[Illustration: GEORGE WASHINGTON]
_GRADED SUPPLEMENTARY READING SERIES_
BRIEF BIOGRAPHIES FROM
AMERICAN HISTORY
FOR THE FIFTH AND SIXTH GRADES
REQUIRED BY THE SYLLABUS FOR ELEMENTARY SCHOOLS
OF THE NEW YORK STATE EDUCATION DEPARTMENT
BY
EDNA HENRY LEE TURPIN
AUTHOR OF “CLASSIC FABLES,” “STORIES FROM AMERICAN HISTORY,”
“FAMOUS PAINTERS,” ETC., ETC.
NEW YORK
CHARLES E. MERRILL CO.
COPYRIGHT, 1907,
BY
CHARLES E. MERRILL CO.
PREFACE
“Universal history, the history of what man has accomplished in the
world, is at bottom the history of the great men who have worked here,”
says Carlyle. “The history of the world is the biography of great men.”
What the historian-philosopher esteemed the truest form of history
is undoubtedly the form which appeals earliest and most strongly
to the child mind. This fact has been recognized by educators, and
biographical stories in the lower grades are wisely made the foundation
for more comprehensive work in advanced grades.
The following biographies of men and women prominent in the making of
American history are intended as an introduction to a topical study of
the history of the United States. These biographies are prepared to
meet the requirements of the New York State schools; the author has
followed the plan outlined in the State Syllabus. She has in every
case consulted the most recent and authoritative biographies, and has
endeavored to make the narrative truthful and vivid.
PUBLISHERS’ NOTE
This book contains all the biographical matter required for the fifth
and sixth grades in the Elementary Syllabus of the New York State
Education Department, and follows faithfully the outlines given.
The style is clear, easy, and concise, common words and short sentences
being used.
The aim is to bring out, so far as the brief space will allow, those
biographical and dramatic elements which make the strongest appeal to
the pupil.
While no attempt is made to present a continuous history of our
country, these biographies show its development from the time of
discovery and exploration through the days of colonization and
settlement to the present period of invention and industrial supremacy.
CONTENTS
PAGE
ADAMS, SAMUEL 149
BACON, NATHANIEL 122
BALTIMORE, CECIL CALVERT, LORD 105
BARTON, CLARA 290
BELL, ALEXANDER GRAHAM 236
BOONE, DANIEL 200
CABOT, JOHN 37
CARNEGIE, ANDREW 297
CHAMPLAIN, SAMUEL DE 94
CLAY, HENRY 247
CLINTON, DEWITT 218
COLUMBUS, CHRISTOPHER 20
DE SOTO, FERDINAND 31
DEWEY, GEORGE B. 292
DRAKE, SIR FRANCIS 41
EDISON, THOMAS A. 238
FARRAGUT, DAVID G. 282
FIELD, CYRUS W. 236
FRANKLIN, BENJAMIN 126
FULTON, ROBERT 223
GRANT, ULYSSES S. 267
GREENE, NATHANAEL 176
HAMILTON, ALEXANDER 193
HENRY, PATRICK 142
HUDSON, HENRY 80
JACKSON, ANDREW 240
JEFFERSON, THOMAS 186
JONES, JOHN PAUL 181
LAFAYETTE, MARIE JEAN, MARQUIS DE 212
LA SALLE, ROBERT DE 100
LEE, ROBERT E. 277
LEIF THE LUCKY 7
LINCOLN, ABRAHAM 257
MCCORMICK, CYRUS 230
MACDONOUGH, THOMAS 204
MINUIT, PETER 84
MONTCALM, LOUIS, MARQUIS DE 136
MORSE, SAMUEL F. B. 233
OGLETHORPE, JAMES EDWARD 114
PENN, WILLIAM 109
PERRY, OLIVER HAZARD 204
PHILIP, KING OF WAMPANOAGS 118
POCAHONTAS 58
POLO, MARCO 13
RALEIGH, SIR WALTER 46
SCHUYLER, PHILIP 169
SMITH, CAPTAIN JOHN 51
STANDISH, MILES 62
STEPHENSON, GEORGE 220
STUYVESANT, PETER 89
WASHINGTON, GEORGE 156
WEBSTER, DANIEL 253
WHITNEY, ELI 226
WILLIAMS, ROGER 76
WINTHROP, JOHN, GOVERNOR 70
WOLFE, JAMES 136
BRIEF BIOGRAPHIES FROM AMERICAN HISTORY
FOR THE FIFTH AND SIXTH GRADES
Leif the Lucky
From the northwestern coast of Europe projects the rock-ribbed
Scandinavian peninsula. The scenery is grand and picturesque, but
the soil is sterile and the climate severe. In this bleak, beautiful
country and on the adjacent islands of the Baltic Sea, there lived, a
thousand years ago, the people called the Norsemen or Northmen.
Their houses were usually long wooden structures a hundred or two
hundred feet in length. Sometimes these houses were divided into
several rooms, but often the dwelling consisted of only one large
hall or living-room. On the floor of stone or hard-trampled earth,
was kindled a fire, the smoke from which found its way upward and out
through the crevices of the high-pitched roof. On three sides of the
room were built beds,--shelf-like structures of boards, with skins for
bedding and blankets.
