[11] Owing to the difficulty in securing animals for the cavalry in Spain (about A. D. 1505), an edict had been published by the King forbidding the use of mules in traveling, except by royal permission.

While Columbus was in Seville he wished to make a journey to the court, then sitting at Granada, to plead his own cause. Cardinal Mendoza placed his litter at the disposal of the Admiral, but he preferred a mule, and wrote to Diego, asking him to petition the King for the privilege of using one. The request was granted in the following curious document:

Decree granting to Don Cristoval Colon permission to ride on a mule, saddled and bridled, through any part of these Kingdoms.

[12]

.s.
.s. s .s.
X M Y
Xpo FERENS.

Columbus' Cipher.—The interpretation of the seven-lettered cipher, accepting the smaller letters of the second line as the final ones of the words, seems to be Servate-me, Xristus, Maria, Yosephus. The name Christopher appears in the last line.

[13] See Washington Irving, Life and Voyages of Columbus, London, 1831; Humboldt, Examen Critique de l'Histoire de la Geographie du Nouveau Continent, Paris, 1836; Sportorno, Codice Diplomatico Colombo-Americano, Genoa, 1823; Hernan Colon, Vita dell' Ammiraglio, 1571; (English translation in vol. xi of Churchill's Voyages and Travels, third edition, London, 1744; Spanish, 1745); Prescott, History of Ferdinand and Isabella, London, 1870; Major, Select Letters of Columbus, Hakluyt Society, London, 1847, and "On the Landfall of Columbus," in Journal of Royal Geographical Society for 1871; Sir Arthur Helps, Life of Columbus, London, 1868; Navarrete, Coleccion de Viages y Descubrimientos desde Fines del Siglo XV., Madrid, 1825; Ticknor, History of Spanish Literature, London, 1863.

See also Pietro Martire d'Anghiera, Opus Epistolarum, 1530, and De Rebus Oceanicis et de Orbe Novo, 1511; Gomora, in Historiadores Primitivos de Indias, vol. xxii of Rivadaneyra's collection; Oveido y Valdes, Cronica de las Indias, Salamanca, 1547; Ramusio, Raccolta delle Navigatione et viaggi iii, Venetia, 1575; Herrera de Tordesillas, Historia de las Indias Occidentales, 1601; Antonio Leon Pinelo, Epitome de la Biblioteca Oriental y Occidental, Madrid, 1623; MuÑoz, Historia del Nuevo Mundo, Madrid, 1793; Cancellieri, Notizia di Christoforo Colombo, 1809; Bossi, Vita di Christoforo Colombo, 1819; Charlevoix, Histoire de San Domingo; Lamartine, Christoph Colomb, Paris, 1862 (Spanish translation, 1865); Crompton, Life of Columbus, London, 1859; Voyages and Discoveries of Columbus, sixth edition, London, 1857; H. R. St. John, Life of Columbus, London, 1850.

[14] This letter received no answer.

[15] Columbus left the Canary Isles September 8th, made the land October 11th—thirty-three days.

[16] Watling's Island.

[17] These canes are probably the flowering stems of large grasses, similar to the bamboo or to the arundinaria used by the natives of Guiana for blowing arrows.

[18] An old Spanish coin, equal to the fiftieth part of a mark of gold.

[19] Small copper coins, equal to about the quarter of a farthing.

[20] One arroba weighs twenty-five pounds.

[21] There appears to be a doubt as to the exact number of men left by Columbus at EspaÑola, different accounts variously giving it as thirty-seven, thirty-eight, thirty-nine, and forty. There is, however, a list of their names included in one of the diplomatic documents printed on Navarrete's work, which makes the number amount to forty, independent of the Governor Diego de Arana and his two lieutenants, Pedro Gutierrez and Rodrigo de Escobedo. All these men were Spaniards, with the exception of two; one an Irishman named William Ires, a native of Galway, and one an Englishman, whose name was given as Tallarte de Lajes, but whose native designation it is difficult to guess at. The document in question was a proclamation to the effect that the heirs of those men should, on presenting at the office of public business at Seville sufficient proof of their being the next of kin, receive payment in conformity with the royal order to that purpose, issued at Burgos on December 20, 1507.

[22] Dominica.

[23] Martinique.

[24] Of Genoa. The Island of Chios belonged to the Genoese Republic from 1346 to 1566.

[25] This prayer of Columbus, which is printed by Padre Claudio Clementi in the "Tablas Chronologicas de los Descubridores" (Valencia, 1689), was afterward repeated, by order of the Sovereigns of Castille, in subsequent discoveries. Hernando Cortez, Vasco NuÑez de Balboa, Pizarro, and others, had to use it officially.

