Footnote 590: The figure given by Columbus is equivalent only to 360 geographical miles (Navarrete, Coleccion, tom. i. p. 246), but as Las Casas (Hist. tom. ii. p. 226) already noticed, there must be some mistake here, for on a S. W. course from the Cape Verde islands it would require a distance of 900 geographical miles to cut the fifth parallel. From the weather that followed, it is clear that Columbus stated his latitude pretty correctly; he had come into the belt of calms. Therefore his error must be in the distance run.[Back to Main Text]
Footnote 591: Humboldt in 1799 did just this thing, starting from Teneriffe and reaching Trinidad in nineteen days. See Bruhn's Life of Humboldt, vol. i. p. 263.[Back to Main Text]
Footnote 592: "The strength of the trade-winds depends entirely upon the difference in temperature between the equator and the pole; the greater the difference, the stronger the wind. Now, at the present time, the south pole is much colder than the north pole, and the southern trades are consequently much stronger than the northern, so that the neutral zone in which they meet lies some five degrees north of the equator." Excursions of an Evolutionist, p. 64.[Back to Main Text]
Footnote 593: Irving's Columbus, vol. ii. p. 137. One is reminded of a scene in the Rime of the Ancient Mariner:—
"All in a hot and copper sky
The bloody sun, at noon,
Right up above the mast did stand,
No bigger than the moon.
"Day after day, day after day,
We stuck,—nor breath nor motion;
As idle as a painted ship
Upon a painted ocean." [Back to Main Text]
Footnote 594: He "gave it the name of Isla Santa," says Irving (vol. ii. p. 140), "little imagining that he now, for the first time, beheld that continent, that Terra Firma, which had been the object of his earnest search." The reader of this passage should bear in mind that the continent of South America, which nobody had ever heard of, was not the object of Columbus's search. The Terra Firma which was the object of his search was the mainland of Asia, and that he never beheld, though he felt positively sure that he had already set foot upon it in 1492 and 1494.[Back to Main Text]
Footnote 595: A modern traveller thus describes this river: "Right and left of us lay, at some distance off, the low banks of the Apuré, at this point quite a broad stream. But before us the waters spread out like a wide dark flood, limited on the horizon only by a low black streak, and here and there showing a few distant hills. This was the Orinoco, rolling with irrepressible power and majesty sea-wards, and often upheaving its billows like the ocean when lashed to fury by the wind.... The Orinoco sends a current of fresh water far into the ocean, its waters—generally green, but in the shallows milk-white—contrasting sharply with the indigo blue of the surrounding sea." Bates, Central America, the West Indies, and South America, 2d ed., London, 1882, pp. 234, 235. The island of Trinidad forms an obstacle to the escape of this huge volume of fresh water, and hence the furious commotion at the two outlets, the Serpent's Mouth and Dragon's Mouth, especially in July and August, when the Orinoco is swollen with tropical rains.[Back to Main Text]
Footnote 596: In Columbus's own words, in his letter to the sovereigns describing this third voyage, "Y digo que ... viene este rio y procede de tierra infinita, pues al austro, de la cual fasta agora no se ha habido noticia." Navarrete, Coleccion, tom. i. p. 262.[Back to Main Text]
Footnote 597: Thus would be explained the astounding force with which the water was poured down. It was common in the Middle Ages to imagine the terrestrial paradise at the top of a mountain. See Dante, Purgatorio, canto xxviii. Columbus quotes many authorities in favour of his opinion. The whole letter is worth reading. See Navarrete, tom. i. pp. 242-264.[Back to Main Text]