Chapter 11

The Rev. FatherNugentof Iowa. From an address printed in the DenverRepublican, 1892.

The theory of the rotundity of the earth was not born with Columbus. It had been announced centuries before Christ, but the law of gravitation had not been discovered and the world found it impossible to think of another hemisphere in which trees would grow downward into the air and men walk with their heads suspended from their feet. The theologians and scholars who scoffed at Columbus' theory had better grounds for opposing him, according tothe received knowledge of the time, than he for upholding his ideal. They were scientifically wrong and he was unscientifically correct.

The President responds to a message from the Alcalde of Palos.

The following cable messages were exchanged this day:

La Rábida, August 3d. The President: To-day, 400 years ago, Columbus sailed from Palos, discovering America. The United States flag is being hoisted this moment in front of the Convent La Rábida, along with banners of all the American States. Batteries and ships saluting, accompanied by enthusiastic acclamations of the people, army, and navy. God bless America.

Prieto,Alcalde of Palos.

Department of State, Washington, D. C., August 3, 1892. Señor Prieto, Alcalde de Palos, La Rábida, Spain: The President of the United States directs me to cordially acknowledge your message of greeting. On this memorable day, thus fittingly celebrated, the people of the new western world, in grateful reverence to the name and fame of Columbus, join hands with the sons of the brave sailors of Palos and Huelva who manned the discoverer's caravels.

Foster,Secretary of State.

The nations of North, South, and Central America in conference assembled, at Washington, D. C., from October 2, 1889, to April 19, 1890.

Resolved, That in homage to the memory of the immortal discoverer of America, and in gratitude for the unparalleled service rendered by him to civilization and humanity, the International Conference hereby offers its heartyco-operation in the manifestations to be made in his honor on the occasion of the fourth centennial anniversary of the discovery of America.[50]

Theodore Parker, a distinguished American clergyman and scholar. Born at Lexington, Mass., August 24, 1810; died in Florence, Italy, May 10, 1860. From "New Assault upon Freedom in America."

To Columbus, adventurous Italy's most venturous son, Spain gave, grudgingly, three miserable ships, wherewith that daring genius sailed through the classic and mediæval darkness which covered the great Atlantic deep, opening to mankind a new world, and new destination therein. No queen ever wore a diadem so precious as those pearls which Isabella dropped into the western sea, a bridal gift, whereby the Old World, well endowed with art and science, and the hoarded wealth of experience, wed America, rich only in her gifts from Nature and her hopes in time. The most valuable contribution Spain has made to mankind is three scant ships furnished to the Genoese navigator, whom the world's instinct pushed westward in quest of continents.

Capt.William H. Parker, an American naval officer of the nineteenth century. From "Familiar Talks on Astronomy."[51]

Let us turn our attention to Christopher Columbus, the boldest navigator of his day; indeed, according to my view, the boldest man of whom we have any account in history.While all the other seamen of the known world were creeping along the shore, he heroically sailed forth on the broad ocean.

When I look back upon my own voyages and recall the many anxious moments I have passed when looking for a port at night, and when I compare my own situation, supplied with accurate charts, perfect instruments, good sailing directions, everything, in short, that science can supply, and then think of Columbus in his little bark, his only instruments an imperfect compass and a rude astrolabe,sailing forth upon an unknown sea, I must award to him the credit of being the boldest seaman that ever "sailed the salt ocean."

Columbus, then, had made three discoveries before he discovered land—the trade-winds, the Sargasso Sea, and the variation of the compass.

THE MAP OF COLUMBUS' PILOT, JUAN DE LA COSA.THE MAP OF COLUMBUS' PILOT, JUAN DE LA COSA.From the original in the Marine Museum, Madrid.(See page228)View larger image

At a banquet in Chicago of the real-estate brokers, a waggish orator remarked that Columbus, with his cry of "Land! Land!" was clearly the patron saint of American real-estate dealers.

