Chapter 22

To-day the Admiral took leave of the king, who entrusted him with some messages to the Sovereigns, and always treating him with much friendliness.[255-1] He departed after dinner, Don Martin de Norona being sent with him, and all the knights set out with him, and went with him some distance, to do him honor. Afterwards he came to a monastery of San Antonio, near a place called Villafranca, where the Queen was residing. The Admiral went to do her reverence and to kiss her hand, because she had sent to say that he was not to go without seeing her. The Duke[256-1] and the Marquis were with her, and the Admiral was received with much honor. He departed at night, and went to sleep at Llandra.

_Tuesday, 12th of March_

To-day, as he was leaving Llandra to return to the caravel, an esquire of the king arrived, with an offer that if he desired to go to Castile by land, that he should be supplied with lodgings, and beasts, and all that was necessary. When the Admiral took leave of him, he ordered a mule to be supplied to him, and another for his pilot, who was with him, and he says that the pilot received a present of twenty _espadines_.[256-2] He said this that the Sovereigns might know all that was done. He arrived on board the caravel that night.

_Wednesday, 13th of March_

To-day, at 8 o'clock, with the flood tide, and the wind N.N.W., the Admiral got under way and made sail for Seville.

_Thursday, 14th of March_

Yesterday, after sunset, a southerly course was steered, and before sunrise they were off Cape St. Vincent, which is in Portugal. Afterwards he shaped a course to the east for Saltes, and went on all day with little wind, "until now that the ship is off Furon."

_Friday, 15th of March_

Yesterday, after sunset, she went on her course with little wind, and at sunrise she was off Saltes. At noon, with the tide rising, they crossed the bar of Saltes, and reached the port which they had left on the 3rd of August of the year before.[257-1] The Admiral says that so ends this journal, unless it becomes necessary to go to Barcelona by sea, having received news that their Highnesses are in that city, to give an account of all his voyage which our Lord had permitted him to make, and saw fit to set forth in him. For, assuredly, he held with a firm and strong knowledge that His High Majesty made all things good, and that all is good except sin. Nor can he value or think of anything being done without His consent. "I know respecting this voyage," says the Admiral, "that he has miraculously shown his will, as may be seen from this journal, setting forth the numerous miracles that have been displayed in the voyage, and in me who was so long at the court of your Highnesses, working in opposition to and against the opinions of so many chief persons of your household, who were all against me, looking upon this enterprise as folly. But I hope in our Lord, that it will be a great benefit to Christianity, for so it has ever appeared." These are the final words of the Admiral Don Cristoval Colon respecting his first voyage to the Indies and their discovery.

FOOTNOTES:

[89-1] The Alhambra.

[89-2] This information Columbus is ordinarily supposed to have derived from Toscanelli's letter which may be found in Fiske, _Discovery of America_, I. 356 ff. and II. App. The original source of the information, however, is Marco Polo, and Columbus summarized the passage on the margin in his copy of Marco Polo, Lib. I., ch. IV., as follows: "Magnus Kam misit legatos ad pontificem:" _Raccolta Colombiana_, Part I, Tomo 2, p. 446. That he read and annotated these passages before 1492 seems most probable. See Bourne, _Spain in America_, pp. 10-15, and Vignaud, _Toscanelli and Columbus_, p. 284.

[90-1] It is interesting to notice the emphasis of the missionary motive in this preamble. Nothing is said in regard to the search for a new route to the Indies for commercial reasons. Nor is reference made to the expectation of new discoveries which is prominent in the royal patent granted to Columbus, see above p. 78.

[90-2] The edict of expulsion bears the date of March 30.

[91-1] Columbus reckoned in Italian miles, four of which make a league. (Navarrete.)

[93-1] On June 30, 1484, King John II. of Portugal granted to Fernam Domimguez do Arco, "resident in the island of Madeyra, if he finds it, an island which he is now going in search of." _Alguns Documentos do Archivo Nacional da Torre do Tombo_, p. 56.

[94-1] _Tres horas de noche_ means three hours after sunset.