The Norsemen did not even attempt to wrest a living from the reluctant
soil. At home their days were given to hunting and fishing, their
evenings to feasting in the hall. While they sat at table, the
scalds, as their poets were called, sang or recited tales of battles,
conquests, voyages,--the daring deeds of the vikings or sea-robbers and
the sea-kings of their race. Thus in hunting, fishing, and feasting
passed the winter.
When summer unlocked the storm- and ice-bound harbors, the Norsemen put
forth in their ships. Their long-ships, or ships of war, were long,
narrow vessels; on each side were benches for rowers and over the sides
hung the shining shields of the Norsemen. Hundreds of these little
vessels pushed off boldly from the shores of Scandinavia every summer.
The Norsemen knew nothing of the mariner’s compass, and they directed
their course on the pathless seas by means of the stars. This was a
dangerous undertaking, and in stormy, foggy weather, many a boat lost
its bearings and went down with all on board.
Fleets of the long-boats, however, braved the rough seas and sought
distant lands--the coasts of England, France, Spain, Italy, even of
Greece and Africa. What was their object? Plunder and always plunder.
The fierce, merciless sea-soldiers descended on a land suddenly, like a
thunder-cloud from the blue summer sky. They laid it waste; then, with
stores of gold and silver, household goods and provisions, they sailed
back home. Year after year, century after century, the Norsemen made
these summer raids and were a terror to all the western and southern
coasts of Europe.
But in the course of time, the character of the Norse invasions
changed. The men did not sail forth alone for summer raids. Instead,
men, women, and children went together and wintered on the coasts which
they plundered. Sometimes they remained summer and winter and made the
stolen lands their own. They were so strong and fierce in battle that
few people could withstand them.
They overran the coasts of England, and it seemed as if they would
take possession of the land. But a brave, wise king, Alfred the Great,
defeated them on land, and built boats, the beginning of the English
navy, to defend the coasts. Thus the Norse people in England became
subjects instead of masters.
France, however, did not have an Alfred the Great. In the ninth century
Rolf, a bold Norseman, established himself on the fair coastland of
France. In course of time, the people there were called Normans instead
of Norsemen, and the land they had seized was known as Normandy. These
Normans, like their Norse ancestors, were fond of battle and conquest.
One of them, Duke William, went to England, took possession of the
land, and made himself King William.
The Norsemen went west as well as south, and in the ninth century, they
settled in Iceland. Thence they pushed on to Greenland, where they
established a colony. Farther west than Greenland it is said that they
went, to the continent of America, hundreds of years before Columbus
was born.
Here is the story as the Sagas, or old Scandinavian tales, tell it.
In 985, Bjarni, a merchant and ship-master who was traveling from
Iceland to Greenland, was driven out of his course by a storm and foggy
weather. “They were borne before the wind for many days, they knew
not whither.” When at last calm and sunshine came, they reached a low
wooded shore, probably Cape Cod. Leaving this land on the left, Bjarni
sailed northward, with a favoring wind. Two days later, he again came
near land, low and wooded. This is supposed to have been Nova Scotia.
Again Bjarni turned from the coast which he felt sure was not the land
that he sought, “because they told me,” he said, “that there are great
mountains of ice in Greenland.” Three days later, he reached a rocky,
snow-covered shore. He coasted along this till he found that it was an
island,--probably Newfoundland,--and then again he turned away. A storm
from the south drove him on his course and in four days he reached
Greenland.
He told the story of his wanderings on the western seas, but he did not
attempt to revisit the lands he had found. At last the tale came to the
ears of Leif Eriksen, “a man strong and of great stature, of dignified
aspect, wise and moderate in all things.”
Leif bought Bjarni’s ship and in 999 sailed forth with about
twenty-five men to find the new land. He reached the snow-covered
island--Newfoundland--which he called Helluland, “land of broad
stones,” and he went ashore to see its “frozen heights and bare
flat rocks.” Next he visited the “low wooded land of white sandy
shore”--Nova Scotia--which he called “Markland, land of woods.” At last
he reached the third promontory--Cape Cod,--the first which Bjarni had
beheld; there he landed and passed the winter. From the wild grapes,
then as now plentiful on the coast of Massachusetts Bay, the Norsemen
gave the land the name “Vinland,” land of wine. The next spring they
returned to Greenland, rescuing on the way a crew of shipwrecked men.
From this time Leif was called “Leif the Lucky.”
Two years later Leif said to his brother Thorvald, “Go brother, take
my ship to Vinland.” Thorvald with thirty men spent the winter in the
dwellings Leif had erected two years before; the next summer they
explored the surrounding country and wintered again in “Leif’s booths.”
In the summer of 1004, the Norsemen coasted along the shore exploring
the country. At one time when they landed, they were attacked by
natives, supposed to be Esquimaux, whom they called Skrælings. In the
skirmish Thorvald received a fatal wound from an arrow. His followers
returned to “Leif’s booths” and in the summer of 1005 went back to
Greenland; they gave an enthusiastic description of Vinland, with its
vines, wild corn, fish, and game.
A few years later, Thorfinn Karlsefne and his wife Gudrid with three
ships and one hundred and sixty persons made a voyage to Vinland.
Gudrid’s son Snorri, the ancestor of the famous Danish sculptor
Thorwaldsen, is said to have been born in Vinland. At the end of three
years, the party returned to Greenland. After the death of her husband,
Gudrid made a pilgrimage to Rome, where she described to the pope the
fair new land in the west, the Christian settlement in “Vinland the
Good.”
