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Columbus (CHRISTOPHER the Latinized form)
CHRISTOPHER, the Latinized form of the Italian Colombo, and the Spanish Colon, the great navigator who added a new hemisphere to our globe; born near Genoa, probably in 1451.
He was the son of a wool-comber; attended for some little time the school of learning in Pavia, where he evinced a taste for astronomy and cosmography; and early went to sea, and made several voyages in the Mediterranean. Settling in Lisbon, in 1470, he married the daughter of an Italian named Palestrello, once a navigator in the Portuguese service, and with her obtained some valuable charts, journals, and memoranda. While constructing maps and charts for the livelihood of his family, Columbus gained the belief of a great land in the west.
To qualify himself for his great enterprise he made several voyages to the Azores, the Canaries, and the coast of Guinea-then the limit of European navigation in this direction. Not until about 1482 or 1483 did he find opportunity to lay his scheme before John II. of Portugal. This monarch referred it to a junta of nautical and scientific men, who decided against it. The king, however, taking advantage of a detailed plan obtained from Columbus under false pretenses, secretly sent out a vessel to examine the route. Too timid to venture far from the beaten track, the pilots soon returned to Lisbon to throw ridicule on the project. Disgusted with the duplicity of his sovereign, Columbus secretly left Lisbon in 1484, taking with him his motherless boy Diego. He found his way to Genoa, where the republic treated his project with scorn. Disappointed, but not despairing, Columbus turned his steps toward Spain. Weary and hungry, he COLUMBUS stopped one day at the gate of the Franciscan convent, La Rabida, in Andalusia, to beg some bread and water for his child.
This day was the turning-point in his career. The superior of the convent, Juan Perez de Marchena, passing at the moment, entered into conversation with the traveler, and was so struck with the grandeur of his views that he used all his influence to procure him the favorable consideration of Ferdinand and Isabella, and it was to the latter, not the king, to whom he owed assistance in his project.
Eight years of disappointment passed, during which Columbus applied to other CRISTOFORO COLOMBO NATO M-CCCCXLII MORTO M-D-VI CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS courts, and without avail, when he found himself in command of three small vessels, only one of which was decked, with 120 men, ready ready to start on his adventur ous enterprise. Columbus claimed, as reward, to be nominated high-admiral and governor-general and viceroy over all the lands he discovered, with a tenth of the produce of the countries. On Aug. 3, 1492, he set sail from the bar of Saltes, near Palos. Delaying a month at the Canaries to refit, he started thence, on Sept. 6, over unknown seas. His crew soon be- COLUMN COLUMN came openly mutinous, but Columbus its own proper style of column. The Grenever flinched in his determination to cian-Doric has no base, and in some other press on.
On Oct. 12 his perseverance was rewarded with the sight of land, Islands. Here he solemnly planted the cross, giving the island the name of San Salvador. After discovering several other of the West India Islands, including Cuba and Haiti, or San Domingo, at the latter of which, called by him Hispaniola, he and Haiti, or San Domingo, at the latter settled a small colony, he set sail again for Spain, where he arrived March 15, 1493, and was received with every demonstration of joy and admiration by the people and the court. In September of the same year he sailed from Cadiz on the second expedition, with 17 ships and 1,500 men. In this voyage he discovered the Caribbee Islands, Jamaica, etc., but in 1496. Having cleared himself with his sovereigns, he, in 1498, set out on a third expedition. This time, steering more to the S., he discovered Trinidad and the mouths of the Orinoco, and landed at Paria, on the coast of South America. After these discoveries Columbus steered for Hispaniola, where he found everything in disorder. Enemies in Spain had been at work, and an officer named Bothing in disorder. Enemies in Spain had been at work, and an officer named Bohim as governor, and by this person Columbus was sent home in chains. This him as governor, and by this person Cotion of the Spanish people to such a degree that Ferdinand was forced to disavow all knowledge of the disgraceful affair. But Columbus failed to obtain redress from the king. The spirit of adventure, however, was not crushed and he set out on May 9, 1502, with four vessels and 150 men to seek a passage uniting the Atlantic and Pacific oceans, which he imagined lay somewhere between Honset out on May 9, 1502, with four vessels and 150 men to seek a passage uniting trous, and the constitution of Columbus never recovered from the shock which it sustained. In coasting Central America he got a hint which, if followed up, might have led to the discovery of Mexico and the Pacific; but the mutinous character of his crew forced him aside to seek for gold, and having added little of importance to his previous discoveries, he rehave led to the discovery of Mexico and the Pacific; but the mutinous character of his crew forced him aside to seek for gold, and having added little of importance to his previous discoveries, he returned to Spain in November, 1504. Isa-