fessed to discover, but also of the nature of their inhabitants. He availed himself of the protection and treasure of Spain and the Pinzons, avowedly that he might sail to India by a western passage, an idea which had been popular with the Portuguese for many years, but with the real object of reaching lands in the West, of the existence and situation of which he had perfect knowledge.

He would have been more than ordinarily ignorant not to have known that the latitude and longitude of the Canaries, or Fortunate Islands, as well as of the port in India to which he professed to be sailing, had been determined many centuries, and that, therefore, seven hundred and fifty leagues west of the former could not bring him to India beyond the Ganges. That he desired others to think this is, however, evident, from the shameful oath he required his men to take in the island of Cuba. Moreover, in his letter to his son Diego, in which he urges the latter to profit by the influence of Amerigo Vespucci at court, after enjoining.secrecy, he says, "Let his majesty believe that his ships were in the richest and best parts of the Indies." This information, which appears to us fully to reveal the systematic deceit of Columbus, has been considerably softened by the English translators of his letter. They render crea su majestad, let his majesty believe" (crea being the imperative of the verb), by the words "his majesty believes," which renders the phrase more ambiguous, and the fraud enjoined not so palpable.

The deceitful and treacherous acts of Columbus pervade his whole career. His contemporaries rarely gave credence to his statements, and he himself did not expect to be believed by those who knew him well, as is made manifest by the swinish evidence of his veracity which he thought necessary to send his men in Jamaica. Nor is this incredulity to be wondered at when we reflect upon the absurdity of many of his assertions. He laid claim to supernatural powers, and professed to believe in sorcery: "In Cariari and the neighboring country there are great enchanters of a very fearful character."

His son tells us the Porrases persuaded their followers in Jamaica that "the coming of the caravel with news of Diego Mendez might make no impression on them. They intimated to them that it was no true caravel, but a phantom made by art

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magic, the admiral being very skillful in that art.170 We need not dwell upon the lack of dignity which Columbus's claim to such a knowledge makes evident.

The two prevailing traits of his character, hypocrisy and deceit, rarely, if ever, exist without their accompanying vices, cowardice and cruelty; and he is no exception to the rule, as the shocking cruelty with which he murdered Moxico and enslaved the Indians, the perfidy which he displayed in the capture of the chief Caonabo, with many other of his acts, will prove, while his quailing before Roldan-conferring upon him office,

lands, slaves, and other property, giving him eertificates of good character and conduct, while secretly traducing him to the sovereigns-leaves no doubt of his cowardice.

Humanity stands appalled at his frightful manifestations of cruelty, even as they are faintly portrayed by his too partial biographers. That delight in blood and thirst for gain which led him to embrace the life of a pirate and slave-catcher for the first fifty or sixty years of his life, did not abandon him when he assumed the mission of Christ-bearer.

170 "Historia del Amirante," chapter cvi.

If we need proof of this let us picture to ourselves, for a moment, those beautiful islands, their glowing vegetation and balmy climate, as first seen by Columbus. The peaceful and innocent inhabitants received him with childlike wonder and noble hospitality, imagining, alas! that those white-winged ships bore messengers from the skies. They eagerly tendered gifts, among which were the little ornaments of gold which were to be the cause of all their misery; for no sooner did the eyes of Columbus rest upon them, than he formed extravagant ideas of the riches he was to acquire without labor. Let us turn our eyes,

then, upon these same beautiful islands when this blood-thirsty pirate, who blasphemously assumed the name of "Christbearer," had sown desolation among them; when the shrieks of the tortured, the groans of the captives who labor unceasingly, the cries of women and maidens whom husbands and fathers dare no longer protect, resound within their once peaceful shores; when he whom they had supposed a messenger from heaven, has brought among them the miseries of hell; and, as we mark the contrast, and remember how all this cruelty is wrought in the name of religion, the man Columbus inspires us with such horror and disgust that we are amazed there should exist histo

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rians who cry out with pity and indignation when he is sent from the scenes of his crimes in chains, yet find neither pity nor indignation for his thousand victims whose chains had been their least sufferings.

Let us remember, too, that, of the people whom he thus tortured and enslaved, Columbus had once written:

"So loving, so tractable, so peaceful are these people that I swear to your majesties there is not in the world a better na

"Now (the captive cazique) being bound to the post, in order to his execution, a certain holy monk, of the Franciscan order, discoursed with him concerning God and the articles of our faith, . . . promising him eternal glory and repose if he truly believed them, or otherwise everlasting torments. After that Hathney had been silently pensive some time, he asked the monk whether the Spaniards also were admitted to heaven, and he answering that the gates of heaven were open to all that were good and godly, the cazique replied, without further consideration, that he would rather go to hell than heaven, for fear he should associate in the same mansion with so sanguinary a nation."-(LAS CASAS, "Crudelitates Hispanorum.")

tion. They love their neighbors as themselves, their discourse is ever sweet and gentle, and, though it is true they are naked, yet their manners are decorous and praiseworthy."

There are natures whose faults we admit, but whose noble qualities outbalance those faults-whose very failings seem to render them more attractive, as being rather noble excesses than defects. Truly great and noble men are often assailed by the

public, and condemned by party-spirit; but we always find that those who were nearest them, seeing them daily in familiar intercourse, were devoted and admiring, alike through prosperity and adversity. Thus the weeping followers of the great Napoleon are proud to share his dreary exile on the lonely rock of St. Helena; but how different is the case with Columbus! Those who knew him the most intimately, despised him the most openly and cordially. We do not find that he stood nobly. by one friend, or indeed that he ever entertained such a noble feeling as friendship. When he had obtained all that was possible from those who befriended him, they were requited by gross ingratitude or forgetfulness. Pinzon, who was the first to protect him, he repaid so cruelly as to cause that noble man to die broken-hearted. Diego Mendez, who saved his life in Jamaica, received, as reward, promises that were never fulfilled. The long list of those who associated with him in the islands is but a long list of quarrels. We look in vain through his life for any trait or action that would endear him to the hearts of men, for one deed that may be regarded as the impulse of a great and noble mind or generous heart; we find nothing but low cunning, arrogance, avarice, religious cant, deceit, and cruelty.