CHAPTER II. Early Years of Columbus.
BIRTH OF COLUMBUS
The question of Columbus's birthplace has been almost as hotly contested as that of Homer's. A succession of pamphleteers had discussed the pretensions of half a dozen different Italian villages to be the birthplace of the great navigator; but still archaeologists were divided on the subject, when, at a comparatively recent period, the discovery of the will in which Columbus bequeathed part of his property to the Bank of Genoa, conclusively settled the point in favour of that city. "Thence I came," he says, "and there was I born." As to the date of his birth there is no such direct evidence; and conjectures and inferences, founded on various statements in his own writings, and in those of his contemporaries, range over the twenty years from 1436 to 1456, in attempting to assign the precise time of his appearance in the world. Mr. Irving adopts the earlier of these two dates, upon the authority of a remark by Bernaldez, the curate of Los Palacios, which speaks of the death of Columbus in the year 1506, "at a good old age, being seventy years old, a little more or less." But this statement has an air of vagueness, and is, moreover, inconsistent with several passages in Columbus's own letters.[6] And the evidence of the ancient authorities who seem most to be relied on, points rather to the year 1447 or 1448 as the probable date.
[Footnote 6: "His hair," says his son Fernando, "turned white before he was thirty." This would add to his apparent age, and might have deceived Bernaldez.]
HIS EDUCATION.
His father was a wool-carder; but this fact does not necessarily imply, in a city of traders like Genoa, that his family was of particularly humble origin. At any rate, like most others, when the light of a great man's birth is thrown upon its records, real and possible, it presents some other names not altogether unworthy to be inscribed among the great man's ancestors. Christopher was not, he says in a letter to a lady of the Spanish court, the first admiral of his family—referring, evidently, to two naval commanders bearing his name, who had attained some distinction in the maritime service of Genoa and France, and the younger of whom, Colombo el Mozo, was in command of a French squadron in the expedition undertaken by John of Anjou against Naples for the recovery of the Neapolitan crown. But his relationship with these Colombos, if traceable at all, was probably only a very distant one, and his son, in admitting this, wisely says that the glory of Christopher is quite enough, without, there being a necessity to borrow any from his ancestors.
At a very early age he became a student at the University of Pavia, where he laid the foundations of that knowledge of mathematics and natural science, which stood him in good stead throughout his life. At Genoa he would naturally regard the sea as the great field of enterprise which produced harvests of rich wares and spoils of glorious victories; and he may have heard, now and then, news of the latest conclusions of the Arabic geographers at Senaar, and rumours of explorations down the African coast, which would be sure to excite interest among the maritime population of his birthplace. It is not wonderful that, exposed to such influences, he preferred a life of adventure on the sea to the drudgery of his father's trade in Genoa. Accordingly, after finishing his academical course at Pavia, he spent but a few irksome months as a carder of wool (tector panni) and actually entered on his nautical career before he was fifteen years old.
EARLY VOYAGES OF COLUMBUS.
Of his many voyages, which of them took place before, and which after, his coming to Portugal, we have no distinct record; but are sure that he traversed a large part of the known world, that he visited England, that he made his way to Iceland and Friesland[7] (where he may possibly have heard vague tales of the discoveries by the Northmen in North America), that he had been at El Mina, on the coast of Guinea, and that he had seen the Islands of the Grecian Archipelago. "I have been seeking out the secrets of nature for forty years," he says, "and wherever ship has sailed, there have I voyaged." But beyond a few vague allusions of this kind, we know scarcely anything of these early voyages. However, he mentions particularly his having been employed by King Rene of Provence to intercept a Venetian galliot. And this exploit furnishes illustrations both of his boldness and his tact. During the voyage the news was brought that the galliot was convoyed by three other vessels. Thereupon the crew were unwilling to hazard an engagement, and insisted that Columbus should return to Marseilles for re-inforcement. Columbus made a feint of acquiescence, but craftily arranged the compass so that it appeared that they were returning, while they were really steering their original course, and so arrived at Carthagena on the next morning, thinking all the while that they were in full sail for Marseilles.
[Footnote 7: The account of this voyage to the north of Europe, as commonly quoted, furnishes a singular instance of the inaccuracy of translators in the matter of figures. Columbus is there made to say, that at the Ultima Thule, which be reached, "the tides were so great as to rise and fall twenty-six fathoms," i.e. 156 feet. Of course this an absurdity; for no tides in Europe rise much above 50 feet. We have no record of the exact words used by Columbus, but in the extant Italian translation he is made to speak of the rise being venti sei bracchia, i.e. twenty-six ells (not fathoms), or about fifty-two feet. But even this reduced estimate must be excessive. Except in the Bristol Channel there is no rise of tide in the seas of Northern Europe which at all approaches this limit. At Reikiavik (Iceland) the rise is seventeen and a half feet. In Greenland it varies from a minimum of seven feet at Julianshaab to a maximum of twelve and a half feet at Frederikshaab.]
CHARACTERISTICS OF COLUMBUS
Considering how much more real the hero of a biography appears if we can picture him accurately in our mind's eye, and see him "in his habit as he lived," it is singularly unfortunate that the personal appearance of Columbus has been so variously described by the old historians that it is impossible to speak with certainty on the subject. Strangely enough, too, no well-authenticated portrait of the great discoverer exists. Ferdinand Columbus, who would be a good authority, fails to give us, in describing his father, any of those little touches which make up a good literary photograph. We learn, however, that he had a commanding presence, that he was above the middle height, with a long countenance, rather full cheeks, an aquiline nose, and light grey eyes full of expression. His hair was naturally light in colour, but, as has been already stated, it turned nearly white while he was still a young man.
The peculiar characteristics of his mind are such as we might naturally expect to find in the originator of such a work as the discovery of America,—who was, indeed, one of the great spirits of the earth; but still of the same order of soul to which great inventors and discoverers have mostly belonged. Lower down, too, in mankind, there is much of the same nature leading to various kinds of worthy deeds, though there are no more continents for it to discover.
But to return to the renowned personage of whom we are speaking. There was great simplicity about him, and much loyalty and veneration. The truly great are apt to believe in the greatness of others, and so to be loyal in their relations here; while, for what is beyond here, a large measure of veneration belongs to them, as having a finer and more habitually present consciousness than most men of something infinitely above what even their imaginations can compass. He was as magnanimous as it was possible, perhaps, for so sensitive and impassioned a person to be. He was humane, self-denying, courteous. He had an intellect of that largely inquiring kind which may remind us of our great English philosopher, Bacon. He was singularly resolute and enduring. The Spaniards have a word, longanimidad, which has been well applied in describing him, as it signifies greatness and constancy of mind in adversity. He was rapt in his designs, having a ringing for ever in his ears of great projects, making him deaf to much, perhaps, that prudence might have heeded:—one to be loved by those near him, and likely by his presence to inspire favour and respect.
COLUMBUS'S DESIRE FOR DISCOVERY.
