was doing great things. It was buffeting, lashing, and wrecking a
caravel which was taking Bobadilla to Spain. The ship, plunging under
the howling, raging, black waters, sank to the bottom of the ocean,
taking Bobadilla with it, and the treasure he had stolen from Columbus.
But Columbus’s own caravels won safely through the storm and across the
Caribbean Sea. They drew near to an unknown shore--the coast of Central
America.
There is not space here in which to tell of the many adventures of
Columbus and his men, nor of all the things that Ferdinand saw. There
were other storms. At one time, the seas ran high and terrific, foaming
like a caldron. The sky burned like a furnace, the lightning played with
such fury that the waves were red like blood.
The coast of Central America was thickly peopled with savages. Some of
them were richly clothed, and wore ornaments of gold and coral, and
carried golden mirrors fastened round their necks. Ferdinand saw other
savages in trees living like wild birds, their huts built on sticks
placed across from bough to bough. He saw strange beasts, beautiful
birds, delicious fruits, brilliant flowers, great apes, and alligators
basking in the rivers.
There were fights with natives, a massacre of some of his father’s men,
there was starvation and misery. Then Columbus, after having sailed down
the coast and back again, turned the ships homeward.
Then came the most terrible adventure of all. The ships were riddled by
worms, their sides were rotten, and the water was pouring through them
like a sieve. Columbus reached the lonely island of Jamaica, just in
time to drive his two remaining ships on the beach, and save them from
sinking.
There for many months Ferdinand was marooned with his father and the
men. There was more starvation, a mutiny, and adventures with savages.
Then came the exciting rescue by two caravels.
Such were the adventures of Queen Isabella’s page. But he went back to
Spain without seeing Cathay the Golden and Kublai Khan’s palace.
THE TWIN CITIES
While Columbus was exploring the coast of Central America, he fell sick
of a fever. He had a dream. He tells us of this dream in his own
letters.
He dreamed that a compassionate Voice spoke to him, bidding him believe
in God, and serve Him who had had him from infancy in His constant and
watchful care, and who had chosen him to unlock the barriers of the
Ocean Sea.
This Voice said many things to Columbus, adding these words, “Even now
He partially shows thee the reward of so many toils and dangers
incurred by thee in the service of others. Fear not but trust.”
And even then, Columbus, though he did not know it, was actually seeing
the land where his hopes were to come true. For to-day, we Americans
know that while Columbus was exploring inlets and river-mouths on the
coast of Central America searching for the Western Passage to Asia, he
entered Limon Bay of Panama. He even sailed part way up the Chagres
River.
And if his melancholy eager eyes might have been opened, what a vision
he would have had of the future! He would have beheld the Caribbean Sea
beating on civilized shores. He would have seen Twin Cities rising,
their pleasant white, palm-shaded houses smiling in the sun, the Twin
Cities of Cristobal and Colon--Christopher and Columbus--proud to bear
his famous name. He would have seen those Twin Cities guarding _a
Western Passage to Asia_.
He would have perceived in his vision ships, greater than any Spanish
caravels, sliding through a Canal the wonder of the world, on their way
to and from Asia the Golden.
* * * * *
But as it was, in a miserable little caravel, tempest-racked, with masts
sprung and sides worm-eaten, the weary disappointed Columbus with the
boy Ferdinand, returned at last to Spain.
And about two years later, in the City of Valladolid, “the Grand Old
Admiral,” who had given a New World to the Old, died almost in poverty.
As he passed away, he murmured, “Into Thy hands, O Lord, I commend my
spirit.”
THE PEARLS AGAIN
The curse of the pearls still held strong after Columbus’s death. News
of the discovery of the Pearl Islands in the New World, spread rapidly
through Europe. Many cruel and greedy pearl-hunters hastened to set out
for the islands.
They pillaged the native villages. They hunted the Indians like wild
beasts. They forced them to work in the mines. But, worst of all, they
made them dive into the deep sea for pearls, under the most horrible
conditions.
Then it was that the compassionate friend of the Indians, the humane
priest Bartolome de Las Casas, took up their cause and pleaded for them
with the Spanish Crown. But Spain was too far away for the Crown to
control Spanish officials in America, and do much to lessen the
sufferings of the natives.
Thus sorrow and desolation followed the finding of the sea-jewels. In
time, they became a rich part of the cargoes of the Treasure Galleons.
