Chapter II: Part 2

The last on the list of those who have been said to precede Columbus in the discovery of America is a Polish pilot, named John Szkolny, whose name has been erroneously Latinized by Hornius, Zurla, Malte Brun, Wytfliet, and Pontanus, “Scolvus,” or “Sciolvus.” He was in the service of Christian II of Denmark in the year 1476. He is said to have landed on the coast of Labrador, after having passed along Norway, Greenland, and the Friseland of the Zeni. Upon this subject Von Humboldt thus expresses himself: “I cannot hazard any opinion upon the statement made to this effect by Wytfliet, Pontanus, and Horn. A country seen _after_ Greenland may, from the direction indicated, have been Labrador. I am, however, surprised to find that Gomara, who published his _Historia de las Indias_ at Saragossa, in 1553, was cognizant even at that time of this Polish pilot. It is possible that when the codfishery began to bring the seamen of southern Europe into more frequent connexion with those of the north, a suspicion may have arisen that the land seen by Szkolny must have been the same as that visited by John Sebastian Cabot in 1497, and by Gaspar Cortereal in 1500. Gomara says what is in other respects not quite correct, _that the English took much pleasure in frequenting the coast of Labrador, for they found the latitude and climate the same as that of their native land, and the men of Norway have been there with the pilot, John Scolvo, as well as the English with Sebastian Cabot_. Let us not forget that Gomara makes no mention of the Polish pilot with reference to the question of the predecessors of Columbus, though he is malignant enough to assert that it is in fact impossible to say to whom the discovery of the New Indies is due.”[7]

In the American Philosophical Transactions for 1786, is a letter addressed to Dr. Franklin by Mr. Otto of New York, in which he not only asserts that the illustrious cosmographer Martin Behaim discovered the Azores, but quotes a passage, from what he calls an authentic record, preserved in the archives of Nuremberg, the tenor of which is as follows:—“Martin Behem, traversing the Atlantic Ocean for several years, examined the American Islands, and discovered the strait which bears the name of Magellan, before either Christopher Columbus or Magellan navigated those seas; and even mathematically delineated on a geographical chart for the king of Lusitania, the situation of the coast around every part of that famous and renowned strait.” He also quotes passages from the _Nuremberg Chronicle_, and from Cellarius, in confirmation of this statement. Don Cristóbal Cladera, in his _Investigaciones Historicas_, says that, in order to refute these statements, he procured from Nuremberg a description of Behaim’s globe, together with historical notes on the life and family of that geographer, and upon examining these and the unpublished works of the Academia de las Ciencias de Lisboa, he became convinced that the observations of Mr. Otto were totally unfounded; and De Murr, who has well investigated the question, assures us that the passage quoted by Mr. Otto from the _Nuremberg Chronicle_ was not to be found in the German translation of that work by George Alt in 1493. Moreover, the real globe of Behaim, made in 1492, does not contain any of the islands or shores of the New World; a fact which sets at rest the two questions of Behaim’s earlier discovery, or of Columbus gaining his information from Behaim.[8]

From the series of evidences contained in the preceding accounts, the fact that America had been visited by European adventurers before the time of Columbus is rendered too certain to admit of contradiction even from the most sanguine advocate of the glory of the great discoverer. But, on the other side, it cannot be denied that the discovery of Columbus, however much later in date, deserves the meed of highest honour, as being the result of sagacity, judgment and indomitable perseverance, and as having been carried on with an energetic endeavour to bring into active operation the incalculable advantages which it opened up to the world at large. To vindicate the correctness of this statement, it will be well to give a brief sketch of his eventful life, and to pourtray as briefly as we may the high qualities to which, far more than to accidental circumstances, the glory of this great discovery is due. The retrospect of his history will at the same time shew, that while every previous discovery was attributable to accident, the greater portion of the accidental or uncontrollable circumstances in the life of Columbus were such as, instead of assisting him, tended to thwart him at every step of his painful career.

It is generally agreed that his father was a wool weaver or carder. There is reason, however, to presume that though his parentage was humble, he was descended from a family of consideration. On this subject his son, Don Ferdinand, denies[9] with great indignation an assertion which occurs in a curious life of the admiral, inserted in the “_Psaltertium Octuplex Augustin Justiniani_,” Genoa, 1516, folio, under the comments on the nineteenth psalm, that he was “vilibus ortus parentibus,” and complains that he is falsely called a mechanic.

