and learned men, both clergy and laity, Latins, Greeks, Indians and Moors, and of many other sects and nations. God has been favourable to my inclination, and has given me the spirit of understanding, so that I have become very skilful in navigation, with a competent knowledge in arithmetic, geometry, and astronomy, and both genius and skill to draw maps and charts of this world, with its cities, rivers, islands, and ports, all in their proper places and proportions. During my whole life, I have endeavoured to see and understand all books of cosmography, history, and philosophy; by which my understanding hath been enlightened so as to enable me to sail from Europe to the Indies, and God hath inclined me to put this design into execution. Filled with this desire I came to your highnesses; and after all who had heard an account of my proposed undertaking had rejected it with scorn and contempt as visionary and impracticable; in your highnesses alone I found judgment to believe in the practicability of my proposal, and constancy and spirit to put it into execution."

[1] This must be understood as referring to voyages in the Mediterranean, in respect of the port of Genoa.--E.

[2] Supposing Columbus to have been 14 years of age on first going to sea, it may be concluded that he was born in 1447. He must therefore have been 45 years old when he set out in 1492 for the discovery of America; and 59 years old at his death, in 1506.--E.

In another letter, written in January 1495 from Hispaniola, to their Catholic majesties, in illustration of the errors and mistakes common in voyages and the piloting of ships, he thus writes, "I was formerly sent to Tunis by King Renee, whom God hath since taken to himself, to take the galeasse called Fernandina; and, when near the island of St Peter off Sardinia, I was informed that the Fernandina was accompanied by two ships and a carack. This intelligence dismayed my people, who refused to proceed in the enterprize, and demanded to go back to Marseilles for another ship and more men. Finding that it was impossible to go on against their inclinations, without a stratagem, I pretended to yield to their desires; but having altered the card of the ships compass, I set sail when it was late, under pretence of making for Marseilles. But next morning at day-break, when all on board believed we had been sailing for Marseilles, we found ourselves close in with Cape Carthagena[3]."

[3] Or rather Cape Carthago, on the coast of Barbary near Tunis.--E.

In a memorandum or observation tending to prove that all the five zones are habitable by the experience of navigation, he thus writes: "In February 1467, I sailed an hundred leagues beyond Thule, or Iceland, the northern part of which is 73 degrees distant from the equinoctial, and not 63 degrees as some suppose; neither does it lie upon the line where Ptolemy begins the West, but considerably more to the westwards. To this island, which is as large as England, the English carry on trade, especially from the port of Bristol. When I was there the sea was not frozen, but the tides were so great that in some places it rose and fell twenty-six fathoms[4]. I have likewise been in the Portuguese fort of St George del Mina, under the equinoctial, and can witness that it is not uninhabitable, as some have supposed." In his book respecting his first voyage, he says that he saw some mermaids on the coast of Menegueta, but that they were not by any means so like ladies as represented in paintings. In another place he says, that, in several voyages between Lisbon and Guinea, he had observed that a degree on the earth corresponds to 56 miles and two thirds. He notices having seen mastick drawn from some trees in the island of Scio, one of the isles in the Greek Archipelago.

[4] It is highly probable that the original translator may have here mistaken the braccio of 1.913 English feet, for the fathom of 6 feet. In fathoms, this tide rises to the incredible height of 156 feet; whereas in braccios, it amounts only to 49 feet: And besides there are braccios considerably shorter than the one here assumed.--E.

In one place of his own writings he says that he had been at sea during twenty-three years, without being on shore for any length of time; and had seen all the countries of the east and west, and towards the north, particularly England and Guinea; yet had never seen any harbours that could be compared for goodness with those which he had discovered in the West Indies. He says farther, "I went first to sea at fourteen years of age, and have followed that profession ever since." In his note book of his second voyage he says, "I had two ships, one of which I left at Porto Sancto, for a certain reason, where it continued one day; and on the day following, I rejoined it at Lisbon[5]; because I encountered a storm, and had contrary winds at south-west, and the other ship had contrary winds at south-east." From these instances it may be inferred that he had great experience in sea affairs, and that he had visited many countries and places, before he undertook his great discovery.

[5] There is some inexplicable ambiguity in this passage, which the original translator must have misunderstood, and which cannot now be explained.--E.

[Illustration: Chart of North Western Africa]

SECTION II.

Of his first coming to Portugal, and the cause or motives of his proposing to discover the West Indies.

The occasion of his first coming into Portugal, arose from his attachment to a famous man of his name and family, named Columbus, long renowned on the sea as commander of a fleet against the infidels; insomuch that even in his own country his name was used to frighten young children. This man, known by the name of Columbus the young, to distinguish him from another great sea captain of the same name, was a person of great prowess, and must have commanded a goodly fleet, as he captured at one time four Venetian galleys, of such size and strength as I could not have believed unless I had seen them fitted out. Of this Columbus junior, Marc Anthony Sabellicus, the Livy of our age, says, in the eighth book of his tenth decade, that he lived at the time when Maximilian the son of the Emperor Frederick III. was chosen king of the Romans; and that Jerom Donato was sent ambassador from Venice to return thanks to John II. king of Portugal, for having relieved and clothed the crews of their great galleys so as to enable them to return to Venice. These galleys were returning from Flanders, when they were encountered and taken by the famous corsair Columbus junior, who stripped their whole crews and turned them ashore on the coast of Portugal.

The authority of so grave an author as Sabellicus, sufficiently proves the malice of Justiniani who makes no mention whatever of this incident, evidently lest the family of Columbus might appear less obscure than he was disposed to hold it out to the world. If in this he erred through ignorance, he is not the less worthy of blame for having undertaken to write the history of his country without making himself acquainted with so signal a victory, of which even the enemies of Genoa make mention. Even Sabellicus in his eighth book, mentions the great discovery of the admiral, though less obliged to inquire into it, but without adding the twelve lies which Justiniani inserted.

To return to the matter in hand. While the admiral my father sailed along with Columbus junior, which he long did, they received intelligence of four large Venetian galleys being on their voyage from Flanders, and going in quest of them, came up with them near Cape St Vincent on the coast of Portugal. A furious contest took place, in which the hostile vessels grappled with each other, and the crews fought with the utmost rage, not only using their hand weapons but artificial fire-works. The fight continued with great fury from morning till