From Greenland, we are told, hunters and fishermen made frequent
voyages to Vinland. They established settlements there and carried on
a fur trade with the Indians. But in course of time, these posts were
destroyed by the Indians, and the Norse settlements in Greenland itself
were destroyed by war and plague. The western voyages and the memory of
them ceased. Only the Scalds, trained to repeat family histories and
tales of war and conquest, remembered and related the story of Vinland.
In the course of time, these sagas, or stories, were written down,
and centuries later men learned about the Norse colony, or “western
planting,” in the New World.
Marco Polo
A Famous Traveler
You do not need to be told that the world as known to us to-day is very
different from the world as it was known--or misknown--to the people
of the thirteenth century. Two great inventions broadened the horizon
of Europe; these were the mariner’s compass and the printing press.
The mariner’s compass made it possible for men to strike boldly across
unknown seas instead of clinging to familiar shores; the printing press
spread books abroad and conveyed the knowledge of the few to the masses.
To-day, the steamship and the railway unite countries and destroy
distance. Even the parts of the world where these do not penetrate,
own, to a greater or less extent, the power of the great nations of the
world. A citizen of the United States can cross the deserts of Africa
or penetrate the wilds of Asia and be protected by his nation’s flag.
There is hardly a place so secluded that some hardy traveler has not
visited it, describing and picturing the country, people, and customs
so as to make them known to all the world.
Very different was the state of affairs in the thirteenth century. The
European who started east had an unblazed trail before him. He had to
make his way on foot or on horseback, by sail or row boats, through
mountain passes, trackless forests, and vast deserts, and across
streams and seas. On the land, he encountered robbers; on the waters,
pirates. Everywhere were people with unknown customs and strange
languages. The chances were that the adventurous traveler, instead of
returning home, would leave his bones to whiten foreign sands.
Yet one traveler encountered and passed through all these dangers,
returned safe home, and dictated an account of his travels,--a true
story, as wonderful as the tales of the “Arabian Nights.” Perhaps some
day you will read the story of Marco Polo’s travels.
Marco Polo began life with three advantages; he was born in the
thirteenth century, he was a Venetian, and he was a Polo. Venice,
in the Middle Ages, was one of the commercial centers of the world.
The great oceans were as yet uncrossed; the Italian cities sent
forth merchant-vessels which brought across the Mediterranean the
goods conveyed overland by caravans from the East,--the spices,
gold, and jewels of Asia. Among the Venetian families made wealthy
by commerce--the merchant-princes, as they were called--was the Polo
family. About the middle of the thirteenth century, there were three
Polo brothers engaged in commerce.
Two of these brothers went to the East, first to the Crimea and
thence to Cathay, as China was then called. They were probably the
first European travelers who reached China. They went to Cambaluc, or
Peking, where they were graciously received by the great emperor,
Kublai Khan. He was the grandson of Jenghiz, who had made himself
master of northern China. The son and grandson of Jenghiz extended his
conquests, so that the kingdom of Kublai Khan embraced China, northern
Asia, Persia, Armenia, and parts of Asia Minor and Russia. Under this
powerful ruler, the East was not only bound together in one vast
empire, it was open to Europeans as it had never been before and has
never been since. Kublai Khan welcomed the Polo brothers to his court,
and they spent there several years. At last they returned to Venice,
where Nicolo had left his wife; his son Marco, born the year of his
departure, was now a youth of about eighteen.
The Polo brothers remained in Venice two years and then returned to
Cathay. With them went Marco Polo, a brave, intelligent youth. They
passed through the country around the sources of the river Oxus and
crossed the plateau of Pamir and the great desert of Gobi. Much of this
country had never before been visited by Europeans, and we have no
record of its being revisited until a few years ago when the Orient was
again to some extent opened to the world.
The Polos were welcomed back by Kublai Khan, who was at his winter
residence, Cambaluc, where “are to be seen in wonderful abundance the
precious stones, the pearls, the silks, and the diverse perfumes of
the East.” Marco mastered the four languages most in use at court.
The Khan, seeing that he was both intelligent and discreet, sent him
on public business to Kara Korum, Cochin-China, India, and other parts
of the great empire. When he returned, he was able to give the Khan
information stored in his memory and his note books not only about the
business of which he had charge but also about the manners, customs,
and peculiarities of the peoples he had visited. He became a great
favorite with the Khan and was, we are told, made governor of the great
city of Yang-Chow.
At the end of fifteen years, the Polos desired to revisit their home,
and the Khan consented on condition that they would return to Cathay.
Some idea of the difficulty of the return journey may be gathered from
the fact that it took twenty-six months. We are told that their kindred
did not recognize the long-absent merchants. They gave a grand feast in
oriental style; at the end they donned costumes suiting their rank and
ripped apart their travel-worn garments, displaying dazzling wealth of
rubies, sapphires, and other gems therein concealed.
The Polos had been at home only about three years when there arose war
between Genoa and Venice, which were commercial rivals. The hostile
fleets met in battle and the Venetians were defeated. Among the seven
thousand prisoners was Marco Polo, who was an officer on one of the
Venetian galleys. He was put in prison in Genoa and there he remained
about a year. One of his fellow-prisoners was Rusticiano of Pisa, an
author. The Pisan was much interested in the wonderful adventures of
Polo and wrote them down from dictation.
