with him, his son Fernando tacitly relinquishes all claims of the kind; for he observes, 'I am of opinion that I should derive less dignity from any nobility of ancestry, than from being the son of such a father.'

"While he was quite a child, he was taught to read and write:-his writing was so remarkably good that it was said he might have gained a livelihood by it. He was sent for a short time to Pavia, the great school of learning in Lombardy. He was instructed in geometry, geography, astronomy, and navigation. He had at a very early age evinced an irresistible inclination for the sea, and he pursued with ardour every congenial study: but the time he remained at Pavia was short, and the elements of those sciences was all he acquired there. The knowledge which he possessed of them in after life, was the result of diligent and solitary study. He was one of those men of strong natural genius, who appear to form themselves; and, from having to contend at their very outset with privations and impediments, acquire an intrepidity to encounter, and a facility to vanquish difficulties. The means with which he performed his greatest undertakings were always small, and apparently insufficient; but his genius supplied what was wanting, and triumphed over difficulties that would have conquered most men. He says of

HIS EARLY LOVE OF ENTERPRISE.

221

himself, that he began to navigate at fourteen years

of age.

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The sea-faring life of the Mediterranean, in those days was made up of hazardous voyages and daring enterprises. Even a commercial expedition resembled a warlike cruise; and the maritime merchant had often to fight his way from port to port. The frequent feuds between the Italian states; the armadas, fitted out by private noblemen, who exercised a kind of sovereignty in their own dominions, and kept petty armies and navies in their pay, these, with the holy wars continually waged against the Mahometan powers, rendered the narrow seas, to which navigation was principally confined, scenes of the most hardy encounters and trying reverses.

"Such was the rugged school in which Columbus was reared. Surrounded by the hardships and humilities which beset a poor adventurer in a seafaring life, he still seems to have cherished a lofty tone of thought, and to have fed his imagination with schemes of glorious enterprise. The severe and varied lessons of his youth gave him that practical knowledge, that facility of resource, that undaunted resolution and vigilant self-command for which he was afterwards remarkable. In this way the fruits of a bitter experience became blessings in disguise.

222

BELIEF IN A WESTERN WORLD.

"It was in 1470 that Columbus arrived in Lisbon, at that time the cradle of maritime discoveries, under the enlightened protection of prince Henry of Portugal. He was then in the full vigour of manhood, and of an engaging presence. His hair in his youthful days was of a light colour; but care and trouble soon turned it grey, and at thirty years of age it was quite white. He was simple and moderate in diet and apparel, eloquent in discourse, engaging and affable with strangers, and of so much amiability in domestic life, that his servants were greatly attached to him. He was remarkable throughout his life for a strict attention to the offices of religion, observing rigorously the fasts and ceremonies of the church.

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At Lisbon he married, and this circumstance fixed him there for a time. This marriage brought him in contact with the discoverers of the Cape de Verde and Canary Islands, and those navigators who were exploring Africa and trading to Guinea. He was in possession of the maps and charts of other voyagers: he examined all that the ancient geographers had said of the islands in the Atlantic, and from these documents and his own calculations he formed the immovable belief that there was yet another world to be discovered, and that by sailing to the west it might be reached. When Columbus had formed his theory, it became fixed in his mind, and influenced his conduct and cha

ILL-USAGE IN PORTUGAL.

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racter. He never spoke in doubt or hesitation, but with as much certainty as if his eyes had beheld the promised land. No trial nor disappointment could afterwards divert him from the steady pursuit of its object. Filled with these projects, he made a proposal to John II. king of Portugal to undertake to explore land to the west. A most unjustifiable fraud was practised upon him by that monarch. He was required to state his reasons, and his proposed route; and when the court received them, they dispatched another by the way which he had indicated, who, wanting his genius and his firmness, was deterred by the first difficulties that presented themselves in an unknown navigation, and returned to Lisbon, ridiculing the project of Columbus, to hide his own miscarriage. Indignant at this deceitful conduct, Columbus, in the year 1484, departed secretly from Lisbon, taking with him his son Diego; and his wife having been some time dead, the tie that attached him to Lisbon was severed for ever.

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an

"The first appearance of Columbus in Spain, was at Palos de Moguer, in Andalusia. About half a league from that town, stood, and stands at present," continued Mr. Delville, with a smile, ancient convent of Franciscan friars, dedicated to Santa Maria de Rabida. He had his young son by the hand, and stopped at the gate of the convent, and asked the porter for a little bread and

224 VISIT TO THE CONVENT OF LA RABIDA.

water for his child. While receiving this humble refreshment, the prior of the convent, friar Juan Perez de Marchena, happening to pass by, was struck with the appearance of the stranger; and oberving, from his air and accent, that he was a foreigner, entered into conversation with him, and soon learned the particulars of his story. The prior was a man of extensive information. He was greatly interested by the conversation of Columbus, and struck by the grandeur of his views. It was a remarkable occurrence in the life of the cloistered monk, that a man of such singular character, intent on so extraordinary an enterprise, should apply for bread and water at the gate of his convent. He was deeply interested in the stranger's story, and he collected together some of the oldest and most experienced pilots in Palos, a place then celebrated for its hardy navigators; and their opinions, concerning the probability of land to the west, agreed with those of Columbus. Fray Juan Perez possessed that hearty zeal in friendship which carries good wishes into good deeds. He advised Columbus to repair to court, and make his propositions to the Spanish sovereigns; and he offered to give him a letter of introduction to Fernando de Talavera, prior of the monastery of Prado and confessor to the queen. Columbus accordingly set forward on this wise and wonderful errand, leaving his son behind him