The date of his birth is a “vexata quæstio,” which it would be well that we should here examine. For settling a disputed question of the kind no process seems so sure as the comparing of statements made by the same individual, if he be a good authority, at different times and under different circumstances. The following are two statements made by Columbus himself at entirely different periods and in an entirely different shape, and yet both having the same result. They are recorded by his son, Fernando, in the Biography of his father, and are as follows: “In his book of his first voyage [1492] he says, ‘I was upon the sea twenty-three years without being off it any time worth the speaking of, and I saw all the East and all the West, and may say towards the North or England, and have been at Guinea. Yet I never saw harbours for goodness like those of the West Indies,’ and a little further he says, ‘That he took to the sea at fourteen years of age and ever after followed it.’” Now we know for certain that he escaped from Lisbon and came to Andalusia at the close of 1484; that during his stay in Portugal he had made many voyages to Guinea, but that from 1484 until his first great voyage in 1492 he was engaged, not at sea, but in endeavouring to secure the interest of the Spanish sovereigns in his important project. If then we add his twenty-three years of almost constant sea-going to fourteen, his age when he first went to sea, we have thirty-seven years to deduct from 1484, and we find 1447 to be the date of his birth. Again in 1501, many years later, he writes to the Spanish sovereigns as follows: “I went to sea very young and have continued it to this day; ... it is now forty years that I have been sailing to all those parts at present frequented.” What “very young” meant he had already told us; viz., 14, which added to 40 makes 54; and this total deducted from 1501, the date at which he writes, leaves the same date for his birth as that resulting from his former statement, viz., 1447. But for the sake of attaining as near to accuracy as possible, we must not overlook another statement made in 1503 by Columbus himself in his letter to Ferdinand and Isabella, describing his fourth voyage. He there says “I was twenty-eight years old when I came into Your Highnesses service, and now I have not a hair upon me that is not grey.” It was in 1484 that he went to Spain, and then, as we have seen, terminated those three-and-twenty years of almost uninterrupted sea-faring life of which he speaks. Now, if he were then only eight-and-twenty, he must have first gone to sea at the age of five instead of fourteen, as he himself informs us. Moreover, by that reckoning he would have been only fifty when he died, in 1506, an age entirely incompatible with the statement of Bernaldez, the Cura de los Palacios, who knew Columbus so well, that he died _in senectute bonâ_, at the age of seventy, more or less. It is intelligible that such a remark should be made of a man of sixty, who had passed through hardships so exhausting to the mind and body as those which had marked the life of Columbus, but scarcely even of him at the age of fifty. It is clear, then, that a mistake has been made in this number 28, but if for it we write 38, it will make the date of Columbus’s birth to be 1446. We have, however, to bear in mind that the two statements previously made by him were of a very general character, in which no month or part of a year was specified. It would therefore seem that, on his own showing, we shall be safe in placing the date of his birth 1446-47, which agrees with the inference of the learned and judicious Muñoz, who places it “por los años 1446,” although he does not show the process by which he arrives at his conclusion.

With respect to the birthplace of our illustrious navigator, were we to enter into the complex discussions of those who, with different arguments of more or less plausibility, place it in Genoa, Nervi, Savona, Pradello, Cogoleto, Quinto, Bogliasco, Albisola, Chiavara, Oneglia, or the castle of Cuccaro in Monferrato,—we should but launch upon a sea of difficulties, with little hope of a successful voyage. It is difficult to withhold credence from the strong assertion made twice by Columbus in his will, dated 22nd February 1498, that he was born in the city of Genoa; namely,—“I, being a native of Genoa”; and “I desire my said son Diego, or the person who may succeed to the said inheritance, always to keep and maintain one person of our lineage in the city of Genoa ... because from thence I came, and there I was born.”[10] But in like manner we know that Leonardo, who was born at Vinci, persisted in calling himself a Florentine.

Having early evinced a strong inclination for the study of geography, geometry, and astronomy, Columbus found at the college of Pavia an excellent opportunity of gaining a more than superficial acquaintance with the principles of those sciences, and at the same time acquired considerable proficiency in the Latin language. The maritime position and commercial engagements of his native city doubtless suggested and fostered much of that propensity for a nautical life, that he exhibited at so early an age; and although it appears from several historians that for a short time he worked at his father’s trade, yet this must have been simply during his earliest boyhood, for by his own account he commenced the life of a mariner at fourteen years of age. The piratical character of the sea-faring life of those days necessarily exposed its followers to unceasing hardships and dangers, and the severity of this early discipline must have most materially tended to render available and permanent those distinguished qualities which have subsequently gained for him the admiration of the world: indeed, no career could have been better calculated to develope his peculiar genius, or add fuel to those enthusiastic aspirations which characterised him to the close of his life.

From the period of his going to sea, which was about the year 1460 until the year 1472, we meet with no distinct mention of his name; although in a letter written by him to their Majesties, in 1495, he says: “_It happened to me that king Réné (whom God has taken to himself) sent me to Tunis to capture the galley Fernandina, and on arriving at the island of San Pedro, in Sardinia, I learned that there were two ships and a caracca with the galley, which so alarmed the crew that they resolved to proceed no further, but to return to Marseilles for another vessel and more people; upon which, being unable to force their inclination, I yielded to their wish, and having first changed the points of the compass, spread all sail, for it was evening, and at daybreak we were within the cape of Carthagena, while all believed for a certainty that they were going to Marseilles._” The date of this occurrence is unknown, but the expedient of Columbus to alter the point of the needle, reminds us of his subsequent stratagem, of altering his reckoning, to appease his discontented crew during his first great voyage of discovery.

In the year 1472, however, we have evidence of his having been in Savona, from the fact of his signature having been found appended to the will of one Nicolò Monleone, under date of the 20th March of that year. The document is preserved in Savona, among the notarial archives.

In 1474 we find his name mentioned in a letter addressed by Ferdinand king of Sicily to Louis king of France, the title of which runs thus: “_Literæ à Ferdinando Rege Siciliæ ad Ludovicum XI, Galliæ Regem, per Fæcialem missæ, quibus quæritur, quod Christophorus Columbus triremes suas deprædatus sit, postulatque sibi ablata restitui. Datum in Terra Fogiæ die 8 Decembr. 1474._” Then follows a letter in five lengthy clauses, in which it is stated that the said vessels were attacked and taken:—“_A Columbo, qui quibusdam navibus præest, Majestatis vestræ subdito._”

The title of Louis’s reply runs thus: “_Responsio Ludovici XI quibus promittit restitutionem, excusat tamen Columbum, quod jus sit in Oceano capere naves ab hostilibus terris venientes et saltem bona hostium inde auferre._” These letters are given by Leibnitz, in his _Codex Juris Gentium Diplomaticus, Prodromus_, art. 16 and 17; but on the correction of Nicolas Toinard, he acknowledges, in the preface to his _Mantissa Codicis_, that he had erroneously inserted the Christian name “Christophorus.”