Horatio J. Perry, an American author. From "Reminiscences."

When those Spanish mutineers leaped upon their Admiral's deck and advanced upon him sword in hand, every man of them was aware that according to all ordinary rules the safety of his own head depended on their going clean through and finishing their work. No compromise that should leave Columbus alive could possibly have suited them then. Nevertheless, at the bottom of it all, the moving impulse of those men was terror. Theywere banded for that work by a common fear and a common superstition, and it was only when they looked in the clear face of one wholly free from the influences which enslaved themselves, when they felt in their marrow that supreme expression of Columbus at the point of a miserable death—only then the revulsion of confidence in him suddenly relieved their own terrors. It was instinctive. This man knows! He does not deceive us! We fools are compromising the safety of all by quenching this light. He alone can get us through this business—that was the human instinct which responded to the look and bearing of Columbus at the moment when he was wholly lost, and when his life's work, his great voyage almost accomplished, was also to all appearance lost. The instinct was sure, the response was certain, from the instinct that its motive was also there sure and certain; but no other man in that age could have provoked it, no other but Columbus could be sure of what he was then doing.

The mutineers went back to their work, and the ships went on. For three days previous, the Admiral, following some indications he had noted from the flight of birds, had steered southwest. Through that night of the 10th and through the day of the 11th he still kept that course; but just at evening of the 11th he ordered the helm again to be put due west. The squadron had made eighty-two miles that day, and his practiced senses now taught him that land was indeed near. Without any hesitation he called together his chief officers, and announced to them that the end of their voyage was at hand; and he ordered the ships to sail well together, and to keep a sharp lookout through the night, as he expected land before the morning. Also, they had strict orders to shorten sail at midnight, and not to advance beyond half speed. Then he promised a velvet doublet of his own as a present to the man whoshould first make out the land. These details are well known, and they are authentic; and it is true also that these dispositions of the Admiral spread life throughout the squadron. Nobody slept that night. It was only twenty-four hours since they were ready to throw him overboard; but they now believed in him and bitterly accused one another.

From a paper inNew England Magazine, 1892, taken originally from a volume of "Reminiscences" left byHoratio J. Perry, who made a voyage from Spain to New Orleans in 1847.

A fortnight out at sea! We are upon the track of Christopher Columbus. Only three centuries and a half ago the keels of his caravels plowed for the first time these very waters, bearing the greatest heart and wisest head of his time, and one of the grandest figures in all history.

To conceive Columbus at his true value requires some effort in our age, when the earth has been girdled and measured, when the sun has been weighed and the planets brought into the relation of neighbors over the way, into whose windows we are constantly peeping in spite of the social gulf which keeps us from visiting either Mars or Venus. It is not easy to put ourselves back into the fifteenth century and limit ourselves as those men were limited.

I found it an aid to my comprehension of Columbus, this chance which sent me sailing over the very route of his great voyage. It is not, even now, a frequented route. The bold Spanish and Portuguese navigators of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries are no longer found upon it. The trade of the Indies has passed into other hands, and this is not the road from England to the West Indies or to America.

Thus you may still sail for weeks in these seas without ever meeting a ship. Leaving Madeira or the Canaries, you may even reach those western lands he reached without having seen or felt any other sign or incident except precisely such as were noted by him.

Oskar Ferdinand Peschel, a noted German geographer. Born at Dresden, March 17, 1826; died, August 31, 1875.

Death saved Columbus the infliction of a blow which he probably would have felt more than Bobadilla's fetters. He was allowed to carry to the grave the glorious illusion that Cuba was a province of the Chinese Empire, that Hispaniola was the Island Zipangu, and that only a narrow strip of land, instead of a hemisphere covered by water, intervened between the Caribbean Sea and the Bay of Bengal.

The discoverer of America died without suspecting that he had found a new continent. He regarded the distance between Spain and Jamaica as a third part of the circumference of the globe, and announced, "The earth is by no means as large as is popularly supposed."