At what precise period his great idea came into his mind we have no means of ascertaining. The continuous current of Portuguese discoveries had, as we have seen, excited the mind of Europe, and must have greatly influenced Columbus, living in the midst of them. This may be said without in the least detracting from his merits as a discoverer. In real life people do not spring from something baseless to something substantial, as people in sick dreams. A great invention or discovery is often like a daring leap, but it is from land to land, not from nothing to something; and if we look at the subject with this consideration fully before us, we shall probably admit that Columbus had as large a share in the merit of his discovery as most inventors or discoverers can lay claim to. If the idea which has rendered him famous was not in his mind at the outset of his career of investigation, at any rate he had from the first a desire for discovery, or, as he says himself, the wish to know the secrets of this world. It may be a question whether this impulse soon brought him to his utmost height of survey, and that he then only applied to learning to confirm his first views; or whether the impulse merely carried him along with growing perception of the great truth he was to prove, into deep thinking upon cosmographical studies, Portuguese discoveries, the dreams of learned men, the labours of former geographers, the dim prophetic notices of great unknown lands, and vague reports amongst mariners of driftwood seen on the seas. But at any rate we know that he arrived at a fixed conclusion that there was a way by the west to the Indies; that he could discover this way, and so come to Cipango, Cathay, the Grand Khan, and all he had met with in the gorgeous descriptions of Marco Polo and other ancient authorities. We may not pretend to lay down the exact chronological order of the formation of the idea in his mind, in fact, to know more about it than he would probably have been able to tell us himself. And it must not be forgotten that his enterprise, as compared with that of the Portuguese along the coast of Africa, was as an invention compared to an improvement. Each new discovery then was but a step beyond that which had preceded it; Columbus was the first to steer boldly from shore into the waste of waters, an originator, not a mere improver.
COLUMBUS'S THEORY.
Fernando Columbus divides into three classes the grounds on which his father's theory was based; namely, reasons from nature, the authority of writers, and the testimony of sailors. He believed the world to be a sphere; he under-estimated its size; he over-estimated the size of the Asiatic continent. The farther that continent extended to the eastward the nearer it came round towards Spain. And this, in a greater or less degree, had been the opinion of the ancient geographers. Both Aristotle and Seneca thought that a ship might sail "in a few days" from Cadiz to India. Strabo, too, believed that it might be possible to navigate on the same parallel of latitude, due west from the coast of Africa or Spain to that of India. The accounts given by Marco Polo and Sir John Maundeville of their explorations towards China confirmed the exaggerated idea of the extent of Eastern Asia.
CARDINAL ALIACO'S "COSMOGRAPHIA."
But of all the works of learned men, that which, according to Ferdinand Columbus, had most weight with his father, was the "Cosmographia" of Cardinal Aliaco. And this book affords a good illustration of the then state of scientific knowledge. Learned arguments are interspersed with the most absurd fables of lion-bodied men and dog-faced women; grave, and sometimes tolerably sound, disquisitions on the earth's surface are mixed up with the wildest stories of monsters and salamanders, of giants and pigmies. It is here that we find the original of our modern acquaintance, the sea-serpent, described as being "of huge size, so that he kills and devours large stags, and is able to cross the ocean;" and the wonders of the unknown world are enunciated with a circumstantial minuteness which must have easily won the credence of a willing disciple like Columbus. He was also confirmed in his views of the existence of a western passage to the Indies by Paulo Toscanelli, the Florentine philosopher, to whom much credit is due for the encouragement he afforded to the enterprise. That the notices, however, of western lands were not such as to have much weight with other men is sufficiently proved by the difficulty which Columbus had in contending with adverse geographers and men of science in general, of whom, he says, he never was able to convince any one. After a new world had been discovered, many scattered indications were then found to have foreshown it. "When he promised a new hemisphere," writes Voltaire, "people maintained that it could not exist, and when he had discovered it, that it had been known a long time." It was to confute such detractors that he resorted to the well known expedient for making an egg stand on end; an illustration of the meaning of originality which, by the way, was not itself original, as Brunelleschi had already employed it when his merit in devising a plan for raising the cupola of Florence cathedral was questioned.
EVIDENCES OF A WESTERN WORLD.
Of the amount of evidence furnished by the testimony of sailors, it is difficult to speak with any degree of accuracy. Rumours of drift-wood, apparently carved with some savage implements; of mammoth reeds, corresponding with Ptolemy's account of those indigenous to India; even of two corpses, cast up on one of the Azores, and presenting an appearance quite unlike that of any race of Europe or Africa; all seem to have come to the willing ears of Columbus, and to have been regarded by him as "confirmations, strong as proofs of holy writ," of the great theory.
About the year 1470 Columbus arrived at Lisbon. According to the account given by his son, and adopted by the historian Bossi, he had sailed with Colombo el Mozo (the nephew of that "first Admiral of the family" of whom we have already heard) on a cruise to intercept some Venetian merchantmen on their way home from Flanders. At break of day the battle began, off Cape St. Vincent, and lasted till nightfall. The privateer commanded by Columbus grappled a huge Venetian galley, which, after a hand-to-hand struggle, caught fire, and the flames spread to the privateer. Friends and enemies alike sought safety in the sea, and Columbus, supporting himself on an oar, succeeded, when nearly exhausted, in gaining the land, which was at some six miles distance. God preserved him, says his son, for greater things.
COLUMBUS AT PORTO SANTO.
It was probably not long after this that he married Donna Felipa Munnis Perestrelo, who was residing at the convent of All Saints, in Lisbon, where he was a regular attendant at the services of the church. She was a daughter of that captain of Prince Henry's who has been already mentioned as the first governor of Porto Santo. On that island, after a short residence in the Portuguese capital, Columbus took up his abode, busying himself with the papers of his deceased father-in-law, and earning a livelihood by making maps and charts for sale. It is a curious fact that the great chief of American discoverers should thus have inhabited a spot which was the first advanced outpost in African discovery. He was here on the high road to Guinea, and being in constant communication with the explorers of the new regions, it was likely that he would become imbued with some of their enthusiasm for adventure.
THE BISHOP OF CEUTA; RETURN OF THE CARAVEL.
Shrouded in obscurity as this period of his life remains, we are only able to find vague traditions of the unsuccessful effort which Columbus made to induce the Senate of Genoa to take up his project. From the Portuguese crown he could scarcely look for help, embroiled as it was in costly wars, and having already a field for discovery along the African coast, which it would scarcely be wise to forsake for an undertaking similar in kind, but more hazardous and less definite. However, King John the Second, to whom Columbus applied, seems to have listened with attention to the exposition of his scheme, and indeed, according to the account of Fernando, to have given a sort of qualified promise of his support, but to have disagreed with Columbus as to terms. The king referred the matter to a Committee of Council for Geographical Affairs, before whom Columbus laid his plans; but it is possible that even in the fifteenth century Boards had come to regard projectors as their natural enemies, and the report of the Committee was entirely adverse to the scheme for Atlantic discovery. But it seems that the king, was not satisfied yet, whereupon the Bishop of Ceuta (who had headed the opposition to Columbus in the Council) suggested that a caravel should be secretly equipped and sent out, with instructions founded on the plan laid before the committee. And this piece of episcopal bad faith was actually perpetrated. The caravel, however, returned without having accomplished anything, the sailors not having had heart to adventure far enough westward. It was not an enterprise to be carried out successfully by men who had only stolen the idea of it.
CHAPTER III. Columbus in Spain.
