Nation in a Nutshell | Page 4

which the voyagers
belonged, and even describe their route around the Cape of Good Hope
and along the west coast of Africa, whence the trade-winds drifted
them across the Atlantic.
[Sidenote: Icelandic Voyagers.]
Confining ourselves to credible history, it appears that in the year 986
(eighty years before the conquest of England by William of Normandy),
an Icelandic mariner named Bjarne Herrjulson, making for Greenland
in his rude bark, was swept across the Atlantic, and finally found
himself cast upon dry land. He made haste to set sail on his return
voyage, and succeeded in getting safely back to Iceland. He told his
story of the strange land beyond the seas; and so pleased had he been
with its pleasant and fruitful aspect that he named it "Vineland."
[Sidenote: Leif Erikson.]
The story of Bjarne impressed itself upon an intelligent and
adventurous man, Leif Erikson; who, having purchased Bjarne's ship,
set sail for Vineland in the year 1000, with a crew of thirty-five men.
He reached what is now Cape Cod, and passed the winter of 1000-1 on
its shores. Returning to Iceland, his example was followed, two years

later, by another Erikson, who established a colony on the shores of
Narragansett Bay, not far from Fall River, where the founder died and
was buried.
[Sidenote: Columbus in Iceland.]
It is well nigh certain that Christopher Columbus, in the year 1477,
visited Iceland, and even sailed one hundred leagues beyond it,
discovering there an unfrozen sea. The idea of western discovery was
already in his mind, and he had received hints of a western continent,
from certain carved objects picked up in the Atlantic by other
navigators. It is altogether probable that the conjectures of Columbus
were confirmed into conviction by the Icelandic traditions of Leif's
discovery, during his sojourn at Rejkjawik. From this time Columbus
was more than ever intent upon the enterprise which, fifteen years after,
conferred upon him imperishable glory.
[Sidenote: Voyage of Columbus.]
The story of Columbus is, or should be, familiar to every American
who can read. How he sailed forth from the roads of Saltez on the 3d of
August, 1492, with three vessels and a crew of one hundred and twenty
men; how the voyage was stormy and full of doubts and
discouragements; how, finally, early on the morning of October 12,
Rodrigo Triana, a seaman of the _Pinta_, first descried the land which
Columbus christened San Salvador; how they pushed on and found
Cuba and Hayti; how, after returning to Spain, Columbus made two
more voyages westward,--one in 1493, when he discovered Jamaica,
Hispaniola, and Porto Rico: and another in 1498 when the Orinoco and
the coast of Para rewarded his researches; and his subsequent unhappy
fate--all these events have been related by many writers, and most
vividly of all by the graphic pen of Washington Irving.
[Sidenote: Menendez.]
The era of American discovery may be said to have continued till the
memorable fourth day of September, 1565, when the Spaniard
Menendez founded the first town on this continent, on the Florida coast,
which he called St. Augustine. In one sense, indeed, the era of
discovery did not cease down to within the memory of men still living;
for the discovery of a path across the Rocky Mountains might well be
regarded as included in it. But during the period which intervened
between the return of Columbus from his first voyage and the building

of St. Augustine, the extent and character of the eastern portion of our
continent was revealed to Europe by many and successful navigators.
[Sidenote: The Cabots.]
The story of Columbus inspired the cupidity and territorial ambition of
England, France, Spain, and Italy; and in the year 1497 John Cabot, a
Venetian by birth, but long a resident of Bristol, England, set out
thence across the Atlantic. He was accompanied by his son Sebastian.
On the 24th of June he came in sight of Newfoundland, and then of
Nova Scotia; then he sailed southward and reached Florida. As this was
a year before the third voyage of Columbus, in which he saw the coast
of the mainland, to John Cabot belongs the honor of having landed
upon the American continent before Columbus.
[Sidenote: Amerigo Vespucci.]
Voyages to the new land now followed each other in quick succession
for many years. It was in 1499 that the accomplished but unscrupulous
Amerigo Vespucci made his first voyage to Hispaniola, following it up
by voyages along the coast of South America. He returned thence to
claim, after the death of Columbus, the honors due to the great
Genoese.
[Sidenote: Verrazzani.]
Portugal and France, jealous of the success of the Spanish and English
expeditions, lost no time in entering into this perilous and brilliant
competition for maritime honor and western possession. Portugal sent
out Cortereal,