The extension of the world by a new continent had no place in his conceptions, and the greatness of his achievement would have been lessened in his eyes if he had been permitted to discover a second vast ocean beyond that which he had traversed, for he would have seen that he had but half accomplished his object, the connection of Europe with the East.

Francesco Petrarch, Italian poet. Born at Arezzo, in Tuscany, July 20, 1304; died at Arquá, near Padua, July 19, 1374.

The daylight hastening with wingéd steps,Perchance to gladden the expectant eyesOf far-off nations in a world remote.

Barnet Phillips, inHarper's Weekly, June 25, 1892, on "The Columbus Festival at Genoa."[52]

It can not be questioned but that Christopher Columbus was a voluminous writer. Mr. Justin Winsor, who has made careful researches, says that "ninety-seven distinct pieces of writing by the hand of Columbus either exist or are known to have existed. Of such, whether memoirs, relations, or letters, sixty-four are preserved in their entirety." Columbus seems to have written all his letters in Spanish. Genoa is fortunate in possessing a number of authentic letters, and these are preserved in a marble custodia, surmounted by a head of Columbus. In the pillar which forms the pedestal there is a bronze door, and the precious Columbus documents have been placed there. (See p. 54,ante.)

Robert Pollok, a Scottish poet of some note. Born at Muirhouse, Renfrewshire, 1798; died near Southampton, September, 1827.

Oh, who can tell what days, what nights, he spent,Of tideless, waveless, sailless, shoreless woe!And who can tell how many glorious once,To him, of brilliant promise full—wasted,And pined, and vanished from the earth!

W. F. Poole, LL. D., Librarian of the Newberry Library, Chicago. From "Christopher Columbus," inThe Dialfor April, 1892. Published byThe DialCompany, Chicago.

It had been well for the reputation of Columbus if he had died in 1493, when he returned from his first voyage. He had found a pathway to a land beyond the western ocean; and although he had no conception of what he had discovered, it was the most important event in the historyof the fifteenth century. There was nothing left for him to do to increase his renown. A coat-of-arms had been assigned him, and he rode on horseback through the streets of Barcelona, with the King on one side of him and Prince Juan on the other. His enormous claims for honors and emoluments had been granted. His first letter of February, 1493, printed in several languages, had been read in the courts of Europe with wonder and amazement. "What delicious food for an ingenious mind!" wrote Peter Martyr. In England, it was termed "a thing more divine than human." No other man ever rose to such a pinnacle of fame so suddenly; and no other man from such a height ever dropped out of sight so quickly. His three later voyages were miserable failures; a pitiful record of misfortunes, blunders, cruelties, moral delinquencies, quarrels, and impotent complainings. They added nothing to the fund of human knowledge, or to his own. On the fourth voyage he was groping about to find the River Ganges, the great Khan of China, and the earthly paradise. His two subsequent years of disappointment and sickness and poverty were wretchedness personified. Other and more competent men took up the work of discovery, and in thirteen years after the finding of a western route to India had been announced, the name and personality of Columbus had almost passed from the memory of men. He died at Valladolid, May 20, 1506; and outside of a small circle of relatives, his body was committed to the earth with as little notice and ceremony as that of an unknown beggar on its way to the potter's field. Yet the Spanish court was in the town at the time. Peter Martyr was there, writing long letters of news and gossip; and in five that are still extant there is no mention of the sickness and death of Columbus. Four weeks later an official document had the brief mention that "the Admiral is dead." Two Italian authors,making, one and two years later, some corrections pertaining to his early voyages, had not heard of his death.

From the New YorkCommercial Advertiser.

Third Assistant Postmaster-General Hazen is preparing the designs for a set of "Jubilee" stamps, to be issued by the Postoffice Department in honor of the quadri-centennial. That is, he is getting together material which will suggest to him the most appropriate subjects to be illustrated on these stamps. He has called on the Bureau of American Republics for some of the Columbian pictures with which it is overflowing, and he recently took a big portfolio of them down into the country to examine at his leisure.