Columbus, disgusted at the treatment he had received from the Portuguese Court, quitted Lisbon for Spain, probably in the year 1485, with his son Diego, the only issue of his marriage with Donna Felipa, now no longer living. Here he addressed himself to the Duke of Medina Sidonia, and to the Duke of Medina Celi, whose extensive possessions along the coasts of Spain were likely to incline them in favour of a maritime expedition. There is some uncertainty as to the degree of encouragement which he received from them; but long afterwards, when Columbus had succeeded, the Duke of Medina Celi wrote to the Cardinal of Spain showing that he (the duke) had maintained Columbus two years in his house, and was ready to have undertaken the enterprise, but that he saw it was one for the queen herself, and even then he wished to have had a part in it. Probably, any man in whose house Columbus resided for two years would have caught some portion of his enthusiasm, and have been ready to take up his project. It may be conjectured, however, that none of the nobles of the Spanish court would have been likely to undertake the matter without some sanction from the king or queen.
LETTER TO QUEEN ISABELLA.
To the queen, accordingly, the Duke of Medina Celi addressed a letter, of which Columbus was himself the bearer, commending his enterprise to the royal favour. But the juncture was singularly inopportune for the consideration of any peaceful project. The war with the Moors was raging more and more furiously, as they were driven back, contesting every inch of ground, farther and farther from the heart of the kingdom. The court was now at Cordova, actively preparing for the campaign which was to result in that subjugation of the crescent to the cross, throughout the Peninsula, which was completed by the conquest of Granada some six years later. Amid the clang of arms and the bustle of warlike preparation, Columbus was not likely to obtain more than a slight and superficial attention to a matter which must have seemed remote and uncertain. Indeed, when it is considered that the most pressing internal affairs of kingdoms are neglected by the wisest rulers in times of war, it is wonderful that he succeeded in obtaining any audience at all.
COLUMBUS AT COURT; JUNTA OF COSMOGRAPHERS; DECISION OF THE JUNTA.
However, he was fortunate enough to find at once a friend in the Treasurer of the Household, Alonso de Quintanilla, a man who, like himself, "took delight in great things," and who obtained a hearing for him from the Spanish monarchs. Ferdinand and Isabella did not dismiss him abruptly. On the contrary, it is said, they listened kindly; and the conference ended by their referring the business to the Queen's Confessor, Fra Hernando de Talavera, who was afterwards Archbishop of Granada. This important functionary summoned a junta of cosmographers (not a promising assemblage!) to consult about the affair, and this junta was convened at Salamanca, in the summer of the year 1487. Here was a step gained; the cosmographers were to consider his scheme, and not merely to consider whether it was worth taking into consideration. But it was impossible for the jury to be unprejudiced. All inventors, to a certain extent, insult their contemporaries by accusing them of stupidity and of ignorance. And the cosmographical pedants, accustomed to beaten tracks, resented the insult by which this adventurer was attempting to overthrow the belief of centuries. They thought that so many persons wise in nautical matters as had preceded the Genoese mariner never could have overlooked such an idea as this which had presented itself to his mind. Moreover, as the learning of the middle ages resided for the most part in the cloister, the member's of the junta were principally clerical, and combined to crush Columbus with theological objections. Texts of Scripture were adduced to refute his theory of the spherical shape of the earth, and the weighty authority of the Fathers of the Church was added to overthrow the "foolish idea of the existence of antipodes; of people who walk, opposite to us, with their heels upwards and their heads hanging down; where everything is topsy turvy, where the trees grow with their branches downwards, and where it rains, hails, and snows upwards." King David, St. Paul, St. Augustine, Lactantius, and a host of other theological authorities were all put in evidence against the Genoese mariner: he was confronted by the "conservatism of lawyers united to the bigotry of priests." Las Casas displays his usual acuteness when he says that the great difficulty of Columbus was, not that of teaching, but that of unteaching: not of promulgating his own theory, but of eradicating the erroneous convictions of the judges before whom he had to plead his cause. In fine, the junta decided that the project was "vain and impossible, and that it did not belong to the majesty of such great princes to determine anything upon such weak grounds of information."
Ferdinand and Isabella seem not to have taken the extremely unfavourable view of the matter entertained by the junta of cosmographers, or at least to have been willing to dismiss Columbus gently, for they merely said that, with the wars at present on their hands, and especially that of Granada, they could not undertake any new expenses, but when that war was ended, they would examine his plan more carefully.
TEDIOUNESS OF COLUMBUS'S SUIT
Thus terminated a solicitation at the court of Ferdinand and Isabella which, according to some authorities, lasted five years; for the facts above mentioned, though short in narration, occupied no little time in transaction. During the whole of this period, Columbus appears to have followed the sovereigns in the movements which the war necessitated, and to have been treated by them with much consideration. Sums were from time to time granted from the royal treasury for his private expenses, and he was billeted as a public functionary in the various towns of Andalusia, where the court rested. But his must have been a very up-hill task. Las Casas, who, from an experience larger even than that which fell to the lot of Columbus, knew what it was to endure the cold and indolent neglect of superficial men in small authority, and all the vast delay, which cannot be comprehended except by those who have suffered under it, that belongs to the transaction of any affair in which many persons have to cooperate, compares the suit of Columbus to a battle, "a terrible, continuous, painful, prolix battle." The tide of this long war (for war it was, rather than a battle) having turned against him, Columbus left the court, and went to Seville "with much sadness and discomfiture." During this dreary period of a suitor's life—which, however, has been endured by some of the greatest men the world has seen, which was well known by close observation, or bitter experience, to Spenser, Camoens, Cervantes, Shakespeare, Bacon—one joy at least was not untasted by Columbus, namely, that of love. His beloved Beatrice, whom he first met at Cordova, must have believed in him, even if no one else had done so; but love was not sufficient to retain at her side a man goaded by a great idea, or perhaps that love did but impel him to still greater efforts for her sake, as is the way with lovers of the nobler sort.
ENCOURAGEMENT OF FRIENDS; GARCIA HERNANDEZ.
Other friends, too, shared his enthusiasm, and urged him onward. Juan Perez de la Marchena, guardian of the monastery of La Rabida, in Andalusia, had been the confessor of Queen Isabella, but had exchanged the bustle of the court for the learned leisure of the cloister. The little town of Palos, with its seafaring population and maritime interests, was near the monastery, and the principal men of the place were glad to pass the long winter evenings in the society of Juan Perez, discussing questions of cosmography and astronomy. Among these visitors were Martin Alonzo Pinzon, the chief shipowner of Palos, and Garcia Hernandez, the village doctor; and one can fancy how the schemes of Columbus must have appeared to the little conclave as a ray of sunlight in the dulness of their simple life. Hernandez, especially, who seems to have been somewhat skilled in physical science, and therefore capable of appreciating the arguments of Columbus, became a warm believer in his project. It is worthy of notice that a person who appears only once, as it were, in a sentence in history, should have exercised so much influence upon it as Garcia Hernandez, who was probably a man of far superior attainments to those around him, and was in the habit of deploring, as such men do, his hard lot in being placed where he could be so little understood. Now, however, he was to do more at one stroke than many a man who has been all his days before the world. Columbus had abandoned his suit at court in disgust, and had arrived at the monastery before quitting Spain to fetch his son Diego, whom he had left with Juan Perez to be educated. All his griefs and struggles he confided to Perez, who could not bear to hear of his intention to leave the country for France or England, and to make a foreign nation greater by allowing it to adopt his project. The three friends—the monk, the learned physician, and the skilled cosmographer—discussed together the propositions so unhappily familiar to the last named member of their little council. The affection of Juan Perez and the learning of Hernandez were not slow to follow in the track which the enthusiasm of the great adventurer made out before them; and they became, no doubt, as convinced as Columbus himself of the feasibility of his undertaking. The difficulty, however, was not in becoming believers themselves, but in persuading those to believe who would have power to further the enterprise.
