The Spanish Pioneers. Charles Fletcher Lummis
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took the lead and the responsibility herself. She had a kingdom of her own; and if her royal husband Ferdinand did not deem it wise to embark the fortunes of Arragon in such a wild enterprise, she could meet the expenses from her realm of Castile. Ferdinand seems to have cared little either way; but his fair-haired, blue-eyed queen, whose gentle face hid great courage and determination, was enthusiastic.
The Genoan's conditions were granted; and on the 17th of April, 1492, one of the most important papers that ever held ink was signed by their Majesties, and by Columbus. If you could see that precious contract, you would probably have very little idea whose autograph was the lower one—for Columbus's rigmarole of a signature would cause consternation at a teller's window nowadays. The gist of this famous agreement was as follows:—
1. That Columbus and his heirs forever should have the office of admiral in all the lands he might discover.
2. That he should be viceroy and governor-general of these lands, with a voice in the appointment of his subordinate governors.
3. That he should reserve for himself one tenth part of the gold, silver, pearls, and all other treasures acquired.
4. That he and his lieutenant should be sole judges, concurrent with the High Admiral of Castile, in matters of commerce in the New World.
5. That he should have the privilege of contributing one eighth to the expenses of any other expedition to these new lands, and should then be entitled to one eighth of the profits.
It is a pity that the conduct of Columbus in Spain was not free from a duplicity which did him little credit. He entered the service of Spain, Jan. 20, 1486. As early as May 5, 1487, the Spanish Crown gave him three thousand maravedis (about $18) "for some secret service for their Majesties;" and during the same year, eight thousand maravedis more. Yet after this he was secretly proffering his services again to the King of Portugal, who in 1488 wrote Columbus a letter giving him the freedom of the kingdom in return for the explorations he was to make for Portugal. But this fell through.
Of the voyage itself you are more likely to have heard—the voyage which lasted a few months, but to earn which the strong-hearted Genoese had borne nearly twenty years of disheartenment and opposition. It was the years of undaunted struggling to convert the world to his own unfathomed wisdom that showed the character of Columbus more fully than all he ever did after the world believed him.
The difficulties of securing official consent and permission being thus at last overcome, there was only the obstacle left of getting an expedition together. This was a very serious matter; there were few who cared to join in such a foolhardy undertaking as it was felt to be. Finally, volunteers failing, a crew had to be gathered forcibly by order of the Crown; and with his não the "Santa Maria," and his two caravels the "Niña" and the "Pinta," filled with unwilling men, the world-finder was at last ready.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] Pronounced Cō-lōn—the Spanish form.
[2] Pronounced Hoon-tah.
III.
COLUMBUS, THE FINDER.
Columbus sailed from Palos, Spain, on Friday, August 3, 1492, at 8 a. m., with one hundred and twenty Spaniards under his command. You know how he and his brave comrade Pinzon held up the spirits of his weakening crew; and how, on the morning of October 12, they sighted land at last. It was not the mainland of America—which Columbus never saw until nearly eight years later—but Watling's Island. The voyage had been the longest west which man had yet made; and it was very characteristically illustrative of the state of the world's knowledge then. When the variations of the magnetic needle were noticed by the voyagers, they decided that it was not the needle but the north star that varied. Columbus was perhaps as well informed as any other geographer of his day; but he came to the sober conclusion that the cause of certain phenomena must be that he was sailing over a bump on the globe! This was more strongly brought out in his subsequent voyage to the Orinoco, when he detected even a worse earth-bump, and concluded that the world must be pear-shaped! It is interesting to remember that but for an accidental change of course, the voyagers would have struck the Gulf Stream and been carried north—in which case what is now the United States would have become the first field of Spain's conquest.
The first white man who saw land in the New World was a common sailor named Rodrigo de Triana, though Columbus himself had seen a light the night before. Although it is probable—as you will see later on—that Cabot saw the actual continent of America before Columbus (in 1497), it was Columbus who found the New World, who took possession of it as its ruler under Spain, and who even founded the first European colonies in it—building, and settling with forty-three men, a town which he named La Navidad (the Nativity), on the island of San Domingo (Española, as he called it), in December, 1492. Moreover, had it not been that Columbus had already found the New World, Cabot never would have sailed.
The explorers cruised from island to island, finding many remarkable things. In Cuba, which they reached October 26, they discovered tobacco, which had never been known to civilization before, and the equally unknown sweet potato. These two products, of the value of which no early explorer dreamed, were to be far more important factors in the money-markets and in the comforts of the world than all the more dazzling treasures. Even the hammock and its name were given to civilization by this first voyage.
In March, 1493, after a fearful return voyage, Columbus was again in Spain, telling his wondrous news to Ferdinand and Isabella, and showing them his trophies of gold, cotton, brilliant-feathered birds, strange plants and animals, and still stranger men—for he had also brought back with him nine Indians, the first Americans to take a European trip. Every honor was heaped upon Columbus by the appreciative country of his adoption. It must have been a gallant sight to see this tall, athletic, ruddy-faced though gray-haired new grandee of Spain riding in almost royal splendor at the king's bridle, before an admiring court.
The grave and graceful queen was greatly interested in the discoveries made, and enthusiastic in preparing for more. Both intellectually and as a woman, the New World appealed to her very strongly; and as to the aborigines, she became absorbed in earnest plans for their welfare. Now that Columbus had proved that one could sail up and down the globe without falling over that "jumping-off place," there was no trouble about finding plenty of imitators.[3] He had done his work of genius—he was the pathfinder—and had finished his great mission. Had he stopped there, he would have left a much greater name; for in all that came after he was less fitted for his task.
A second expedition was hastened; and Sept. 25, 1493, Columbus sailed again—this time taking fifteen hundred Spaniards in seventeen vessels, with animals and supplies to colonize his New World. And now, too, with strict commands from the Crown to Christianize the Indians, and always to treat them well, Columbus brought the first missionaries to America—twelve of them. The wonderful mother-care of Spain for the souls and bodies of the savages who so long disputed her entrance to the New World began early, and it never flagged. No other nation ever evolved or carried out so noble an "Indian policy" as Spain has maintained over her western possessions for four centuries.
The second voyage was a very hard one. Some of the vessels were worthless and leaky, and the crews had to keep bailing them out.
Columbus made his