[94-2] "On this day [Sunday, Sept. 9] they lost sight of land; and many, fearful of not being able to return for a long time to see it, sighed and shed tears. But the admiral, after he had comforted all with big offers of much land and wealth to keep them in hope and to lessen their fear which they had of the long way, when that day the sailors reckoned the distance 18 leagues, said he had counted only 15, having decided to lessen the record so that the crew would not think they were as far from Spain as in fact they were." _Historie del Signor Don Fernando Colombo_ (London ed., 1867), pp. 61-62.

[95-1] Las Casas in his _Historia_, I. 267, says "on that day at nightfall the needles northwested that is to say the fleur de lis which marks the north was not pointing directly at it but verged somewhat to the left of north and in the morning northeasted that is to say the fleur de lis pointed to right of the north until sunset."

The _Historie_ agrees with the text of the Journal that the needle declined more to the west, instead of shifting to an eastern declination.

The author of the _Historie_ remarks: "This variation no one had ever observed up to this time," p. 62. "Columbus had crossed the point of no variation, which was then near the meridian of Flores, in the Azores, and found the variation no longer easterly, but more than a point westerly. His explanation that the pole-star, by means of which the change was detected, was not itself stationary, is very plausible. For the pole-star really does describe a circle round the pole of the earth, equal in diameter to about six times that of the sun; but this is not equal to the change observed in the direction of the needle." (Markham.)

[96-1] _Garjao._ This word is not in the Spanish dictionaries that I have consulted. The translator has followed the French translators MM. Chalumeau de Verneuil and de la Roquette who accepted the opinion of the naturalist Cuvier that the _Garjao_ was the _hirondelle de mer_, the _Sterna maxima_ or royal tern.

[96-2] _Rabo de junco_, literally, reedtail, is the tropic bird or Phaethon. The name "boatswain-bird" is applied to some other kinds of birds, besides the tropic bird. _Cf._ Alfred Newton, _Dictionary of Birds_ (London, 1896). Ferdinand Columbus says: _rabo di giunco_, "a bird so called because it has a long feather in its tail," p. 63.

[96-3] This remark is, of course, not true of the tropic bird or _rabo de junco_, as was abundantly proved on this voyage.

[97-1] See p. 96, note 2.

[98-1] _Alcatraz._ The rendering "booby" follows Cuvier's note to the French translation. The "booby" is the "booby gannet." The Spanish dictionaries give pelican as the meaning of _Alcatraz_. The gannets and the pelicans were formerly classed together. The word _Alcatraz_ was taken over into English and corrupted to _Albatros_. Alfred Newton, _Dictionary of Birds_ (London, 1896), art. "Albatros."

[98-2] More exactly, "He sailed this day toward the West a quarter northwest and half the division [_i.e._, west by north and west by one eighth northwest] because of the veering winds and calm that prevailed."

[100-1] The abridger of the original journal missed the point here and his epitome is unintelligible. Las Casas says in his _Historia_, I. 275: "The Admiral says in this place that the adverseness of the winds and the high sea were very necessary to him since they freed the crew of their erroneous idea that there would be no favorable sea and winds for their return and thereby they received some relief of mind or were not in so great despair, yet even then some objected, saying that that wind would not last, up to the Sunday following, when they had nothing to answer when they saw the sea so high. By which means, Cristobal Colon says here, God dealt with him and with them as he dealt with Moses and the Jews when he drew them from Egypt showing signs to favor and aid him and to their confusion."

[100-2] Las Casas, _Historia_, I. 275-276, here describes with detail the discontent of the sailors and their plots to put Columbus out of the way. The passage is translated in Thacher, _Christopher Columbus_, I. 524. The word rendered "sandpipers" is _pardelas_, petrels. The French translation has _petrels tachetes_, _i.e._, "pintado petrels," or cape pigeons.

[101-1] More exactly, "On which it seems the Admiral had painted certain islands." The Spanish reads: "_donde segun parece tenia pintadas el Almirante ciertas islas_," etc. The question is whether Columbus made the map or had it made. The rendering of the note is supported by the French translators and by Harrisse.