The book consists practically of two parts. The first part, or prologue
as it is called, relates the circumstances of the two Polos’ first
visit to the Khan’s court, their second voyage accompanied by Marco,
and their return home by way of the Indian Seas and of Persia. Polo
informed the Europeans, who thought that eastern Asia ended in swamps
and fog and darkness, that there was open sea east of Asia and that
he, his father, and his uncle had sailed from the southeast coast
of Cathay, or China, to the Persian Gulf. The second part of Polo’s
“Travels” describes the different states and provinces of Asia, and the
court and rule of Kublai Khan. Little is told of the traveler himself,
but we gather that he was a brave, shrewd, and prudent man.
After Marco Polo’s release from prison in 1299, he seems to have
returned to Venice, married, and lived quietly in his native city until
his death in 1324.
“The Book of Marco Polo,” as Rusticiano of Pisa called his work,
was read with much interest and was translated into many languages.
For many centuries it was the only European description of the far
East, written by an eye-witness. Polo was accused of falsehood and
exaggeration, but as people learned more about the lands he described,
they found that, in the main, he was right; he was truthful and
accurate in describing what he had seen, but he was sometimes misled
by the tales of others to whom he listened. In the prologue, Rusticiano
says that he describes things seen by “Messer Marco Polo, a wise and
noble citizen of Venice.... Some things indeed there be therein which
he beheld not; but these he heard from men of credit and veracity, and
we shall set down things seen as seen, and things heard as heard only,
so that no jot of falsehood may mar the truth of our book and that all
who shall read it or hear it read may put full faith in the truth of
all its contents.”
Marco Polo was the first European traveler to make his way across the
whole length of Asia, naming and describing the kingdoms which he
visited. He was the first to describe the Pamir plateau, “the roof of
the world,” the highest level country on the globe, the deserts and
flowery plains of Persia, the wealth and size of China, the manners and
customs of its people, and the splendid court of its emperor, the great
Kublai Khan. He was the first to describe Tibet, and to tell of Burmah,
Cochin-China, Siam, Japan, Java, Sumatra, Ceylon, and India, not merely
as names but as places he had seen and known. He gave an account of
the secluded Christian empire of Abyssinia, of the tropical luxuriance
of the far-off islands, of the negroes and ivory of Zanzibar, of vast
and distant Madagascar, of Siberia and the Arctic shores with their
dog-sledges, white bears, and reindeer. In brief, he described Asia
from Siberia and the Arctic Ocean, to Ceylon, from the Adriatic Sea
to the Pacific Ocean, and to him Europe owes its first geographical
knowledge of Asia.
In the time of Marco Polo, the Mongolian Empire was probably the
largest in the world. He informed Europeans that in the East, which
they thought inhabited by savage and ignorant people, was a wealthy
and civilized kingdom, swarming with inhabitants and _dotted with huge
cities_. He described the palaces and pleasure grounds of Cambaluc, or
Peking, somewhat as they are to-day. He told how “black stones” were
dug out of the earth and burnt for fuel, because they “burn better
and cost less” than wood,--whereat Polo marveled. He told about the
emperor’s granaries for wheat, barley, millet, and rice, about the
wool, silk, hemp, spices, sugar, gold, and salt of the country. At
first it seems strange that Polo did not mention tea, for hundreds of
years the national drink of the Chinese, but we must remember that he
was associated with the Tartar ruling classes and so was to a great
extent ignorant of the manners and customs of the subject natives.
Cipangu or Cipango--that is, Japan--was made known to Europeans by
Polo. He described it as “an island in the high seas,” and said that
the sea around it was studded with thousands of islands rich in spices
and perfumes. Cipango was the only country attacked by Kublai Khan
which was able to resist his power. Its people were civilized and it
was rich in gold and in wonderful pearls, white and rose-colored. Polo
says “rubies are found on this island and in no other country in the
world but this.”
He described India,--the scanty garments of the people and their
magnificent jewels. He gave an interesting account of the diamond mines
of Golconda, and of the cotton plant--more valuable even than those
rich mines--from which fiber is obtained for clothing. He visited and
described the places from which are obtained ginger, pepper, cinnamon,
camphor, and other gums and spices.
Seilan, or Ceylon, was another place visited by Polo. He described the
pearl fisheries there, much as they are to-day.
Christopher Columbus
The Great Admiral
With the name and deeds of Christopher Columbus you are already
familiar. You will be interested in a brief sketch of the main facts
of his life; some day, it is hoped, you will read the story as told at
length by our great American author, Washington Irving.
Careful research has not been able to ascertain the exact year of
Christopher Columbus’s birth. It was sometime about the middle of the
fifteenth century, probably 1445 or 1446. His father was a wool-comber
who lived in a village near the great Italian city of Genoa. Genoa
was a rich commercial city,--the rival of Venice, as you learned in the
story of Marco Polo.
[Illustration: CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS]
Probably Columbus often visited Genoa in boyhood; he early showed his
inclination for a seafaring life and became a sailor when he was about
fifteen. Seafaring then was very different from what it is now. People
knew little of the world beyond Europe, western Asia, and northern
Africa. Sailors were beginning to use the mariner’s compass, but old
habits were still strong, and they did not often venture far from
land. This was not only because they feared that they would lose their
way and be unable to return home. They thought that around the known
land and sea circled the Sea of Darkness, full of raging monsters and
dangerous whirlpools. For centuries some geographers had reasoned that
the world was round, but they never went to see if this were true.
