CHAPTER III. First Voyage.
At length all the preparations were complete, and on a Friday (not inauspicious in this case), the 3rd of August, 1492, after they had all confessed and received the sacrament, they set sail from the Bar of Saltes, making for the Canary Islands. One can fancy how the men and the women of Palos watched the specks of white sails vanishing in the west, and how, as each frail bark in turn disappeared in the great ocean, mothers and sisters turned weepingly away as if from a last farewell at the grave of their sailor kinsmen.
Columbus was now fairly afloat, and we may say with Milton, that—
The world was all before him, where to choose.
And Providence his guide.
His choice was made, however; and his Guide did not fail him.