gaze into the eyes of the Admiral. "And another thing will make me
guard my behavior and control my tongue, which will be this: that my
father has done so much, not only for Spain, but for the whole world,
that the discovery is so vast, it means so much to mankind, that for
me, the son of the discoverer, to be boastful would be mean beyond
comparison. I have learned much, my father, in the time that I have
lived at court. I have heard the conversation of the great Queen with
mighty men like the Cardinal Pedro Gonzalez de Mendoza and the Duke
of Medina Coeli, and with statesmen and great generals and admirals
and learned men. I have been under the care of the Duke de Medina
Coeli, a man reckoned fit to train the heir to the throne, and with
the nineteen other royal pages, all selected for their character and
intelligence. The Queen does not value rank exclusively, and means that
the companions of Prince Juan shall all be worthy of his friendship.
When you sailed away, my father, I was a boy; now I am a man, I think
as a man and feel as a man, and I hope I shall be able to act as a man.
I cannot help feeling in my heart that I am the son of the greatest
man in the world; but I know that I, myself, have done nothing; I have
only reaped the benefit of what you have done, beginning, even before
I was born, those eighteen years of eternal struggle, of heartbreaking
disappointments. Do you think that in this triumphant hour I have
forgotten the days so far away now when I was a little ragged, barefoot
boy holding your hand and toiling along the country roads as well as I
could, and when I was tired and footsore being carried in your arms?
You were often tired and footsore, too, were you not? And so in my mind
I have a pride in you such as no son ever felt before in a father, and
a deep joy, and it only makes me feel my own nothingness, The only way
I can ever prove myself worthy of being your son is by good conduct,
and in that I will ever do my best."
The Admiral listened with amazement as Diego proceeded. Here indeed was
the transition in the mind and heart of a boy to the dignity of a man.
Diego was no longer a mere lad to be guided and instructed. Much, it is
true, was still for him to learn as men of intelligence learn from the
beginning to the end of life; but his character was now fixed. He could
stand alone, confident of his own integrity, looking boldly at the
world around him, able to retrieve his own mistakes and to extricate
himself from the perplexities of life and to protect himself amid its
dangers. Something of this the Admiral said to him, clasping Diego to
his breast. The father and the son, looking into each other's eyes, so
much alike, understood each other perfectly.
"I have never left any place so unwillingly in my life as I shall leave
here to-morrow," said Diego; "but I will not say one word of complaint,
and I shall be ready to mount before any of those who return with me."
"That shows that you have become indeed a man," replied the Admiral.
"It is the mark of manhood to do promptly and uncomplainingly the
necessary and painful things of life. Boys and weaklings complain and
protest and disobey; men obey silently and immediately if they are fit
to be called men."
Diego was as good as his word, and at daylight on the March morning he
was on horseback before any of the party, even the Daredevil Knight.
Some secondary thoughts came to console him. He had seen those strange
beings, those wonderful productions, those birds and animals of the
New World, and could tell Prince Juan and the pages of honor all about
them. This natural feeling was shared by Don Felipe, who whispered to
him, as they stood in the courtyard ready to depart:
"I have drawn pictures of the Indians to show Prince Juan, and also
pictures of all the strange animals of which I could get sight."
Diego was charmed at this. Don Felipe drew well, while Diego was but
an indifferent hand at it; and it had not occurred to him to make any
pictures. He had, however, some little plants from the New World, which
were meant for Doña Luisita's garden at the castle of Langara.
IX
GLORIA
The party started off joyously; Don Tomaso was always joyous, but
even the sober Alonzo de Quintanilla was full of gaiety. It was found
impossible to prevent the people knowing that one of the two young men
with Don Tomaso's party was the son of the immortal man with whose
fame the world was ringing. In every town through which they passed
multitudes collected, wild with curiosity and enthusiasm, and eager
to see not only the son of the Admiral, but the men who had seen and
talked with those who had returned from the marvelous voyage. Along the
highways crowds assembled, made up of all classes of persons, from the
great nobles down to the humblest muleteer or peasant; all were filled
with an overwhelming sense of what the great discovery meant, not only
to Spain, but to the whole world. So large were these concourses that
travel became exceedingly slow; and Don Tomaso wished it to be as
rapid as possible. He managed, however, to make up for the delays by
traveling at night and resting only a few brief hours. To Diego and Don
Felipe and all it seemed possible to do without sleep.