PEREZ WRITES TO THE QUEEN.
Their discussions upon this point ended in the conclusion that Juan Perez, who was known to the queen, having acted as her confessor, should write to her highness. He did so; and the result was favourable. The queen sent for him, heard what he had to say, and in consequence remitted money to Columbus to enable him to come to Court and renew his suit.
COLUMBUS'S CONDITIONS.
He attended the court again; his negotiations were resumed, but were again broken off on the ground of the largeness of the conditions which he asked for. His opponents said that these conditions were too large if he succeeded, and if he should not succeed and the conditions should come to nothing, they thought that there was an air of trifling in granting such conditions at all. And, indeed, they wore very large; namely, that he was to be made an admiral at once, to be appointed viceroy of the countries he should discover, and to have an eighth of the profits of the expedition. The only probable way of accounting for the extent of these demands and his perseverance in making them, even to the risk of total failure, is that the discovering of the Indies was but a step in his mind to greater undertakings, as they seemed to him, which he had in view, of going to Jerusalem with an army and making another crusade. For Columbus carried the chivalrous ideas of the twelfth century into the somewhat self-seeking fifteenth. The negotiation, however, failed a second time, and Columbus resolved again to go to France, when Alonzo de Quintanilla and Juan Perez contrived to obtain a hearing for the great adventurer from Cardinal Mendoza, who was pleased with him. Columbus then offered, in order to meet the objections of his opponents, to pay an eighth part of the expense of the expedition. Still nothing was done.
SANTANGLE'S ADDRESS.
And now, finally, Columbus determined to go to France, and indeed had actually set off one day in January of the year 1492, when Luis de Santangel, receiver of the ecclesiastical revenues of the crown of Aragon, a person much devoted to the plans of Columbus, addressed the queen with all the energy that a man throws into his words when he is aware that it is his last time for speaking in favour of a thing which he has much at heart. He told her that he wondered that, as she always had a lofty mind for great things, it should be wanting to her on this occasion. He endeavoured to pique her jealousy as a monarch, by suggesting that the enterprise might fall into the hands of other princes. Then he said something in behalf of Columbus himself, and the queen was not unlikely to know well the bearing of a great man. He intimated to her highness that what was an impossibility to the cosmographers, might not be so in nature. Nor, continued he, should any endeavour in so great a matter be attributed to lightness, even though the endeavour should fail; for it is the part of great and generous princes to ascertain the secrets of the world. Other princes (he did not mention those of neighbouring Portugal) had gained eternal fame this way. He concluded by saying that all the aid Columbus wanted to set the expedition afloat, was but a million of maravedis (equivalent to about 308 Pounds, English money of the period); and that so great an enterprise ought not to be abandoned for the sake of such a trifling sum.
SUCCESS OF THE ADDRESS.
These well addressed arguments, falling in, as they did, with those of Quintanilla, the treasurer, who had great influence with the queen, prevailed. She thanked these lords for their counsel, and said she would adopt it, but they must wait until the finances had recovered a little from the drain upon them occasioned by the conquest of Granada, or if they thought that the plan must be forthwith carried out, she would pledge her jewels to raise the necessary funds. Santangel and Quintanilla kissed her hands, highly delighted at succeeding; and Santangel offered to advance the money required. Upon this the queen sent an alguazil to overtake Columbus and bring him back to the court. He was overtaken at the bridge of Pinos, two leagues from Granada; returned to Santa Fe, where the sovereigns were encamped before Granada; was well received by Isabella; and finally the agreement between him and their catholic highnesses was settled with the secretary, Colama.
THE AGREEMENT SETTLED.
Not much is seen of King Ferdinand in all these proceedings; and it is generally understood that he looked rather coldly upon the propositions of Columbus. We cannot say that he was at all unwise in so doing. His great compeer, Henry the Seventh, did not hasten to adopt the same project submitted to him by Bartholomew Columbus, sent into England[8] for that purpose by his brother Christopher; and it has not been thought to derogate from the English king's sagacity.
[Footnote 8: It is difficult to determine how the project brought before Henry the Seventh's notice by Bartholomew Columbus was received. Some say it was made a mockery of at the English court; others speak of it as actually accepted. Lord Bacon states that Bartholomew was taken by pirates on his voyage to England, which delayed him so much that "before he had obtained a capitulation with the king for his brother, the enterprise by him was achieved." It is probable that Henry listened with interest to Bartholomew Columbus, who was a man of much intelligence and great maritime knowledge. But it seems unlikely that the negotiation went very far, considering the rigid manner in which Columbus insisted upon his exact conditions being accepted by the Spanish court. No such bargain, at a distance, with a reserved and parsimonious monarch, was likely, therefore, to have been concluded. It appears, however, from a despatch from the Spanish ambassador to his sovereigns, dated the 25th July, 1498, that the English were not behind other nations in a thirst for discovery, "Merchants of Bristol," he says, "have for the last seven years sent out annually some ships in search of the island of Brazil and the Seven Cities." If this assertion is accurate, England must have anticipated Spain in the search for, though not in the discovery of, the western world.]
FATE OF PROJECTORS' PLANS.
Those who govern are in all ages surrounded by projectors, and have to clear the way about them as well as they can, and to take care that they get time and room for managing their own immediate affairs. It is not to be wondered at, therefore, if good plans should sometimes share the fate which ought to attend, and must attend, the great mass of all projects submitted to men in power. Here, however the ultimate event would justify the monarch's caution; for it would be hard to prove that Spain has derived aught but a golden weakness from her splendid discoveries and possessions in the new world.
FERDINAND'S COLDNESS.
Moreover, the characters of the two men being essentially opposed, it is probable that Ferdinand felt something like contempt for the uncontrolled enthusiasm of Columbus; and, upon the whole, it is rather to be wondered that the king consented to give the powers he did, than that he did not do more. Had it been a matter which concerned his own kingdom of Aragon, he might not have gone so far; but the expenses were to be eventually charged on Castille, and perhaps he looked upon the whole affair as another instance of Isabella's good natured sympathy with enthusiasts. His own cool and wary nature must have distrusted this "pauper pilot, promising rich realms." [9]
[Footnote 9: "Nudo nocchier, promettitor di regni:"—Chiabrea.]
COLUMBUS'S AGREEMENT WITH THE COURT OF SPAIN.
The agreement between Columbus and their Catholic highnesses is to the following effect:—
The favours which Christopher Columbus has asked from the King and Queen of Spain in recompense of the discoveries which he has made in the ocean seas, and as recompense for the voyage which he is about to undertake, are the following:—
1. He wishes to be made admiral of the seas and countries which he is about to discover. He desires to hold this dignity during his life, and that it should descend to his heirs.