And they forged one of the first links in the chain of oppression which
bound all Spanish America for over three hundred years.
For how this chain was broken by the great Liberators, read:--
_Miranda, the Flaming Son of Liberty_, page 325; _San Martin, the
Protector_, page 235; _O’Higgins, First Soldier, First Citizen_,
page 393; _Bolivar, the Liberator_, page 371.
OCTOBER 14
WILLIAM PENN THE FOUNDER OF PENNSYLVANIA
_As Justice is a preserver, so it is a better procurer of Peace,
than War._
WILLIAM PENN
_Within the Land of Penn,
The sectary yielded to the citizen,
And peaceful dwelt the many-creeded men._
_Peace brooded over all. No trumpet stung
The air to madness, and no steeple flung
Alarums down from bells at midnight rung._
_The Land slept well. The Indian from his face
Washed all his war-paint off, and in the place
Of battle-marches, sped the peaceful chase._
* * * * *
_The desert blossomed round him; wheatfields rolled
Beneath the warm wind, waves of green and gold,
The planted ear returned its hundredfold._
JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER
WILLIAM PENN was born in London, October 14, 1644
Received the Charter, granting him Pennsylvania, 1681
Composed the Plan for the Peace of Europe, 1693
He died in England, May 30, 1718.
THE BOY OF GREAT TOWER HILL
In a house on Great Tower Hill near London Wall, was born William Penn,
who was to become the Founder of Pennsylvania.
He was christened William after his ancestor, Penn of Penn’s Lodge. He
was a charming baby, with round face, soft blue eyes, and curling hair.
His father, Captain Penn, who had been called home to see the new baby
on that first birthday of little William Penn, went back to his ship
rejoicing that he had such a handsome son and heir.
When William Penn was ten years old, a strange thing befell him. He was
not like other boys. He was quiet and serious. At that time he was a
schoolboy in an English village.
One day, he was alone in his room. Suddenly he felt a wonderful peace
and an “inner comfort,” while a glory filled the room. He felt that he
was drawn near to God, so that his soul might speak with him. A strange
experience for a boy to have. But it was an experience which helped to
shape William Penn’s life. From that time on, he believed that he had
been called to live a holy life.
When he grew older, his family tried to make him forget this religious
experience, but he never forgot. In time he became a Friend--or Quaker.
In those days, Friends were bitterly persecuted in England. William Penn
suffered imprisonments and persecutions, but always with patient
sweetness and endurance.
At last, the persecutions of the Friends made William Penn turn his
thoughts toward the New World of America.
HE WORE IT AS LONG AS HE COULD
When William Penn became a Friend, he did not immediately leave off his
gay apparel, as other Friends did. He even wore a sword, as was
customary among men of rank and fashion.
One day, being with George Fox the great leader of the Friends, he asked
his advice about wearing the sword, saying that it had once been the
means of saving his life without injuring his antagonist, and that
moreover Christ has said, “He that hath no sword, let him sell his
garment and buy one.”
“I advise thee,” answered George Fox quietly, “to wear it _as long as
thou canst_.”
Shortly after this, they met again. William Penn had no sword.
“William,” said George Fox, “where is thy sword?”
“Oh!” replied William Penn, “I have taken thy advice. I wore it _as long
as I could_!”
_Samuel M. Janney_ (_Retold_)
THE PEACEMAKER
“He must not be a man but a statue of brass or stone, whose bowels do
not melt when he beholds the bloody tragedies of this war in Hungary,
Germany, Flanders, Ireland, and at sea; the mortality of sickly and
languishing camps and navies; and the mighty prey the devouring winds
and waves have made upon ships and men,” wrote William Penn over two
hundred years ago.
It was then that William Penn became the peacemaker.
The world was in the midst of a terrible war. William Penn did not
believe in war. He had cast aside his own sword for principle’s sake,
and had bravely suffered persecutions and imprisonments in the Tower of
London and in Newgate. Fearlessly now he came forward with a plan for
world peace, which he hoped would stop bloody wars, and persuade rulers
to arbitrate their quarrels.
He published a “Plan for the Peace of Europe,” urging the formation of a
league of European countries.
So earnest is this plan and so profoundly thought out, that it has had
much influence on rulers and statesmen, who from time to time have held
peace congresses in Europe. But rivalry of Nations, has prevented the
peace plan from ever being carried out.
