W. N. W., while the second island of Columbus bore S. W. from the first. The third island of Columbus was in sight from the second. Inagua Chica (Little Inagua), Navarrete's third island, is not in sight from Caicos. The third island of Columbus was 60 miles long. Inagua Chica is only 12 miles long. The fourth island of Columbus bore east from the third. Inagua Grande (Great Inagua), Navarrete's fourth island, bears southwest from Inagua Chica.

Cat Island was the landfall advocated by Washington Irving and Humboldt, mainly on the ground that it was called San Salvador on the West India map in Blaeu's Dutch atlas of 1635. But this was done for no known reason but the caprice of the draughtsman. D'Anville copied from Blaeu in 1746, and so the name got into some later atlases. Cat Island does not meet a single one of the requirements of the case. Guanahani had a reef round it, and a large lagoon in the center. Cat Island has no reef and no lagoon. Guanahani was low; Cat Island is the loftiest of the Bahamas. The two islands could not be more different. Of course, in conducting Columbus from Cat Island to Cuba, Washington Irving is obliged to disregard all the bearings and distances given in the journal.]

[Footnote 49: The cross-staff had not then come into use, and it was never of much service in low latitudes.]

[Footnote 50: It was also resolved to establish in the city of Washington a Latin-American Memorial Library, wherein should be collected all the historical, geographical, and literary works, maps, and manuscripts, and official documents relating to the history and civilization of America, _such library to be solemnly dedicated on the day on which the United States celebrates the fourth centennial of the discovery of America_.]

[Footnote 51: Published by A. C. McClurg & Co., Chicago.]

[Footnote 52: Copyright, 1892, by Harper & Brothers.]

[Footnote 53: NOTE.--Those marked * were left behind, in the fort, at La Navidad, and perished there.]

[Footnote 54: NOTE.--The names of the crew are on the Madrid monument.]

[Footnote 55: Randolph Rogers, an American sculptor of eminence, was born in Waterloo, N. Y., in 1825; died at Rome, in the same State, aged sixty-seven, January 14, 1892.]

[Footnote 56: Mr. George Sumner, a painstaking investigator, states that after diligent search he is unable to find any other inscription to the memory of Columbus in the whole of Spain.

At Valladolid, where he died, and where his body lay for some years, there is none, so far as he could discover; neither is there any trace of any at the Cartuja, near Seville, to which his body was afterward transferred, and in which his brother was buried. It is (he writes in 1871) a striking confirmation of the reproach of negligence, in regard to the memory of this great man, that, in this solitary inscription in old Spain, the date of his death should be inaccurately given.--Major's "Letters of Columbus," 1871.

(The Madrid and Barcelona statues were erected in 1885 and 1888 respectively.)--S. C. W.]

[Footnote 57: Since writing this the Lotto portrait has been selected.]

[Footnote 58: For an English metrical translation, see _post_, WIFFEN.]

[Footnote 59: Died at Aldworth October 6, 1892.]

NEW YORK CELEBRATED THE TERCENTENARY.

The managers of the World's Columbian Exposition have prided themselves upon being the first to celebrate any anniversary of the Columbian discovery, but this credit really belongs to the Tammany Society of New York, and the second place of honor belongs to the Massachusetts Historical Society of Boston. The Tammany Society met in the great wigwam on the 12th day of October, 1792 (old style), and exhibited a monumental obelisk, and an animated oration was delivered by J. B. Johnson, Esq.

The Massachusetts Historical Society met at the house of the Rev. Dr. Peter Thacher, in Boston, the 23d day of October, 1792, and, forming in procession, proceeded to the meeting-house in Brattle Street, where a discourse was delivered by the Rev. Jeremy Belknap upon the subject of the "Discovery of America by Christopher Columbus." He gave a concise and comprehensive narrative of the most material circumstances which led to, attended, or were consequent on the discovery of America. The celebration commenced with an anthem. Mr. Thacher made an excellent prayer. Part of a psalm was then sung, and then Mr. Belknap delivered his discourse, which was succeeded by a prayer from Mr. Eliot. Mr. Thacher then read an ode composed for the occasion by Mr. Belknap, which was sung by the choir. This finished the ceremony.