Toinard’s correction went to shew that Leibnitz had confounded the name of Guillaume de Caseneuve, surnamed Coulomp, Coulon, or Colon, as the Spaniards called him, with that of the illustrious discoverer. This acknowledgment by Leibnitz of his error might seem to render useless any reference to the letters in question; but as Christopher Columbus is stated by his son, Don Ferdinand, to have been of the same family as the pirate here mentioned, and also to have been engaged at sea with him and his nephew, it becomes interesting to examine what record exists of these illustrious pirates, and to see how far the assertion of Don Ferdinand bears the semblance of correctness. This Caseneuve, or Colon, is called by Duclos, in speaking of the very circumstance which occasioned these letters, in his _Histoire de Louis XI_, “_Vice-Amiral de France, et le plus grand homme de mer de son temps._” And Zurita, in his _Libro 19 de los Anales de Aragon_, calls him, “_Colon, capitan de la Armada del Rey de Francia_.” Garnier, in his _Histoire de France_, thus relates the circumstance: “_Guillaume de Casenove, Vice-Amiral de Normandie, connu dans notre histoire sous le nom d’Amiral Coulon, s’était rendu formidable sur toutes les mers de l’Europe, où il exerçait le métier d’armateur: dans une de ses courses il s’empara de deux riches frégates chargées pour le compte des plus riches négocians de Naples, de Florence, et de plusieurs autres villes d’Italie, qui tout sollicitèrent vivement la restitution de cette importante prise._”

Another exploit, in which this Colon was successfully engaged, was the taking of eighty Dutch ships returning from the herring fishery, in the Baltic, in 1479. Again, another sea-fight related by Marc Antonio Sabelico, in the eighth book of his tenth Decade, is quoted by Don Fernando, where Columbus the younger (described by Sabelico as the nephew, but by Zurita as Francis, the son of the famous corsair), intercepted, between Lisbon and Cape St. Vincent, four richly laden Venetian galleys, on their return from Flanders. Fernando further asserts that his father (Christopher) was present in this engagement, and that after a desperate contest, which lasted from morning till evening, the hand-grenades and other fiery missiles used in the battle, caused a general conflagration among the vessels, which having been lashed together with iron grapplings, could not be separated, and the crews were compelled to leap into the water to escape the fire. He then goes on to say that “his father, who was a good swimmer, finding himself at the distance of two leagues from the land, seized an oar, and by its aid succeeded in reaching the shore. Whereupon, learning that he was not far from Lisbon, where he knew he should find many natives of Genoa, he went thither, and meeting with a gratifying reception, took up his abode in that city.” The engagement here described is shown by various French historians to have taken place in 1485, and as it is certain that Columbus was in Lisbon prior to 1474 (for in that year he has a letter addressed to him in that city by Paolo Toscanelli, in reply to one written by himself from the same place), this relation by Don Ferdinand assumes a very apocryphal aspect.

With respect to his other statement, that his father was of the same name and family as these two renowned corsairs, it is to be remarked that neither he nor any of the subsequent historians who have claimed this needless honour for the great discoverer, appears to have been acquainted with the real name of the pirates; and as Caseneuve was the strict family name of the latter, and Coulon merely a superadded surname, we may fairly conclude that the claim to consanguinity has no other foundation than the identity in the Spanish language of Columbus’s patronymic with the distinguishing surname of the French vice-admiral.

In the _Chronique Scandaleuse_ (folio 109) this Caseneuve is said to have had a very handsome mansion, named Gaillart-Bois, in the neighbourhood of Notre Dame d’Escouys, in Normandy, at which Louis XI made a stay of two or three days in the month of June 1475, and returned thither also in the following month and stayed there some time. Spotorno suggests that his name of Coulon may have been derived from a place so called in the province of Berri; so that, in addition to the evidence that he was not of the same name or family with Christopher Columbus, there arises strong reason to believe that he was in reality a Frenchman:[11] in which case it becomes probable that an event which has been generally attributed to him, or to his still more renowned relative François Caseneuve, would be with greater correctness ascribed to the Genoese navigator, Christopher Columbus. It appears that, in a letter dated Terra d’Otranto, 2nd October, 1476 (preserved, according to Bossi, in the royal archives at Milan), addressed to the Duke of Milan by two illustrious gentlemen of that city,—the one Guid’Antonio Arcimboldo, and the other Giovanni Giacomo Trivulzio—the following story is related. It says that the captain of the Venetian fleet, when stationed off Cyprus to defend the island, had twice encountered a _Genoese_ ship, called the “Nave Palavisina,” which he had taken to be a Turkish caracca; and in these two engagements one hundred and twenty of the Turks and Genoese had been killed, and in the Venetian squadron thirty had been killed, and two hundred wounded. The captain appears to have had doubts whether he might not have done wrong, and caused offence to the duke of Milan, who might perhaps be an ally of the Genoese: he therefore goes on to say that his only desire had been to meet with his enemies (the Turks) and plunder them; and adds, in confirmation of that assertion, that “a year before he had met with three times as many galleys, who spoke no evil of his good name, and that he found Columbus with ships and galleys, and had cheerfully let him pass by, upon which the cry was raised of ‘Viva San Georgio,’ and nothing further passed between them.” The Columbus here mentioned is shewn, by the cry of “Viva San Georgio,” and by the general tenour of the Venetian captain’s letter, to have been a Genoese, and with a Genoese crew; and as it appears probable that the Caseneuves were Frenchmen, and would in all probability sail with French crews, it leaves strong reason to presume that the Genoese captain here mentioned was Christopher Columbus, who is allowed by all his early historians to have been engaged in the Mediterranean about the period referred to.

