OTHER DISCOVERIES--WET AND DRY.
America had many other discoverers besides Columbus, but he seems to
have made more satisfactory arrangements with the historians than any of
the others. He had genius, and was also a married man. He was a good
after-dinner speaker, and was first to use the egg trick, which so many
after-dinner speakers have since wished they had thought of before Chris
did.
In falsifying the log-book in order to make his sailors believe that
they had not sailed so far as they had, Columbus did a wrong act,
unworthy of his high notions regarding the pious discovery of this land.
The artist has shown here not only one of the most faithful portraits of
Columbus and his crooked log-book, but the punishment which he should
have received.
The man on the left is Columbus; History is concealed just around the
corner in a loose wrapper.
Spain at this time regarded the new land as a vast jewelry store in
charge of simple children of the forest who did not know the value of
their rich agricultural lands or gold-ribbed farms. Spain, therefore,
expected to exchange bone collar-buttons with the children of the forest
for opals as large as lima beans, and to trade fiery liquids to them for
large gold bricks.
The Montezumas were compelled every little while to pay a freight-bill
for the Spanish confidence man.
Ponce de Leon had started out in search of the Hot Springs of Arkansas,
and in 1512 came in sight of Florida. He was not successful in his
attempt to find the Fountain of Youth, and returned an old man so deaf
that in the language of the Hoosier poet referring to his grandfather,--
"So remarkably deaf was my grandfather Squeers
That he had to wear lightning-rods over his ears
To even hear thunder, and oftentimes then
He was forced to request it to thunder again."
Balboa crossed the Isthmus of Darien, and, rolling up his pantalettes,
waded into the Pacific Ocean and discovered it in the name of Spain. It
was one of the largest and wettest discoveries ever made, and, though
this occurred over three centuries ago, Spain is still poor.
Balboa, in discovering the Pacific, did so according to the Spanish
custom of discovery, viz., by wading into it with his naked sword in one
hand and the banner of Castile, sometimes called Castile's hope (see
Appendix), in the other. He and his followers waded out so as to
discover all they could, and were surprised to discover what is now
called the undertow.
[Illustration: BALBOA DRYING HIS CLOTHES.]
The artist has shown the great discoverer most truthfully as he appeared
after he had discovered and filed on the ocean. No one can look upon
this picture for a moment and confuse Balboa, the discoverer of the
Pacific, with Kope Elias, who first discovered in the mountains of North
Carolina what is now known as moonshine whiskey.
De Narvaez in 1528 undertook to conquer Florida with three hundred
hands. He also pulled considerable grass in his search for gold. Finally
he got to the gulf and was wrecked. They were all related mostly to
Narvaez, and for two weeks they lived on their relatives, but later
struck shore--four of them--and lived more on a vegetable diet after
that till they struck the Pacific Ocean, which now belonged to Spain.
De Soto also undertook the conquest of Florida after this, and took six
hundred men with him for the purpose. They wandered through the Gulf
States to the Mississippi, enduring much, and often forced to occupy the
same room at night. De Soto in 1541 discovered the Mississippi River,
thus adding to the moisture collection of Spain.
After trying to mortgage his discovery to Eastern capitalists, he died,
and was buried in the quiet bosom of the Great Father of waters.
Thus once more the list of fatalities was added to and the hunger for
gold was made to contribute a discovery.
Menendez later on founded in 1565 the colony of St. Augustine, the
oldest town in the United States. There are other towns that look older,
but it is on account of dissipation. New York looks older, but it is
because she always sat up later of nights than St. Augustine did.
Cortez was one of the coarsest men who visited this country. He did not
marry any wealthy American girls, for there were none, but he did
everything else that was wrong, and his unpaid laundry-bills are still
found all over the Spanish-speaking countries. He was especially lawless
and cruel to the Peruvians: "recognizing the Peruvian at once by his
bark," he would treat him with great indignity, instead of using other
things which he had with him. Cortez had a way of capturing the most
popular man in a city, and then he would call on the tax-payers to
redeem him on the instalment plan. Most everybody hated Cortez, and when
he held religious services the neighbors did not attend. The religious
efforts made by Cortez were not successful. He killed a great many
people, but converted but few.
The historian desires at this time to speak briefly of the methods of
Cortez from a commercial stand-point.
Will the reader be good enough to cast his eye on the Cortez securities
as shown in the picture drawn from memory by an artist yet a perfect
gentleman?
[Illustration: BANK OF CORTEZ.]
