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Biography.

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BIOGRAPHY.

COLUMBUS AND HIS DISCOVERIES (1492—1506).

THE enterprise of Columbus, the most memorable enterprise in the history of the world, formed between Europe and America the communication which will never cease. The national pride of an Icelandic historian has, indeed, claimed for his ancestors the glory of having discovered the western hemisphere. It is said they passed from their own island to Greenland, and were driven by adverse winds from Greenland to the shores of Labrador; that the voyage was often repeated; that the coasts of America were extensively explored, and colonies established on the shores of Nova Scotia or Newfoundland. But the story of the colonisation of America by northmen rests on narratives, mythological in form and obscure in meaning; ancient, yet not contemporary... Imagination had conceived the idea that vast inhabited regions lay unexplored in the west; and poets had declared that empires beyond the ocean would one day be revealed to the daring navigator. But Columbus, although with the special view of discovering a shorter route to India by the west, deserves the undivided glory of having realised that belief... During his lifetime he met with no adequate recompense. The self-love of the Spanish monarch was offended at receiving from a foreigner in his service benefits too vast for requital; and the contemporaries of the great navigator persecuted the merit which they could not adequately reward... Nor had posterity been mindful to gather into a finished picture the memorials of his career, till the genius of Irving, with candor, liberality, and original research, made a record of his eventful life, and in mild but enduring colors sketched his sombre inflexibility of purpose, his deep religious enthusiasm, and the disinterested magnanimity of his character.

We may learn a lesson of patience from details of his first endeavors often thwarted but never relaxed-to find the means of accomplishing the dreams of his youth, destined to be realised after successive years of struggle and disappointment. Let me give you a few pictures of the events in the life of this remarkable man from the pen of the writer alluded to :

When the companions of Columbus beheld the sun go down upon a shoreless horizon, they broke forth into clamorous turbulence. Fortunately, however, the manifestations of neighbouring land were such on the following day as no longer to admit a doubt. Besides a quantity of fresh weeds, such as grow in rivers, they saw a green fish of a kind which keeps about rocks; then a branch of thorn with berries on it, and recently separated from the tree, floated by them; then they picked up a reed, a small board, and, above all, a staff artificially carved ... All gloom and mutiny now gave way to sanguine expectation; and throughout the day each one was eagerly on the watch, in hopes of being the first to discover the long-sought-for land. In the evening, when, according to invariable custom on board the admiral's ship, the mariners had sung the vesper hymn, Columbus made an impressive address to his crew He pointed out the goodness of God in thus conducting them, by such soft and favoring breezes, across a tranquil ocean, cheering their hopes continually with fresh signs, increasing as their fears augmented, and thus leading and guiding them to a promised land.

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The breeze had been fresh all day, with more sea than usual, and they had made great progress. At sunset they had stood again to the west, and were ploughing the waves at a rapid rate, the Pinta keeping the lead, from her superior sailing... The greatest animation prevailed throughout the ships; not an eye was closed that night. As the evening darkened, Columbus took his station on the top of the castle or cabin, on the high poop of his vessel... However he might carry a cheerful and confident countenance during the day, it was to him a time of the most painful anxiety; and now, when he was wrapped from observation by the shades of night, he maintained an intense and unintermitting watch, ranging his eye along the dusky horizon, in search of the most vague indications of land. ... Suddenly, about ten o'clock, he thought he beheld a light glimmering at a distance! Fearing that his eager hopes might deceive him, he called to Pedro, a gentleman of the King's bedchamber, and inquired whether he saw a light in that direction, the latter replied in the affirmative... Columbus, yet doubtful whether it might not be some delusion of the fancy, called Roderigo Sanchery, and made the same inquiry. By the time the latter had ascended the round-house the light had disappeared. They saw it once or twice afterwards in sudden and passing gleams; as it were a torch in the bark of a fisherman, rising and sinking with the waves; or in the hand of some person on shore, borne up and down as he walked from

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