The facts were brought to light by World's Fair Commissioner John Boyd Thacher, New York. The account is taken from "a journal of a gentleman visiting Boston in 1792." The writer is said to have been Nathaniel Cutting, a native of Brookline, Mass., and who, in the following year, was appointed by Washington, upon the recommendation of Thomas Jefferson, on a mission to the Dey of Algiers.

It is interesting to note that the Massachusetts Historical Society, in assuming to correct the old style date, October 12th, was guilty of the error of dropping two unnecessary days. It dropped eleven days from the calendar instead of nine, and at a subsequent meeting it determined to correct the date to October 21st, "and that thereafter all celebrations of the Columbian discovery should fall on the 21st day of October."

The proclamation of the President establishing October 21st as the day of general observance of the anniversary of the Columbian discovery, and the passage of Senator Hill's bill fixing the date for the dedication of the buildings at Chicago, it is believed will forevermore fix October 21st as the Columbian day.

COLUMBUS' SUPREME SUSPENSE.

MAURICE THOMPSON, an American poet and novelist. Born at Fairfield,
Ind., September 9, 1844. From his "Byways and Bird-notes."

What a thrill is dashed through a moment of expectancy, a point of supreme suspense, when by some time of preparation the source of sensation is ready for a consummation --a catastrophe! At such a time one's soul is isolated so perfectly that it feels not the remotest influence from any other of all the universe. The moment preceding the old patriarch's first glimpse of the promised land; that point of time between certainty and uncertainty, between pursuit and capture, whereinto are crowded all the hopes of a lifetime, as when the brave old sailor from Genoa first heard the man up in the rigging utter the shout of discovery; the moment of awful hope, like that when Napoleon watched the charge of the Old Guard at Waterloo, is not to be described. There is but one such crisis for any man. It is the yes or no of destiny. It comes, he lives a lifetime in its span; it goes, and he never can pass that point again.

GREAT WEST.

HENRY DAVID THOREAU, an American author and naturalist. Born in
Concord, Mass., in 1817; died, 1862. From his "Excursions,"
published by Houghton, Mifflin & Co.

Every sunset which I witness inspires me with the desire to go to a west as distant and as far as that into which the sun goes down. He appears to migrate westward daily, and tempt us to follow him. He is the Great Western Pioneer whom the nations follow. We dream all night of those mountain ridges in the horizon, though they may be of vapor only, which were last gilded by his rays. The Island of Atlantis, and the islands and gardens of the Hesperides, a sort of terrestrial paradise, appear to have been the Great West of the ancients, enveloped in mystery and poetry. Who has not seen in imagination, when looking into the sunset sky, the gardens of the Hesperides, and the foundation of all those fables?

Copyright, 1892, by Harper & Brothers.

THE LANDING OF COLUMBUS. Bas-relief on the New York Monument. (See page 244.)]

Columbus felt the westward tendency more strongly than any before. He obeyed it, and found a new world for Castille and Leon. The herd of men in those days scented fresh pastures from afar.

And now the sun had stretched out all the hills,
And now was dropped into the western bay;
At last _he_ rose, and twitched his mantle blue;
To-morrow to fresh woods and pastures new.

THE ROUTE TO THE SPICE INDIES.

PAOLO DEL POZZO TOSCANELLI, a celebrated Italian astronomer. Born
at Florence, 1397; died, 1482. From a letter to Columbus in 1474.

I praise your desire to navigate toward the west; the expedition you wish to undertake is not easy, but the route from the west coasts of Europe to the spice Indies is certain if the tracks I have marked be followed.

A VISIT TO PALOS.

GEORGE ALFRED TOWNSEND. In a letter to the Philadelphia _Times_.

