"Well would it be [exclaims our author a few pages afterwards] for the honour of human nature, could history, like romance, close with the consummation of the hero's wishes; we should then leave Columbus in the full fruition of great and well merited prosperity. But his history is destined to furnish another proof, if proof be wanting, of the inconstancy of public favour, even when won by distinguished services. No greatness was ever acquired by more incontestable, unalloyed, and exalted benefits rendered to mankind, yet none ever drew on its possessor, more unremitting jealousy and defamation, or involved him in more unmerited distress and difficulty. Thus it is with illustrious merit; its very effulgence draws forth the rancorous passions of low and grovelling minds, which too often have a temporary influence in obscuring it to the world; as the sun, emerging with full splendour into the heavens, calls up by the very fervour of his rays, the rank and noxious vapours which for a time becloud his glory." Vol. i. p. 277.

It is not our intention to pursue the history of Columbus through the checquered scenes, the vexations and disappointments of his subsequent life. Its general tenor is well known. For a time the novelty and splendour of his discoveries sustained the strong feeling of enthusiastic gratitude. Honours and authority were lavished upon him, and orders were issued to make preparations for a new expedition, in a style of royal magnificence. Every civilized nation appeared to take a deep interest in the events which were so unexpectedly passing before them. All turned their eyes on those exploits which were opening new realms to the enterprise of the valiant, and the researches of the wise, and which were giving to the Christian world, according to the sublime predictions of Scripture, "the Heathen for an inheritance, and the uttermost parts of the earth for a possession."

It is pleasant to contrast the feelings and situation of Columbus and his followers, when leaving Spain on his two first voyages. Our author thus eloquently describes them.

"The squadron being ready to put to sea, Columbus impressed with the solemnity of his undertaking, confessed himself to the friar Juan Perez, and partook of the sacrament of the communion. His example was followed by his officers and crew, and they entered upon their enterprise full of awe, and with the most devout and affecting ceremonials, committing themselves to the especial guidance and protection of Heaven. A deep gloom was spread over the whole community of Palos at their departure, for almost every one had some relative on board of the squadron. The spirits of the seamen, already depressed by their own fears, were still more cast down at the affliction of those they left behind, who took leave of them with tears and lamentation.s, and dismal forebodings, as of men they were never again to behold.” Vol. i. p. 115.

*

"The departure of Columbus on his second voyage of discovery, presented a brilliant contrast to his gloomy embarkation at Palos. On

the 25th September, at the dawn of day, the bay of Cadiz was whitened by his fleet. There were three large ships of heavy burthen,* and fourteen caravels, loitering with flapping sails, and awaiting the signal to get under way. The harbour resounded with the well-known note of the sailor, hoisting sail or weighing anchor. A motley crowd were hurrying on board and taking leave of their friends, in the confidence of a prosperous voyage and triumphant return. There was the highspirited cavalier bound on romantic enterprise; the hardy navigator, ambitious of acquiring laurels in these unknown seas; the roving adventurer, who anticipates every thing from change of place and distance; the keen calculating speculator, eager to profit by the ignorance of savage tribes; and the pale missionary from the cloister, anxious to extend the dominion of the church, or devoutly zealous for the propagation of the faith. All were full of animation and lively hope. Instead of being regarded by the populace as devoted men, bound upon a dark and desperate enterprise, they were contemplated with envy, as favoured mortals, destined to golden regions and happy climes, where nothing but wealth and wonders and delights awaited them. Columbus moved among the throng, conspicuous for his height and for his commanding appearance. He was attended by his two sons, Diego and Fernando, the eldest but a stripling, who had come to witness his departure, proud of the glory of their father. Wherever he passed every eye followed him with admiration, and every tongue praised and blessed him. Before sunrise, the whole fleet was under way; the weather was serene and propitious; and as the populace watched their parting sails, brightening in the morning beams, they looked forward to their joyful return, laden with the treasures of the new world." Vol. i. pp. 303-304.

Columbus made four voyages to America. To the first we have already adverted; the second expedition, fitted out with great cost and the most splendid anticipations, was intended not only as a voyage of discovery, but of occupation; the third, more limited, prepared and furnished even with reluctant bounty; the fourth, equipped on the most contracted scale, and apparently sent to rid the Court of Spain of the presence and high claims of their great benefactor, and to exhibit him as a mere adventurer on those shores he had first made known to man.

In his first voyage, he discovered, besides the Island of Guanahani or St. Salvador, on which he first landed, several of the Islands among the group of the Bahamas, and a part of the north coasts of the great Islands of Cuba and Hispaniola or Hayti. In his second, in which a leading object was to take possession of Hispaniola, the greater part of the interior of that fertile island was explored, and the south coast of Cuba,

*Peter Martyr says they were carracks, (a large species of merchant vessels principally used in coasting trade,) of one hundred tons burthen, and that two of the caravels were much larger than the rest, and more capable of bearing decks, from the size of their masts.—Decade, 1, lib. i.

Hist. del Almirante, c. 44.

Jamaica, the southern shores of Hispaniola, and several of the Carribean Isles were visited. In the third, although his principal object was the government and improvement of the infant settlements in Hispaniola, he discovered Trinidad, the adjacent coasts of South America, and some of the contiguous islands; and in his fourth and last voyage, the shores of Honduras, Mosquito, Veragua and Porto Bello.

The misfortunes of his declining years are familiar to our readers. It is generally known, that during his third voyage, whilst occupied in almost ineffectual efforts to maintain order in Hispaniola, he was superseded in his command, and by Bobadilla, who was appointed to succeed him, imprisoned and sent to Spain in chains; and that in his fourth voyage, when stranded on Jamaica, he was suffered by Ovando, the successor of Bobadilla, to remain twelve months on that island without the smallest assistance, left apparently to perish either by famine or the hostility of the natives.

