Chapter IX: From the New Printing Press

"And I am surety for you, my son; so if you owe me any thanks for my pains, be honest."

Such was the parting injunction of Master Sancho, as he bade his _protégé_ farewell in the harbour of Cadiz on the morning of the 8th of May, 1502. And with a hot flush in his cheeks, and sparkling eyes, the youth replied quickly:

"Honest! Am I not noble? How should a noble of Aragon ever sully his name with dishonour?"

"How indeed?" replied Master Sancho as he laid his hand on the lad's shoulder and continued gravely: "One may well wonder that any bearing the name of man should sully his manhood by aught that is base; but you will henceforth be surrounded by many a companion who knows nought of honour but the honour of grasping more than his neighbour, who cares for no shame but the shame of being thought capable of virtue. See that you become not one of them."

"You have said that the great Admiral is far from being one of such blots on Spain," said the lad more humbly. "And as I am to be on his own ship, so I will trust to show myself deserving of the honour. And"--he added after a moment with a sudden burst of gratitude--"deserving of all your noble generosity towards me, and your most helpful trust. The memory of that will be a strong guard to me from temptation."

"May St. Jago grant it!" ejaculated the good-hearted man with affectionate fervour.

And then patron and _protégé_ had to exchange hasty farewells, for Ferdinand Columbus, a boy a year or two younger than Montoro, came to summon him on board. Kind-hearted Queen Isabella, in her good-will towards the old and trouble-worn navigator, had given up the services of her young page that on this occasion he might accompany his father, and comfort him with his mingled love and enthusiasm.

To Montoro also it was some secret relief to see that there was one even younger than himself about to brave the very many known, and many unknown, perils of those far-sought adventures and discoveries; for more than his timid, grieving mother in El Cuevo had sought to persuade him that, in leaving that humdrum, safe little town for untried paths, he was foolishly relinquishing all chances of growing up to man's estate. That the Admiral was about to take one of his own two sons seemed a tolerable proof that matters could not be so altogether desperate as that.

Meantime, while these thoughts were flashing through Diego's brain, the merchant's eyes had been attracted by a great iron-bound, iron-clasped book under the boy Ferdinand's arm, and he at once remembered his friend Pedro.

"My lad," he said, with one of his most winning smiles, "I have left a neighbour behind me in my own town who loves curiosities, and things from past times, not only for their value as articles of merchandise, but for their own sakes, and I would gladly pleasure him with some worthy gift, on my return, after his own heart. Thinkest thou that I could purchase yon great old tome of thee? Missal or Moorish prayers, songs or quaint sayings, I care not, so it be but rare and of a far-gone date."

He put out his hand as he spoke to examine his wished-for bargain; and as Ferdinand Columbus courteously yielded it for inspection he accompanied the civil act with a smiling:

"See for yourself, Señor, if it be old enough to suit an antiquary. Rare it is, certainly; but for the age--it cannot boast as many years as I. It is one of the Bibles printed, by the king's permission, in our own tongue, by Theodoric the German, at his printing presses in Valencia. This copy my father took with him on his first voyage, ten years ago, across the Atlantic, and he would not think of undertaking any great expedition without it."

"And doth he greatly study it, and do you?" inquired Master Sancho, as with mingled awe and wonder he turned the leaves of a book upon which his eyes had never before rested.

But its bearer appeared to think that it was being treated with too much freedom, and rather anxiously held out his hands to receive it back as he murmured in a shocked voice:

"_I_ study it, Señor! The holy saints forbid. That is for the priests. It is taken with us that by its blessed power may be exorcised such spirits of evil, and baneful influences, as we may meet with in those unblessed regions of the West."

So saying, with a formal bow to the merchant, and a sign to Montoro to follow him, the son of the great discoverer of a new world, but not of a more enlightened faith, returned to the small boat that was to carry them on shipboard.

Master Sancho stood on the busy strand watching with many another, until they were drawn up the vessel's side, and then, with a tolerably deep sigh for the loss of his young companion, he wandered away into the streets of the bustling city, and soon became the owner of many curious treasures brought from all parts of the known world, and far safer possessions in that land of the Inquisition than the one he had made an attempt, in ignorance, to buy for his timidly cautious neighbour.

Indeed, with all his own honest courage shown on behalf of the orphaned and beggared young noble, the worthy merchant himself would not have cared to risk travelling with a copy of the Scriptures in his bales, unauthorized.