His son, Ferdinand Columbus, distinctly states that, “it was in Portugal that the admiral began to surmise, that, if the Portuguese sailed so far south, one might also sail westward, and find lands in that direction.”

The period of Christopher Columbus’s sojourn in Portugal was from 1470 to the close of 1484, during which time he made several voyages to the coast of Guinea in the Portuguese service. While at Lisbon he married Felipa Moñiz de Perestrello, daughter of that Bartollomeu Perestrello to whom Prince Henry had granted the commandership of the island of Porto Santo. For some time Columbus and his wife lived at Porto Santo with the widow of Perestrello, who, observing the interest he took in nautical matters, spoke much to him of her husband’s expedition, and handed over to him the papers, journals, maps, and nautical instruments, which Perestrello had left behind him.[12]

“It was not only,” says Ferdinand Columbus (see _Vida_, cap. 8), “this opinion of certain philosophers, that the greatest part of our globe is dry land, that stimulated the admiral; he learned, also, from many pilots, experienced in the western voyages to the Azores and the Island of Madeira, facts and signs which convinced him that there was an unknown land towards the west.” Martin Vicente, pilot of the King of Portugal, told him that at a distance of four hundred and fifty leagues from Cape St. Vincent, he had taken from the water a piece of wood sculptured very artistically, but not with an iron instrument. This wood had been driven across by the west wind, which made the sailors believe, that certainly there were on that side some islands not yet discovered. Pedro Correa, the brother-in-law of Columbus, told him, that near the island of Madeira he had found a similar piece of sculptured wood, and coming from the same western direction. He also said that the King of Portugal had received information of large canes having been taken up from the water in these parts, which between one knot and another would hold nine bottles of wine; and Herrera (Dec. 1, lib. 1, cap. 2) declares that the king had preserved these canes, and caused them to be shown to Columbus. The colonists of the Azores related, that when the wind blew from the west, the sea threw up, especially in the islands of Graciosa and Fayal, pines of a foreign species. Others related, that in the island of Flores they found one day on the shore two corpses of men, whose physiognomy and features differed entirely from those of our coasts. Herrera, perhaps from the MSS. of Las Casas, says, that the corpses had broad faces, different from those of Christians. The transport of these objects was attributed to the action of the west winds. The true cause, however, was the great current of the Gulf or Florida stream. The west and north-west winds only increase the ordinary rapidity of the ocean current, prolong its action towards the east, as far as the Bay of Biscay, and mix the waters of the Gulf stream with those of the currents of Davis’ Straits and of North Africa. The same eastward oceanic movement, which in the fifteenth century carried bamboos and pines upon the shores of the Azores and Porto Santo, deposits annually on Ireland, the Hebrides, and Norway, the seeds of tropical plants, and the remains of cargoes of ships which had been wrecked in the West Indies.[13]

While availing himself of these sources of information, Columbus studied with deep and careful attention the works of such geographical authors as supplied suggestions of the feasibility of a short western passage to India. Amongst these, the _Imago Mundi_ of Cardinal Pierre d’Ailly (Petrus de Aliaco) was his favourite, and it is probable that from it he culled all he knew of the opinions of Aristotle, Strabo, and Seneca, respecting the facility of reaching India by a western route. Columbus’s own copy of this work is now in the cathedral of Seville, and forms one of the most precious items in the valuable library, originally collected by his son Ferdinand, and bequeathed to the cathedral on condition of its being constantly preserved for public use. It contains many marginal notes in his own handwriting, but of comparatively little importance.

The fondness of Columbus for the works of Pierre d’Ailly, a Frenchman, has caused a recent French writer, M. Margry, to put forth the empty pretension that the discovery of America was due to the influence of French teaching, whereas, not only was the _Imago Mundi_ itself a compilation from ancient authors, but the first edition was not printed till many years after Columbus had devoted himself to the purpose which ended in his great discovery, for his famous correspondence with Toscanelli, of which I shall presently speak, occurred in 1474. M. Margry, indeed, _asserts_, but without giving his authority, that in the Columbian Library at Seville are D’Ailly’s treatises _printed at Nuremberg in 1472_. This is in contravention of all the bibliographers—Panzer, Ebert, Hain, Serna Santander, Lambinet, and Jean de Launoy.

The earliest date assigned to the first edition of the _Imago Mundi_, is _about_ 1480 by Serna Santander, 1483 (?) by Lambinet, while Jean de Launoy, in his _Regii Navarræ Gymnasii Parisiensis Historia_, Parisiis, 1677, tom. ii, page 478, distinctly gives it the date of 1490. Humboldt, who had Columbus’s copy in his hands, and who, as the subject was especially his own, cannot be suspected of sleeping over such an important point, adopts De Launoy’s date of 1490, while Lambinet gives the queried date of 1483 from actual collation with another work printed in that year, at Louvain, in the very identical type, by John of Westphalia. In the recently published second volume of the _Ensayo de una bibliotheca de libros españoles raros_, por Don Bartolomé Gallardo, is a list of the books in the Columbian Library, but D’Ailly’s _Imago Mundi_ is not therein mentioned, although his _Quæstiones_, printed much later by Jean Petit at Paris, a far less important book, is inserted. The omission is to be regretted, as we might have hoped for some illustrative comments from the author.