How deeply Columbus felt this neglect, all who have studied his character must be aware. In one of his letters from Jamaica he thus expresses himself:

"Until now," says he, "I have wept for others; have pity upon me heaven, and weep for me earth! In my temporal concerns, without a farthing to give in offering; in spiritual concerns, cast away here in the Indies; isolated in my misery, infirm, expecting each day will be my last; surrounded by cruel savages, separated from the holy sacraments of the church, so that my soul will be lost, if separated here from my body! Weep for me whoever has charity, truth and justice. I came not on this voyage to gain honour or estate; for all hope of the kind is dead with me. I came to serve your majesties with a sound intention and an honest zeal, and I speak no falsehood. If it should please God to deliver me from hence, I humbly supplicate your majesties to permit me to repair to Rome, and perform other pilgrimages." Vol. iii. p. 94.

These incidents disclose the declining favour of Columbus at the Court of Spain. Indeed, the remnant of a shattered constitution was consumed in efforts to reclaim the prerogatives which had been more than once solemnly granted to him, and he died amidst his efforts to obtain justice for the most flagrant violation of his rights.

There were many circumstances which led to these disgraceful occurrences, for, on the reputation of Ferdinand of Spain, the treatment of Columbus must reflect indelible disgrace. In the first place, the sanguine and enthusiastic temperament of Columbus himself, was, amidst his actually great discoveries, always exposing him to severe disappointments. His ardent

imagination had been exalted by the pictures of oriental magnificence, which Mandeville and Marco Polo had so brightly drawn. The fairy land where the shores were strewed with pearl, the rocks glittered with gems, the palaces were roofed with gold, and the air itself filled with fragrance, was forever rising in his waking and even in his nightly visions. Neither was this delusion singular, nor was it confined to his own age or nation. Even from the earliest records of history, while travellers and fabulists spoke in rapturous strains of the "spicy shores of Araby the blest," tradition always turned to the remoter east, to "Seres and to Ind," as to countries abounding in aromatics still more fragrant, in gems, yet inore costly, where every thing which nature had formed most rich, most rare, most exquisite, was produced with a liberal and boundless profusion. Commerce brought a few of the most precious of the productions of India to Europe, and as is usual with things unknown or dimly seen, fancy had room to magnify and exaggerate every gift and blessing in that really rich and productive climate. When Columbus bent his course to the west, it was with a lively hope that he should reach, by a direct and shorter navigation, these scenes of wonder and enchantment. Each point that he arrived at in his voyages, seemed only to be some covering reef or island, or some projecting promontory of the eastern coast of India. The uncultivated soil, the naked inhabitants, the barbarous languages-nothing could dispel the illusion. He, in truth, never knew the nature nor the magnitude of his discoveries. In every new shore that he approached, his sanguine anticipations were renewed, and he seemed constantly on the verge of those fortunate climes, where every enjoyment and every blessing were spontaneously prepared for man. Every vague or, perhaps, ill construed report of the natives, which appeared to point to this still retiring paradise, was received with eagerness, and transmitted to Europe with all the bright and vivid colouring of an enthusiastic imagination. In these expeditions, gold and pearl were actually obtained in abundance sufficient to nourish the cupidity of avarice, and adventurers of all descriptions and all classes of society, hastened, as fast as permission could be obtained from the Government of Spain, to visit and possess this land of promise. But when this purpose had been accomplished, when men, for the most part, young and delicate, brought up in luxury and accustomed to indulgence, reached this newly discovered world, they found that the soil, though fertile almost beyond imagination, required to be cultivated before it could yield them wealth, that gold, though mingled in the rocks, must be extracted and separated from the ore by their own labours; that they must become

pack-horses to transport their own burthens, and daily labourers even to procure their daily bread; when they found themselves compelled to join also in the works necessary to give them shelter from the elements and protection from their enemies, and this in a tropical climate, not friendly to the European constitution, need we wonder that many perished in their inconsiderate enterprise, and that many returned to Spain, only to give vent to feelings of mortification and disappointment, well disposed to consider and reproach Columbus as the author of their unexpected sufferings. A few who were desperate and hardy enough to remain, soon found means to shift their heavier burthens on the shoulders of a more unfortunate race.

The Government of Spain itself, as anxious for wealth as the needy adventurers who followed the footsteps of Columbus, soon began to complain that its expenses were not reimbursed, and made this a plea for diminishing the equipment of each successive expedition, and treating coldly him, to whom they could not deny their many obligations.

Another circumstance extremely unpropitious to Columbus, and which mingled great bitterness in almost every occurrence of his subsequent life, was the difference in the views and objects of his followers and himself. Columbus was sincere and pious, a lover of order and of justice, and his feelings were lofty and benevolent; he stood, besides, in this hemisphere, as a discoverer, and he was naturally much interested in preserving his discoveries in good order, and in rendering them as valuable as possible to the crown of Spain, whether considered as an element of power or of wealth. Besides, he had a direct personal interest in their prosperity. By his engagements with the crown of Spain, he was to receive a large proportion of the treasures and revenue derived from the countries he should discover. He was, therefore, on every ground, opposed to the rapacious and destructive systems pursued generally by his followers, and he restrained, as long as power was given him, their disorders and excesses. The adventurers, on the other hand, came over with extravagant expectations of immediate wealth, they looked to no future advantage, no distant recompense; they wished to exact from every thing within their reach, whatsoever it could yield. They despoiled the native inhabitants, compelled them to labour in their service, injured them by indulging in the most unbridled licentiousness, provoked them, as long as any remnant of power or spirit remained, to perpetual insurrections, and then punished them with the most savage inhumanity. Every effort made by Columbus to restrain their lawless violence, was considered by these wretches as the wanton exercise of high