As the party neared the splendid city of Barcelona the crowds and
enthusiasm seemed, if possible, to increase. Foreseeing what their
entrance into Barcelona by daylight might be, Don Tomaso determined
to steal into the city by night. Accordingly, on that last night they
prepared as usual to bivouac at sunset, that they might get rid of the
surging people for a little while. About nine o'clock the party quietly
rose and slipped away upon the dark and silent highroad. The night was
gloomy and the darkness impenetrable, but that best suited the purposes
of the travelers. The road was straight and level; and, giving their
horses the rein, they rode steadily until they reached the outlying
gardens and villas of Barcelona. Soon they stood before the main gate
of the city. Don Tomaso, riding up to the postern-gate, rapped gently
with the hilt of his sword. The warder in the tower asked his name and
business.
"I am," replied Don Tomaso, "Don Tomaso de Gama, and I bear a letter
for their Majesties the King and the Queen. Open the small gate; we
will dismount to enter."
The warder came hastily down and, removing the bolts, chains, and
bars from the small postern-gate, the party dismounted, and, leading
their horses, entered the silent city. The warder, like all the people
of Spain, was eager to know something of the wonderful rumors that
agitated Barcelona.
"Is it true, sir," he asked of Don Tomaso, who, once inside the walls,
was preparing to mount, "that the Genoese captain has returned after
finding a new world?"
"As true as my sword, which is of the best steel made in Toledo, and
never misses fire," answered Don Tomaso, flinging himself upon his
horse and galloping off.
The echo of iron hoofs upon the stones of the street waked the whole
city. The minds of men were at a tension, and every sound startled
them. When the horsemen reached the palace, lights were still burning
in the Queen's apartments, although it was past midnight. The sound of
arriving horsemen aroused the whole palace. The gate was immediately
opened, and Don Tomaso and his party, dismounting, entered. In the
corridors they were met by all the officers of the palace, none of
them fully dressed, some putting on their clothes and shoes, others
barefooted and wrapped in blankets. None dared to stop them, because
Don Tomaso was making direct for the Queen's part of the palace. When
they reached the Queen's anteroom, guarded by halberdiers, the door
opened and Doña Christina appeared. In place of her usual splendid and
correct costume she wore a short black silk petticoat, while a large
shawl wrapped around her concealed other deficiencies of her toilet.
She was too much agitated to do more than to give a hasty greeting to
Don Felipe and Diego, and in her excitement called Diego, Felipe, and
Felipe, Diego.
"Her Majesty has sent for the King," she said to Don Tomaso, "and
desires that you will come in immediately. You bear a letter, I
suppose, from the Admiral?"
All then entered the Queen's room, while Doña Christina disappeared for
a moment. She came back saying:
"The Queen desires to see you, Don Tomaso, and Señor de Quintanilla in
private. Don Diego and Don Felipe may retire to bed."
Diego and Don Felipe looked at each other in silent chagrin; but knew
better than to protest.
They had hoped to be present at the interview of Don Tomaso and Alonzo
de Quintanilla with the sovereigns, and were disappointed at being sent
to bed, as it were. Nevertheless, their return was not without triumph.
As they walked down the long corridor, now full of persons, for the
palace was thoroughly aroused, they were stopped at every moment by
eager questioners. Diego until then had been merely an object of
curiosity, and even of prejudice on the part of some. Many persons of
rank treated him haughtily and disapproved the conferring of the title
of "Don" upon the son of an obscure Italian and putting him upon an
equality with the greatest nobles of Spain. Now, they regarded him with
extraordinary interest and respect. This youth, closely resembling
his father, would one day inherit all the titles and dignities of the
greatest man in the world at that time. Diego subtly realized this,
and, instead of dazzling and unsettling him, gave him a better poise
and a more sensible view of honors and distinctions. Midway of the
crowd in the corridor they met the Duke de Medina Coeli, governor of
the pages. Although stern in discipline, he was strictly just, and had
never made the smallest distinction between Diego and the other pages,
and was always careful to give him the title of "Don." As Diego and Don
Felipe stopped and respectfully saluted him, the Duke spoke kindly to
Diego, congratulating him upon the glorious achievement of his father
and hoping that Diego would prove worthy of him.