But perhaps it may be suggested that Columbus may have possessed, or seen, a _manuscript_ copy of Pierre d’Ailly at a yet earlier period. We will willingly suppose it for the sake of the argument; but even then the reasoning will fail, for I find that the very portion of the _Imago Mundi_, written in 1410, which is assumed to have supplied the inspiration for the discovery of America, and which Columbus quoted in his letter to Ferdinand and Isabella from Haiti in 1498, is _taken by Pierre d’Ailly, without acknowledgment, almost word for word, from the “Opus Majus,” of Roger Bacon_, written in 1267, a hundred and forty-three years before, as will be seen at page 183 of that work, printed Londini, 1733, fol. See Humboldt, _Examen Critique_, tom. i, pp. 64-70.

Unfortunately Roger Bacon was not a Frenchman, but there remains for M. Margry the consolatory fact that no Englishman is likely to avail himself of the circumstance which I have just enunciated, to claim for his countrymen the honour of having inspired Columbus with the idea which led to the discovery of America, although, by M. Margry’s process of reasoning, he might do so if he would. True, Roger Bacon had been a student in the University of Paris; but this fact did not communicate the character of French inspiration to the ancient authors whose statements he quotes. True also (but this is a circumstance either unknown to or unnoticed by M. Margry), Ferdinand Columbus tells us that his father was principally influenced in his belief of the smallness of the space between Spain and Asia, by the opinion of the Arab astronomer, Al Fergani, or Alfragan, to that effect; and it is further true that Alfragan is further treated of by Pierre d’Ailly, in his _Mappa Mundi_. This is a separate work from the _Imago Mundi_, although it happens to have been printed with it, at a period which we have shown to be posterior to Columbus’s correspondence with Toscanelli, in 1474.

It follows, therefore, that either: 1st, the great explorer obtained his knowledge of Alfragan’s opinion through one of the Arabo-Latin translations, to which he seems to have had recourse during his cosmographical studies in Portugal and Spain (see Humboldt, _Examen Critique_, tom. i, p. 83), in which case French influence is eliminated; or 2ndly, he derived it from a manuscript of Pierre d’Ailly before 1474, which there is no evidence to show; or 3rdly, he derived it from the printed copy of Pierre d’Ailly, in which case the influence of Alfragan on his mind could not have been primarily suggestive, but only corroborative of conclusions to which he had come several years before that book was printed. And in either of the two latter cases, the information supplied by Alfragan would not become French because adduced by a Frenchman, unless we introduce into serious history a principle analogous to the old conventional English blunder of giving to the toys manufactured in Nuremberg the name of “Dutch toys,” because imported through Holland.

The suggestions derived from these works were corroborated by the narratives of Marco Polo and Sir John Mandeville, whose reports of the vast extent of Asia eastward led to the reasonable inference, that the western passage to the eastern confines of that continent could not demand any considerable length of time. The natural tendency of his thoughts to nautical enterprise being thus fostered by the works that he studied, and by the animating accounts of recent adventurers, as well as by the glorious prospects which the broad expanse of the unknown world opened up to his view, we find that in the year 1474 his ideas had formed for themselves a determined channel, and his grand project of discovery was established in his mind as a thing to be done, and done by himself. The combined enthusiasm and tenacity of purpose which distinguished his character, caused him to regard his theory, when once formed, as a matter of such undeniable certainty, that no doubts, opposition, or disappointment, could divert him from the pursuit of it. It so happened that while Columbus was at Lisbon a correspondence was being carried on between Fernam Martins, a prebendary of that place, and the learned Paolo Toscanelli, of Florence, respecting the commerce of the Portuguese to the coast of Guinea, and the navigation of the ocean to the Westward. This came to the knowledge of Columbus, who forthwith despatched by an Italian, then at his house, a letter to Toscanelli, informing him of his project. He received an answer in Latin, in which, to demonstrate his approbation of the design of Columbus, Toscanelli sent him a copy of a letter which he had written to Martins a few days before, accompanied by a chart, the most important features of which were laid down from the descriptions of Marco Polo. The coasts of Asia were drawn at a moderate distance from the opposite coasts of Europe and Africa, and the islands of Cipango, Antilla, etc., of whose riches such astonishing accounts had been given by this traveller, were placed at convenient spaces between the two continents.

While all these exciting accounts must have conspired to fan the flame of his ambition, one of the noblest points in the character of Columbus had to be put to the test by the difficulty of carrying his project into effect. The political position of Portugal, engrossed as it was with its wars with Spain, rendered the thoughts of an application for an expensive fleet of discovery worse than useless, and several years elapsed before a convenient opportunity presented itself for making the proposition.