From one of the hillocks behind the hotel at Huelva you can see in the distance East Rábida, Palos, Moguer, San Juan del Porto, and the sea, where the three birds of good omen went skimming past in the vague morning light 400 years ago, lest they might be seen by the Portuguese. Columbus means dove, and the arms of Columbus contained three doves. From Huelva I sailed to Rábida first. Rábida is on the last point of the promontory, nearest the sea, and Palos is inland from it three miles north, and is near half a mile from the Tinto. Passing down the oozy Odiel, we soon saw a watering place on the beach outside just where Columbus put to sea. We could also see the scaffolding around the Columbus monument they were building by Rábida.

After inspecting the convent at Rábida, I bade my skipper wait for flood tide to sail round to Palos, while I proceeded by land.

They brought me at Palos an old man who was extremely polite, but not one word could we understand of each other, until finally I took him by the arm and walked him in the direction of the church, whereupon suppressed exclamations of delight broke forth; the American savage had guessed the old man out. In point of fact, this old man was waiting all the time to take me to the church, and was the father of the boy behind whom I had ridden. Between the church and the beach rose a high hillock covered with grass, and as high as the church tower. In old times this was a mosque of military work, and it had not very long been Christian when Columbus came here; possibly it had been Christian in his day 150 years. It stands quite alone, is of rude construction, and has at the back of it some few graves--perhaps of priests. In the back part is a very good Moorish arch, which they still show with admiration. The front proper has a big door, barred strongly, as if the church might have been in piratical times a place of refuge for the population up in the hills. To the right of the entrance is the tower, which is buttressed, and its spire is made of blue and colored tiles, which have thoroughly kept their colors. A bell in this tower may have rung the inhabitants to church when Columbus announced that he meant to impress the Palos people to assist him in his voyage. I entered the church, which was all whitewashed, and felt, as I did at Rábida, that it was a better monument than I had reason to expect.

Its walls were one yard thick, its floors of tiles laid in an L form. As I measured the floor it seemed to me to be sixty-six feet wide and sixty-six feet long, but to the length must be added the altar chapel, bringing it up to ninety feet, and to the width must be added the side chapels, making the total width about eighty feet. The nave has a sharper arched top than the two aisles, which have round arches. The height of the roof is about thirty-five feet. The big door by which I entered the church is fifteen feet high by eight feet wide. Some very odd settees which I coveted were in the nave. The chief feature, however, is the pulpit, which stands at the cross of the church, so that persons gathered in the transepts, nave, or aisles can hear the preacher. It has an iron pulpit of a round form springing from one stem and railed in, and steps lead up to it which are inclosed. It looks old, and worn by human hands, and is supposed to be the identical pulpit from which the notary announced that, as a punishment of their offenses, the Queen's subjects must start with this unknown man upon his unknown venture. Those were high times in Palos, and it took Columbus a long while to get his expedition ready, and special threats as of high treason had to be made against the heads of families and women. But when Columbus returned, and the same day Pinzon came back after their separation of weeks, Palos church was full of triumph and hosannas. The wild man had been successful, and Spain found another world than the apostle knew of.

The grown boy, as he showed the building, went into an old lumber room, or dark closet, at one corner of the church, and when I was about to enter he motioned me back with his palm, as if I might not enter there with my heretic feet. He then brought out an image of wood from four to five feet high, or, I might say, the full size of a young woman. It was plain that she had once been the Virgin worshiped here, but age and moisture had taken most of the color from her, and washed the gilt from her crown, and now we could only see that in her arm she bore a child, and this child held in its hand a dove or pigeon. The back of the female was hollow, and in there were driven hooks by which she had once been suspended at some height. This was the image, I clearly understood, which Columbus' men had knelt to when they were about to go forth upon the high seas.

Strangely enough, the church is named St. George, and St. George was the patron saint of Genoa, where Columbus was born; and the Genoese who took the Crusaders to Jaffa had the satisfaction of seeing England annex their patron saint.

BIBLE.

The Rev. LUTHER TRACY TOWNSEND, D. D., an American divine. Born at
Orono, Maine, September 27, 1838. From "The Bible and the
Nineteenth Century."