One of the scenes to be illustrated, undoubtedly, will be the landing of Columbus. The Convent of La Rábida, where Columbus is supposed to have been housed just before his departure from Spain on his voyage of discovery, will probably be the chief figure of another. The head of Columbus will decorate one of the stamps—probably the popular 2-cent stamp. Gen. Hazen resents the suggestion that the 5-cent, or foreign, stamp be made the most ornate in the collection. He thinks that the American public is entitled to the exclusive enjoyment of the most beautiful of the new stamps.

Besides, the stamps will be of chief value to the Exposition, as they advertise it among the people of America. The Jubilee stamps will be one of the best advertisements the World's Fair will have. It would not be unfair if the Postoffice Department should demand that the managers of the World's Fair pay the additional expense of getting out the new issue. But the stamp collectors will save the department the necessity of doing that.

It may be that the issue of the current stamps will not be suspended when the Jubilee stamps come in; but it is altogether likely that the issue will be suspended for a year, and that at the end of that time the dies and plates for the Jubilee stamps will be destroyed and the old dies and plates will be brought out and delivered to the contractor again. These dies and plates are always subject to the order of the Postmaster-general. He can call for them at any time, and the contractor must deliver them into his charge.

While they are in use they are under the constant supervision of a government agent, and the contractor is held responsible for any plate that might be made from his dies and for any stamps that might be printed surreptitiously from such plates.

An oddity in the new series will be the absence of the faces of Washington and Franklin. The first stamps issued by the Postoffice Department were the 5 and 10 cent stamps of 1847. One of these bore the head of Washington and the other that of Franklin. From that day to this these heads have appeared on some two of the stamps of the United States. In the Jubilee issue they will be missing, unless Mr. Wanamaker or Mr. Hazen changes the present plan. It is intended now that only one portrait shall appear on any of the stamps, and that one will be of Columbus.

It will take some time to prepare the designs for the new stamps, after the selection of the subjects, but Gen. Hazen expects to have them on sale the 1st of January next. The subjects will be sent to the American Bank Note Company, which will prepare the designs and submit them for approval. When they are approved, the dies will be prepared and proofs sent to the department. Five engravings were made before an acceptable portrait of Gen.Grant was obtained for use on the current 5-cent stamp. Gen. Grant, by the way, was the only living American whose portrait during his lifetime was under consideration in getting up stamp designs.

William Hickling Prescott, an eminent American historian. Born at Salem, Mass., May 4, 1796; died January 28, 1859. From "Ferdinand and Isabella."

There are some men in whom rare virtues have been closely allied, if not to positive vice, to degrading weakness. Columbus' character presented no such humiliating incongruity. Whether we contemplate it in its public or private relations, in all its features it wears the same noble aspect. It was in perfect harmony with the grandeur of his plans and their results, more stupendous than those which heaven has permitted any other mortal to achieve.

The bells sent forth a joyous peal in honor of his arrival; but the Admiral was too desirous of presenting himself before the sovereigns to protract his stay long at Palos. His progress through Seville was an ovation. It was the middle of April before Columbus reached Barcelona. The nobility and cavaliers in attendance on the court, together with the authorities of the city, came to the gates to receive him, and escorted him to the royal presence. Ferdinand and Isabella were seated with their son, Prince John, under a superb canopy of state, awaiting his arrival. On his approach they rose from their seats, and, extending their hands to him to salute, caused him to be seated before them. These were unprecedented marks of condescension to a person of Columbus' rank in the haughty and ceremonious court of Castille. It was, indeed, the proudestmoment in the life of Columbus. He had fully established the truth of his long-contested theory, in the face of argument, sophistry, sneer, skepticism, and contempt. After a brief interval the sovereigns requested from Columbus a recital of his adventures; and when he had done so, the King and Queen, together with all present, prostrated themselves on their knees in grateful thanksgivings, while the solemn strains of theTe Deumwere poured forth by the choir of the royal chapel, as in commemoration of some glorious victory.—Ibid.