This request is granted by the king and queen.
2. Christopher Columbus wishes to be made viceroy of all the continents and islands.
Granted by the king and queen.
3. He wishes to have a share, amounting to a tenth part, of the profits of all merchandise, be it pearls, jewels, or any other things, that may be found, gained, bought, or exported from the countries which he is to discover.
Granted by the king and queen.
4. He wishes, in his quality of admiral, to be made sole judge of all mercantile matters that may be the occasion of dispute in the countries which he is to discover.
Granted by the king and queen, on the condition, however, that this
jurisdiction should belong to the office of admiral, as held by Don
Enriquez and other admirals.
5. Christopher Columbus wishes to have the right to contribute the eighth part of the expenses of all ships which traffic with the new countries, and in return to earn the eighth part of the profits.
Granted by the king and queen.
Santa Fe, in the Vega of Granada,
April 17, 1492.
This agreement is signed by the Secretary Coloma and written by Almazan.
Then there is a sort of passport or commendatory letter intended for presentation to the Grand Khan, Prester John, or any other oriental potentate at whose territories Columbus might arrive:—
FERDINAND AND ISABELLA TO KING— The sovereigns have heard that he and his subjects entertain great love for them and for Spain. They are moreover informed that he and his subjects very much[10] wish to hear news from Spain; and send, therefore, their admiral, Ch. Columbus, who will tell them that they are in good health and perfect prosperity.
Granada, April 30, 1492.
[Footnote 10: This crediting the unknown ruler with an anxiety for the welfare of the Spanish sovereigns is really a delicious piece of diplomatic affectation.]
COLUMBUS GOES TO PALOS.
Armed with these royal commissions, Columbus left the court for Palos; and we may be sure that the knot of friends at the monastery were sufficiently demonstrative in their delight at the scheme on which they had pinned their faith being fairly launched. There was no delay in furnishing the funds for the expedition. From an entry in an account-book belonging to the Bishopric of Palencia, it appears that one million one hundred and forty thousand maravedis were advanced by Santangel in May, 1492, "being the sum he lent for paying the caravels which their highnesses ordered to go as the armada to the Indies, and for paying Christopher Columbus, who goes in the said armada." The town of Palos was ordered to provide two vessels.[11]
[Footnote 11: The requisition to the municipality of Palos runs thus: "In consequence of the offence which we received at your hands, you were condemned by our council to render us the service of two caravels, armed, at your own expense, for the space of twelve months, whenever and wherever it should be our pleasure to demand the same:" (30th April, 1492.) A proclamation of immunity from civil and criminal process to persons taking service in the expedition was issued at the same time. The ship of Columbus was, therefore, a refuge for criminals and runaway debtors, a cave of Adullam for the discontented and the desperate. To have to deal with such a community was not of the least of Columbus's difficulties.]
ORDER TO PRESS MEN.
But there was still a weighty difficulty to be surmounted. It was no easy matter to obtain crews for such an expedition. The sovereigns issued an order authorizing Columbus to press men into the service, but still the numbers were incomplete, for the mariners of Palos held aloof, unwilling to risk their lives in what seemed to them the crazy project of a monomaniac. But Juan Perez was active in persuading men to embark. The Pinzons, rich men and skilful mariners of Palos, joined in the undertaking personally, and aided it with their money, and, by these united exertions, three vessels were manned with ninety mariners, and provisioned for a year.
CHARACTER OF VESSELS AND CREWS.
The vessels were all of small size, probably of not more than one hundred tons' burden each, and, therefore, not larger than the American yachts, whose ocean race from New York to Cowes was regarded as an example of immense hardihood, even in the year 1867. But Columbus considered them very suitable for the undertaking. The Santa Maria, which Columbus himself commanded, was the only one of the three that was decked throughout. The official persons and the crew on board her were sixteen in number. The two other vessels were of the class called caravels, and were decked fore and aft, but not amidships, the stem and the stern being built so as to rise high out of the water. One of them, the "Pinta," was manned by a crew of thirty, commanded by Martin Alonzo Pinzon. The other, the "Nina," had Vincent Yanez Pinzon for captain, and a crew of twenty-four men. The whole number of adventurers amounted to a hundred and twenty persons, men of various nationalities, including, by the way, among them, two natives of the British Isles.
CHAPTER III. First Voyage.
At length all the preparations were complete, and on a Friday (not inauspicious in this case), the 3rd of August, 1492, after they had all confessed and received the sacrament, they set sail from the Bar of Saltes, making for the Canary Islands. One can fancy how the men and the women of Palos watched the specks of white sails vanishing in the west, and how, as each frail bark in turn disappeared in the great ocean, mothers and sisters turned weepingly away as if from a last farewell at the grave of their sailor kinsmen.
Columbus was now fairly afloat, and we may say with Milton, that—
The world was all before him, where to choose.
And Providence his guide.
His choice was made, however; and his Guide did not fail him.
CANARY ISLANDS REACHED.
He was about to change the long-continued, weary, dismal life of a suitor, for the sharp intense anxiety of a struggle in which there was no alternative to success but deplorable, ridiculous, fatal failure. Speaking afterwards of the time he spent as a suitor at court, he says, "Eight years I was torn with disputes, and in a word, my proposition was a thing for mockery." It was now to be seen what mockery was in it. The following account of the voyage is mainly taken from an abridgment of Columbus's own diary made by Las Casas, who in some places gives the admiral's own words.
The little squadron reached the Canary Islands in a few days, with no event worth recording, except that the caravel "Pinta," commanded Martin Alonzo Pinzon, unshipped her rudder. This was supposed to be no accident, but to have been contrived by the owners of the vessel, who did not like the voyage. The admiral (from henceforth Columbus is called "the admiral") was obliged to stay some time at the Canary Islands, to refit the "Pinta," and to make some change in the cut of her sails. While this was being done, news was brought that three Portuguese government vessels were cruising in the offing with the intention of preventing the expedition. However, on the 6th of September, Columbus set sail from Gomera, and struck boldly out to sea, without meeting with any of his supposed enemies.
RUMORS OF LAND SEEN.
In the abridgment of the diary, under the date of the 19th of August, the admiral remarks that many Spaniards of these islands, "respectable men," swear that each year they see land; and he remembers how, in the year 1484, some one came from the island of Madeira to the King of Portugal to beg a caravel in order to go and discover that land which he declared he could see each year, and in the same manner. Had not the admiral been conscious of the substantial originality of his proceedings, he would hardly have been careful to collect these scattered notices which might afterwards be used, as many like them were used, to depreciate that originality. There is no further entry in the diary until the 6th of September, when they set out from Gomera (one of the Canary Islands), on their unknown way. For many days, what we have of the diary is little more than a log-book, giving the rate of sailing, or rather two rates, one for Columbus's own private heed, and the other for the sailors. On the 13th of September it is noted that the needle declined in the evening to the north-west, and on the ensuing morning, to the north-east, the first time that such a variation had been observed, or, at least recorded by Europeans. On the 14th, the sailors of the caravel "Nina" saw two tropical birds, which they said were never wont to be seen at more than fifteen or twenty leagues from shore. On the 15th they all saw a meteor fall from heaven, which made them very sad.
