Mercedes of Castile Part 20

"The silly mariners have toiled in their own behalf, without knowing it," observed Columbus. "It is the duty of the ignorant to submit to be led by the more enlightened, and to be grateful for the advantages they derive from a borrowed knowledge, albeit it is obtained contrary to their own wishes."

"That is it, truly," added the prior; "else would the office of us churchmen be reduced to very narrow limits. Faith--faith in the church--is the Christian's earliest and latest duty."

"This seemeth reasonable, excellent sirs," returned Master Alonzo, "though the ignorant find it difficult to comprehend matters that they do not understand. When a man fancieth himself condemned to an unheard-of death, he is little apt to see the benefit that lieth beyond the grave. Nevertheless, the Pinta is more nearly ready for the voyage, than any other of our craft, and hath her crew engaged to a man, and that under contracts that will not permit much dispute before a notary."

"There remaineth only the Nina, then," added Columbus; "with her prepared, and our religious duties observed, we may hope finally to commence the enterprise!"

"Senor, you may. My brother, Vicente Yanez, hath finally consented to take charge of this little craft; and that which a Pinzon promiseth, a Pinzon performeth. She will be ready to depart with the Santa Maria and the Pinta, and Cathay must be distant, indeed, if we do not reach it with one or the other of our vessels."

"This is right encouraging, neighbor Martin Alonzo," returned the friar, rubbing his hands with delight; "and I make no question all will come round in the end. What say the crones and loose talkers of Moguer, and of the other ports, touching the shape of the earth, and the chances of the admiral's reaching the Indies, now-a-days?"

"They discourse much as they did, Fray Juan Perez, idly and without knowledge. Although there is not a mariner in any of the havens who doth not admit that the upper sails, though so much the smallest, are the first seen on the ocean, yet do they deny that this cometh of the shape of the earth, but, as they affirm, of the movements of the waters."

"Have none of them ever observed the shadows cast by the earth, in the eclipses of the moon?" asked Columbus, in his calm manner, though he smiled, even in putting the question, as one smiles who, having dipped deeply into a natural problem himself, carelessly lays one of its more popular proofs before those who are less disposed to go beneath the surface. "Do they not see that these shadows are round, and do they not know that a shadow which is round can only be cast by a body that is round?"

"This is conclusive, good Martin Alonzo," put in the prior, "and it ought to remove the doubts of the silliest gossip on the coast. Tell them to encircle their dwellings, beginning to the right, and see if, by following the walls, they do not return to the spot from which they started, coming in from the left."

"Ay, reverend prior, if we could bring our distant voyage down to these familiar examples, there is not a crone in Moguer, or a courtier at Seville, that might not be made to comprehend the mystery. But it is one thing to state a problem fairly, and another to find those who can understand it. Now, I did give some such reasoning to the Alguiazil, in Palos here, and the worthy Senor asked me if I expected to return from this voyage by the way of the lately captured town of Granada. I fancy that the easiest method of persuading these good people to believe that Cathay can be reached by the western voyage, will be by going there and returning."

"Which we will shortly do, Master Martin Alonzo," observed Columbus, cheerfully--"But the time of our departure draweth near, and it is meet that none of us neglect the duties of religion. I commend thee to thy confessor, Senor Pinzon, and expect that all who sail with me, in this great enterprise, will receive the holy communion in my company, before we quit the haven. This excellent prior will shrive Pedro de Munos and myself, and let each man seek such other holy counsellor and monitor as hath been his practice."

With this intimation of his intention to pay a due regard to the rites of the church before he departed--rites that were seldom neglected in that day--the conversation turned, for the moment, on the details of the preparations. After this the parties separated, and a few more days pa.s.sed away in active exertions.

On the morning of Thursday, August the second, 1492, Columbus entered the private apartment of Fray Juan Perez, habited like a penitent, and with an air so devout, and yet so calm, that it was evident his thoughts were altogether bent on his own transgressions and on the goodness of G.o.d. The zealous priest was in waiting, and the great navigator knelt at the feet of him, before whom Isabella had often knelt, in the fulfilment of the same solemnity. The religion of this extraordinary man was colored by the habits and opinions of his age, as, indeed, in a greater or less degree, must be the religion of every man; his confession, consequently, had that admixture of deep piety with inconsistent error, that so often meets the moralist in his investigations into the philosophy of the human mind. The truth of this peculiarity will be seen, by adverting to one or two of the admissions of the great navigator, as he laid before his ghostly counsellor the catalogue of his sins.