From an editorial inPublic Opinion, Washington.

Modern historians are pretty generally agreed that America was actually first made known to the Eastern world by the indefatigable Norsemen. Yet, in spite of this fact, Columbus has been, and still continues to be, revered as the one man to whose genius and courage the discovery of the New World is due. Miss Brown, in her "Icelandic Discoverers," justly says it should be altogether foreign to American institutions and ideas of liberty and honor to countenance longer the worship of a false idol. The author first proceeds to set forth the evidence upon which the claims of the Norsemen rest. The author charges that the heads of the Roman Catholic church were early cognizant of this discovery of the Norsemen, but that they suppressed this information. The motives for this concealment are charged to their well-known reluctance to allow any credit to non-Catholic believers, under which head, at that time, the Norsemen were included. They preferred that the New World should first be made known to Southern Europe by adherents to the Roman Catholic faith. Most damaging evidence againstColumbus' having originated, unaided, the idea of a western world or route to India is furnished by the fact that he visited Iceland in person in the spring of 1477, when he must have heard rumors of the early voyages. He is known to have visited the harbor at Hvalfjord, on the south coast of Iceland, at a time when that harbor was most frequented, and also at the same time when Bishop Magnus is known to have been there. They must have met, and, as they had means of communicating through the Latin language, would naturally have spoken of these distant countries. We have no hint of the object of this visit of Columbus, for he scrupulously avoids subsequent mention of it; but the author pleases to consider it as a secret mission, instigated by the Church for the purpose of obtaining all available information concerning the Norse discoveries. Certain it is that soon after his return to Spain we find him petitioning the King and Queen for a grant of ships and men to further the enterprise; and he was willing to wait for more than fourteen years before he obtained them. His extravagant demands of the King and Queen concerning the rights, titles, and percentage of all derived from the countries "he was about to discover," can hardly be viewed in any other light than that of positive knowledge concerning their existence.

Luigi Pulci, an Italian poet. Born at Florence in 1431; died about 1487.

Men shall descry another hemisphere,Since to one common center all things tend;So earth, by curious mystery divine,Well balanced hangs amid the starry spheres.At our antipodes are cities, states,And thronged empires ne'er divined of yore.

George Payne Quackenbos, an American teacher and educational writer. Born in New York, 1826; died December 24, 1881.

Full of religious enthusiasm, he regarded this voyage to the western seas as his peculiar mission, and himself—as his name,Christopher, imports—the appointedChrist-bearer, orgospel-bearer, to the natives of the new lands he felt that he was destined to discover.

The Rev.Myron Reed, a celebrated American clergyman of the present day.

Here is Columbus. Somehow I think he is more of a man while he is begging for ships and a crew, when he is in mid-ocean sailing to discover America, than when he found it.

The last days of the voyage of Columbus were lonesome days. He had to depend on his own vision. I do not know what he had been—probably a buccaneer. We know that he was to be a trader in slaves. But in spite of what he had been and was to become, once he was great.—Ibid.

