Part 18 (1/2)
Such was the last sally of his sanguine and unconquerable spirit; which, disregarding age and infirmities, and all past sorrows and disappoint bed with all the confidence of youthful hope; and talked of still greater enterprises, as if he had a long and vigorous life before him The Adelantado took leave of his brother, whoain, and set out on his racious reception The claireat attention by the young king and queen, and flattering hopes were given of a speedy and prosperous termination to his suit
In theto a close The momentary fire which had reani infirmities Immediately after the departure of the Adelantado, his illness increased in violence His last voyage had shattered beyond repair a frame already worn and wasted by a life of hardshi+p; and continual anxieties robbed him of that sweet repose so necessary to recruit the weariness and debility of age The cold ingratitude of his sovereign chilled his heart The continued suspension of his honors, and the enmity and defamation experienced at every turn, seereat object of his ambition This shadow, it is true, could be but of transient duration; but it is difficult for the most illustrious man to look beyond the present cloud which may obscure his fame, and anticipate its per ads that his end was approaching, he prepared to leave his affairs in order for the benefit of his successors
It is said that on the 4th of May he wrote an infore of a little breviary, given him by Pope Alexander VI In this he bequeathed that book to the republic of Genoa, which he also appointed successor to his privileges and dignities, on the extinction of his male line He directed likewise the erection of an hospital in that city with the produce of his possessions in Italy The authenticity of this document is questioned, and has beco commentators It is not, however, of ht readily have been written by a person like Coluined his end suddenly approaching, and shows the affection hich his thoughts were bent on his native city It is ter commentators a military codicil, because testamentary dispositions of this kind are executed by the soldier at the point of death, without the usual formalities required by the civil law About teeks afterwards, on the eve of his death, he executed a final and regularly authenticated codicil, in which he bequeathed his dignities and estates with better judgment
In these last and awful moments, when the soul has but a brief space in which to make up its accounts between heaven and earth, all dissimulation is at an end, and we read unequivocal evidences of character The last codicil of Colurave, is stanant virtues He repeats and enforces several clauses of his original testao his universal heir The entailed inheritance, or o to his brother Don Fernando, and from him, in like case, to pass to his uncle Don Bartholo always to the nearest male heir; in failure of which it was to pass to the fee to the admiral He enjoined upon whoever should inherit his estate never to alienate or diment its prosperity and importance He likewise enjoined upon his heirs to be prompt and devoted at all tin and proo should devote one tenth of the revenues which ht arise from his estate, when it caent relatives and of other persons in necessity; that, out of the remainder, he should yield certain yearly proportions to his brother Don Fernando, and his uncles Don Bartholoo; and that the part allotted to Don Fernando should be settled upon him and histhus provided for the nities, he ordered that Don Diego, when his estates should be sufficiently productive, should erect a chapel in the island of Hispaniola, which God had given to hia, where masses should be daily performed for the repose of the souls of himself, his father, his mother, his wife, and of all who died in the faith Another clause recoo, Beatrix Enriquez, the mother of his natural son Fernando His connection with her had never been sanctioned by lect of her, see o to provide for her respectable maintenance; ”and let this be done,” he adds, ”for the discharge of hs heavy on my soul”
[234] Finally, he noted with his own hand several minute sums, to be paid to persons at different and distant places, without their being told whence they received them These appear to have been trivial debts of conscience, or rewards for petty services received in ti them is one of half a ate of the Jewry, in the city of Lisbon These minute provisions evince the scrupulous attention to justice in all his dealings, and that love of punctuality in the fulfillment of duties, for which he was reave o, as to the conduct of his affairs, enjoining upon him to take every month an account with his own hand of the expenses of his household, and to sign it with his naularity in this, he observed, lost both property and servants, and turned the last into ene bequests were made in presence of a few faithful followers and servants, and a them we find the nao Mendez in the perilous voyage in a canoe fro thus scrupulously attended to all the claims of affection, loyalty, and justice upon earth, Colu received the holy sacrament, and performed all the pious offices of a devout Christian, he expired with great resignation, on the day of ascension, the 20th of May, 1506, being about seventy years of age
[235] His last words were, ”_In manus tuas Domine, commendo spiritum meum:_” Into thy hands, O Lord, I commend my spirit [236]
His body was deposited in the convent of St Francisco, and his obsequies were celebrated with funereal pomp at Valladolid, in the parochial church of Santa Maria de la Antigua His remains were transported afterwards, in 1513, to the Carthusian monastery of Las Cuevas of Seville, to the chapel of St Ann or of Santo Christo, in which chapel were likewise deposited those of his son Don Diego, who died in the village of Montalban, on the 23d of February, 1526 In the year 1536 the bodies of Coluo were removed to Hispaniola, and interred in the principal chapel of the cathedral of the city of San Do since been again disinterred and conveyed to the Havanna, in the island of Cuba