"Then, I fear, holy father," Columbus continued, after having made most of the usual confessions touching the more familiar weaknesses of the human race, "that my mind hath become too much exalted in this matter of the voyage, and that I may have thought myself more directly set apart by G.o.d, for some good end, than it might please his infinite knowledge and wisdom to grant."

"That would be a dangerous error, my son, and I carefully admonish thee against the evils of self-righteousness. That G.o.d selecteth his agents, is beyond dispute; but it is a fearful error to mistake the impulses of self-love, for the movements of his Divine Spirit! It is hardly safe for any who have not received the church's ordination, to deem themselves chosen vessels."

"I endeavor so to consider it, holy friar," answered Columbus, meekly; "and, yet, there is that within, which constantly urgeth to this belief, be it a delusion, or come it directly from heaven. I strive, father, to keep the feeling in subjection, and most of all do I endeavor to see that it taketh a direction that may glorify the name of G.o.d and serve the interests of his visible church."

"This is well, and yet do I feel it a duty to admonish thee against too much credence in these inward impulses. So long as they tend, solely, to increase thy love for the Supreme Father of all, to magnify his holiness, and glorify his nature, thou may'st be certain it is the offspring of good; but when self-exaltation seemeth to be its aim, beware the impulse, as thou wouldst eschew the dictation of the great father of evil!"

"I so consider it; and now having truly and sincerely disburdened my conscience, father, so far as in me lieth, may I hope for the church's consolation, with its absolution?"

"Canst thou think of naught else, son, that should not lie hid from before the keeper of all consciences?"

"My sins are many, holy prior, and cannot be too often or too keenly rebuked; but I do think that they may be fairly included in the general heads that I have endeavored to recall."

"Hast thou nothing to charge thyself with, in connection with that s.e.x that the devil as often useth as his tempters to evil, as the angels would fain employ them as the ministers of grace?"

"I have erred as a man, father; but do not my confessions already meet those sins?"

"Hast thou bethought thee of Dona Beatriz Enriquez? of thy son Fernando, who tarrieth, at this moment, in our convent of la Rabida?"

Columbus bowed his head in submission, and the heavy sigh, amounting almost to a groan, that broke out of his bosom, betrayed the weight of his momentary contrition.

"Thou say'st true, father; that is an offence which should never be forgotten, though so often shrived since its commission. Heap on me the penance that I feel is due, and thou shalt see how a Christian can bend and kiss the rod that he is conscious of having merited."

"The spirit thus to do is all that the church requireth; and thou art now bent on a service too important to her interests to be drawn aside from thy great intentions, for any minor considerations. Still may not a minister of the altar overlook the offence. Thou wilt say a pater, daily, on account of this great sin, for the next twenty days, all of which will be for the good of thy soul; after which the church releaseth thee from this especial duty, as thou wilt, then, be drawing near to the land of Cathay, and may have occasion for all thy thoughts and efforts to effect thy object."

The worthy prior then proceeded to prescribe several light penances, most of which were confined to moderate increases of the daily duties of religion; after which he shrived the navigator. The turn of Luis came next, and more than once the prior smiled involuntarily, as he listened to this hot-blooded and impetuous youth, whose language irresistibly carried back his thoughts to the more meek, natural, and the more gentle admissions of the pure-minded Mercedes. The penance prescribed to Luis was not entirely free from severity, though, on the whole, the young man, who was not much addicted to the duties of the confessional, fancied himself well quit of the affair, considering the length of the account he was obliged to render, and the weight of the balance against him.

These duties performed in the persons of the two princ.i.p.al adventurers, Martin Alonzo Pinzon and the ruder mariners of the expedition appeared before different priests and gave in the usual reckoning of their sins.

After this came a scene that was strictly characteristic of the age, and which would be impressive and proper, in all times and seasons, for men about to embark in an undertaking of a result so questionable.