“Christians,” argued William Penn, “have embrewed their hands in one
another’s blood, invoking and interesting all they could the good and
merciful God to prosper their arms to their brethren’s destruction. Yet
their Saviour has told them that He came to save and not to destroy the
lives of men, to give and plant peace among men. And, if in any sense,
He may be said to send war, it is the Holy War indeed, for it is against
the Devil, and not the persons of men. Of all His titles, this seems the
most glorious as well as comfortable for us, that He is the _Prince of
Peace_.”
WESTWARD HO, AND AWAY!
The time arrived when William Penn’s peaceful thoughts went sailing over
the Atlantic, westward ho, and away! For he was appointed a trustee of
Jersey in America. There came to him while he was still in England, news
of immense tracts of land lying beyond Jersey, so fertile that under
cultivation they would yield harvests unparalleled in his island home.
He heard of rich minerals, of noble forests, of river-banks offering
splendid sites for towns and cities, of bays where proud navies might
ride at anchor.
Moreover, many Friends, who had fled from persecution in England, were
settled in Jersey. Their industry had already turned the wilderness into
a garden. They were holding their meetings and worshipping God, without
fear of constables and fines, of imprisonments and attacks by mobs. In
Jersey, they had full liberty of conscience.
And William Penn, as his thoughts sailed westward ho, and away! saw,
rising from the sea, bright and fair, a land of refuge not only for
persecuted Friends, but for all oppressed people. He determined to found
a new State in America, where nobody should be persecuted for religion’s
sake, where everybody should be free, and where the people should govern
themselves. “A holy experiment,” he called it.
He presented a petition to Charles the Second, asking for a royal grant
of land near Jersey. “After many waitings, watchings, solicitings,” the
title to a vast tract was confirmed to him under the Great Seal of
England. He was to be its ruler and “Lord Proprietor,” “with large
powers and privileges.” He was to make laws, grant pardons, and appoint
officials as he saw fit, but subject to the approval of the English
Government.
Penn named his land, “Sylvania”; but the King called it Penn-sylvania,
in honour of old Admiral Penn, William Penn’s father.
Almost the first thing that Penn did was to write to the people already
settled in Pennsylvania, “a loving address.”
“My Friends,” he began, “I wish you all happiness, here and hereafter.
These are to let you know that it hath pleased God, in his providence,
to cast you within my lot and care....
“You shall be governed by laws of your own making, and live a free, and,
if you will, a sober and industrious people.”
Thus William Penn promised the People of Pennsylvania, Liberty and the
right to govern themselves. And he kept his promises.
_John Stoughton_ (_Retold_)
THE CITY OF BROTHERLY LOVE
With what delight did William Penn first set foot on the shore of the
Delaware River. It was Autumn. The sweet clear air, the serene skies,
the trees, fruits, and flowers, filled him with a wellnigh unspeakable
joy.
And later, while being rowed up the river in a barge, he saw the ancient
forest trees on either bank, their leaves flaming with red, gold, and
amber. He saw flocks of wild fowl rise up from the water, and fly
screaming overhead. The solitude and grandeur of the wilderness brooded
over all.
Meanwhile, farther up the river, a welcome was awaiting him. In a little
town, shaded by pine-trees and built on the high shore, there were white
men and Indians hurrying to and fro. They were preparing an
entertainment for William Penn, their Governor.
The town was Penn’s capital city. He had named it Philadelphia, which
means Brotherly Love.
And as his barge drew near the City of Brotherly Love, the white
settlers, Swedish, Dutch, and English Friends, greeted him heartily, for
they already knew how just, gentle, and wise he was.
As for the Indians, so stately in their robes of fur and nodding plumes,
William Penn walked with them, and sat down on the ground to eat with
them. They gave him hominy and roasted acorns. And after the feast, they
entertained him with their sports, jumping and hopping. And William Penn
sprang up gayly like a boy, and joining in their games, beat them all,
young Braves and old.
And so the Red Men learned to love and trust their great White
Father--Onas they called him. For Onas is Indian for a pen, or a quill.
Such was William Penn’s happy welcome to the City of Brotherly Love.
THE PLACE OF KINGS
It was the last of November. The lofty forest trees on the shore of the
Delaware had shed their summer attire. The ground was strewn with
leaves. A Council-fire was burning brightly beneath a huge Elm, not far
from the City of Brotherly Love.