Notice the bonds Nos. 18 and 27. Do you notice the listening attitude of
No. 18? He is listening to the accumulating interest. Note the aged and
haggard look of No. 27. He has just begun to notice that he is maturing.
Cast your eye on the prone form of No. 31. He has just fallen due, and
in doing so has hurt his crazy-bone (see Appendix).
Be good enough to study the gold-bearing bond behind the screen. See the
look of anguish. Some one has cut off a coupon probably. Cortez was that
kind of a man. He would clip the ear of an Inca and make him scream with
pain, so that his friends would come in and redeem him. Once the bank
examiner came to examine the Cortez bank. He imparted a pleasing flavor
on the following day to the soup.
Spain owned at the close of the sixteenth century the West Indies,
Yucatan, Mexico, and Florida, besides unlimited water facilities and the
Peruvian preserves.
North Carolina was discovered by the French navigator Verrazani, thirty
years later than Cabot did, but as Cabot did not record his claim at the
court-house in Wilmington the Frenchman jumped the claim in 1524, and
the property remained about the same till again discovered by George W.
Vanderbilt in the latter part of the present century.
Montreal was discovered in 1535 by Cartier, also a Frenchman.
Ribaut discovered South Carolina, and left thirty men to hold it. They
were at that time the only white men from-Mexico to the North Pole, and
a keen business man could have bought the whole thing, Indians and all,
for a good team and a jug of nepenthe. But why repine?
The Jesuit missionaries about the middle of the seventeenth century
pushed their way to the North Mississippi and sought to convert the
Indians. The Jesuits deserve great credit for their patience, endurance,
and industry, but they were shocked to find the Indian averse to work.
They also advanced slowly in church work, and would often avoid early
mass that they might catch a mess of trout or violate the game law by
killing a Dakotah in May.
[Illustration: CONVERTING INDIANS.]
Father Marquette discovered the Upper Mississippi not far from a large
piece of suburban property owned by the author, north of Minneapolis.
The ground has not been disturbed since discovered by Father Marquette.
The English also discovered America from time to time, the Cabots
finding Labrador while endeavoring to go to Asia via the North, and
Frobisher discovered Baffin Bay in 1576 while on a like mission. The
Spanish discovered the water mostly, and England the ice belonging to
North America.
Sir Francis Drake also discovered the Pacific Ocean, and afterward
sailed an English ship on its waters, discovering Oregon.
Sir Walter Raleigh, with the endorsement of his half-brother, Sir
Humphrey Gilbert, regarding the idea of colonization of America, and
being a great friend of Queen Elizabeth, got out a patent on Virginia.
He planted a colony and a patch of tobacco on Roanoke Island, but the
colonists did not care for agriculture, preferring to hunt for gold and
pearls. In this way they soon ran out of food, and were constantly
harassed by Indians.
[Illustration: COULD NOT REACH THEM.]
It was an odd sight to witness a colonist coming home after a long hard
day hunting for pearls as he asked his wife if she would be good enough
to pull an arrow out of some place which he could not reach himself.
Raleigh spent two hundred thousand dollars in his efforts to colonize
Virginia, and then, disgusted, divided up his patent and sold county
rights to it at a pound apiece. This was in 1589. Raleigh learned the
use of smoking tobacco at this time.
[Illustration: RALEIGH'S ASTONISHMENT.]
He was astonished when he tried it first, and threatened to change his
boarding-place or take his meals out, but soon enjoyed it, and before
he had been home a week Queen Elizabeth thought it to be an excellent
thing for her house plants. It is now extensively used in the best
narcotic circles.
[Illustration: RALEIGH'S ENJOYMENT.]
Several other efforts were made by the English to establish colonies in
this country, but the Indians thought that these English people bathed
too much, and invited perspiration between baths.
One can see readily that the Englishman with his portable bath-tub has
been a flag of defiance from the earliest discoveries till this day.
This chapter brings us to the time when settlements were made as
follows:
The French at Port Royal, N.S., 1605.
The English at Jamestown 1607.
The French at Quebec 1608.
The Dutch at New York 1613.
The English at Plymouth 1620.
* * * * *
The author's thanks are due to the following books of reference,
which, added to his retentive memory, have made the foregoing
statements accurate yet pleasing:
A Summer in England with H. W. Beecher. By J. B. Reed.
Russell's Digest of the Laws of Minnesota, with Price-List of
Members.
Out-Door and Bug Life in America. By Chilblainy, Chief of the
Umatilla.
Why I am an Indian. By S. Bull. With Notes by Ole Bull and
Introduction by John Bull.
[Illustration: BONA FIDE PICTURE OF THE MAYFLOWER.]