[101-2] Las Casas, I. 279, says: "This map is the one which Paul, the physician, the Florentine, sent, which I have in my possession with other articles which belonged to the Admiral himself who discovered these Indies, and writings in his own hand which came into my possession. In it he depicted many islands and the main land which were the beginning of India and in that region the realms of the Grand Khan," etc. Las Casas does not tell us how he knew that the Toscanelli map which he found in Columbus's papers was the map that the Admiral used on the first voyage. That is the general assumption of scholars, but there is no positive evidence of the fact. The Toscanelli map is no longer extant, and all reconstructions of it are based on the globe of Martin Behaim constructed in 1492. The reconstruction by H. Wagner which may be seen in S. Ruge, _Columbus_, 2^te aufl. (Berlin, 1902) is now accepted as the most successful.

According to the reckoning of the distances in the Journal, Columbus was now about 550 leagues or 2200 Italian miles west of the Canaries. The Toscanelli map was divided off into spaces each containing 250 miles. Columbus was therefore nine spaces west of the Canaries. No reconstruction of Toscanelli's map puts any islands at nine spaces from the Canaries except so far as the reconstructors insert the island of Antilia on the basis of Behaim's globe. The Antilia of Behaim according to Wagner was eight spaces west of the Canaries. Again Ferdinand Columbus, in his _Historie_ under date of October 7 (p. 72), says the sailors "had been frequently told by him that he did not look for land until they had gone 750 leagues west from the Canaries, at which distance he had told them he would have found Espanola then called Cipango." 750 leagues or 3000 Italian miles would be 12 spaces on the Toscanelli map. But according to the Toscanelli letter Cipango was 10 spaces west of Antilia, and therefore 18 spaces or 4500 miles west of the Canaries. Columbus then seems to have expected to find Cipango some 1500 miles to the east of where it was placed on the Toscanelli map. These considerations justify a very strong doubt whether Columbus was shaping his course and basing his expectations on the data of the Toscanelli letter and map, or whether the fact that Las Casas found what he took to be the Toscanelli map in the Admiral's papers proves that it was that map which he had on his first voyage.

[102-1] _Dorado_ is defined by Stevens as the dory or gilt head.

[103-1] _Rabiforcado_, Portuguese. The Spanish form is _rabihorcado_. It means "forked tail." The modern English equivalent is "frigate bird." It is "the Fregata aquila of most ornithologists, the Fregate of French and the Rabihorcado of Spanish mariners." Newton, _Dictionary of Birds_, art. "Frigate-Bird." Newton says that the name "man-of-war bird" has generally passed out of use in books.

[103-2] Rather, the Guards, the name given to the two brightest stars in the constellation of the Little Bear. The literal translation is: "the Guards, when night comes on, are near the arm on the side to the west, and when dawn breaks they are on the line under the arm to the northeast," etc. What Columbus meant I cannot explain. Neither Navarrete nor the French translators offer any suggestions.

[105-1] Las Casas, I. 282, adds to the foregoing under date of October 3: "He says here that it would not have been good sense to beat about and in that way to be delayed in search of them [_i.e._, the islands] since he had favorable weather and his chief intention was to go in search of the Indies by way of the west, and this was what he proposed to the King and Queen, and they had sent him for that purpose. Because he would not turn back to beat up and down to find the islands which the pilots believed to be there, particularly Martin Alonzo by the chart which, as was said, Cristobal Colon had sent to his caravel for him to see, and it was their opinion that he ought to turn, they began to stir up a mutiny, and the disagreement would have gone farther if God had not stretched out his arm as he was wont, showing immediately new signs of their being near land since now neither soft words nor entreaties nor prudent reasoning of Cristobal Colon availed to quiet them and to persuade them to persevere." Ferdinand Columbus says simply, "For this reason the crew began to be mutinous, persevering in their complaints and plots," p. 71. See page 108, note 1.

[106-1] _A la cuarta del Oueste, a la parte del Sudueste_, at the quarter from the west toward the southwest, _i.e._, west by south.

[106-2] Las Casas, in the _Historia de las Indias_, I. 283, writes, "That night Martin Alonso said that it would be well to sail west by south for the island of Cipango which the map that Cristobal Colon showed him represented." _Cf._ page 101, note 2.

[107-1] Las Casas remarks, I. 285, "If he had kept up the direct westerly course and the impatience of the Castilians had not hindered him, there is no doubt that he would have struck the main land of Florida and from there to New Spain, although the difficulties would have been unparalleled and the losses unbearable that they would have met with, and it would have been a divine miracle if he had ever returned to Castile."

