To assist Columbus and to conduct the business of exploration and colonization, Archdeacon Juan Rodriguez de Fonseca was made a sort of Secretary of Exploration and Superintendent of Indian Affairs, and was given very extensive powers. It may seem to us strange that a priest should have received this appointment, but priests were as numerous in Spain as Colonels now are in South Carolina, and probably all the men who were not priests were either in jail or had volunteered to join Columbus as sailors and gold-hunters. It was this able Archdeacon who chiefly organized the second expedition of Columbus, and he engaged twelve active priests well acquainted with the screw, the pulley, the wheel, and the other theologico-mechanical powers, and commanded by the Apostolic Vicar Rev. Bernardo Boyle, to convert the heathen as fast as they should be discovered.
It would violate all precedent if the story of Columbus and the egg were to be spared the readers of this volume. It is briefly as follows: Soon after his return to Spain he dined with Cardinal de Mendoza, an eminent clergyman with a talent for dinner. An objectionable young man who was present, and who undoubtedly had taken more champagne than was good for his fellow-diners, asked the Admiral if he did not think that if he had not discovered the New World some one else would very shortly have discovered it. He was unquestionably an impertinent young man, but he was undoubtedly right in assuming that sooner or later the Atlantic would have been crossed, even if Columbus had never been born. Historians tell us that Columbus, in reply, asked the young man if he could stand an egg on its little end; and when the young man, after rudely inquiring what Columbus was giving him, was constrained to admit that he could not perform the feat in question, the great explorer simply flattened the little end of the egg by knocking it against the table, and then easily made it stand upright. The whole company instantly burst into tears, and exclaimed that Columbus was the greatest and noblest of mankind.
If this trick of flattening an egg was really regarded as a brilliant repartee, by which the impertinent young man ought to have been utterly withered up, it gives us a melancholy view of the state of the art of repartee among the Spaniards. The real facts of the case are probably these: Cardinal De Mendoza, the dinner, and the impertinent young man doubtless existed in the form and manner specified; and the impertinent young man, in an advanced state of champagne, probably said something insulting to the Admiral. The latter, disdaining to notice the affront by words, and reluctant to cause any unpleasant scene at the Cardinal’s dinner-table, merely threw an egg at the offender’s head, and pursued his conversation with his host. Subsequent writers, determined to give a profoundly scientific character to everything the Admiral did, built up from this slight basis of fact the egg-balancing story. In point of fact, any one can balance an egg on its little end by the exercise of little care and patience, and it is rather more easy to do this with an egg that has not been flattened than with one that has.
There is another contemporaneous story which is far more credible, and requires no explanation. While Columbus was enjoying the honors which were everywhere lavished upon him, and was on visiting terms with the King and Queen, and dining with Cardinals and Aldermen and Chambers of Commerce, the unhappy sailor who first saw land, but whose promised reward was appropriated by Columbus, went to Africa and turned Mahometan, in disgust at his treatment. Probably Columbus thought that, in the circumstances, this was a delicate and considerate act, for the sight of the man could hardly have given much satisfaction to the Admiral who had pocketed the reward.
Meanwhile King John of Portugal was busy fitting out an expedition ostensibly to explore the coast of Africa, but really to discover transatlantic countries. He tried to induce the Pope to give him the islands discovered by Columbus, and informed Ferdinand and Isabella that he was advised by his counsel that, under the authority of the early bull already referred to, any countries that might be discovered south of a line drawn westward from the Canaries were, in the eye of the law, a part of Africa, and as such would belong to Portugal. The Spanish monarchs conducted the diplomatic dispute with him in the ablest manner, sending to Portugal their most tedious ambassadors, and thus prolonging the negotiations as long as possible.
Columbus, refusing all offers to lecture before the Spanish lyceums, hurried forward his own expedition so as to sail before the Portuguese fleet could be made ready. With the aid of Fonseca and the latter’s two chief assistants, Francisco Pinelo and Juan de Soria, he collected seventeen ships, their crews, and a large company of colonists, and all the supplies and live-stock needed for planting an imposing colony. There was no lack of volunteers. Every man who thirsted for adventure, and every ruined nobleman who wanted to repair his broken fortunes, was eager to accompany Columbus; and even the small-boys, excited by a desire to scalp Indians, were anxious to run away and ship as cabin-boys on board the fleet. No less than fifteen hundred persons were either accepted as volunteers or accompanied the expedition as stowaways, and among them was as fine and varied a collection of scoundrels as had ever set sail from an alleged Christian country.
The expedition was not organized without several disputes between Columbus and Fonseca. The latter complained that the Admiral wanted too many servants, including footmen, coachmen, and other gaudy and useless followers; while the Admiral, in his turn, insisted that the Archdeacon could not be made to understand that footmen were absolutely necessary to the work of exploration. The King, when appealed to, always decided that Columbus was right; but it is doubtful if Fonseca’s affection for the Admiral was thereby greatly increased. Finally all was ready, and on the 25th of September, 1493, the second personally conducted transatlantic expedition of Christopher Columbus set sail from Cadiz.
CHAPTER XI.
EXPLORATIONS IN THE WEST INDIES.
[Æt. 57; 1493]
The voyage was smooth and prosperous. The expedition reached the Canaries on the 1st of October, where Columbus laid in a supply of chickens, sheep, goats, calves, and pigs. It is interesting to know that these were the pioneer pigs of America. They were eight in number, and from them descended most of the pigs that now inhabit the West India islands. On October 7th the fleet again weighed anchor, and by order of its Admiral steered in a rather roundabout direction for the islands which were supposed to lie south of Hispaniola. Columbus was determined—of course for the noblest and most public-spirited reasons—that no one but himself should know the true route to the New World; but his trick of steering first in one direction and then in another could not have had the desired effect of puzzling any really intelligent sailor. This time whales, floating bushes, and other signs of land were not needed to cheer the crews, and consequently they were not seen—a circumstance that strengthens in the minds of some persons the belief that Columbus on his first voyage secretly dropped these signs of land overboard from the bow of his vessel, and then called his men to look at them. In the latter part of the voyage a heavy thunder-storm occurred, and while it was in progress lights were seen at the tops of the masts and elsewhere aloft. These electrical phenomena, called by the sailors “St. Elmo’s candles,” were received with much satisfaction as evident tokens that the saint was busily taking care of the vessels. As he is an able and careful saint, it is perhaps impertinent to criticise his methods, but it does seem rather odd that he cannot take care of a ship without running the risk of setting her on fire by the reckless use of naked and unprotected lights. This was the only storm of consequence that was met on the passage, and, thanks to St. Elmo! it does not seem to have done any harm.