DREAM.
John William Draper, a celebrated American chemist and scientist. Born near Liverpool, England, 1811; died January 4, 1882. From his "Intellectual Development of Europe," 1876. By permission of Messrs. Harper & Brothers, Publishers, New York.
Columbus appears to have formed his theory that the East Indies could be reached by sailing to the west about A. D. 1474. He was at that time in correspondence with Toscanelli, the Florentine astronomer, who held the same doctrine, and who sent him a map or chart constructed on the travels of Marco Polo. He offered his services first to his native city, then to Portugal, then to Spain, and, through his brother, to England; his chief inducement, in each instance, being that the riches of India might be thus secured. In Lisbon he had married. While he lay sick near Belem, an unknown voice whispered to him in a dream, "God will cause thy name to be wonderfully resounded through the earth, and will give thee the keys of the gates of the ocean which are closed with strong chains." The death of his wife appears to have broken the last link which held him to Portugal, where he had been since 1470. One evening, in the autumn of 1485, a man of majestic presence, pale, careworn, and, though in the meridian of life, with silver hair, leading a little boy by the hand, asked alms at the gate of the Franciscan convent near Palos—not for himself, but only a little bread and water for his child. This was that Columbus destined to give to Europe a new world.