In those days the Bible was for the priests, as Ferdinand Columbus had said; and the priests took good care not to let the fountain of light out of their hidden keeping. They loved darkness to reign in the land rather than light, because their deeds were evil. But when the boy passed the book for a few minutes into Montoro's charge, as soon as they got on board, that he might the more readily go in search of his father, he was not again giving it into the hands of one so ignorant of its contents, nor to whom it was an affair of so much mystery.

One small, unsuspected portion of her inheritance had Rachel Philip saved from the rapacious grasp of the vile informer, Jerome Tivoli, the Italian. It consisted of three rolls of vellum closely written over in Hebrew characters, and when Don Philip's father became a Christian he did not declare his possession of these rolls; but, on the contrary, closely concealed them, lest he should be deprived of the pearl without price--the Word of God.

In a secresy that the more fully impressed the lessons upon his mind had Don Philip's father taught his son to read these rolls, and to write "in his mind and in his heart" God's law. In like manner had Don Philip, in his turn, taught his daughter; and in like manner had Rachel Diego taught her son to read those three rolls--the Pentateuch, the Psalms of David, and the book of the prophet Isaiah.

Through all her troubles of widowhood, wanderings, and poverty she had kept those books, and she still kept them, for she dared not risk her child's life with their transfer to him. But it mattered not, for their truths were imprinted in his soul, and his faith was a living faith, pure and free from superstition, being built upon the knowledge of God's own Word.

Many of those Jew converts who fell at the mandate of the Spanish Inquisition were the truest Christians, the most upright men, and the best citizens of their age, for they _knew_ what they believed.

From his mother's secret teaching, and his own reading, the young Montoro had become wise unto salvation before the new career began that had been opened up for him by the merchant's benevolence; and when he stepped on board the world-renowned Admiral's ship it may be safely said that the young sweet-voiced, earnest-eyed lad was the mental superior of most of those with whom he was surrounded. He had now a great curiosity to see what might be the contents of the Christian parts of the Bible; and while he awaited his young companion's return, and was pushed with scant ceremony out of the way of the rough sailors, only to be hustled yet more imperiously aside by the penniless but haughty hidalgos who were setting out, as they fondly believed, on a royal road to fortune, he had the opportunity to gratify his desire.

Partly by others' driving, partly by his own good management, he at length got comfortably stowed away into a quiet corner, and there, dropping himself down on to a bale of goods, he carefully unclasped the great book, and turned towards the latter half.

He began to read at once the first words of the first page that opened beneath his eyes, for the disputes he had witnessed during the past few minutes between several of his self-asserting companions made them appear startlingly appropriate.

"And there was also a strife amongst them, which of them should be accounted the greatest."

Many a time did those words recur to his memory during the coming years, but just then, as he sat in his obscure corner in enforced quietude and inactivity, he read on and on with forgetfulness even of his novel position and commencing adventures, in his absorbing interest in a history then read and fully understood for the first time. We know the account of our Lord's agony, base betrayal, and awfully cruel death so well that we have not the faintest idea of how intensely it moved intelligent minds, who first quietly perused it for themselves in its own pathetic simplicity, unspoilt in its solemn appeal by any priestly shows or pageants.

Montoro Diego clenched his fists and his eyes flashed as he read of Peter's denial of his Lord and friend.

"Mean coward!" he muttered. And then his own eyes grew dim as he read how the slandered, insulted Son of man, the denied of his own chosen companion, "turned, and looked upon Peter." He seemed to feel his own being thrilled with the sad reproach, the tender compassion, and the full forgiveness of that look, and a smothered choking sob parted his own lips, as "Peter went out, and wept bitterly."

He read on undisturbed, until he suddenly, as it seemed to him, received an answer to many long-standing, half-formed questions in his mind, with the words:

"And beginning at Moses and all the prophets, He expounded unto them in all the Scriptures, the things concerning Himself."

That was the last of his reading for that day, and for many days to come.

Montoro's eyes were resting on the words--"And beginning at Moses," his lips were repeating a phrase that seemed for him to form the close connecting link between the religion given by God to his forefathers, and the crown of that religion as sealed by Jesus Christ, when energetic young Fernando found him out in his hiding-place. The younger boy pounced upon the volume instantly, with a half-indignant cry.

"Nay then, Diego, if that be thy name, I gave thee this volume of my father's to hold; there was no commission attached that thou shouldst read it, or even so much as venture to unclose the clasps. It is more than I have done, myself."

Montoro rose from his rough couch, and for all apology said with a long-drawn breath:

"I have found wonderful things therein."