The majority of people believed that the earth was flat like a floor.
Probably that was what Columbus believed in his youth.
We have little record of his early years. “Wherever ship has sailed,”
he wrote later, “there have I journeyed.”
When he was about twenty-five years old, he married and settled in
Lisbon. There he supported himself and his family by making the maps
and charts, so necessary to sailors. He seems to have spent his leisure
reading books of geography and travels, studying old papers and
charts, and talking with seamen. One of his favorite books was the
story of the old Venetian traveler, Polo; as Columbus read about the
vast and wealthy country of Cathay and the island of Cipango with its
houses roofed with gold, he longed to visit them.
As he pondered the matter, he became convinced that these eastern
lands could be reached by sailing west. Old geographers described the
earth as a sphere. Columbus was convinced that this was true. It never
occurred to him that any land unknown to him lay between Europe and
Asia. He thought that the earth was much smaller than it really is and
that Asia was much larger. He believed that the sea which Marco Polo
described as east of Asia extended eastward to the shores of western
Europe. He thought it was about twenty-five hundred or three thousand
miles from Spain to China. This was a great mistake. But Columbus was
much nearer the truth than most men of the day--who thought the world
flat with an edge over which there was danger of falling. And, unlike
the old geographers, Columbus resolved to sail westward to prove the
truth of his theory.
There was living in Florence at this time a learned old man, a scholar
and student, named Toscanelli, who had said he believed that India
could be reached by sailing west. Columbus wrote to this scholar in
1474, telling of his intention to attempt the voyage. Toscanelli sent
him a chart which unfortunately has been lost and wrote, “I praise
your desire to navigate toward the west; the expedition you wish to
undertake is not easy, but the route from the west coast of Europe to
the Spice Indies is certain, if the tracks I have marked be followed.”
Three years later Columbus made a voyage to Iceland. It has been
suggested that he went there because he had heard sailors’ tales of the
news carried to Rome by Gudrid of “Vinland the Good”--the western land
discovered by Leif the Lucky. It is said that in Iceland Columbus met
a learned bishop with whom he conversed in Latin about Greenland and
Vinland. But these northern lands were not the ones sought by Columbus.
He wanted to reach the southern coast, to visit the Cathay and Cipango
of Marco Polo.
Soon after his return from Iceland, it is said that Columbus applied
to his native city, Genoa, to fit out an expedition for a voyage of
discovery. Meeting refusal there and at Venice, he turned to Portugal.
The king of Portugal was not averse to undertaking the expedition but
was unwilling to give Columbus the rank and rewards he demanded in case
of success. The king secretly sent out an expedition to follow the
route indicated by Columbus. But the faint-hearted captain returned
after a brief cruise, saying he had seen no signs of land.
Indignant at this bad faith, Columbus took his little son Diego and
set out in 1484 to present his project to the Spanish sovereigns.
His brother Bartolomeo had gone to plead his cause with the king of
England. Columbus reached Spain at an unfavorable time. King Ferdinand
and Queen Isabella were engaged in a war against the Moors, which
occupied their time and emptied their treasury. However, the matter was
laid before a council of scholars who decided that the plan was vain
and impracticable.
Seven years Columbus attended the Spanish court, hoping against hope
that a decision would be made in his favor. Weary and disappointed, he
at last turned away, in 1491, to lay his project before Charles VIII.,
King of France.
Footsore and dejected, he stopped one evening with his son Diego at the
convent of La Rabida to beg a night’s lodging. There he told the prior
about the plan on which his heart was set,--his longing to add the rich
domains which he was certain lay to the west, to the kingdom of Spain,
his desire to win the great Khan and his subjects to the Christian
faith and extend the power of the Church. This ambition appealed to the
devout prior. At midnight he mounted his mule and rode to the camp to
see the queen and persuade her to give Columbus an interview. He was
successful and Columbus returned to plead his own cause with the king
and queen. The king regarded the project coldly and reminded the queen
that war had emptied the royal treasury.
“I undertake the enterprise for my own crown of Castile,” exclaimed
Isabella, “and will pledge my jewels to raise the necessary funds.”
Columbus was granted the rank and title of admiral over all lands he
might discover and was promised one-tenth of all gold, gems, spices,
and other merchandise from these lands. Leaving his son Diego as
page to the young Prince John, Columbus set to work to fit out the
expedition. It was difficult to secure seamen to venture on the unknown
ocean. At last the required number was secured; some were forced into
service, some taken from jails, some won by bounties in advance and
promises of rewards later.
On Friday, August 3, 1492, Columbus set sail from the port of Palos,
Spain, with three little vessels. The Santa Maria was a decked ship,
ninety feet long, carrying sixty-six men; the Nina and the Pinta,
smaller than the Santa Maria, were boat-like vessels, carrying each
about twenty-five men. Columbus had a letter from the King of Spain to
the great Khan whose realm, Cathay, he expected to reach.
You have read the story of that wonderful voyage to seek an Old World
which ended in the finding of a New. You can in fancy follow the course
of Columbus day after day--his struggles with his timorous, ignorant,
greedy, turbulent, mutinous crew,--his iron will, and determination to
“sail on and on.” Day after day he set his will and courage against
their stubborn fears. Like children, the sailors rejoiced at every
good sign--birds, reeds, and boughs floating on the waters; and were
depressed by every evil omen--calms and contrary winds.