It was an ancient Elm, which for over a hundred years had guarded
Shackamaxon, the Place of Kings. For long before the Pale-faces had
landed on the shore of the Delaware, Indian Sachems, Kings of the Red
Skins, had held their friendly councils in its shade, and smoked many a
Pipe of Peace.
On that November day, the tribes of the Lenni Lenapé under the
wide-spreading branches of the Elm, were gathered around the
Council-fire. They were seated in a half circle, like a half moon. They
were all unarmed.
Among the Chiefs, was the Great Sachem Taminend, revered for his wisdom
and beloved for his goodness. He sat in the middle of the half moon,
with his council, the aged and wise, on either hand.
They waited.
Then, lo! a barge approached. At its masthead flew the broad pennant of
Governor William Penn. The oars were plied with measured strokes,
guiding the barge to land. And near the helm sat William Penn attended
by his council.
He landed with his people, and advanced toward the Council-fire. A
handsome man he was, only thirty-eight years old, athletic, and
graceful. His manners were courteous, his blue eyes were friendly. He
was plainly dressed, with a scarf of sky-blue network bound about his
waist.
Some of his people preceded him. They carried presents for the Indians,
which they laid on the ground before them.
Then William Penn approached the Council-fire.
Thereupon the Great Sachem, Taminend, put on a chaplet surmounted by a
horn, the emblem of his power, and through an interpreter announced that
the Nations were ready to hear William Penn.
Thus being called upon, William Penn began his speech:--
“The Great Spirit,” he said, “who made me and you, who rules the heavens
and the earth, and who knows the innermost thoughts of men, knows that I
and my friends have a hearty desire to live in peace and friendship with
you, and to serve you to the utmost of our power.
“It is not our custom to use hostile weapons against our
fellow-creatures, for which reason we have come unarmed. Our object is
not to do injury, and thus provoke the Great Spirit, but to do good.
“We are met on the broad pathway of good faith and good will, so that no
advantage is to be taken on either side, but all to be openness,
brotherhood, and love.”
Here William Penn unrolled a parchment on which was inscribed an
agreement for trading, and promises of friendship. He explained the
agreement article by article. Then laying the parchment on the ground,
he said that that spot should ever more be common to both
Peoples,--Pale-face and Red Skin.
The Indians listened to his speech in perfect silence, and with deep
gravity. And when he was finished speaking, they deliberated together,
for some time. Then the Great Sachem ordered one of his Chiefs to
address William Penn.
The Chief advanced, and in the Sachem’s name saluted him, and taking
William Penn by the hand, made a speech pledging kindness and
neighbourliness, saying that the English and the Lenni Lenapé should
live together in love, so long as the sun and the moon should endure.
_Samuel M. Janney_ (_Retold_)
ONAS
After the Treaty was made at the Place of Kings, the Lenni Lenapé, for
many years enjoyed the mild and just rule of their “elder brother Onas.”
He met them often around the Council-fire, hearing and rectifying their
wrongs, adjusting trade matters, and smoking with them the Pipe of
Peace.
And William Penn made treaties with the Indians who dwelt on the
Potomac, and with the Five Nations. Thus Pennsylvania had quiet; and the
Red Men were friends of the settlers. Sometimes they brought the white
men venison, beans, and maize, and refused to take pay. Whereas, in the
other Colonies, the Indians were dangerous neighbours, cruel and
delighting in blood. They had been made suspicious and revengeful by the
injustice and wickedness of white men.
So the Red Men of Pennsylvania, trusted William Penn, although he was a
Pale-face. What Pale-face had they ever seen like him? A Pale-face was
to them a trapper, a soldier, a pirate, a man who cheated them in
barter, who gave them fire-water to drink, who hustled them off their
hunting-ground.
But here was one Pale-face, who would not cheat and lie; who would not
fire into their lodge; who would not rob them of their beaver skins;
who would not take a rood of land from them, till they had fixed and he
had paid their price.
Where were they to look for such another lord?
So when they heard that Onas was about to sail for England, Indians from
all parts of Pennsylvania gathered to take sorrowful leave of him.
After he was gone, they preserved with care the memory of their treaties
with him, by means of strings or belts of wampum. Often they gathered
together in the woods, on some shady spot, and laid their wampum belts
on a blanket or a clean piece of bark, and with great satisfaction went
over the whole. So great was their reverence and affection for William
Penn, inspired by his virtues, that they handed on the memory of his
name to their children.
