Any urchin in the streets will tell you. “Why, master, have you not heard of the Genoese seaman, Christopher Columbus?—he who five years ago set sail from Palos in three ships, and sailed to the west’ard across the ocean, seeking a new sea-road to far-off India and Cathay. Do you not know that he lighted on marvellous new lands, which he seized in the name of Spain, and then returned home to tell the wondrous news? There’s gold by the bucketful across the Western Ocean, and we Bristol folks mean to have our share of it. So we have fitted out the Matthew and the other ship which you see yonder, and this very day John Cabot and his sons are to set sail. Would that I could sail with them too!” Many an English lad, in many a seaport, echoes his wish.
“Westward! westward! westward!
The sea sang in his head,
At morn in the busy harbour,
At nightfall on his bed.
“Westward! westward! westward!
Over the line of breakers,
Out of the distance dim,
For ever the foam-white fingers,
Beckoning, beckoning him.”