At last one night there was seen the flickering light of a torch, and
the next morning revealed the fair shore of a wooded island. As we
shut our eyes, we can almost see the Spaniards landing on that October
morning. Columbus, richly dressed in scarlet, went ashore, fell upon
his knees, kissed the earth, and gave thanks to God. Then, drawing his
sword and unfurling the royal banner, he took possession of the land in
the name of the king and queen of Spain.
Eyeing the strangers were the natives,--naked, with straight, black
hair, and swarthy skins daubed with paint. Columbus, who thought he
had reached India, called these people Indians, the name they retain
to this day. The island, which he called San Salvador, was one of the
Bahamas. In search of gold, Columbus cruised about, touching one island
after another, Cuba, Haiti, and others of the West Indies. These he
thought were the “thousands of islands rich in spices” which Marco Polo
said dotted the sea around Cipango. Cuba, Columbus at first thought was
Cipango itself, but afterwards he concluded that it was the mainland
of India. Out of the timbers of the Santa Maria, which was wrecked, a
fort was built on Haiti, and here thirty-nine sailors were left.
From Haiti, Columbus set sail for Spain, and he reached the port of
Palos on the fifteenth of March, 1493. Now indeed, his good fortune was
at its height. He was received with almost royal honors. He was bidden
to sit in the presence of the king and queen--an unheard-of honor in
that formal court--while he described his voyage and displayed the
plants and birds and natives he had brought back. Nothing, so thought
he and his sovereigns, remained but to take possession of the spices,
gems, and gold described by Marco Polo.
Another expedition was planned. Instead of having to seek adventures
and criminals to fit out a crew, he had but to choose among the
gentlemen and nobles who contended for the privilege of accompanying
him. A fleet of seventeen ships and fifteen hundred men was fitted
out. With this Columbus sailed away from Cadiz, September 25, 1493.
The good fortune for which he had had to wait so many weary years did
not long abide with him, and ere this voyage was over it had taken its
flight. The colony established on Haiti had by cruelty provoked the
Indians and had been destroyed. On this second voyage new islands were
discovered,--Jamaica, Porto Rico, and others,--a second colony was
established, and one exploring expedition after another was sent out in
search of gold, of which small quantities were found. The turbulent,
disappointed adventurers quarreled with Columbus, and his enemies at
home were active against him. He landed at Cadiz, June 11, 1496, and
laid his case before his sovereigns.
He was restored to royal favor, but it was two years before he could
get another expedition fitted out, and then, May 30, 1498, only six
vessels set sail. This time Columbus followed a southernly course and
reached the mainland of South America, which was visited about this
time by Amerigo Vespucci, a Florentine, who wrote an account of his
voyage. Later, a German geographer spoke of it as “Americi terra,” land
discovered by Americus, and so the land came to be called America.
Columbus at first thought that he had reached another island;
afterwards he decided that this was the coast of Asia and that the
Orinoco was a river in the Garden of Eden. Making his way to the
Indies, Columbus found the colony at Santo Domingo in disorder but
unwilling to submit to his authority. Each side appealed to Spain,
and Bobadilla was sent out to investigate and settle the matter.
He listened to but one side--that against Columbus. With harshness
uncalled-for, had he been guilty of the charges brought against him,
Columbus was sent to Spain, a prisoner, and in chains. The officers of
the ship would have removed his fetters, but he proudly forbade, saying
that they had been put upon him by the agent of the king and queen and
so by their authority.
“I will wear them until my sovereigns order them to be taken off, and I
will preserve them afterwards as relics and memorials of the reward of
my services,” he said.
This he did. His son Fernando “saw them always hanging in his cabinet,
and he requested that when he died they might be buried with him.” The
sight, the thought, of the great admiral brought in chains from the
lands he had discovered turned all hearts to him with indignant pity.
The queen, it is said, was moved to tears. Rewards and satisfaction
were promised Columbus, and Bobadilla was deposed.
Another voyage Columbus was to make,--his fourth and last,--in search
of a strait or passage by which he might reach Portuguese Asia. On May
9, 1502, he set sail with four ships and one hundred and fifty men. It
was a voyage of “horror, peril, sickness, and starvation.” Columbus
sailed along the Gulf of Mexico, coming pitifully near lands as rich in
gold as the eastern ones which he sought. He missed them and found only
savage tribes with a few rings and chains of gold. The story of these
months is a sad one of famine, hardship, disease, tempest, mutiny, and
quarrels with the natives. It was told in after years by Columbus’s
brave young son Fernando, who accompanied him on this voyage. At last
the admiral turned homeward and reached Seville in the autumn of 1504.
While he lay ill, soon after his return, he received the sad news of
the death of his good friend, Queen Isabella.
In vain during the months and years which followed did the admiral
strive to win justice from the king. Old and worn out, he had, as he
said, “no place to repair to except an inn, and often with nothing
to pay for sustenance.” He died, May 20, 1506, thinking to the last
that the land which he had discovered was a part of the Old World.
The voyages of the great admiral did not end with his life. His body
was moved from one tomb to another in Spain, then was carried to the
Cathedral in Santo Domingo and, in 1796, to the Cathedral of Havana.
Seven years after his death, king Ferdinand erected in his honor a
marble tomb, bearing this inscription, “To Castile and Leon Colon
gave a new world.” But the New World slipped from the grasp of the
Spaniards, unable to hold the rich prize. Other nations of Europe
claimed and sought to share it, but the brave and hardy English
overcame one after another of their rivals and established here the
colonies which grew into our mighty commonwealth. The land which
Columbus discovered is a nation richer and greater than the Cathay of
which he dreamed.