Crew of the Santa Maria.—Admiral, Cristoval Colon;Master and owner, Juan de la Cosa of Santoña;Pilot, Sancho Ruiz;Boatswain, Maestre Diego;Surgeon, Maestre Alonzo of Moguer;Assistant Surgeon, Maestre Juan;Overseer, Rodrigo Sanchez of Segovia;Secretary, *Rodrigo de Escobedo[53];Master at Arms, *Diego de Aranaof Cordova;Volunteer, *Pedro Gutierrez, (A gentleman of the King's bedchamber);Volunteer, *Bachiller Bernardo de Tapia of Ledesma;Steward, Pedro Terreros;Admiral's Servant, Diego de Salcedo;Page, Pedro de Acevedo;Interpreter, Luis de Torres, (A converted Jew);Seamen, Rodrigo de Jerez, Garcia Ruiz of Santoña, Pedro de Villa of Santoña, Rodrigo Escobar, Francisco of Huelva, Ruy Fernandez of Huelva, Pedro Bilbao of Larrabezua, *Alonzo Velez of Seville, *Alonzo Perez Osorio;Assayer and Silversmith, *Castillo of Seville;Seamen of the Santa Maria, *Antonio of Jaen, *Alvaro Perez Osorio, *Cristoval de Alamo of Niebla, *Diego Garcia of Jerez, *Diego de Tordoya of Cabeza de Vaca, *Diego de Capilla of Almeden, *Diego of Mambles, *Diego de Mendoza, *Diego de Montalvan of Jaen, *Domingo de Bermeo, *Francisco de Godoy of Seville, *Francisco de Vergara of Seville, *Francisco of Aranda, *Francisco Henao of Avila, *Francisco Jimenes of Seville, *Gabriel Baraona of Belmonte, *Gonzalo Fernandez of Segovia, *Gonzalo Fernandez of Leon, *Guillermo Ires of Galway, *Jorge Gonzalez of Trigueros, *Juan de Cueva, *Juan Patiño of La Serena, *Juan del Barco of Avila, *Pedro Carbacho of Caceres, *Pedro of Talavera, *Sebastian of Majorca, *Tallarte de Lajes (Ingles).

The Crew of the Pinta.—Captain of the Pinta, Martin Alonzo Pinzon;Master, Francisco Martin Pinzon;Pilot of the vessel, Cristoval Garcia Sarmiento;Boatswain, Bartolomè Garcia;Surgeon, Garci Hernandez;Purser, Juan de Jerez;Caulker, Juan Perez;Seamen, Rodrigo Bermudez de Triana of Alcala de la Guadaira, Juan Rodriguez Bermejo of Molinos, Juan de Sevilla, Garcia Alonzo, Gomez Rascon (owner), Cristoval Quintero (owner), Diego Bermudez, Juan Bermudez, Francisco Garcia Gallegos of Moguer, Francisco Garcia Vallejo, Pedro de Arcos.

Crew of the Niña.—Captain of the Niña, Vicente Yañez Pinzon;Master and part owner of the vessel, Juan Niño;Pilots, Pero Alonzo Niño, Bartolomè Roldan;Seamenof the Niña, Francisco Niño, Gutierrez Perez, Juan Ortiz, Alonso Gutierrez Querido, *Diego de Torpa[54], *Francisco Fernandez, *Hernando de Porcuna, *Juan de Urniga, *Juan Morcillo, *Juan del Villar, *Juan de Mendoza, *Martin de Logrosan, *Pedro de Foronda, *Tristan de San Jorge.

John Clark Ridpath, LL. D., an American author and educator. Born in Putnam County, Indiana, April 26, 1840. From "History of United States," 1874.

Sir John Mandeville had declared in the very first English book that ever was written (A. D. 1356) that the world is a sphere, and that it was both possible and practicable for a man to sail around the world and return to the place of starting; but neither Sir John himself nor any other seaman of his times was bold enough to undertake so hazardous an enterprise. Columbus was, no doubt, the firstpracticalbeliever in the theory of circumnavigation, and although he never sailed around the world himself, he demonstrated the possibility of doing so.

The great mistake with Columbus and others who shared his opinions was not concerning the figure of the earth, but in regard to its size. He believed the world to be no more than 10,000 or 12,000 miles in circumference. He therefore confidently expected that after sailing about 3,000 miles to the westward he should arrive at the East Indies, and to do that was the one great purpose of his life.

Juan F. Riaño."Review of Continental Literature," July, 1891, to July, 1892. From "The Athenæum" (England), July 2, 1892.