Meanwhile Columbus was not idle. In the year 1477, he tells us, in a letter quoted by his son, Don Ferdinand, that “_he sailed a hundred leagues beyond the island of Thule, the southern part of which is distant from the equinoctial line seventy-three degrees, and not sixty-three, as some assert; neither does it lie within the line which includes the west of Ptolemy, but is much more westerly. To this island, which is as large as England, the English, especially those from Bristol, go with their merchandize. At the time that I was there the sea was not frozen, but the tides were so great as to rise and fall twenty-six fathoms. It is true that the Thule of which Ptolemy makes mention lies where he says it does, and by the moderns it is called Frislanda._” Whether the Færoe islands [see ante, page xxiii], or Iceland, was alluded to is uncertain, for nothing more is known of the voyage than is contained in this letter. It is moreover supposed by his son, as has been already stated, that he passed a considerable portion of his time at sea, with one or both of the famous pirates of the same name, who were so many years engaged in the Levant; but upon the whole of this portion of his history there rests an impenetrable cloud of obscurity.

About the year 1480, by the joint labours of the celebrated Martin Behaim and the prince’s two physicians, Roderigo and Josef, who were the most able geographers and astronomers in the kingdom, the astrolabe was rendered serviceable for the purposes of navigation, as by its use the seaman was enabled to ascertain his distance from the equator by the altitude of the sun.

Shortly after this invaluable invention Columbus submitted to the king of Portugal his proposition of a voyage of discovery, and succeeded in obtaining an audience to advocate his cause. He explained his views with respect to the facility of the undertaking, from the form of the earth, and the comparatively small space that intervened between Europe and the eastern shores of Asia, and proposed, if the king would supply him with ships and men, to take the direct western route to India across the Atlantic. His application was received at first discouragingly, but the king was at length induced, by the excellent arguments of Columbus, to make a conditional concession, and the result was that the proposition was referred to a council of men supposed to be learned in maritime affairs. This council, consisting of the above-mentioned geographers, Roderigo and Josef, and Cazadilla, bishop of Ceuta, the king’s confessor, treated the question as an extravagant absurdity. The king, not satisfied with their judgment, then convoked a second council, consisting of a considerable number of the most learned men in the kingdom; but the result of their deliberations was only confirmative of the verdict of the first junta, and a general sentence of condemnation was passed upon the proposition. As the king still manifested an inclination to make a trial of the scheme of Columbus, and expressed a proportionate dissatisfaction with the decisions of these two juntas, some of his councillors, who were inimical to Columbus, and at the same time unwilling to offend the king, suggested a process which coincided with their own views, but which was at once short-sighted, impolitic, and ungenerous. Their plan was to procure from Columbus a detailed account of his design under the pretence of subjecting it to the examination of the council, and then to dispatch a caravel on the voyage of discovery under the false pretext of conveying provision to the Cape Verde Islands. King John, contrary to his general character for prudence and generosity, yielded to their insidious advice, and their plan was acted upon, but the caravel which was sent out, after keeping on its westward course for some days, encountered a storm, and the crew, possessing none of the lofty motives of Columbus to support their resolution, returned to Lisbon, ridiculing the scheme in excuse of their own cowardice. So indignant was Columbus at this unworthy manœuvre, that he resolved to leave Portugal and offer his services to some other country, and towards the end of 1484 he left Lisbon secretly with his son Diego. The learned and careful Muñoz states his opinion that he went immediately to Genoa, and made a personal proposition to that government, but met with a contemptuous refusal; at any rate, we are positively informed by Fernando Columbus that his father went to Spain at the close of 1484. A curious surmise is expressed in a note to Sharon Turner’s _History of England in the Middle Ages_, in which the supposition is propounded of the possible identity of Christopher Columbus with a person named Christofre Colyns, who is recorded in some grants in the Harleian MSS. to have been military commandant of Queenborough castle, in the isle of Sheppy, in 1484 and 1485. This man is distinctly stated in the same grants to have held that post in April 1485, and it may be reasonably conjectured that the cessation of his office would not take place till the accession of Henry VII, in August in that year, which leaves but little time for his making his way to Genoa, and subsequently reaching Spain, so as to make his application to that court. Moreover, the impoverished condition in which Columbus presented himself at the convent de la Rabida was very incompatible with the probable pecuniary position of a person, who is described by the grants in question not only to have held the prominent station already mentioned, but to have had a ship given him, with an annuity of £100, and an especial grant of money to enable him to supply himself with habiliments of war. These considerations, combined with the statement of Fernando Columbus just referred to, show that the supposition proposed by Mr. Turner cannot be regarded as tenable.