"I thank you, sir," responded Diego, with a low bow, "and I shall try
by my conduct not to discredit my honored father."
Don Felipe, who was really more courageous with the Duke than Diego,
whispered a request into his ear. The Duke smiled, and answered:
"You may go to Prince Juan's room if you wish. No doubt he is awake
like every one else in the palace. If he chooses to go with you to the
dormitory of the pages to see what you have to show, I shall make no
objection."
The Duke passed on, and Diego and Don Felipe made straight for the
apartments of Prince Juan. The Prince was under military discipline,
and had no more privileges in regard to leaving his room than had any
of the pages. Diego knocked at the Prince's door, and it was opened,
not by an attendant, but by Prince Juan himself. He caught Diego in his
arms and hugged him, boy fashion, and then hugged Don Felipe.
"I have scarcely slept since the great news came!" cried Prince Juan.
"Never did any country receive so great a gift as your father, Don
Diego, has made my country. Tell me all, all, all, that you have seen
and heard."
"The governor bade me say that if your Highness wished to go into the
pages' dormitory he would permit it, and there we can show the pictures
and tell the story as we have heard it," said Don Felipe.
Prince Juan had in him that fine quality of wishing to share his
pleasures with others. The thought of being surrounded by his friends
and young companions while the story was told delighted him. He, with
Diego and Don Felipe, rushed pell-mell into the long dormitory, simple
as a barrack, where the pages slept on their hard, narrow beds. But
they were not sleeping. They were gathered in groups at the narrow
windows trying to make out from the commotion in the courtyard what
had happened. When the door opened the dormitory was quite dark, but
Prince Juan, seizing with his own hands a lamp that hung from the wall
outside, carried it into the large, bare room. The three were greeted
with shouts of delight, for when alone with Prince Juan, he was treated
as a friend and comrade rather than a prince. Prince Juan, putting
the lamp on the table, and with the twenty pages around it, began to
examine the pictures that Don Felipe had drawn and painted, and to
listen breathlessly to the story of what they had seen. When the gray
dawn crept in at the windows they were still gathered around the table,
although the lamp had long since burnt itself out. Then, however, they
scampered back to their beds, and Prince Juan ran to his apartment, for
in a little while it would be time for the governor of the pages to
glance in Prince Juan's room and inspect the dormitory.
Although it was still March, and the Admiral was not expected to arrive
at Barcelona until the middle of April, preparations for his reception
were already begun. As the magnitude of the discovery of a new world
grew more apparent the people seemed to be more and more dazzled by
the great event. It not only meant an incalculable increase of power,
territory, and wealth for Spain, but it was of great import to science
and learning of all sorts. Geography had to be reconstructed, and
astronomy would make a tremendous advance. The strange phenomenon of
the variation of the compass excited all Europe, and the discovery of
the trade-winds by the Admiral was of enormous benefit to commerce.
It was indeed the revelation of a new and stupendous world to the Old
World.
There were two persons, however, who, without forgetting the vast
material and scientific value of the discovery, fixed their minds upon
a nobler ideal, the taking to the New World the Christian religion and
civilization. These two were the Admiral himself and the great Queen
Isabella. Daily letters were exchanged between these two lofty and
kindred spirits, who could rise above the consideration of earthly
grandeur, and who cherished splendid dreams of the reclamation and
civilization of the unknown lands.
