Old Times in the Colonies & The Story of Liberty. Charles Carleton Coffin
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"If you discover, any countries, they shall be mine," he says.
He is possessed with the idea that he alone can lay claim to all countries discovered, no matter who may be living upon the land. The people of England have few rights which he is bound to respect; much less will the Indians have any rights.
"That we promise," the merchants reply.
"If you make any money, I must have one-fifth of it."
This is a hard condition. Not a dollar will he contribute toward fitting out the expedition. The merchants must be at all the expense. They may lose every cent of their investment, their vessels may be wrecked; the king will not share in any loss. But on no other condition will he permit the fleet to sail. Hard as the terms are, the merchants accept them.
In the month of May, 1497, John Cabot commanding one vessel, Sebastian another, with a third to keep them company, set sail from Bristol. The tide wafts them down the Severn River, just as it wafted John Wick-life dust. The steer westward — out upon a stormy sea, to sail where vessels never have sailed before.
By the middle of June they find themselves on soundings, and the sea is swarming with fish. They catch all they want. Never before have they seen such myriads of fish.
On the 24th of June they discover land. It is not India, for they are only sixteen hundred miles west of Ireland. They name it Prima Vista. It is new found land. They behold dense forests of pine and cedar, but no sign that it is inhabited.
They sail north-west, and discover a bleak and rocky shore, where the surf is breaking on cavern ledges — the coast of Labrador. Since the days of the old Northmen, no European eye has seen the Western continent, Columbus has as yet only discovered the West India Islands. Onward the vessels glide, sailing north-west, till at midnight, on the July days, the sun only disappears for a few moments beneath the horizon. They are in the frozen sea, with icebergs around them. Their provisions begin to fail; the ice blocks their farther progress; and the brave sailors, disappointed in not being able to find a way to India, but happy in the thought that they have discovered new lands, return to Bristol.
Although the merchants have spent much money, they resolve to fit out a second expedition. John Cabot is getting to be an old man; but Sebastian is in the full vigor of manhood, and a skilful navigator, and they give the command to him. He sails west to the New-foundland, but, instead of steering north after sighting its wooded shores, turns south, enters the Bay of Fundy, where the tide rushes in with a roar like distant thunder, rising sixty feet Sailing still farther, he comes to Frenchman's Bay, and gazes upon Mount Desert, at whose base the sea breaks upon granite ledges, tossing the spray high in air.
Day after day the vessel glides along, past bluffs and headlands, where the waves have eaten their way into rocky caverns, then past sandy beaches glowing in the summer sun. If a storm comes on, Captain Cabot finds shelter behind some island.
Southward the vessel sails, past Cape Ann, past Cape Cod; then turning westward, skirts the shores of Long Island, and then the coast of New Jersey, and the low beaches of Delaware and Virginia — sailing till provisions fail, when the hardy captain turns about, and reaches England, informing the king that he has discovered a fair and virgin land in the west, which he may claim as his own.
As this story unfolds, we shall see that through the enterprise of the Bristol merchants, through the discoveries of Sebastian Cabot, and through the claims of the king to the ownership of all lands discovered by him, the new home of liberty became the heritage of the people of England.
The King of Spain could not at that moment claim possession of the New World by priority of discovery; for while Sebastian Cabot was sailing along the coast of Virginia, Columbus was starting on his third voyage, during which he discovered South America, as we have seen.
Would the United States have been the nation that it is if Spain had first discovered North America, and established its colonies and planted its civilization on the shores of Virginia? Far from it; for the king, who could violate his most solemn promises, as Ferdinand violated his with the Moors — the queen, Isabella, who could sit complacently by while heretics were being roasted to death — the people who could drive out the Jews and Moors, and seize their estates, were not the sovereigns nor the people to establish liberty in the Western World. We shall see that it required such men as those who compelled John Lackland to sign the Magna Charta; such men as John Wicklif, who dared to brave the Pope's authority; such men as Geoffrey Chaucer, who dared to ridicule the monks — men who were strong-hearted enough to resist tyranny, who were ready to sacrifice everything they held dear rather than yield their natural rights — that it required such men to plant the seeds of a new civilization in tho western hemisphere.
It was not till two years after Cabot's voyage that Amerigo Vespucci sailed on his voyage of discovery; and although the continent of America bears his name, he was far from being the first to discover it.
The intelligence that the sea off Newfoundland is alive with fish is good news to the fishermen of Northern France, for the Pope has decreed that everybody must eat fish on Friday. The fishermen of Honfleur and other towns set nil in their little vessels for the New-found-land, and drop their anchors in a bay, which they call St. John's. the; dress their fish, and dry them on the rocks and ledges. They build hurdles of brush, and lay the fish upon them to dry, pack them in the hold, and go back to France with their vessels loaded to the water's edge.
While the fishermen of France are making these voyages to Newfoundland, the Spaniards are establishing colonies in the West Indies, for they now know that the islands are not the East Indies. They make the Indians slaves, treat them cruelly, making themselves rich on the unrequited labor of the simple-hearted natives.
Adventurers are sailing here and there, establishing colonies and seeking for gold. One of the adventurers is Martin Encisco. He is at Hayti, ready to sail into the unexplored regions o£ the west. Just before the anchor is hoisted, two men bring a cask on board the ship. The sails are hoisted, and the vessel speeds away over the waters. The sailors hear a pounding inside of the cask; then the head falls out, and, to their amazement, a young man stands before them. It is Vasco Balboa, a young Spanish nobleman, who has led a dissolute life in Spun, who has been trying to recover his fortune at Hayti, but who has been getting deeper in debt He has taken this method to escape from his creditors.
"Who are you? Captain Encisco asks.
"Vasco Nuñez de Balboa."
He is young, noble-looking, fearless, and well-dressed.
"I will leave you on the first island I come to," says the captain, in a rage; but he soon sees that Balboa is a man who can be of great use to him.
This man from the cask has already been down to a place called Darien — a rich country, where the Indians have gold in abundance.
"I will pilot you there; we shall find gold," says Balboa.
They reach Darien, make an attack upon an Indian village, and collect gold ornaments worth fifty thousand dollars. Encisco makes a settlement; but he forbids the sailors to trade with the Indians. The sailors do not like that; so they mutiny, and elect Balboa to be their leader. The man from the cask sends Encisco back to Hayti a prisoner; but he is careful to send a large amount of gold to the royal treasurer