The excitement about Columbus has rather been heightened by the accidental discovery of three large holograph volumes, in quarto, of Fr. Bartolomé de Las Casas, the Bishop of Chiapa, who, as is well known, accompanied the navigator in his fourth voyage to the West Indies. The volumes were deposited by Las Casas in San Gregorio de Valladolid, where he passed the last years of his life in retirement. There they remained until 1836, when, owing to the suppression of the monastic orders, the books of the convent were dispersed, and the volumes of the Apostle of the Indies, as he is still called, fell into the hands of a collector of the name of Acosta, from whom a grandson named Arcos inherited them. Though written in the bishop's own hand, they are not of great value, as they only contain his well-known "Historia Apologetica de las Indias," of which no fewer than three different copies, dating from the sixteenth century, are to be found here at Madrid, and the whole was published some years ago in the "Documentos Inéditos para la Historia de España."

The enthusiasm for Columbus and his companions has not in the least damped the ardor of my countrymen for every sort of information respecting their former colonies, in America or their possessions in the Indian Archipelago and on the northern coast of Africa. Respecting the former I may mention the second volume of the "Historia del Nuevo Mundo," by Cobo, 1645; the third and fourth volume of the "Origen de los Indios del Peru, Mexico, Santa Féy Chile," by Diego Andrés Rocha; "De las Gentes del Peru," forming part of the "Historia Apologetica," by Bartolomé de las Casas, though not found in his three holograph volumes recently discovered.

William Robertson(usually styled PrincipalRobertson), a celebrated Scottish historian. Born at Bosthwick, Mid-Lothian, September 19, 1721; died June, 1793.

Columbus was the first European who set foot in the New World which he had discovered. He landed in a rich dress, and with a naked sword in his hand. His men followed, and, kneeling down, they all kissed the ground which they had long desired to see. They next erected a crucifix, and prostrating themselves before it returned thanks to God for conducting their voyage to such a happy issue.

The Spaniards while thus employed were surrounded by many of the natives, who gazed in silent admiration upon actions which they could not comprehend, and of which they could not foresee the consequences. The dress of the Spaniards, the whiteness of their skins, their beards, their arms, appeared strange and surprising. The vast machines in which the Spaniards had traversed the ocean, that seemed to move upon the water with wings, and uttered a dreadful sound, resembling thunder, accompanied with lightning and smoke, struck the natives with such terror that they began to respect their new guests as a superior order of beings, and concluded that they were children of the sun, who had descended to visit the earth.

To all the kingdoms of Europe, Christopher Columbus, by an effort of genius and of intrepidity the boldest and most successful that is recorded in the annals of mankind, added a new world.—Ibid.

THE COLUMBUS MONUMENT,THE COLUMBUS MONUMENT, Paseo de la Reforma, City of Mexico. Sculptor, M, Cordier.

This is the main central door of the Capitol at Washington, D. C., and on it is a pictured history of eventsconnected with the life of Columbus and the discovery of America.

The door weighs 20,000 pounds; is seventeen feet high and nine feet wide; it is folding or double, and stands sunk back inside of a bronze casing, which projects about a foot forward from the leaves or valves. On this casing are four figures at the top and bottom, representing Asia, Africa, Europe, and America. A border, emblematic of conquest and navigation, runs along the casing between them.

The door has eight panels besides the semicircular one at the top. In each panel is a picture inalto-relievo.

It was designed by Randolph Rogers, an American, and modeled by him in Rome, in 1858; and was cast by F. Von Muller, at Munich, 1861.

The story the door tells is the history of Columbus and the discovery of America.

The panel containing the earliest event in the life of the discoverer is the lowest one on the south side, and represents "Columbus undergoing an examination before the Council of Salamanca."

The panel above it contains "Columbus' departure from the Convent of Santa Maria de la Rábida," near Palos. He is just setting out to visit the Spanish court.

The one above it is his "audience at the court of Ferdinand and Isabella."

The next panel is the top one of this half of the door, and represents the "starting of Columbus from Palos on his first voyage."