[107-2] A remark by the abridger who noted the inconsistency between a total of 48 miles for a day and night and even an occasional 15 miles per hour.

[107-3] _Grajaos._ The translator assumed this to be the same as _garjao_; the French translators, on the other hand, took it to be the same as _grajos_, crows. In Portuguese dictionaries the word _grajao_ is found as the name of "an Indian bird."

[108-1] The trouble with the captains and the sailors is told in greatest detail by Oviedo, _Historia de las Indias_, lib. II., cap. V. He is the source of the story that the captains finally declared they would go on three days longer and not another hour. Oviedo does not say that Columbus acquiesced in this arrangement. Modern critics have been disposed to reject Oviedo's account, but strictly interpreted, it is not inconsistent with our other sources. Columbus recalls in his Journal, February 14, 1493, the terror of the situation which was evidently more serious than the entry of October 10 would imply. Peter Martyr too says that the sailors plotted to throw Columbus overboard and adds: "After the thirtieth day roused by madness they declared they were going back," but that Columbus pacified them. _De Rebus Oceanicis_, Dec. lib. I., fol. 2, ed. of 1574. Oviedo says that he derived information from Vicente Yanez Pinzon, "since with him I had a friendship up to the year 1514 when he died." _Historia de las Indias_, II., cap. XIII.

[108-2] _Escaramojos._ Wild roses.

[109-1] It was full moon on October 5. On the night of the 11th the moon rose at 11 P.M. and at 2 A.M. on the morning of the 12th it was 39 deg. above the horizon. It would be shining brightly on the sandy shores of an island some miles ahead, being in its third quarter, and a little behind Rodrigo de Triana, when he sighted land at 2 A.M. (Markham.)

[109-2] The high decks fore and aft were called castles. The name survives in the English forecastle. Stevens gives poop alone as the English for _Castilla de popa_.

[109-3] Oviedo, lib. II., cap. V., says that, as they were sailing along, a sailor, a native of Lepe, cried out, "Light," "Land," but was immediately told that the admiral had already seen it and remarked upon it.

[109-4] Columbus received this award. His claiming or accepting it under the circumstances has been considered discreditable and a breach of faith by many modern writers. Oviedo says the native of Lepe was so indignant at not getting the reward that "he went over into Africa and denied the faith," _i.e._, became a Mohammedan. Las Casas seems to have seen no impropriety in Columbus' accepting the award. He tells us, I. 289, that this annuity was paid to Columbus throughout his life and was levied from the butcher shops of Seville. A maravedi was equal to two-thirds of a cent.

[110-1] Pronounced originally, according to Las Casas, I. 291, with the accent on the last syllable. Guanahani is now generally accepted to have been Watling Island. See Markham, _Christopher Columbus_, pp. 89-107, for a lucid discussion of the landfall.

[110-2] Fernando and Ysabel.

[110-3] The royal inspector.

[110-4] Las Casas adds, I. 293, "To which he gave the name Sant Salvador."

[110-5] We have here perhaps the original title of what in its abridged form we now call the Journal.

[113-1] The Portuguese _ceitil_ (pl. _ceitis_) was a small coin deriving its name from Ceuta, opposite Gibraltar, in Africa, a Portuguese possession. The _blanca_ was one-half a maravedi, or about one-third of a cent.

[113-2] Cipango. Marco Polo's name for Japan.

[115-1] Rather, "I had lain to during the night for fear of reaching the land," etc.

[115-2] These lengths are exaggerated.

[115-3] The word is _cargue_ and means "raised" or "hoisted." The same word seven lines above was translated "made sail." Las Casas in the corresponding passage in his _Historia_ uses _alzar_.

[115-4] Identified as Rum Cay.

[116-1] A line is missing in the original. The text may be restored as follows, beginning with the end of the preceding sentence, "jumped into the sea and got into the canoe; in the middle of the night before the other threw [himself into the sea and swam off. The boat was lowered] and put after the canoe which escaped since there never was a boat which could have overtaken him, since we were far behind him."

[117-1] Long Island. (Markham.)

[117-2] Possibly a reference to tobacco.

[118-1] It should be "about nine o'clock." The original is _a horas de tercia_, which means "at the hour of tierce," _i.e._, the period between nine and twelve.

