in his ears of great projects, making him deaf to much, perhaps, that prudence might have heeded; one to be loved by those near him, and likely by his presence to inspire favor and respect. Such was the hero under whose guidance we are now called to enter upon a wider sphere of the history of discovery and colonization; and also, somewhat to his shame, of the mournful annals of Slavery. CHAPTER I. COLUMBUS DISCOVERY OF AMERICA. OLUMBUS was born in the Genoese territory in the year 1447 or 1448.* His family was obscure, but, like most others, when the light of a great man's birth is thrown upon its records, real and possible, it presents some other names not altogether unworthy to be inscribed among the great man's ancestors. Columbus was sent to Pavia for his education, and seems to have profited by it; for he wrote legibly, designed well, was a good Latin scholar, and it is probable that he then acquired the rudiments of the various sciences in which he afterward became proficient. At the age of fourteen he went to sea. Of his many voyages, which of them took place before, and which after his coming to Portugal, we have no distinct record, but are sure that he traversed a large part of the known world, that he visited England,† that he made his way to Iceland, that he had been at El Mina, on the coast * I am aware that this date differs considerably from those given by some biographers of Columbus; I have, however, determined it for myself upon the evidence of ancient authorities which seemed to me the most to be relied upon. + "Ví todo el Levante y Poniente, que dice por ir al camino de Septentrion, que es Inglaterra."-NAVARRETE, Coleccion, Madrid, 1825, vol. i., p. 101. "Yo navegué el año de cuatrocientos y setenta y siete en el mes de Febrero ultra Tile. es tan grande como Inglaterra, van los Ingleses con mercadería; especialmente los de Bristol.”—Las Casas, Hist. de las Indias, MS., lib. i., cap. 8. |