Ferdinand De Soto
The Discoverer of the Mississippi River
In Spain and all Europe, men were willing and eager to cross the
western ocean to learn more about the lands Columbus had found. The
early discoverers and explorers thought that these West Indian islands
were the East Indies, off the coast of Asia. They wished to reach the
mainland and get the gold, gems, spices, and silks which Polo had told
them were to be found there. Wealth, even beyond their dreams, the
Spaniards found. Seeking Cathay, they reached Mexico and Peru, rich
in mines of gold and silver. Our famous American historian Prescott,
tells the story of the conquest of Mexico by the Spaniards under Cortez
and the conquest of Peru by the Spaniards under Pizarro. Like a fairy
tale is the history of how a handful of men entered the unknown lands
and made themselves masters of their wonderful treasures. It is a sad
story too, of the greed and cruelty of the conquering white men, of the
suffering and ruin of the gentle natives.
Some of the Spaniards, turning a little to the north, reached land on
Easter Sunday which they call _Pascua Florida_, flowery Easter. In
honor of the day the Spaniards gave to this land of flowers the name
Florida, which was applied to all the country north of Mexico. All the
flowers of that fair land, were not so charming to Spanish eyes as one
ounce of gold, and for this they roamed the country far and wide. It
was not gold, however, which Ponce de Leon sought. His hair was turning
white and he listened with eager credulity to tales of a fountain whose
waters would give perpetual youth. Landing on the coast of Florida
in 1513, he wandered hither and thither in a vain search for this
longed-for fountain. Instead of finding it, he received his death wound
in a fight with Indians.
A few years later, Narvaez was made governor of Florida, and he came
with a force of three hundred men to conquer it. His troops made
their way through trackless swamps and forests and among hostile
Indian tribes, across the peninsula to the Gulf. Here they constructed
rude vessels in which to go to Cuba or Mexico. Through shipwreck,
starvation, and disease, the four hundred were reduced to four men
who after nine years of hardships and wanderings reached a Spanish
settlement in Mexico. There one of them, De Vaca, met and talked with a
young Spanish captain, Ferdinand De Soto.
Ferdinand, or Hernando, De Soto belonged to a Spanish family that
was both poor and noble. As a youth, he attracted the attention of a
gentleman of wealth who took charge of him and educated him. It was
not, however, the patron’s wish that De Soto should marry his daughter;
when he found that this was the young folks’ plan, in order to separate
them he took De Soto on an expedition to the Isthmus of Darien. There
De Soto distinguished himself by his courage and his daring coolness.
In 1528 he left the service of his patron and went on a journey of
exploration, in search of the passage supposed to connect the ocean
west of Spain with that east of Asia. Columbus, Cortez, and others
had searched for this water-way which, as you and I know, does not
exist. De Soto explored more than seven hundred miles of the coast of
Guatemala and Yucatan. As he found no passage between the two oceans,
he decided that there was none and gave up the search.
In 1532, De Soto with a band of horsemen joined Francisco Pizarro, the
leader of the army which invaded and conquered Peru. He was nominally
under the command of Pizarro but was really the master of his brave
band of three hundred volunteer horsemen. Some historians say that the
brave De Soto did more to secure victory than did the cruel Pizarro.
At all events, the higher glory belongs to the young cavalry-man; he
displayed more humanity in his dealings with the natives than any other
Spanish leader and he endeavored to prevent the murder of the captive
Inca, or emperor, of Peru.
The wealth wrested from the conquered Peruvians enriched the Spanish
invaders. De Soto, who had landed in America with “nothing else of
his own save his sword and shield” became master of a fortune of
“an hundred and four score thousand ducats.” He returned to Spain
and married Isabella, his patron’s daughter, from whom he had been
separated about fifteen years. But he was not content to rest at home.
The age’s spirit of adventure and love of wandering was in his veins.
Remembering De Vaca’s tales about Florida, he persuaded the emperor
Charles V. to appoint him governor of Cuba and to grant him the region
of Florida to explore and conquer at his own expense. Adventurers
flocked to join him, hoping that in the unexplored land of Florida they
would find treasures to equal or surpass those of Mexico and Peru.
De Soto’s wife went with him as far as Cuba, and there he bade her
farewell--a final farewell, as events proved--and in May, 1539, he set
sail with five vessels for Florida. He landed at Tampa Bay on the west
coast. From the first he encountered hardship and opposition. Florida
was occupied by Indian tribes naturally fiercer and more warlike than
the Mexicans and Peruvians; they had met with cruelty and outrage,
the outrage and cruelty of the Spaniards under De Leon and Narvaez.
Almost everywhere De Soto found ready-made foes, expert with war club
and bow and arrow. For nearly four years he and his men wandered from
place to place, through morasses and forests, seeking gold and treasure
but finding them not. Disappointed in his search he grew bitter and
merciless. “He was much given to the sport of slaying Indians,” says
one old historian.
The exact route that De Soto followed is in many places hard to
determine. He wandered through Florida and Georgia, probably into South
Carolina and Tennessee, and perhaps as far as North Carolina,--then he
turned southward and approached Mobile Bay. On this southward march
was carried the Indian chief Tuscaloosa. At Mauvila, or Mabila, near
Mobile Bay, a desperate battle took place in October, 1540, between
Tuscaloosa’s warriors and the Spaniards. The Spaniards bought victory
with the loss of eighty men and forty horses, which could ill be
spared. They lost not only forces but hope.