[119-1] _Panizo_, literally "panic grass." Here Columbus seems to use the word as descriptive of maize or Indian corn, and later the word came to have this meaning. On the different species of panic grass, see Candolle, _Origin of Cultivated Plants_ (index under _panicum_.)

[120-1] Rather, "since it is noon."

[120-2] Port Clarence in Long Island. (Markham.)

[121-1] Rather, "beds and hangings." The original is _paramentos de cosas_, but in the corresponding passage in his _Historia_, I. 310, Las Casas has _paramentos de casa_, which is almost certainly the correct reading.

[121-2] "These are called Hamacas in Espanola." Las Casas, I. 310, where will be found an elaborate description of them.

[121-3] For ornament. Las Casas calls them caps or crowns, I. 311.

[121-4] Rather: "mastiffs and beagles." Las Casas, I. 311, says the Admiral called these dogs mastiffs from the report of the sailors. "If he had seen them, he would not have called them so but that they resembled hounds. These and the small ones would never bark but merely a grunt in the throat."

[121-5] The _castellano_ was one-sixth of an ounce. Las Casas, I. 311, remarks: "They were deceived in believing the marks to be letters since those people are wont to work it in their fashion, since never anywhere in all the Indies was there found any trace of money of gold or silver or other metal."

[123-1] Crooked Island (Markham.)

[123-2] Cape Beautiful.

[125-1] "The Indians of this island of Espanola call it _iguana_." Las Casas I. 314. He gives a minute description of it.

[126-1] The names in the Spanish text are Colba and Bosio, errors in transcription for Cuba and Bohio. Las Casas, I. 315, says in regard to the latter: "To call it Bohio was to misunderstand the interpreters, since throughout all these islands, where the language is practically the same, they call the huts in which they live _bohio_ and this great island Espanola they called Hayti, and they must have said that in Hayti there were great _bohios_."

[126-2] The name is spelled Quinsay in the Latin text of Marco Polo which Columbus annotated.

[127-1] One or two words are missing in the original.

[128-1] The translation here should be, "raised the anchors at the island of Isabella at Cabo del Isleo, which is on the northern side where I tarried to go to the island of Cuba, which I heard from this people is very great and has gold," etc.

[128-2] These two lines should read, "I believe that it is the island of Cipango of which marvellous things are related."

[128-3] The exact translation is, "On the spheres that I saw and on the paintings of world-maps it is this region." The plural number is used in both cases. Of the globes of this date, _i.e._, 1492 or earlier, that of Behaim is the only one that has come down to us. Of the world maps Toscanelli's, no longer extant, may have been one, but it is to be noted that Columbus uses the plural.

[129-1] Columbus's conviction that he has reached the Indies is registered by his use from now on of the word "Indians" for the people.

[130-1] This should be, "The mouth of the river is 12 fathoms deep and it is wide enough," etc.

[131-1] _Bledos._ The French translators give _cresson sauvage_, wild cress, as the equivalent.

[131-2] Las Casas, I. 320, says Columbus understood "that from these to the mainland would be a sail of ten days by reason of the notion he had derived from the chart or picture which the Florentine sent him."

[131-3] Baracoa (Las Casas); Puerto Naranjo (Markham); Nipe (Navarrete); Nuevitas (Thacher).

[132-1] Punta de Mulas. (Navarrete.)

[132-2] Punta de Cabanas. (Navarrete.)

[132-3] Puerto de Banes. (Navarrete.)

[132-4] Puerto de las Nuevitas del Principe. (Navarrete.)

[132-5] Las Casas, I. 321, has "many heads well carved from wood." Possibly these were totems.

[133-1] Las Casas, I. 321, comments, "These must have been skulls of the manati, a very large fish, like large calves, which has a skin with no scales like a whale and its head is like that of a cow."

[133-2] "I believe that this port was Baracoa, which name Diego Velasquez, the first of the Spaniards to settle Cuba, gave to the harbor of Asumpcion." Las Casas, I. 322.

[133-3] Near Granada in Spain.

[133-4] Nuevitas del Principe. (Navarrete.)

[133-5] "Alto de Juan Danue." (Navarrete.)

[134-1] Rio Maximo. (Navarrete.)

[134-2] See above, p. 91.