The transom panel occupies the semicircular sweep over the whole door. The extended picture here is the "first landing of the Spaniards at San Salvador."

The top panel on the other leaf of the door represents the "first encounter of the discoverers with the natives." In it one of the sailors is seen bringing an Indian girl onhis shoulders a prisoner. The transaction aroused the stern indignation of Columbus.

The panel next below this one has in it "the triumphal entry of Columbus into Barcelona."

The panel below this represents a very different scene, and is "Columbus in chains."

In the next and last panel is the "death scene." Columbus lies in bed; the last rites of the Catholic church have been administered; friends and attendants are around him; and a priest holds up a crucifix for him to kiss, and upon it bids him fix his dying eyes.

On the door, on the sides and between the panels, are sixteen small statues, set in niches, of eminent contemporaries of Columbus. Their names are marked on the door, and beginning at the bottom, on the side from which we started in numbering the panels, we find the figure in the lowest niche is Juan Perez de la Marchena, prior of La Rábida; then above him is Hernando Cortez; and again, standing over him, is Alonzo de Ojeda.

Amerigo Vespucci occupies the next niche on the door.

Then, opposite in line, across the door, standing in two niches, side by side, are Cardinal Mendoza and Pope Alexander VI.

Then below them stand Ferdinand and Isabella, King and Queen of Spain; beneath them stands the Lady Beatrice Enriquez de Bobadilla; beside her is Charles VIII., King of France.

The first figure of the lowest pair on the door is Henry VII. of England; beside him stands John II., King of Portugal.

Then, in the same line with them, across the panel, is Alonzo Pinzon.

In the niche above Alonzo Pinzon stands Bartolomeo Columbus, the brother of the great navigator.

Then comes Vasco Nuñez de Balboa, and in the niche above, again at the top of the door, stands the figure of Francisco Pizarro, the conqueror of Peru.

Between the panels and at top and bottom of the valves of the door are ten projecting heads. Those between the panels are historians who have written Columbus' voyages from his own time down to the present day, ending with Washington Irving and William Hickling Prescott.

The two heads at the tops of the valves are female heads, while the two next the floor possess Indian characteristics.

Above, over the transom arch, looks down, over all, the serene grand head of Columbus. Beneath it, the American eagle spreads out his widely extended wings.

Mr. Rogers[55]received $8,000 for his models, and Mr. Von Muller was paid $17,000 in gold for casting the door. To a large portion of this latter sum must be added the high premium on exchange which ruled during the war, the cost of storage and transportation, and the expense of the erection of the door in the Capitol after its arrival. These items would, added together, far exceed $30,000 in the then national currency.

Samuel Rogers, the English banker-poet. Born near London, July 30, 1763; died December, 1855. Translated from a Castilian MS., and printed as an introduction to his poem, "The Voyage of Columbus." It is stated that he spent $50,000 in the illustrations of this volume of his poems.

In Rábida's monastic faneI can not ask, and ask in vain;The language of Castille I speak,'Mid many an Arab, many a Greek,Old in the days of Charlemagne,When minstrel-music wandered round,And science, waking, blessed the sound.No earthly thought has here a place,The cowl let down on every face;Yet here, in consecrated dust,Here would I sleep, if sleep I must.From Genoa, when Columbus came(At once her glory and her shame),'T was here he caught the holy flame;'T was here the generous vow he made;His banners on the altar laid.Here, tempest-worn and desolate,A pilot journeying through the wildStopped to solicit at the gateA pittance for his child.'T was here, unknowing and unknown,He stood upon the threshold stone.But hope was his, a faith sublime,That triumphs over place and time;And here, his mighty labor done,And here, his course of glory run,Awhile as more than man he stood,So large the debt of gratitude.

Who the great secret of the deep possessed,And, issuing through the portals of the West,Fearless, resolved, with every sail unfurled,Planted his standard on the unknown world.

—Ibid.

Thy brave mariners,They had fought so often by thy side,Staining the mountain billows.—Ibid.

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