Part 22 (1/2)
”The Parisian is right, and he pays America a most deserved compliment.
Never was so elegant a panorama enrolled as at Chicago,” responded Colonel Harris.
”You are correct, Colonel,” said Captain Hall, ”the triumph of our Exposition was largely due to the masterly supervision which evoked uniformity of design and harmonious groupings by employing only those of our architects, sculptors, painters, and landscape gardeners, who possessed the highest skill.”
Leo ventured to add that the ”White City” seemed to him dream-like and that under the magical influence of Columbus, as patron-saint, all nationality, creed, and s.e.x, were harmoniously blended in ideal beauty and grandeur.
Lucille, who had just sipped the last of her chocolate, also bore testimony, and Harry watched her admiringly as she said, ”At times, especially in the evening, when thousands of incandescent lights outlined the Court of Honor with its golden G.o.ddess of the Republic and the facades, turrets, and domes, it seemed to some of us as if we had stepped out upon a neighboring planet, where civilization and art had been purified, or that the veil was lifted and we were gazing upon the glories of the New Jerusalem.”
The ladies now sought the deck of the ”Hallena,” and were soon followed by the gentlemen, who smoked their fragrant Havanas, enjoying every moment's vacation from business anxieties at home. The yacht, like a slender greyhound, in charge of the first officer was swiftly running towards the Isle of Elba, en route to Naples. The stars never shone more brilliantly in the Italian sky, and land breezes were mingling their rich odors with the salt sea air.
The spell of Columbus's great discovery stirred the soul of Harry Hall.
Holding his half-smoked cigar, he repeated the familiar couplet,
”Man's inhumanity to man Makes countless thousands mourn.”
”Strange that four centuries go by before even Genoa erects his monument, which we have admired to-day; though monuments to the memory of Columbus have been erected in many cities, yet, how tardy the world was to appreciate the value of Columbus's discovery, a third of the land of the globe. How pitiful the last days of Columbus, who, old and ill, returning in 1504 from his fourth voyage to the new world, found his patroness Isabella dying, and Ferdinand heartless. With no money to pay his bills, Columbus died May 20th, 1505, in poor quarters at Valladolid, his last words being, 'Into thy hands, O Lord, I commit my spirit.' It is now natural perhaps that many cities should claim his birth and his bones.”
”Yes,” said Lucille, ”how encouraging some of the world's kind epitaphs would be if they were only spoken before death came. Two hemispheres now eagerly study the inspiring story of Columbus's faith, courage, perseverance, and success.”
Henley said, ”Captain Hall, you are young yet, but by the time you reach my age you will have little use for the sentiment young people so often indulge in. When New York tries her hand with expositions she will doubtless deal with facts. The truth is, Columbus was human like the rest of us, and followed in the wake of others for his own personal aggrandizement. He was not the first man to discover America. The Nors.e.m.e.n antedated him by five centuries.”
”What if the Nors.e.m.e.n did first discover America?” said Colonel Harris.
”The discoveries of the vikings were not utilized by civilization. It is held by the courts that a patent is valid only in the name of the inventor who first gives the invention a useful introduction. Columbus's discovery was fortunately made at a time when civilization was able with men and money to follow up and appropriate its advantages.”
”The true discoverer of America,” said Henley, ”I believe to be Jean Cousin, a sea captain of Dieppe, France, who crossed the Atlantic and sailed into the Amazon River in 1488, four years before Columbus reached San Salvador. Then Spain, Portugal, the States of the Church, Ferdinand, Isabella, and Columbus attempted to rob Cousin of his bold adventure. In brief these are the facts: Jean Cousin was an able and scientific navigator. In 1487 his skill so contributed in securing a naval victory for the French over the English that the reward for his personal valor was the gift of an armed s.h.i.+p from the merchants of Dieppe, who expected him to go forth in search of new discoveries.[A]
[Footnote A: _The True Discovery of America._ Captain R.N. Gambier.
_Fortnightly Review_, January 1, 1894.]
”In January, 1488, Cousin sailed west out into the Atlantic, and south, for two months with Vincent Pinzon a practical sailor, second in command.
He sailed up the Amazon River, secured strange birds, feathers, spices, and unknown woods, and returned to the coast of Africa for a cargo of ivory, oil, skins, and gold dust. Pinzon quarreled with the natives, fired upon them, and seized some of their goods, so that they fled and would not come back to him. He thus lost a valuable return cargo. At Dieppe the merchants were enraged; Pinzon was tried by court martial for imperilling the trade of Africa, and banished from French soil. He thirsted for revenge and went back to Palos to tell his brothers Alonzo and Martin, s.h.i.+powners, of the mighty Amazon; often they speculated as to the vast lands which the Amazon drained.
”Columbus, discouraged, ridiculed, and begging his way, started out to meet at Huelva his brother-in-law and secure promised help, so that he could visit France. Suddenly he changed his route, stopped at the little convent La Rabida, met Juan Perez, who knew Queen Isabella, and Fernandez the priest, the latter a close friend of the three Pinzon brothers.
Columbus got what he wanted at court, returned to Palos, and with the Pinzon brothers sailed west, with Vincent Pinzon, Cousin's s.h.i.+pmate, as pilot. The conclusion that Jean Cousin, and not Columbus first discovered America, seems irresistible. Pope Alexander VI., by Papal bull, had already divided all the new discoveries made, between Catholic Spain and Portugal. Dieppe and France were in the Pope's black books. What chance of recognition had Cousin against Columbus, the protege of this Pope?”
”You seem to win your case,” said Major Williams, ”what romance in history will be left us? William Tell is now a myth, and Was.h.i.+ngton's little hatchet story is no more.”
Lucille quieted Leo with a smile, cigars were thrown overboard, the light on the Isle of Elba was visible, and all retired for the night, while the alert yacht, like a whirring night-hawk, flew on towards Naples.
On the yacht ”Hallena” early to bed and early to rise was an unwritten law. By six o'clock next morning, breakfast had been served, and the tourists were on deck with gla.s.ses, each anxious to discover objects of interest. During the night busy Leghorn on the coast, and Pisa, and Florence up the Arno, were left behind. Leo was proud of sunny and artistic Italy and he much desired that Lucille should see at Pisa the famous white marble leaning tower, with its beautiful spiral colonnades; its n.o.ble cathedral and baptistry, the latter famous for its wonderful echo, and the celebrated cemetery made of earth brought from the Holy Land. At Florence she should see the stupendous Duomo, with the Brunelleschi dome that excited the emulation of Michael Angelo; the bronze gates of Ghiberti, ”worthy to be the gates of paradise,” and the choice collections of art in the Pitti Palace and the Uffizi Gallery connected by Porte Vecchio. But Leo contented himself with the thought that when the yacht episode was over, and Harry Hall had pa.s.sed out of sight, he could then take Lucille over Italy to enjoy a thousand-and-one works of art, including masterpieces by such artists as Michael Angelo, Raphael, t.i.tian, Correggio, Guido, and others.
Lucille had studied art in Boston, and she was fond of Leo because he pa.s.sionately loved art and could a.s.sist her. She began to comprehend what Aristotle meant when he defined art as ”the reason of the thing, without the matter,” or Emerson, ”the conscious utterance of thought, by speech, or action, to any end.”
CHAPTER XXI
TWO UNANSWERED LETTERS