* * * * *
When William Penn died in England, the Indians sent his wife a message,
mourning the loss of their “honoured brother Onas.”
And with the message went a present of beautiful skins for a cloak “to
protect her while passing through the thorny wilderness without her
guide.”
_W. Hepworth Dixon and Other Sources_
OCTOBER 27
THEODORE ROOSEVELT AMERICA’S HERO
_On behalf of all our people, on behalf no less of the honest man of
means, than of the honest man who earns each day’s livelihood by that
day’s sweat of his brow, it is necessary to insist upon honesty in
business and politics alike, in all walks of life, in big things and in
little things; upon just and fair dealing as between man and man._
THEODORE ROOSEVELT
THE SQUARE DEAL
_We of the great modern democracies, must strive unceasingly to make our
several Countries, lands in which a poor man who works hard can live
comfortably and honestly, and in which a rich man cannot live
dishonestly nor in slothful avoidance of duty._
_And yet, we must judge rich man and poor man alike by a standard which
rests on conduct and not on caste. And we must frown with the same stern
severity on the mean and vicious envy which hates and would plunder a
man because he is well off, and on the brutal and selfish arrogance,
which looks down on and exploits the man with whom life has gone hard._
THEODORE ROOSEVELT
COLONEL THEODORE ROOSEVELT was born in New York City, October 27,
1858
Was appointed Police Commissioner of New York City, 1895
Aided in establishing the Independence of Cuba, 1898
Was elected Governor of the State of New York, 1898
Served as President of the United States, 1901-1909
He died, January 6, 1919.
THE BOY WHO GREW STRONG
_Not in a Log Cabin_
Theodore Roosevelt, unlike Abraham Lincoln, was not born in a log cabin.
On the contrary, he was born to wealth and position in the City of New
York.
He was reared in an elegant home and educated in one of the famous
universities of the Country. He read law, but he had no need to practise
a profession. His father had retired from business, and there was no
occasion for the son to take up a business career.
But Theodore Roosevelt preferred for himself a life of toil--the
strenuous life.
Ill-health was the first and greatest of all his disadvantages. “When a
boy,” said he, “I was pig-chested and asthmatic.”
From earliest infancy he was called to battle with asthma. It lowered
his vitality and threatened his growth. His body was frail, but within
was the conquering spirit. He determined to be strong like other boys.
In this, he had the loving help of gentle parents. On the wide back
porch of their home in the City of New York, they fitted up a gymnasium,
where he strove for bodily vigour with all his might. Although at the
start, his pole climbing was very poor, he kept trying until he got to
the top. He would carry his gymnastic exercises to the perilous verge of
the window ledge, more to the alarm of the neighbours than of his own
family.
_In the Wide Out-of-Doors_
Summer was the season of Roosevelt’s delight. Then he ceased to be a
city boy. At his father’s country place on Long Island, he learned to
run and ride, row, and swim. And when the long sleepless nights came,
the father would take his invalid boy in his arms, wrap him up warmly,
and drive with him in the free open air through fifteen or twenty miles
of darkness.
The boy had his father’s love of the woods and the fields. He studied
and classified the birds of the neighbourhood, until he knew their songs
and plumage and nests. He and his young friends could be relied on to
find the spot where the violets bloomed the earliest, and the trees on
which the walnuts were most plentiful, as well as the pools where the
minnows swarmed, and the favourite refuge of the coon.
He was taken to Europe, in the hope that it would benefit his health, “a
tall thin lad with bright eyes and legs like pipestems.”
When at last, he was ready to go to college, he had vanquished his
enemy, ill-health, and was ready to play a man’s part in life.
“I made my health what it is,” he said later, “I determined to be strong
and well, and did everything to make myself so. By the time I entered
Harvard, I was able to take part in whatever sports I liked. I wrestled
and sparred, and I ran a great deal, and, although I never came in
first, I got more out of the exercise than those who did, because I
immensely enjoyed it and never injured myself.
_Busting Broncos_
After leaving college, young Roosevelt entered politics. Finally,
between legislative sessions, he surrendered to his impulses and started
for the Wild West.
He left the train in North Dakota at the little town of Medora. The
young visitor from the East, sought out two hunters and told them that
he wished to go buffalo hunting with them. And he did so, though hunting
the buffalo then was no fancy pastime.