From that time De Soto’s wanderings seem to have been animated by a
dogged resolution not to return without honor and treasure. He learned
that his men planned, as soon as they reached the Bay of Pensacola,
then less than a hundred miles away, to give up the expedition. Swiftly
he resolved that they should not reach Pensacola. Instead of going
toward the coast and the ships containing supplies, he set his face to
the wilderness and marched northward. “He determined to send no news of
himself until he should have discovered a rich country,” says an old
annalist.
“He was an inflexible man and dry of word,” wrote one who knew him,
“who, although he liked to know what the others all thought and had to
say, after he once said a thing he did not like to be opposed; and as
he ever acted as he thought best, all bent to his will.... There was
none who would say a thing to him after it became known that he had
made up his mind.”
Traveling to the northwest, in May, 1541, he reached “a deep and very
furious” river, so wide that “a man standing on the farther shore could
not be told whether he was a man or not.” This was the Mississippi, the
Father of Waters. The Spaniards made boats and crossed the river and
continued their wanderings on the other side, going northward nearly to
the Missouri River. Month after month they sought gold; at last they
turned southward from the vain search. On the homeward journey, De Soto
was taken ill. He faced death as fearlessly as he had met every foe
before. He bade farewell to his men, thanked them for their loyalty and
faith to him, and advised them as to the choice of a leader to take his
place.
The Spaniards did not wish the Indians, to whom they had represented
themselves as immortal, to know that death had overtaken their great
captain. Therefore, in the dead of night they sunk his body in the
Father of Waters, near the junction of the Mississippi and Red Rivers.
After wandering about for several months, they constructed frail
vessels and trusted themselves to the stream. They reached the mouth of
the river and made their way along the coast until the remnant left by
disease and warfare arrived at a Spanish settlement in Mexico.
John Cabot
The Discoverer of the Continent of North America
By virtue of the discovery of Columbus, Spain claimed all the land
beyond the western ocean. The other countries of Europe, however,
refused to recognize its claim to any land except that actually
discovered, explored, and possessed. Kings, nations, private
individuals even, sent out expeditions to discover and settle lands in
the New World, hoping to find treasure and to reach Cathay and Cipango.
We are particularly interested in John Cabot, whose discoveries gave
England its first claim to the New World.
John Cabot was not, like Columbus, a writer as well as a discoverer;
we know little about his life, and the accounts of his discoveries are
meager and contradictory. Cabot was born about 1450, so he was a few
years younger than Columbus. Like him, he was by birth a native of
Genoa. Cabot, however, moved to Venice and became an adopted son of
that City of the Sea. He was a good navigator and went East on trading
ventures. Having an inquiring turn of mind, when he bought cargoes of
spices he tried to learn something about the countries from which they
came.
Like most master-navigators of the time, Cabot was a maker of maps
and charts. He also believed that the world is round; he thought that
Cathay and Cipango and “the spice lands” could be reached by sailing
west. He tried in vain to secure the aid of Portugal or of Spain in
fitting out an expedition to undertake the westward voyage. Columbus
was one of many who were beginning to believe that the world was a
sphere; he was bolder and more persistent than most of them, and had
the good fortune to prove the truth of his theory.
About 1490 Cabot went to England “to follow the trade of merchandises”
and to seek aid in his exploring projects. In 1496 he secured the
countenance of Henry VII. of England, who granted John Cabot and his
sons, Sebastian, Lewis, and Sanctius permission “for the discovery
of new and unknown lands,” “upon their own proper cost and charges.”
In return for his countenance the king was to receive one-fifth of
all profits. Much uncertainty surrounds Cabot’s first voyage. It is
now thought that his son Sebastian did not accompany him, as was long
believed to be the case. Some say that Cabot had two ships, some say he
had five, but an Italian acquaintance writing at the time says that he
made his discovery with only “one little ship of Bristol and eighteen
men.”
Cabot set sail from Bristol in May and returned in August. He sailed
northwest, and it is supposed that the land which he reached was
Labrador. From the time the Norsemen left “Vinland the Good,” Cabot
was the first European to touch the mainland of North America. He
sailed some distance along the coast of what he thought was “the land
of the great Khan.” He saw no inhabitants, but observed that the
sea swarmed with fish, and on his return he suggested that England
should send fishermen thither instead of depending on the fisheries of
Iceland. He noted, too, that “the tides are slack and do not flow as
they do here,” that is, in England.
A few days after Cabot’s return, a Venetian who was in England wrote
his family an account of the voyage. “His name is Zuan Cabot,” he said,
“and he is styled the great Admiral. Vast honor is paid to him; he
dresses in silk and the English run after him like mad people.” The
Venetian went on to say that Cabot “planted on his New-found land” the
flags of England and Venice.
The king was so pleased with Cabot’s first voyage of discovery that it
was promised he should have fitted out for a second voyage a fleet of
ten ships and to man it he was to have “all prisoners except traitors.”
Some merchants of Bristol aided in fitting out the expedition. With
these ten ships, Cabot wished to go on westward to the east, hoping to
reach Cipango, “where he thinks all the spices of the world and also
all the precious stones originate.”