PLAINS OF SEAWEED.
On the 16th, they first came upon those immense plains of seaweed (the fucus natans), which constitute the Mar de Sargasso, and which occupy a space in the Atlantic almost equal to seven times the extent of France. The aspect of these plains greatly terrified the sailors, who thought they might be coming upon submerged lands and rocks; but finding that the vessels cut their way well through this seaweed, the sailors thereupon took heart. On the 17th, they see more of these plains of seaweed, and thinking themselves to be near land, they are almost in good spirits, when finding that the needle declines to the west a whole point of the compass and more, their hopes suddenly sink again: they begin "to murmur between their teeth," and to wonder whether they are not in another world. Columbus, however, orders an observation to be taken at day-break, when the needle is found to point to the north again; moreover he is ready with a theory sufficiently ingenious for that time, to account for the phenomenon of variation which had so disturbed the sailors, namely, that it was caused by the north star moving round the pole. The sailors are, therefore, quieted upon this head.
SIGNS OF LAND.
In the morning of the same day they catch a crab, from which Columbus infers that they cannot be more than eighty leagues distant from land. The 18th, they see many birds, and a cloud in the distance; and that night they expect to see land. On the 19th, in the morning, comes a pelican (a bird not usually seen twenty leagues from the coast); in the evening, another; also drizzling rain without wind, a certain sign, as the diary says, of proximity to land.
The admiral, however, will not beat about for land, as he concludes that the land which these various natural phenomena give token of, can only be islands, as indeed it proved to be. He will see them on his return; but now he must press on to the Indies. This determination shows his strength of mind, and indicates the almost scientific basis on which his great resolve reposed.
CONSPIRACY AMONG THE MEN.
Accordingly, he was not to be diverted from the main design by any partial success, though by this time he knew well the fears of his men, some of whom had already come to the conclusion, "that it would be their best plan to throw him quietly into the sea, and say he unfortunately fell in, while he stood absorbed in looking at the stars." Indeed, three days after he had resolved to pass on to the Indies, we find him saying, for Las Casas gives his words, "Very needful for me was this contrary wind, for the people were very much tormented with the idea that there were no winds on these seas that could take them back to Spain."
HIS DETERMINATION TO PROCEED.
On they go, having signs occasionally in the presence of birds and grass and fish that land must be near; but land does not come. Once, too, they are all convinced that they see land: they sing the "Gloria in excelsis;" and even the admiral goes out of his course towards this land, which turns out to be no land. They are like men listening to a dreadful discourse or oration, that seems to have many endings which end not: so that the hearer listens at last in grim despair, thinking that all things have lost their meaning, and that ending is but another form of beginning.
These mariners were stout-hearted, too; but what a daring thing it was to plunge, down-hill as it were, into
A world of waves, a sea without a shore,
Trackless, and vast, and wild, [Rogers]
mocked day by day with signs of land that neared not. And these men had left at home all that is dearest to man, and did not bring out any great idea to uphold them, and had already done enough to make them important men in their towns, and to furnish ample talk for the evenings of their lives. Still we find Columbus, as late as the 3rd of October, saying, "that he did not choose to stop beating about last week during those days that they had such signs of land, although he had knowledge of there being certain islands in that neighbourhood, because he would not suffer any detention, since his object was to go to the Indies; and if he should stop on the way, it would show a want of mind."
SIGNS OF LAND AGAIN.
Meanwhile, he had a hard task to keep his men in any order. Peter Martyr, who knew Columbus well, and had probably been favoured with a special account from him of these perilous days, describes his way of dealing with the refractory mariners, and how he contrived to win them onwards from day to day; now soothing them with soft words, now carrying their minds from thought of the present danger by spreading out large hopes before them, not forgetting to let them know what their princes would say to them if they attempted aught against him, or would not obey his orders. With this untutored crowd of wild, frightened men around him, with mocking hopes, not knowing what each day would bring to him, on went Columbus. At last came the 11th of October, and with it indubitable signs of land. The diary mentions their finding on that day a table-board and a carved stick, the carving apparently wrought by some iron instrument. Moreover, the men in one of the vessels saw a branch of a haw tree with fruit on it.
LIGHT ON SHORE.
Now, indeed, they must be close to land. The sun went down upon the same weary round of waters which for so long a time their eyes had ached to see beyond, when, at ten o'clock, Columbus, standing on the poop of his vessel, saw a light, and called to him, privately, Pedro Gutierrez, a groom of the king's chamber, who saw it also. Then they called Rodrigo Sanchez, who had been sent by their highnesses as overlooker. I imagine him to have been a cold and cautious man, of the kind that are sent by jealous states to accompany and curb great generals, and who are not usually much loved by them. Sanchez did not see the light at first, because, as Columbus says, he did not stand in the place where it could be seen; but at last even he sees it, and it may now be considered to have been seen officially. "It appeared like a candle that went up and down, and Don Christopher did not doubt that it was true light, and that it was on land; and so it proved, as it came from people passing with lights from one cottage to another."
THE PROMISED PENSION.
Their highnesses had promised a pension of ten thousand maravedis to the fortunate man who should see land first. The "Pinta" was the foremost vessel; and it was from her deck, at two o'clock in the morning, that land was first seen by Rodrigo de Triana. We cannot but be sorry for this poor common sailor, who got no reward, and of whom they tell a story, that in sadness and despite, he passed into Africa, after his return to Spain, and became a Mahometan. The pension was adjudged to the admiral: it was charged, somewhat ominously, on the shambles of Seville, and was paid him to the day of his death; for, says the historian Herrera, "he saw light in the midst of darkness, signifying the spiritual light which was introduced amongst these barbarous people, God permitting that, the war being finished with the Moors, seven hundred and twenty years after they had set foot in Spain, this work (the conversion of the Indians) should commence, so that the Princes of Castille and Leon might always be occupied in bringing infidels to the knowledge of the Holy Catholic faith."
RELIGIOUS MOTIVIES.
These last words are notable. They are such as Columbus himself would probably have made use of in describing this, the crowning event of his life. In the preface to his diary, which is an address to Ferdinand and Isabella, he speaks at large of the motives of their highnesses. He begins by saying how, in this present year of 1492, their highnesses had concluded their war with the Moors, having taken the great city of Granada, at the siege of which he was present, and saw the royal banners placed upon the towers of the Alhambra. He then tells how he had given information to their highnesses of the lands of India, and of a prince, called the Grand Khan, who had sent ambassadors to Rome, praying for doctors to instruct him in the faith; and how the Holy Father had never provided him with these doctors; and that great towns were perishing, from the belief of their inhabitants in idolatry, and from receiving amongst them "sects of perdition." After the above statement, he adds, "Your highnesses, as Catholic Christians and princes, lovers and furtherers of the Christian faith, and enemies of the sect of Mahomet, and of all idolatries and heresies, thought to send me, Christopher Columbus, to the aforesaid provinces of India to see the aforesaid princes, the cities and lands, and the disposition of them and of everything about them, and the way that should be taken to convert them to our holy faith."
GOOD FAITH OF COLUMBUS.