Half-an-hour later it would have appeared that all memory of those wonderful things was lost. The anchors of the somewhat shabby little fleet of four vessels were being raised, and with flushed cheeks and eyes blazing with excitement Montoro Diego was making amends for ignorance by the most determined vigour and good-will. Such a little while ago he had been hustled on one side as a useless bit of goods, whose room was worth more than his company; but already his keen-sightedness and ready hands had reversed the judgments of those in his immediate neighbourhood in his favour.

The afternoon was wearing on, when a grave, kind voice addressed him:

"My son, I have been observing you. You have done well."

It was the Admiral himself who spoke, the grand old man who had attained to ever great heights of humility as he attained to greater fame, and who never held himself too high to see the worthy efforts of his humblest follower.

Montoro's handsome face grew brilliant with delight, and as he bent it gratefully in acknowledgment of the commendation, his heart seemed to rise to the possible achievement of deeds of hitherto unheard-of heroism. At that moment he little knew what those deeds would be; deeds not indeed wholly unmatched in the previous history of the world, but yet so rare that, not infidels, but, on the contrary, the most earnest believers in Christianity, are tempted sometimes to believe that their faith must be a fable, and those who proclaim its teachings must do so to tickle their hearers' ears, and as a pastime of the moment.

Having uttered his few words of encouraging praise, Columbus passed on, and Montoro, for whom there was no further employment for the moment, turned to lean over the side of the vessel, and watch the receding shores of his native land, the fast-diminishing lines of the harbour of Cadiz, and its throngs of traders from all nations. His mother was very present with him at that minute, and his mother's parting words:

"You, the unknown and disinherited noble of Aragon, son of a foully-slandered and slain father, are, in the world's eyes, nought. You, the boy Montoro de Diego, may be a hero, the winner of fresh glory for your name, the gainer of the highest honour from your fellow-men. The past is not your fault, the future may be your praise. Keep firm to God and the truth, and fear none."

That last injunction "to fear none" was indeed little needed in the sense in which the boy took it.

"I am not wont to fear," he said, with a touch of impatient pride, adding the next instant, as his eyes rested on his mother's gentle face, and with a mischievous smile, "I rather thought, my mother, that your counsels to me generally were against being overbold."

"That is true," was the reply, with a fleet answering smile. "But that is in matters concerning thyself, my son. Be ever backward in self-assertion, and ever fearless in the cause of justice, truth, and mercy. As thy father was, so I pray that his son may be."

* * * * *

"My father saith that he likes the look of thy face, and wills that we may be friends."

Such was the abrupt announcement of that courtly page and intrepid young adventurer, Fernando Columbus, breaking in upon Montoro's reverie, and joining him at his post by the vessel's side.

A third person stood there also for a minute,--a man with grey hair, and a form shrunken with old age,--and a tear rolled slowly down his furrowed cheek as he gazed for the last time at his country's strand.

Montoro's great eyes widened with questioning wonder at sight of the bowed old man, and when he withdrew he asked his companion, in low tones, what could have possibly induced one so infirm to set out upon such toilsome journeyings.

Ferdinand turned his head to look after the retreating figure, and shrugged his shoulders. "Well, I suppose his inducement would be thought by many people a more sensible one than those of the rest of us, although, if we have anything of a rough voyage, I doubt he will be proved to have set out too tardily."

"Still, I hope for my part we shall not always have these smooth waters," impulsively exclaimed the inexperienced young sailor. "I want to see what a storm on the ocean is like. But that by the by. Just now I wish to know what is the inducement of that old hidalgo for leaving his own home, and the comforts he seems to need. Why do you think it is a sensible one?"

"Because," answered the younger boy more gravely, "gold without life is useless, and even glory without it is not much worth. And various of our nobles at the Court have come to the belief that the fountain of youth wastes its precious waters in some hitherto undiscovered region of this New World. The brave knight, Ponce de Leon, hath determined on an expedition to go in search of it; meantime yon wealthy Señor hopes to bribe the Indians to bestow upon him a draught of the precious water before it be too late. And my father though something doubtful of this thing, hath consented that Don Aguilar should have passage with us for the chance. He, himself, would far rather find the Holy Garden of Eden, which he tells me most surely is out yonder."

"At any rate," said one of the knightly adventurers who had now stepped up beside the two lads; "at any rate, Ferdinand, whether thy father finds the Garden or no, I trust that no flaming firebrands of the Indians will hinder him from finding, and traversing, that strait leading from this ocean into the Indian Sea, of which he seems to be so well assured. The finding of that passage will be wealth for all of us."

Unfortunately for the hopes of those days, that expected passage proved to be a land one, and is now called the Isthmus of Darien, which art, not nature, promises soon to convert into the realization of Columbus's belief.