The interesting story of Columbus’s visit to the Franciscan convent of Santa Maria de Rabida forms the first incident that we find recorded of him after his arrival in Spain. It is well known that the lively interest which the worthy prior of that convent, Fray Juan Perez de Marchena, took in his guest, was the means, through the anticipated influence of his friend Fernando de Talavera, of first leading Columbus to the Spanish court, under the hope of obtaining the patronage of the king and queen. Talavera, who was prior of the monastery of Prado, and confessor to the queen, possessed great political interest. Juan Perez took advantage of this influential position of his friend, and addressed him a letter by the hands of Columbus, strongly recommending the project of the latter to his favourable consideration, and requesting his advocacy of it before the sovereigns. It was in the spring of 1486 that Columbus first ventured to the Spanish court in the hope of gaining a favourable audience. On reaching Cordova, however, he had the mortification to find that Talavera, upon whose influence he mainly relied, regarded his design as unreasonable and preposterous. The court also was at that time so engrossed with the war at Granada, as to place any hope of gaining attention to his novel and expensive proposition out of the question. At length, at the close of 1486, the theory of Columbus, backed as it was by his forcible arguments and earnest manner, gained weight with the most important personage at court next to the sovereigns themselves. This was Mendoza, archbishop of Toledo, and grand cardinal of Spain; who, pleased with the grandeur of the scheme and the fervent but clear-headed reasoning of Columbus, adopted his cause, and became his staunch protector and friend. Through his means an audience was procured with the sovereigns, and the result of the interview was the expression of a favourable opinion, qualified by the necessity of an appeal to the judgment of the literati of the country. But here again Columbus found himself in a painful predicament, which it required all his knowledge and prudence to escape from with safety. He was examined at Salamanca by a council of ecclesiastics, and had to propound opinions which appeared to be at variance with the descriptions contained in the sacred Scriptures, and that at a period when the expression of any sentiment approaching to heresy exposed its owner to the persecution of the newly established Inquisition. The ignorance of cosmography, and the blind conclusions drawn from various misinterpreted texts of Scripture, formed mighty impediments to the pleadings of Columbus, and he began to find himself in danger of being convicted not only of error, but of heresy. One learned man of the number, however, Diego de Deza, tutor to prince John, and afterwards archbishop of Seville, appreciated the eloquent and lucid reasonings of the adventurer, and aiding him with his own powers of language and erudition, not only gained for him a hearing, but won upon the judgments of some of the most learned of the council. Nevertheless, so important a question could not be hastily decided; and the result of the united pedantry and sluggish superstition of the learned body, was to expose the question to protracted argumentation or neglect, while Talavera, who was at its head, and from whom Columbus had hoped to receive the greatest assistance, was too busied with political matters to bring it to a conclusion. At length, in the early part of 1487, the deliberations of the council were brought to a stand-still by the departure of the court to Cordova, and were not resumed till the winter of 1491. During this wearisome period the bustle and excitement of the memorable campaign against the Moors, with its alternations of triumphant festivity, together with the marriage of the princess Isabella to the prince Alonzo, heir apparent of Portugal, were far too engrossing to admit of much attention being given to the schemes of Columbus.[14] At the close, however, of the year 1491, the learned conclave appears to have recommenced its consultations; but upon being called upon by the sovereigns for a decision, a report was returned to Talavera that the scheme was considered by the general vote of the junta too groundless to be recommended. Accordingly Talavera was commanded to inform Columbus that the cares and expenses of the war precluded the possibility of their highnesses engaging in any new enterprises, but that when it was concluded, there would be both the will and the opportunity to give the subject further consideration. Regarding this as nothing better than a courteous evasion of his application, he retired wearied and disappointed from the court, and, but for an attachment which he had formed at Cordova which made him reluctant to leave Spain, he would in all probability have repaired to France, under the encouragement of a favourable letter which he had received from that quarter.

The ensuing period till 1492 was spent in a succession of vexatious appeals to the Spanish court, during which he had to contend with every obstacle that ignorance, envy, or a pusillanimous economy could suggest.

At length having overcome all difficulties, he set sail with a fleet of three ships on the 3rd of August 1492, on his unprecedented and perilous voyage. The ordinary difficulties which might be expected to occur in so novel and precarious an adventure were seriously aggravated by the alarming discovery of the variation of the needle, as well as by the mutinous behaviour of his crew; and his life was upon the point of being sacrificed to their impatience, when the fortunate appearance of land, on the morning of the 12th of October, converted their indignation into compunction, and their despondency into unbounded joy.

With reference to the identity of the first landing place of Columbus in America, I too readily adopted in 1847 the conclusions of Navarrete that the Great Turk, the northernmost of the Turk islands, was the true landfall. I did so under the following process of reasoning. My predecessors in the consideration of the subject had been the learned Juan Bautista Muñoz in 1793, Navarrete in 1825, Washington Irving in 1828, and the Baron Alexander von Humboldt in 1837. It was the opinion of Muñoz that Guanahani was Watling’s Island. Navarrete, as just shown, placed it in the Grand Turk, far to the east, while Washington Irving and Humboldt made it to be Cat Island to the west. Such different conclusions, formed by thoughtful men from an examination of the diary of Columbus and other early documents, caused me to set a great value upon any modern reconnaissance of the locality which might throw a fuller light upon these documents and perhaps show which of the conclusions was correct. Now, it so happened that a communication made a short time previously to the New York Historical Society by Mr. Gibbs, a resident on Turk’s Island, presented several points of evidence strongly confirmative of the correctness of Navarrete’s deductions. The most important of Mr. Gibbs’s arguments were the following. Columbus states in his journal that there were several islands in sight from Guanahani. From the island now called San Salvador, Mr. Gibbs found no land visible. The journal speaks of soundings to the eastward of Guanahani: there were none to the eastward of San Salvador. All the marks wanting at San Salvador were found at Turk’s Island. The journal describes Guanahani as well wooded, and having much water; a large lake in the centre, and two several running streams flowing into the sea. Turk’s Island has about one-third of its surface covered with lakes of salt and fresh water; and a few years before vessels had sailed into one of the ponds. Although the island was now without trees, Mr. Gibbs recollected some remains of a forest existing in his youth. Moreover the journal makes no allusion to the Great Bahama Bank, which must have been passed in approaching San Salvador.[15] As Mr. Gibbs’s personal observation thus appeared to corroborate the deductions of Señor de Navarrete, I yielded to this combination of evidence and so submitted it to the reader. Since that time, however, we have seen other arguments advanced, in which local investigation, as well as the examination of the early documents, have resulted in conclusions as divergent as those which preceded them. Captain Becher, R.N., of our own Hydrographic Office, in his _Landfall of Columbus_, published London, 1856, examining the question from a seaman’s point of view, fell in with the opinion formed by Muñoz in 1793, that Guanahani was Watling’s Island, while Señor de Varnhagen, in his _La verdadera Guanahani de Colon_, published at Santiago, 1864, maintains the unique opinion that it was the island of Mayaguana.