We are told that Ferdinand, after the death of Colu a monument to be erected to his memory, on which was inscribed the ranted to hins: A Castilla y a Leon nuevo ave a neorld_) However great an honor a monument may be for a subject to receive, it is certainly but a cheap reward for a sovereign to bestow As to the raved in the memory of mankind, reat debt of gratitude due to the discoverer, which the e
Attempts have been made in recent days, by loyal Spanish writers, to vindicate the conduct of Ferdinand towards Columbus They were doubtless well intended, but they have been futile, nor is their failure to be regretted To screen such injustice in so eminent a character from the reprobation of mankind, is to deprive history of one of its ratitude of Ferdinand stand recorded in its full extent, and endure throughout all time The dark shadohich it casts upon his brilliant renoill be a lesson to all rulers, teaching thein what is important to their own fame in their treatment of illustrious men
Chapter V
Observations on the Character of Colu the story of Columbus, it has been the endeavor of the author to place him in a clear and familiar point of view; for this purpose he has rejected no circumstance, however trivial, which appeared to evolve soht all kinds of collateral facts which ht upon his views and motives With this view also he has detailed uely noticed by historians, probably because they ht be deemed instances of error or reat h he may produce a fine picture, will never present a faithful portrait Great reat and little qualities Indeed, reatness arises from their mastery over the imperfections of their nature, and, their noblest actions are sometimes struck forth by the collision of their ularly corasped all kinds of knowledge, whether procured by study or observation, which bore upon his theories; impatient of the scanty aliment of the day, ”his impetuous ardor,” as has well been observed, ”threw him into the study of the fathers of the church; the Arabian Jews, and the ancient geographers;” while his daring but irregular genius, bursting from the limits of imperfect science, bore him to conclusions far beyond the intellectual vision of his contemporaries If soenious and splendid; and their error resulted fro over his peculiar path of enterprise His own discoveries enlightened the ignorance of the age; guided conjecture to certainty, and dispelled that very darkness hich he had been obliged to struggle
In the progress of his discoveries he has been reacity and the admirable justness hich he seized upon the phenomena of the exterior world The variations, for instance, of terrestrial s of rand cli not solely with the distance to the equator, but also with the difference of meridians: these and similar phenomena, as they broke upon him, were discerned onderful quickness of perception, and eneral knowledge This lucidity of spirit, this quick convertibility of facts to principles, distinguish him from the dawn to the close of his subli ardor of his iination, his ultimate success has been admirably characterized as a ”conquest of reflection” [237]
It has been said that led with the ambition of Columbus, and that his stipulations with the Spanish court were selfish and avaricious The charge is inconsiderate and unjust He ainity and wealth in the saht renown; they were to be part and parcel of his achievement, and palpable evidence of its success; they were to arise from the territories he should discover, and be commensurate in i of the sovereigns but a coive thenity of his command If there should be no country discovered, his stipulated viceroyalty would be of no avail; and if no revenues should be produced, his labor and peril would produce no gain If his conificent, it was froions he had attached to the Castilian crown What ain empire on such conditions? But he did not risk merely a loss of labor, and a disappoint questioned, he voluntarily undertook, and, with the assistance of his coadjutors, actually defrayed, one-eighth of the whole charge of the first expedition
It was, in fact, this rare union already noticed, of the practical man of business with the poetical projector, which enabled hih so many difficulties; but the pecuniary calculations and cares, which gave feasibility to his sche aspirations of his soul The gains that promised to arise from his discoveries, he intended to appropriate in the same princely and pious spirit in which they were demanded He conteion; vast contributions for the relief of the poor of his native city; the foundation of churches, where masses should be said for the souls of the departed; and armies for the recovery of the holy sepulchre in Palestine
Thus his aht and prone to generous deed
In the discharge of his office he maintained the state and ceremonial of a viceroy, and was tenacious of his rank and privileges; not froar love of titles, but because he prized them as testimonials and trophies of his achievereat rewards In his repeated applications to the king, he insisted nities As to his pecuniary dues and all questions relative to mere revenue, he offered to leave them to arbitration or even to the absolute disposition of the s,” said he nobly, ”affect o, and whoever after hinities and titles n hi in the fareatness
His conduct was characterized by the grandeur of his views, and thethe newly-found countries, like a grasping adventurer eager only for ienerally the case with conteht to ascertain their soil and productions, their rivers and harbors: he was desirous of colonizing and cultivating the cities; introducing the useful arts; subjecting every thing to the control of law, order, and religion; and thus of founding regular and prosperous elorious plan he was constantly defeated by the dissolute rabble which it was his misfortune to command; hom all laas tyranny, and all order restraint They interrupted all useful works by their seditions; provoked the peaceful Indians to hostility; and after they had thus dran misery and warfare upon their own heads, and overwhel, they charged hi the cause of the confusion
Well would it have been for Spain had those who followed in the track of Columbus possessed his sound policy and liberal views The New World, in such cases, would have been settled by pacific colonists, and civilized by enlightened legislators; instead of being overrun by desperate adventurers, and desolated by avaricious conquerors