Columbus then speaks of the expulsion of the Jews from Spain as occurring at the same time as that in which he received orders to pursue a westerly course to India, thus combining the two transactions together, no doubt as proofs of the devout intentions of their highnesses: and, indeed, throughout the document, he ascribes no motives to the monarchs but such as were religious.
The diary to which this address was prefixed is probably one of the books which their highnesses allude to in a letter to Columbus, as being in their possession, and which they assured him they had not shown to anybody. I see no reason to doubt the perfect good faith of Columbus in making such a statement as that just referred to; and it is well to remark upon it, because we shall never come to a right understanding of those times and of the question of slavery as connected with them, unless we fully appreciate the good as well as the bad motives which guided the most important persons of that era.
CHARACTER OF THE QUEEN.
As for Queen Isabella, there can be no doubt about her motives. Even in the lamentably unjust things in which she was but too often concerned, she had what, to her mind, was compelling reason to act as she did. Perhaps there is hardly any great personage whose name and authority are found in connection with so much that is strikingly evil, all of it done, or rather assented to, upon the highest and purest motives. Whether we refer to the expulsion of the Jews, the treatment of the Moorish converts, or the establishment of the Inquisition, all her proceedings in these matters were entirely sincere and noble-minded. Methinks I can still see her beautiful majestic face (with broad brow, and clear, honest, loving eye), as it looks down upon the beholder from one of the chapels in the cathedral at Granada: a countenance too expressive and individual to be what painters give as that of an angel, and yet the next thing to it. Now, I could almost fancy, she looks down reproachfully, and yet with conscious sadness. What she would say in her defence, could we interrogate her, is, that she obeyed the voice of heaven, taking the wise and good men of her day as its interpreters. Oh! that she had but persisted in listening to it, as it spoke in her own kindly heart, when with womanly pity she was wont to intercede in favour of the poor cooped-up inmates of some closely beleaguered town or fortress! But at least the poor Indian can utter nothing but blessing's on her. He might have needed no other "protector" had she lived; nor would slavery have found in his fate one of the darkest and most fatal chapters in its history.
LANDING IN THE NEW WORLD.
But now, from Granada, and our fancies there, the narrative brings us back to the first land touched by Columbus. The landing of Columbus in the New World must ever be a conspicuous fact in the annals of mankind, and it was celebrated by a ceremonial worthy of the occasion. On the ensuing morning, after the light had been observed from the ships, being a Friday, the 12th of October, 1492, Columbus, clad in complete armour, and carrying in his hand the royal banner of Spain, descended upon the level shores of the small island [San Salvador, one of the Bahamas] which had first greeted him, and which he found to be very fruitful—fresh and verdant, and "like a garden full of trees." The other captains accompanied him, each of them bearing a banner with a green cross depicted upon it, and with the initials of Ferdinand and Isabella surmounted by their respective crowns—a device that well expressed the loyalty and devotion of Columbus, and had been chosen by him. These chief officers were followed by a large retinue from their crews. In numerous lines along the shore stood the simple islanders, looking on with innocent amazement.
THEIR GRATITUDE.
On touching land, Columbus and all the Spaniards who were present fell upon their knees, and with tears—tears of that deepest kind which men do not know the cause of—poured forth their "immense thanksgivings to Almighty God."
The man who, of all that embassage, if we may call it so, from the Old to the New World, was certainly the least surprised by all he saw, was, at the same time, the most affected. For thus it is, that the boldness of a great design is never fully appreciated by the designer himself until he has apparently accomplished his work, when he is apt, if it be indeed a great work, to look back with shuddering awe at his own audacity in having proposed it to mankind. The vast resolve which has sustained such a man throughout his long and difficult enterprise, having for the moment nothing to struggle against, dies away, leaving a strange sinking at the heart: and thus the greatest successes are often accompanied by a peculiar and bewildering melancholy. New difficulties, however, bred from success (for nothing is complete in life), soon arise to summon forth again the discoverer's energies, and to nerve him for fresh disappointments and renewed endeavours. Columbus will not fail to have his full share of such difficulties.
GENERAL RECONCILATION.
The followers of the great man, whose occasional faintheartedness must often have driven all sleep from his weary eyelids throughout the watches of the night, now began to think with remorse how much suffering they had needlessly inflicted upon their greatly-enduring leader. They sought his pardon with tears, and, subdued for the moment by his greatness when illustrated by success, expressed in loving terms their admiration, their gratitude, and their assurances of fidelity. The placable Columbus received their gracious sayings with all the warmth and tenderness that belonged to his large-hearted and amiable character.
THEY TAKE LEGAL POSSESSION.
The great business of the day then commenced; and Columbus, with the due legal formalities, took possession, on behalf of the Spanish monarchs, of the island Guanahani, which he forthwith named San Salvador. The gravity of the proceeding must have astonished the beholding islanders. Their attention, however, was soon turned to the Spaniards themselves; and they approached the strangers, wondering at their whiteness and at their beards. Columbus, as being the noblest looking personage there present, and also from wearing a crimson scarf over his armour, attracted especial attention, and justly seemed, as he was, the principal figure in this great spectacle.
Columbus is for the present moment radiant with success. Our interest passes now from him to the new people he was amongst. And what were they like? Were they worthy of the efforts which the Old World had made to find them? Was there mind and soul enough in them for them to become good Christians? What says the greatest of the men who first saw them? What impression did they make on him? Let him answer for himself:—
"Because they had much friendship for us, and because I knew they were people that would deliver themselves better to the Christian faith, and be converted more through love than by force, I gave to some of them some coloured caps and some strings of glass beads for their necks, and many other things of little value, with which they were delighted, and were so entirely ours that it was a marvel to see. The same afterwards came swimming to the ship's boats where we were, and brought us parrots, cotton threads in balls, darts and many other things, and bartered them with us for things which we gave them, such as bells and small glass beads. In fine, they took and gave all of whatever they had with good will. But it appeared to me they were a people very poor in everything. They went totally naked, as naked as their mothers brought them into the world."
CHARACTER OF THE INDIANS.
Then Columbus goes on to say that these Indians were well made, with very good countenances, but hair like horsehair, their colour yellow; and that they painted themselves. They neither carried arms, nor understood such things, for when he showed them swords, they took hold of them by the blade, and hurt themselves. Their darts were without iron; but some had a fish's tooth at the end. In concluding his description, he says, "they ought to make faithful servants, and of good understanding, for I see that very quickly they repeat all that is said to them, and I believe they would easily be converted to Christianity, for it appeared to me that they had no creed."
THEIR HOUSES AND IMPLEMENTS.
A little further on, the admiral says of the people of a neighbouring island, that they were more domestic and tractable than those of San Salvador, and more intelligent, too, as he saw in their way of reckoning for the payment of the cotton they brought to the ships. At the mouth of the Rio de Mares, some of the admiral's men, whom he had sent to reconnoitre, brought him word that the houses of the natives were the best they had seen. They were made, he says, like "Alfaneques (pavilions), very large, and appeared as royal tents without an arrangement of streets, except one here and there, and within they were very clean, and well swept, and their furniture very well arranged. All these houses were made of palm branches, and were very beautiful. Our men found in these houses many statues of women, and several heads fashioned like masks, and very well wrought. I do not know, he adds, whether they have these for the love of the beautiful, or for purposes of worship." The Spaniards found also excellent nets, fish-hooks, and fishing-tackle. There were tame birds about the houses, and dogs which did not bark. "Mermaids," too, the admiral saw on the coasts, but thought them "not so like ladies as they are painted."
