Christopher Columbus | Page 9

opened a book-and-map shop, or at least they worked in one at odd
times, Christopher acting as a draftsman; for, as he himself quaintly
expressed it, "God had endowed me with ingenuity and manual skill in
designing spheres, and inscribing upon them in the proper places cities,
rivers and mountains, isles and ports." He appears to have tried to earn
a little money by commerce as well as by map-making. We have no
exact record of this, but it is thought that he borrowed capital for
trading purposes from rich Genoese merchants settled in Lisbon, and
lost it. This we conclude because, in his will, he ordered certain sums to
be paid to these merchants, without mentioning why. That he tried to
add to the small profits of map-making by trading with sea captains is
not surprising. We can only be sorry that he did not make a handsome
profit out of his ventures, enough for himself and for those who lent
him capital.
We have mentioned that all the men who had a scientific interest in
navigation tried to get to Lisbon. Among those whom Columbus may
have met there, was the great German cosmographer from Nuremburg,
Martin Behaim. Martin helped to improve the old-fashioned astrolabe,
an instrument for taking the altitude of the sun; more important still,
toward the end of 1492 he made the first globe, and indicated on it how
one might sail west and reach Asiatic India. This is the first record of
that idea which was later attributed to Columbus, but which Columbus
himself, until his return from his first voyage of discovery, never even
mentioned. Whether he and Martin Behaim talked together about the
route to India we shall never know. Probably they did not; for when
Christopher importuned later for ships, it was only for the purpose of
discovering "lands in the west" and not for finding a short route to India.
Columbus, though he knew how to draw maps and design spheres,

really possessed but little scientific knowledge. Intuition, plus tenacity,
always did more for him than science; and so it is likely that he talked
more with sailors than with scientists. While he may have known the
learned Behaim, certain it is that, from his earliest days in Lisbon, he
sought the society of men who had been out to the Azores or to
Madeira; men who told him the legends, plentiful enough on these
islands, of lands still farther out toward the setting sun, that no one had
yet ventured to visit.
CHAPTER IV
THE SOJOURN IN MADEIRA
Columbus had not been very long in Lisbon when he met, at church, a
girl named Felipa Monez Perestrello. Felipa was of noble birth;
Christopher was not; but he was handsome--tall, fair-haired,
dignified,--and full of earnestness in his views of life. Felipa consented
to marry him.
Felipa must have been a most interesting companion for a man who
loved voyaging, for she had been born in the Madeiras. Her father, now
dead, had been appointed governor, by Prince Henry, of a little island
called Porto Santo, and Felipa and her mother (with whom the young
couple went to live) had many a tale to tell about that far outpost of the
Atlantic. This is probably what set Christopher yearning for the sea;
and so, about 1479, he and his wife and her mother, Senora Perestrello,
all sailed off for Porto Santo. The Senora must have liked her new
son-in- law's enthusiasm for the sea, for she gave him the charts and
instruments that had belonged to her husband; but as Governor
Perestrello had never been a navigator, these could not have been either
very numerous or very helpful.
From Porto Santo, Columbus made a voyage to Guinea and back; and
after that he and his family went to live on the larger island of Madeira.
There, according to many men who knew Columbus well, the
following event happened.
One day a storm-tossed little caravel, holding four sick, battered,

Portuguese sailors and a Spanish pilot, all of them little more than
living skeletons, was blown on the Madeira shore near where
Christopher dwelt. Their tale was a harrowing one. They had started,
they said, months before from the Canaries for the Madeiras, but had
been blown far, far, far, to the west; and then, when the wind quieted
down so that they could try to get back, their ship became disabled and
their food gave out. Starvation and exposure had nearly finished them;
four, in fact, died within a day or two; but the Spanish pilot, the one
who had kept his strength long enough to steer toward Madeira, lived
longer. The kind-hearted Christopher, who was devoured with curiosity,
had had the poor fellow carried to his own home. He and Felipa did all