High ma.s.s was said in the chapel of the convent, and Columbus received the consecrated bread from the hands of Fray Juan Perez, in humble reliance on the all-seeing providence of G.o.d, and with a devout dependence on his fostering protection. All who were about to embark with the admiral imitated his example, communing in his company; for that was a period when the wire-drawn conclusions of man had not yet begun so far to supplant the faith and practices of the earlier church as to consider its rites as the end of religion, but he was still content to regard them as its means. Many a rude sailor, whose ordinary life might not have been either saintly or even free from severe censure, knelt that day at the altar, in devout dependence on G.o.d, with feelings, for the moment, that at least placed him on the highway to grace; and it would be presumptuous to suppose that the omniscient Being to whom his offerings were made, did not regard his ignorance with commiseration, and even look upon his superst.i.tion with pity. We scoff at the prayers of those who are in danger, without reflecting that they are a homage to the power of G.o.d, and are apt to fancy that these pa.s.sages in devotion are mere mockery, because the daily mind and the ordinary life are not always elevated to the same standard of G.o.dliness and purity. It would be more humble to remember the general infirmities of the race; to recollect, that as none are perfect, the question is reduced to one of degree; and to bear in mind, that the Being who reads the heart, may accept of any devout pet.i.tions, even though they come from those who are not disposed habitually to walk in his laws. These pa.s.sing but pious emotions are the workings of the Spirit, since good can come from no other source; and it is as unreasonable as it is irreverent to imagine that the Deity will disregard, altogether, the effects of his own grace, however humble.

Whatever may have been the general disposition of most of the communicants on this occasion, there is little doubt that there knelt at the altar of la Rabida, that day, one in the person of the great navigator himself, who, as far as the eye could perceive, lived habitually in profound deference to the dogmas of religion, and who paid an undeviating respect to all its rites. Columbus was not strictly a devotee; but a quiet, deeply seated enthusiasm, which had taken the direction of Christianity, pervaded his moral system, and at all times disposed him to look up to the protecting hand of the Deity and to expect its aid. The high aims that he entertained for the future have already been mentioned, and there is little doubt of his having persuaded himself that he had been set apart by Providence as the instrument it designed to employ in making the great discovery on which his mind was so intently engaged, as well as in accomplishing other and ulterior purposes. If, indeed, an overruling Power directs all the events of this world, who will presume to say that this conviction of Columbus was erroneous, now that it has been justified by the result?

That he felt this sentiment sustaining his courage and constantly urging him onward, is so much additional evidence in favor of his impression, since, under such circ.u.mstances, nothing is more probable than that an earnest belief in his destiny would be one of the means most likely to be employed by a supernatural power in inducing its human agent to accomplish the work for which he had actually been selected.

Let this be as it might, there is no doubt that Colon observed the rites of the church, on the occasion named, with a most devout reliance on the truth of his mission, and with the brightest hopes as to its successful termination. Not so, however, with all of his intended followers. Their minds had wavered, from time to time, as the preparations advanced; and the last month had seen them eager to depart, and dejected with misgivings and doubts. Although there were days of hope and brightness, despondency perhaps prevailed, and this so much the more because the apprehensions of mothers, wives, and of those who felt an equally tender interest in the mariners, though less inclined to avow it openly, were thrown into the scale by the side of their own distrust. Gold, unquestionably, was the great aim of their wishes, and there were moments when visions of inexhaustible mines and of oriental treasures floated before their imaginations; at which times none could be more eager to engage in the mysterious undertaking, or more ready to risk their lives and hopes on its success. But these were fleeting impressions, and, as has just been said, despondency was the prevalent feeling among those who were about to embark. It heightened the devotion of the communicants, and threw a gloom over the chastened sobriety of the altar, that weighed heavily on the hearts of most a.s.sembled there.

"Our people seem none of the most cheerful, Senor Almirante," said Luis, as they left the convent-chapel in company; "and, if truth must be spoken, one could wish to set forth on an expedition of this magnitude, better sustained by merry hearts and smiling countenances."

"Dost thou imagine, young count, that he hath the firmest mind who weareth the most smiling visage, or that the heart is weak because the countenance is sobered? These honest mariners bethink them of their sins, and no doubt are desirous that so holy an enterprise be not tainted by the corruption of their own hearts, but rather purified and rendered fitting, by their longings to obey the will of G.o.d. I trust, Luis"--intercourse had given Columbus a sort of paternal interest in the welfare of the young grandee, that lessened the distance made by rank between them--"I trust, Luis, thou art not, altogether, without these pious longings in thine own person."

"By San Pedro, my new patron! Senor Almirante, I think more of Mercedes de Valverde, than of aught else, in this great affair. She is my polar star, my religion, my Cathay. Go on, in Heaven's name, and discover what thou wilt, whether it be c.i.p.ango or the furthest Indies; beard the great Khan on his throne, and I will follow in thy train, with a poor lance and an indifferent sword, swearing that the maid of Castile hath no equal, and ransacking the east, merely to prove in the face of the universe that she is peerless, let her rivals come from what part of the earth they may."