Under these circumstances it has become a duty in me to revise my old opinion; and while the process to which I shall resort will, as I hope, finally settle this much vexed question, it is happily one which will not lay me open to the charge of presumption in giving a judicial verdict where men of such high renown have differed. I congratulate myself on having found a means of enabling the reader to judge for himself by a very simple mode of examination. Annexed is a fac-simile of Herrera’s map of the Bahama Islands, as laid down from the original documents in the handwriting of Columbus and his contemporaries, to which, as official historiographer of the Indies in the sixteenth century, Herrera had exclusive access; and side by side with it is a map, reduced from the Admiralty survey, showing those islands as now known, and with their modern names. I indulge the hope that no one will contest the identification[16] of the respective islands laid down in the old map with those which I have set forth as their correlatives in the modern one, and if so, the Guanahani of Columbus will be plainly seen to be Watling’s Island. The correctness of this identification is not only confirmed, but made easily perceptible, by the fact that certain islands of the series have retained their ancient names without change from the beginning, thus affording stations for comparison which reduce the chances of error to a minimum. This map of Herrera’s is of especial value for the purpose, because while it embodies the information contained in the map of the pilot Juan de la Cosa, who was with Columbus in his second voyage (1493-96); it has the advantage over the latter in having been made nearly a century later, and so contains the entire chain of islands, many of which had not been explored at the time when De la Cosa laid down his map in 1500. For the satisfaction of the reader, however, a reduction of that part of De la Cosa’s map which shows these islands is here given.

ANTONIO DE HERRERA

1601.]

MODERN]

Herrera Modern

_Bahama_ _Gᵗ. Bahama Iᵈ._
_Bimini_ } _Andros Iˢ._
_Habacoa_ }
_Cabeça de los Martires_ _Cay Sal Bank_
_Yucayoneque_ _Gᵗ. Abaco Iᵈ._
_Cigateo_ _Eleuthera_
_Curateo_ _Little S. Salvador_
_Guanima_ _S. Salvador or Cat Iᵈ._
_Anonymous between Habacoa & Yuma_ _Great Exuma_
_Guanihana_ _Watlings Iᵈ._
_Yuma_ _Yuma_
_Samana_ _Samana_
_Xumeto_ _Crooked Iᵈ._
_Yabaque_ _Acklin’s Iᵈ._
_Mayaguana_ _Mariguana_
_Caycos_ } _The Caycos Group_
_Amana_ }
_Canciba_ _Turks Iˢ._
_Abreojo_ _Mouchoir Carré_
_Canaman_ _Silver Plate Bank_
_Macarey_ _Navidad or Ship B._
_Mira por vos_ _Miraporvos_
_Ynagua_ _Gᵗ. Inagua_
_La Tortuga_ _Tortuga_

But while it is hoped that the identity of Guanahani with Watling’s Island will be admitted to be authoritatively established by this comparison, it would be wanting in respect to those who have put forth other claims not to show, I will not say the ground on which these claims were advanced, but rather, for brevity’s sake, the points at which their arguments fail. I adopt this plan on the principle that a chain is no stronger than its weakest link. Of all these I fear none occupies so disadvantageous a position as His Excellency Senhor de Varnhagen; for having unfortunately adopted for his _protégée_ an island (Mayaguana), which is represented _together with_ the island of Guanahani both on De la Cosa’s and Herrera’s maps, I regret to say that he seems to me to be _ipso facto_ put out of court, since no reasoning whatever could by any possibility make identical two islands so markedly distinct that several other islands are shown to lie between them. Washington Irving, in advocating Cat Island, or the island at present called St. Salvador, as the genuine Guanahani, adduces an examination of the route of Columbus by Commander Alexander Slidell Mackenzie of the U.S. navy, but which being principally addressed to the disproval of Navarrete’s Turk’s Island, fails to establish Cat Island as the real landfall in contradistinction to Watling’s Island. In examining this route I observe a startling inaccuracy, which underlies the whole question. It is stated that Columbus describes the island as _very large_. On referring to Columbus’s logbook in Navarrete, I find it, on the contrary, called an “isleta,” or islet, _i. e._ _small_ island, a term which could scarcely be applied to an island forty-two miles long and the loftiest of the Bahamas, which Cat Island is, whereas it would be correctly applied to Watling’s Island, which is only twelve miles long, cut up by salt water lagoons, separated from each other by small woody hills. At the close, reference is made to the identity preserved to Cat Island as San Salvador with that given by Columbus, and a remonstrance against disturbing the ancient landmarks. But this is a _petitio principii_, inasmuch as at the period when the name of San Salvador was first continuously applied to Cat Island, viz., the middle of the seventeenth century, both map makers and sailors were possessed of no better materials, nor even so good, as ourselves, for coming to an accurate determination. Humboldt, in accepting the conclusions of Commander Mackenzie as adopted by Irving, thinks them confirmed by the map of Juan de la Cosa, of which I have given an extract. But here I would observe that the attention of the illustrious philosopher was bent on the point to which Mackenzie’s paper was directed, viz., the disproval of Turk’s Island, and not to a discrimination between Cat Island and Watling’s Island for the true landfall. A glance will show that the imperfectness of the Bahama group in Juan de la Cosa’s map renders it perfectly inadequate for settling so minute a question.

1500.]