Speaking of the Indians of the coast near the Rio del Sol, he says that they are "very gentle, without knowing what evil is, neither killing nor stealing." He describes the frank generosity of the people of Marien, and the honour they thought it to be asked to give anything, in terms which may remind his readers of the doctrines maintained by Christians in respect of giving.
DISCOVERY OF TOBACCO; ITS PECULIAR EFFECTS.
It is interesting to observe the way in which, at this point of the narrative, a new product is introduced to the notice of the old world, a product that was hereafter to become, not only an unfailing source of pleasure to a large section of the male part of mankind, from the highest to the lowest, but was also to distinguish itself as one of those commodities for revenue, which are the delight of statesmen, the great financial resource of modern nations, and which afford a means of indirect taxation that has, perhaps, nourished many a war, and prevented many a revolution. Two discoverers, whom the admiral had sent out from the Puerto de Mares (one of them being a learned Jew, who could speak Hebrew, Chaldee, and some Arabic, and would have been able to discourse, as Columbus probably thought, with any of the subjects of the Grand Khan, if he had met them), found that the men of the country they came to investigate, indulged in a "fumigation" of a peculiar kind. The smoke in question was absorbed into the mouth through a charred stick, and was caused by burning certain herbs wrapped in a dry leaf, which outer covering was called "tabaco." Las Casas, who carefully describes this process of imbibing smoke, mentions that the Indians, when questioned about it, said that it took away fatigue, and that he has known Spaniards in the island of Hispaniola who adopted the same habit, and who, being reproved for it as a vice, replied that it was not in their power to leave it off. "I do not know," he adds, "what savour or profit they found in them" (tabacos). I cannot help thinking that there were several periods in his own life, when these strange fumigations would have afforded him singular soothing and comfort. However that may be, there can be no doubt of the importance, financially and commercially speaking, of this discovery of tobacco; a discovery which, in the end, proved more productive to the Spanish Crown, than that of the gold mines of the Indies.
The excellent relations that existed between the expedition of Columbus and the inhabitants of Cuba may be seen from the fact that these two Christians, who were the first witnesses of tobacco smoking, and who travelled with only two Indian attendants, were everywhere well and reverently received.
GOLD ORNAMENT'S OBSERVED.
Resuming the thread of the history, it remains to be seen what more Columbus did and suffered in this voyage. The first Indians he met with had some few gold ornaments about them—poor wretches, if they had possessed the slightest gift of prophecy, they would have thrown these baubles into the deepest sea;—and they were asked whence came this gold? From a race, they said, living southwards, where there was a great king, who had much gold. On another occasion, other Indians being asked the same question, answered, "Cubanacan, Cubanacan." They meant the middle of Cuba; but their word at once suggested to Columbus the idea that he was now upon the traces of his long-looked-for friend, Kublai Kaan, the Khan of Khans. Indeed, it is almost ludicrous to see, throughout, how Columbus is possessed with the notions borrowed from his reading of Marco Polo and other travellers. He asks for "his Cipango," as Herrera slily puts it; and the natives at once point out to him the direction where that is. They thought he meant Cibao, where afterwards the best mines of gold were found.
FURTHER EXPLORATIONS.
The admiral, bent on discovery, and especially on finding the terra firma, which adjoined "his" India, did not stay long anywhere. Proceeding southwards from San Salvador, he discovered an island, or rather a group of islands, to which he gave the name of Santa Maria de la Concepcion; he then discovered Cuba, and coasted along the northeastern part of that island; and afterwards, in due course, came to Hispaniola, called by the natives Hayti, in which island he landed upon the territory of King Guacanagari where he was received most cordially.
Various conjectures have been made as to the different results which would have followed, both for the New and for the Old World, if Columbus had steered a little to the northward, or the southward, of the course which he actually took. One thing, however, is obvious, that in arriving at Hispaniola he came to a central point, not only of the West Indies, but of the whole of the New World, and a point, therefore, most felicitously situated for the spreading of future discovery and conquest.
INSUBORDINATION OF MARINERS.
It may be mentioned here, that Martin Alonzo Pinzon had wilfully parted company from the admiral while on the coast of Cuba: covetousness being probably the cause of this most undutiful proceeding. But, indeed, there is another instance of the insubordination of the mariners, which makes the wonder only still greater how Columbus could have brought them across the Atlantic at all.
WRECK OF ADMIRAL'S VESSEL.
One evening the admiral, after paying a visit to Guacanagari, seeing the sea quite calm, betook himself to rest. As he had not slept for two days and a night, it is probable his slumber was deep. Meanwhile, the steersman, contrary to the distinct orders of the admiral, gave the helm to a common sailor, a youth. All the sailors went to sleep. The sea was as calm "as water in a dish." Little by little the ship drifted on to a shoal. Directly they touch, the sailor-boy at the helm starts from his dream, and gives the alarm. The admiral jumps up first (for the responsibility of command seldom goes quite to sleep); then the officer whose watch it ought to have been hurries up, and the admiral orders him to lower the boat which they carried on the poop, and to throw out all anchor astern. Instead of obeying the admiral, this cowardly villain, with others like him, sprang into the boat and made off for the other vessel, which was about half a league off. The other vessel would not receive them, and they rowed back again. But it was too late. The admiral did what he could in the emergency: he cut down the mast, lightened the vessel as best he might, took out his people and went with them to the other caravel, sending his boat to Guacanagari to inform him of the misfortune.
KINDNESS OF INDIAN CHIEF.
The good Guacanagari was moved to tears by this sad affair. He gave not only sympathy, however, but assistance. His people went out with their canoes, and in a few moments cleared the vessel of all the goods in it. Guacanagari was very careful that nothing should be lost. He himself stood guard over the things which had been taken out of the ship. Then he sent comforting messages to the admiral, saying that he would give him what he had to make up for the loss. He put all the effects under shelter, and placed guards round them. The wrecker's trade might flourish in Cornwall; but, like other crimes of civilization, it was unknown in St. Domingo. The admiral was evidently touched to the heart, as well he might be, by the kindness of these Indians. He thus expresses himself, "They are a loving, uncovetous people, so docile in all things, that I assure your highnesses I believe in all the world there is not a better people, or a better country; they love their neighbours as themselves, and they have the sweetest and gentlest way of talking in the world, and always with a smile."
A COLONY FOUNDED.
The admiral resolved to found a colony in Guacanagari's land, "having found such good will and such signs of gold." In relating this, the Spanish historian, Herrera, makes some curious reflections. He looks upon the loss of the vessel as providential, in order that the true faith might be preached in that country. Then he says, how providence causes its work to be done, not on high motives only, but also on the ordinary ones which influence mankind. He concludes by observing that providence dealt with the Indians as a prudent father who has an ugly daughter, but makes up for her ugliness by the help of a large dowry. By the ugliness in this case he means the seas to be traversed, the hunger to be endured, and the labours to be undertaken, which he considers no other nation but the Spaniards would have encountered, even with the hope of greater booty.