Although Columbus permitted his grave countenance slightly to relax at this rhapsody, he did not the less deem it prudent to rebuke the spirit in which it was uttered.

"I grieve, my young friend," he said, "to find that thou hast not the feelings proper for one who is engaged, as it might be, in a work of Heaven's own ordering. Canst thou not foresee the long train of mighty and wonderful events that are likely to follow from this voyage--the spread of religion, through the holy church; the conquest of distant empires, with their submission to the sway of Castile; the settling of disputed points in science and philosophy, and the attainment of inexhaustible wealth; with the last and most honorable consequence of all, the recovery of the sepulchre of the Son of G.o.d, from the hands of the Infidels!"

"No doubt, Senor Colon--no doubt, I see them all, but I see the Dona Mercedes at their end. What care I for gold, who already possess--or shall so soon possess--more than I need? what is the extension of the sway of Castile to me, who can never be its king? and as for the Holy Sepulchre, give me but Mercedes, and, like my ancestors that are gone, I am ready to break a lance with the stoutest Infidel who ever wore a turban, be it in that, or in any other quarrel. In short, Senor Almirante, lead on; and though we go forth with different objects and different hopes, doubt not that they will lead us to the same goal. I feel that you ought to be supported in this great and n.o.ble design, and it matters not what may bring me in your train."

"Thou art a mad-brained youth, Luis, and must be humored, if it were only for the sake of the sweet and pious young maiden who seemeth to engross all thy thoughts."

"You have seen her, Senor, and can say whether she be not worthy to occupy the minds of all the youth of Spain?"

"She is fair, and virtuous, and n.o.ble, and a zealous friend of the voyage. These are all rare merits, and thou may'st be pardoned for thy enthusiasm in her behalf. But forget not, that, to win her, thou must first win a sight of Cathay."

"In the reality, you must mean, Senor Almirante; for, with the mind's eye, I see it keenly, constantly, and see little else, with Mercedes standing on its sh.o.r.es, smiling a welcome, and, by St. Paul! sometimes beckoning me on, with that smile that fires the soul with its witchery, even while it subdues the temper with its modesty. The blessed Maria send us a wind, right speedily, that we may quit this irksome river and wearying convent!"

Columbus made no answer; for, while he had all consideration for a lover's impatience, his thoughts turned to subjects too grave, to be long amused even by a lover's follies.

CHAPTER XIII.

"Nor Zayda weeps him only, But all that dwell between The great Alhambra's palace walls And springs of Albalein."

Bryant's Translations.

The instant of departure at length arrived. The moment so long desired by the Genoese was at hand, and years of poverty, neglect, and of procrastination, were all forgotten at that blessed hour; or, if they returned in any manner to the constant memory, it was no longer with the bitterness of hope deferred. The navigator, at last, saw himself in the possession of the means of achieving the first great object for which he had lived the last fifteen years, with the hope, in perspective, of making the success of his present adventure the stepping-stone toward effecting the conquest of the Holy Sepulchre. While those around him were looking with astonishment at the limited means with which ends so great were to be attained, or were struck aghast at the apparent temerity of an undertaking that seemed to defy the laws of nature, and to set at naught the rules of Providence, he had grown more tranquil as the time for sailing drew nearer, and his mind was oppressed merely by a feeling of intense, but of sobered, delight. Fray Juan Perez whispered to Luis, that he could best liken the joy of the admiral to the chastened rapture of a Christian who was about to quit a world of woe, to enter on the untasted, but certain, fruition of blessed immortality.

This, however, was far from being the state of mind of all in Palos. The embarkation took place in the course of the afternoon of the 2d of August, it being the intention of the pilots to carry the vessels that day to a point off the town of Huelvas, where the position was more favorable to making sail than when anch.o.r.ed in front of Palos. The distance was trifling, but it was the commencement of the voyage, and, to many, it was like snapping the cords of life, to make even this brief movement. Columbus, himself, was one of the last to embark, having a letter to send to the court, and other important duties to discharge. At length he quitted the convent, and, accompanied by Luis and the prior, he, too, took his way to the beach. The short journey was silent, for each of the party was deeply plunged in meditation. Never before this hour, did the enterprise seem so perilous and uncertain to the excellent Franciscan. Columbus was carefully recalling the details of his preparations, while Luis was thinking of the maid of Castile, as he was wont to term Mercedes, and of the many weary days that must elapse before he could hope to see her again.