[26] It is very much to be regretted that Christopher Columbus' intentions in this respect were not carried out because the Protectors would have certainly decreed that a marble statue should be erected to commemorate so great a gift, and we would then possess an authentic portrait of the discoverer of America, which does not exist anywhere. Nor do I believe that the portrait of Columbus ever was drawn, carved, or painted from the life.

There were doubtless painters already in Spain at the close of the fifteenth century, such, for instance, as Juan Sanchez de Castro, Pedro Berruguette, Juan de Borgona, Antonio del Rincon, and the five artists whom Cardinal Ximenes intrusted with the task of adorning the paranymph of the University of Alcala, but they painted only religious subjects. It is at a later period that portrait painting commenced in Spain. One of those artists may have thought of painting a portrait of Columbus, but there is no trace of any such intention in the writings of the time, nor of the existence of an authentic effigy of the great navigator in Spain or any other country.

We must recollect that the enthusiasm created by the news of the discovery of America was far from being as great as people now imagine, and if we may judge from the silence of Spanish poets and historians of the fifteenth century, it produced less effect in Spain than anywhere else. At all events, the popularity of Columbus lasted scarcely six months, as deceptions commenced with the first letters that were sent from Hispaniola, and they never ceased whilst he was living. In fact, it is only between April 20, 1493, which is the date of his arrival in Barcelona, and the 20th of May following, when he left that city to embark for the second expedition (during the short space of six weeks), that his portrait might have been painted; although it was not then a Spanish notion, by any means. Neither Boabdil nor Gonzalvo de Cordova, whose exploits were certainly much more admired by the Spaniards than those of Columbus, were honored in that form during their lifetime. Even the portraits of Ferdinand and Isabella, although attributed to Antonio del Rincon, are only fancy pictures of the close of the sixteenth century.

The popularity of Columbus was short-lived because he led the Spanish nation to believe that gold was plentiful and easily obtained in Cuba and Hispaniola, whilst the Spaniards who, seduced by his enthusiastic descriptions, crossed the Atlantic in search of wealth, found nothing but sufferings and poverty. Those who managed to return home arrived in Spain absolutely destitute. They were noblemen, who clamored at the court and all over the country, charging "the stranger" with having deceived them. (Historia de los Reyes Catolicos, cap. lxxxv, f. 188; Las Casas, lib. i, cap. cxxii, vol. ii, p. 176; Andres Bernaldez, cap. cxxxi, vol. ii, p. 77.) It was not under such circumstances that Spaniards would have caused his portrait to be painted. The oldest effigy of Columbus known (a rough wood-cut in Jovius, illustrium virorum vitÆ, FlorentiÆ, 1549, folio), was made at least forty years after his death, and in Italy, where he never returned after leaving it as a poor and unknown artizan. Let it be enough for us to know that he was above the medium height, robust, with sandy hair, a face elongated, flushed and freckled, vivid light gray eyes, the nose shaped like the beak of an eagle, and that he always was dressed like a monk. (Bernaldez, Oviedo, Las Casas, and the author of the Libretto, all eye-witnesses.)—H. Harrisse's "Columbus, and the Bank of St. George, in Genoa."

[27] What strikes the paleographer, when studying the handwriting of Christopher Columbus, is the boldness of the penmanship. You can see at a glance that he was a very rapid caligrapher, and one accustomed to write a great deal. This certainly was his reputation. The numberless memoirs, petitions, and letters which flew from his pen gave even rise to jokes and bywords. Francesillo de ZuÑiga, Charles V.'s jester, in one of his jocular epistles exclaims: "I hope to God that Gutierrez will always have all the paper he wants, for he writes more than Ptolemy and than Columbus, the discoverer of the Indies."—Harrisse.

[28] By permission of Messrs. D. Appleton & Co.

[29] For the above interesting particulars, and for the artistic illustration of this beautiful statue, the compiler desires to record his sincere obligations to the courteous kindness of Mr. William G. Williams of Rutherford, N. J.

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

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

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

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

[34] Copernicus has also been so styled.

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

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

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

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

[39] The Rock of Gibraltar is referred to.

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

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

[42] A replica is erected in Boston.

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

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

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

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

[47] Docuit quae maximus Atlas. Hic canit errantem Lernam, Solisque labores. Virgil, Æneid, I, 741.

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

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

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

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

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

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

[53] Note.—Those marked * were left behind, in the fort, at La Navidad, and perished there.

[54] Note.—The names of the crew are on the Madrid monument.

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

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

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

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

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

[58] For an English metrical translation, see post, Wiffen.

[59] Died at Aldworth October 6, 1892.

[60] Copyright, by permission of Messrs. Lippincott.

[61] By permission of The Matthews-Northrup Co., Publishers.