When Luther in the sixteenth century brought the truths of the Bible from the convent of Erfurth, and gave them to the people, he roused to mental and moral life not only the slumbering German nationality, but gave inspiration to every other country in Europe. "Gutenburg with his printing press, Columbus with his compass, Galileo with his telescope, Shakspere with his dramas, and almost every other man of note figuring during those times, are grouped, not around some distinguished man of science, or man of letters, or man of mechanical genius, or man famous in war; but around that monk of Wittenberg, who stood with an unchained Bible in his hand."

TESTIMONY OF A CONTEMPORARY AS TO THE TREATMENT OF COLUMBUS.

From a letter of ANGELO TRIVIGIANO, of Granada, Spain, dated August
1, 1501.

I have seen so much of Columbus that we are now on a footing of great friendship. He is experiencing at present a streak of bad luck, being deprived of the King's favor, and with but little money.

THE VALPARAISO STATUE.

At Valparaiso, Chili, a bronze statue of Columbus has been erected on a marble pedestal. The figure, which is of heroic size, stands in an advancing attitude, holding a cross in the right hand.

COLUMBUS AND THE EGG.

Dr. P. H. VAN DER WEYDE. In an article in the _Scientific
American_, June, 1892.

The stupid anecdote of the egg was a mere trifling invention, in fact a trick, and it is surprising that intelligent men have for so many years thoughtlessly been believing and repeating such nonsense. For my part, I can not believe that Columbus did ever lower himself so far as to compare the grand discovery to a trick. Surely it was no trick by which he discovered a new world, but it was the result of his earnest philosophical convictions that our earth is a globe, floating in space, and it could be circumnavigated by sailing westward, which most likely would lead to the discovery of new lands in the utterly unknown hemisphere beyond the western expanse of the great and boisterous Atlantic Ocean; while thus far no navigator ever had the courage to sail toward its then utterly unknown, apparently limitless, western expanse.

THE MAN OF THE CHURCH.

Padre GIOCCHINO VENTURA, an eloquent Italian preacher and
theologian. Born at Palermo, 1792; died at Versailles, August,
1861.

Columbus is the man of the Church.

ATTENDANT FAME SHALL BLESS.

The Venerable GEORGE WADDINGTON, Dean of Durham, an English divine
and writer. Died, July 20, 1869. From a poem read in Cambridge in
1813.

And when in happier days one chain shall bind,
One pliant fetter shall unite mankind;
When war, when slav'ry's iron days are o'er,
When discords cease and av'rice is no more,
And with one voice remotest lands conspire,
To hail our pure religion's seraph fire;
Then fame attendant on the march of time,
Fed by the incense of each favored clime,
Shall bless the man whose heav'n-directed soul
Form'd the vast chain which binds the mighty whole.

* * * * *

Columbus continued till death eager to extend his discoveries, and by so doing to promote the glory of his persecutors.

VANDERLYN'S PICTURE AT WASHINGTON.

The first of the eight pictures in the rotunda of the Capitol at Washington, D. C., and the first in point of event, is the "Landing of Columbus at San Salvador in 1492," by John Vanderlyn; its cost was $12,000. This picture represents the scene Washington Irving so admirably describes in his "Voyages of Columbus," occurring the morning the boats brought the little Spanish band from the ships to the shore of Guanahani. "Columbus first threw himself upon his knees; then, rising, drew his sword, displayed the royal standard, and, assembling around him the two captains, with Rodrigo de Escobedo, notary of the armament; Rodrigo Sanchez (the royal inspector), and the rest who had landed, he took solemn possession of the island in the name of the Castilian sovereigns." The picture contains the picture of Columbus, the two Pinzons, Escobedo, all bearing standards; Sanchez, inspector; Diego de Arana, with an old-fashioned arquebus on his shoulder; a cabin-boy kneeling, a mutineer in a suppliant attitude, a sailor in an attitude of veneration for Columbus, a soldier whose attention is diverted by the appearance of the natives, and a friar bearing a crucifix.

COLUMBUS STATUE AT WASHINGTON, D. C.