When it became known that the Admiral was to be received at Barcelona
by their Majesties about the middle of April, all Spain, Italy, and
France were aroused, for the event had so stirred men's minds that
it was communicated with unheard-of rapidity; even far-off England
and Germany were thrilled to the centre. The King and the Queen, to
do honor to the Admiral, determined to receive him in full sight of
the people instead of in the palace. A huge temporary saloon open to
the air was built in the great Plaza opposite the Cathedral. It was
carpeted with magnificent Moorish carpets and blazed with cloth of
gold and gorgeous tapestries brought from the Spanish palaces. At the
end a magnificent throne was erected with three chairs upon it, two
throne chairs and one for the Admiral, who was to receive an honor
never before granted to any but reigning sovereigns, to sit upon the
throne with the King and the Queen. A grand Te Deum was to be sung,
and all the greatest singers in Spain flocked to Barcelona that they
might take part in the music. The streets became so crowded that
it was difficult to make progress, and the country round about was
converted into a camp by a tented army of travelers who could get no
accommodations in the city.
Through it all Diego felt as if he were in a splendid dream. His heart
swelled with joy; his prayers were all thanksgivings; but his mind
remained steady and his conduct modest. To have shown a haughty and
vainglorious spirit he felt would degrade him more than anything else
in the world. His own sound sense and his father's counsels prevented
him from being unbalanced by the flatterers who surrounded him. Those
who had jeered at him as being an upstart and a foreigner were now the
ones who paid him court, as if he were a man grown, who could not
meet him without linking their arms in his, and who embarrassed him by
the urgency of their invitations to banquets and feasts and jousts at
arms and in the tilt-yard. Diego in his heart scornfully contrasted
them with those of his friends like Don Felipe and the other pages who
had treated him always with friendliness; with the Daredevil Knight,
who had made no difference between the son of the Genoese captain and
Don Felipe, heir to the honors of the house of Langara y Gama; of Doña
Christina, who had shown him unvarying sweetness; and Doña Luisita,
whose soft eyes had always smiled on him from the night he had first
seen her, in her white gown and veil, standing in the archway of the
castle of Langara, the light from the silvery lamp falling upon her
slender white figure. But above all was the great Queen unchanged,
because she had ever been the soul of gentleness and kindness to the
motherless Diego.
It was a time of brilliant happiness for all, but to the son of the
great Admiral it was a time of joy deeper than he had ever dreamed.
Four days before the arrival of the Admiral, who was making his way
amid acclamations from Cordova to Barcelona, Juan Perez, the Prior
of La Rabida, arrived with Fray Piña and Brother Lawrence, bringing
the little Fernando. It was the wish of the Admiral that both of his
sons and his tried and true friends should be present in his hour of
unprecedented triumph. Lodgings were prepared in the palace for the
party from La Rabida. The palace was already crowded with members of
the royal family and their attendants. The pages had to find quarters
where best they could, their dormitory being given up to the great
nobles in attendance on royalty. Diego and Don Felipe were glad of
a little room to themselves, with a pallet on the floor for little
Fernando, whom Brother Lawrence still faithfully attended.
"It is no use to find a sleeping place for me," said Brother Lawrence
to Diego, "for no one can sleep until the Admiral comes. I ever
believed in your father, and when I saw the Prior with his head bending
down over the maps for hours and days with the Admiral, I said to
myself, 'That Genoese captain will find something yet.'"
As Brother Lawrence could neither read nor write, his views on
geography were not particularly valuable; but his faithfulness and
devotion to Diego in his childhood, and to little Fernando now, made
him a prized though humble friend. Fray Piña was perfectly unchanged,
being the same calm, polished and somewhat stern young man; but Diego
and Don Felipe had learned to understand and admire his justice and
even his sternness, for he was no sterner with others than with himself.
"I should not be surprised," said Diego to Don Felipe, on the night
of the fourteenth of April, as they lay in their beds watching the
stars shining through the window, the little Fernando sleeping on the
floor, and Brother Lawrence snoring loudly on a bench outside the
door--"I should not be surprised if Fray Piña were to send us word the
first thing in the morning that he is prepared to give us a lesson in
astronomy to-morrow instead of watching the great procession."
"It would be exactly like him," replied Don Felipe, laughing; "but for
once I would not obey him."
Half the night the two youths watched the night sky, dreading that
clouds and storms might mar the most glorious day that had ever dawned
for Spain. But the stars shone from a clear sky, and the April morning
broke as beautiful as that August morning when the Santa Maria, the
Pinta, and the Niña slipped away into the sunlit ocean, or on that
glorious March day when the Niña passed the bar of Saltes, the great
standard of Spain floating in triumph from her peak.
Scarcely an eye closed that night in Barcelona. Not only was every
street, window, and balcony filled, but the roofs were black with
persons passionately anxious to see the great pageant. The sun shone
with unclouded splendor, and soft airs from the blue and glittering
Mediterranean gently moved the flags and banners that were clustered
thick over city and harbor. A great collection of vessels from every
adjacent port and country made the spacious harbor of Barcelona a
forest of shipping and extended in long lines on both sides of the
coast.
The entrance of the Admiral was to take place at ten o'clock in the
morning. At that hour all was arranged in the great Plaza of the
city. The King and the Queen, wearing their royal robes and mantles,
and with crowns upon their heads, were seated on the throne in their
great gilded chairs. Behind the King's chair stood Prince Juan; and
behind the Queen were grouped the Princess Katharine and the other
royal children. Of the ladies-in-waiting of the Queen, Doña Christina
held the place of honor, and among the young ladies of the highest
rank was seated Doña Luisita. She was dressed in white and silver,
and was in clear view of Diego, who, with little Fernando, was given
a seat next the steps of the throne. The robes, jewels, and plumes of
the ladies made a splendid glow of color. The cardinals, headed by
the great Cardinal Pedro Gonzalez de Mendoza, the firm friend of the
Admiral, made a blaze of glory in their scarlet robes, while all the
bishops and archbishops of Spain in purple robes and white capes, their
glittering mitres and crosiers shining in the April sun, with their
train-bearers and attendants, were seated next the cardinals. Among
the ecclesiastics there were two plain, black-gowned figures, those of
Juan Perez, Prior of La Rabida, and Father de Deza, tutor to Prince
Juan, the two friends of whom the Admiral in life and in his will after
his death spoke with gratitude which has immortalized them. Others who
had stood by the Admiral, like Alonzo de Quintanilla and Luis de St.
Angel, were given places of honor. The nobles, wearing their robes of
state, the knights, resplendent in flashing armor, added magnificence
to the scene. A solemn hush was upon the great company. All excitement
and jubilation subsided as the deep and tremendous meaning of the day
made itself felt.
All was in readiness by half-past nine o'clock; but long before that
came from afar off a deep murmur like the distant roar of breakers
on the seashore as the Admiral approached the gates of the city. The
murmur grew, never loud, but deep, because it came from the hearts
of the people. It seemed to rise from the earth and the sea and to
extend to the limits of the horizon. Presently, in the glowing April
morning, the head of the advancing procession was seen as it entered
the spacious Plaza. Then it parted to the right and the left, and the
figure of the Admiral, mounted on a stately black horse, was seen
advancing, while immediately behind him rode a color-bearer carrying
the great Gonfalon of Spain that Columbus himself carried ashore and
planted upon the soil of the New World. At sight of him, suddenly
the silence was broken with a clashing of joy bells, the salvos of
artillery, the solemn thunder of cathedral chimes, and the shrill
acclaims of trumpets and clarions. The tongues of the people were
unloosed, and a storm of applause that began in the Plaza of Barcelona
and reached for leagues beyond on land and sea rose to Heaven. This
lasted until the Admiral reached the foot of the broad, red-carpeted
stairs that led to the great platform. There he dismounted and ascended
the stairs.
Never had this majestic man appeared so majestic. His tall and
stately figure, his hair already white, his carriage full of grace
and dignity, would have made him a marked man among other men under
any circumstances; but, above all, his eyes, gravely triumphant,
introspective, of unshakable steadiness, proclaimed him as a master
of men, born a captain, and designed for command. Well might it be
believed that this man stood ready to sail into the perilous and
uncharted seas, to meet unknown dangers and horrors, to face and subdue
mutineers who would have thrown him into the ocean and dared not,
though they were many and he was but one, who kept his course due west,
when even the hearts of his captains and his pilots fainted within
them, remaining unshaken when the North Star seemed to tremble in its
orbit. Brave and skilful mariners had there been before, but he was the
bravest and the most skilful man who had ever sailed blue water.