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CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS.
F A M O U S
Voyagers and Explorers
BY
SARAH KNOWLES BOLTON
AUTHOR OF "poor BOYS WHO BECAME FAMOUS," " GIRLS WHO BECAME FAMOUS,'
"famous AMERICAN AUTHORS," "FAMOUS AMERICAN STATESMEN,"
"famous MEN OF SCIENCE," "FAMOUS EUROPEAN ARTISTS,"
"from heart AND NATURE" (POEMS), "FAMOUS
H AUTHORS," " FAMOUS F
STATESMEN," ETC., ETC.
ENGLISH AUTHORS," " FAMOUS ENGLISH
NEW YORK : 46 East 14TH Street.
THOMAS Y. CROWELL & CO.
BOSTON: 100 Purchase Street.
Copyright, 1893,
BY
Thomas Y. Cuowell & Co.
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C. J PETERS & SON,
Type-Setteks and Ei.ecteotytees,
145 High Stbbet, Boston.
TO
0. E. BOLTON,
MY HUSBAND,
I Dedicate this Book.
PREFACE.
In this volume, for the most part, those explorers
have been, chosen whose labors have been connected with
North America. Columbus naturally comes first. Mar-
co Polo's book doubtless influenced Columbus in his
search for the route to India and Cathay. Magellan
was the first to circumnavigate the globe. Sir Walter
Raleigh, believing in the future of America, tried in
vain to establish an English colony in the new world.
Sir John Franklin, with many hardships, closed his
pathetic and noble life in exploring our northern lati-
tudes. The search for the North Pole has all the
interest of a romance in the experience of Kane,
Hall, Greely, Lockwood, and others. David Livingstone
reveals much of Africa, and furnishes an example of
true manhood and heroic purpose. Perry opened Japan
to the world. Suffering and privation were the lot of
most of these men, but by their courage and persever-
ance they overcame great difficulties and accomplished
important results for the benefit of mankind.
s. K. B.
V
447317
TABLE OF CONTENTS.
PAGTi;
CiinisTOPHEu Columbus , 1
Marco Polo 73
Ferdixaxd Magellan,, . 120
Sib Walter Kaleigh 154
Sir John Franklin, Dr. Kane, C. F. Hall, and others 235
David Livingstone 336
Matthew Calbraitii Peijry 412
General A. W. Greely and other Arctic Explorers, 442
Vll
CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS.
MORE than four hundred years ago^ was born in
Genoa, Italy, a boy who was destined to become
famous the world over. Monuments to his memory
are in very many of the great cities. Scores of books
have been written about him, and now in 1893 the
country which he discovered is doing him honor by the
greatest exposition the world has ever seen.
Dominico Colombo, a wool-comber, and his wife
Susannah Fontanarossa, the daughter of a wool-weaver,
lived in a simple home in Genoa. They had five chil-
dren, — Christoforo ; Giovanni, who died young ; Barto-
lomeo, called later Bartholomew, who never married ;
Giacomo, called in Spain, Diego; and one sister, Bian-
chinetta, who married a cheesemonger, Bavarello, and
had one child.
Susannah, the mother, appears to have had a little prop-
erty, but Dominico was always unsuccessful, and died
poor and in debt, his sons in his later years sending
him as much money as they were able to spare.
1 Avitliors (lifler as to the year in which Christopher was born. Wash-
in<;tou living', in his delightful life of Columbus, thinks about the year 1435,
and .lolin Fiske, in his " Discovery of America," and several other historians,
UKree with liinr, while Justin Wiiisor, in his life of Columbus, thinks with
Hiirrisse, Mufioz, and others that he was jirohably born between Marcli 15,
1440, and Maroli V!U, 1417. Kniilio Castelar in the Centtiry for May-October,
18'J-', puts the date of birth at 14:j:) or 1431.
1
2 CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS.
The weavers had schools of their own iu Genoa ; and
the young Christoplier learned at these the ordinary
branches, — reading, writing, grammar, and arithmetic,
with something of Latin and drawing. He seems to have
been at the University of Pavia for a short time, where
he studied geometry, geography, astronomy, and naviga-
tion, returning to his father's house to help the family
by wool-combing.
The boy was eager for the sea, and at fourteen started
out upon his life of adventure on the jSIediterranean,
under a distant relative named Colombo. His first
voyage of which we have an account, was in a naval
expedition fitted out in 1459 by John of Anjou, with
the aid of Genoa, against Naples, to recover it for his
father, Duke Eene, Count of Provence.
This warfare lasted four years, and was unsuccessful.
Nearly forty years later Columbus wrote concerning
this struggle to the Spanish monarchs : "King Rene
(whom God has taken to himself) sent me to Tunis
to capture the galley Fernandina. Arriving at the
island of San Pedro in Sardinia, I learned that there
were two ships and a Caracca with the galley, which so
alarmed the crew that they resolved to proceed no far-
ther, but to go to Marseilles for another vessel and a
larger crew, before which, being unable to force their
inclinations, I apparently yielded to their wish, and,
having first changed the points of the compass, spread
all sail (for it was evening), and at daybreak we were
witliin the Cape of Carthagena, when all believed for
a certainty that we were nearing Marseilles."
If Columbus was born in 1435, he was at this time
twenty-four ; a young man to be intrusted with such an
enterprise.
CHUISrOPHER COLUMBUS. 3
These early years must have been full of clanger and
hardship. Piracy on the seas was common, and battles
between the Italian republics almost constant. The
young man learned to be fearless, to govern sailors well,
and was full of the spirit of the age, — that of explo-
ration and conquest.
Like most other men who have come to renown,
Columbus was an ardent seeker after knowledge. He
read everything obtainable about navigation, astronomy,
and the discoveries which had been made at that time.
Portugal was showing herself foremost in all mari-
time enterprises. This activity has been attributed,
says Irving, to a romantic incident of the fourteenth
century, in the discovery of the Madeira Islands.
In the reign of Edward III. of England (1327-1378)
Robert Machin ^ fell in love with a beautiful girl named
Anne Dorset. She was of a proud family, which refused
to allow her to marry Machin, who was arrested by
order of the king, and she was obliged to marry a noble-
man, who took her to his estate near Bristol.
Maciiin and his friends determined to rescue her
from her hated wifehood. One of his companions be-
came a groom in the nobleman's household, ascertained
that she still loved Robert, and planned with her an
escape with him to France.
Riding out one day with the pretended groom, she was
taken to a boat, and conveyed to a vessel, in which the
lovers put out to sea. They sailed along the coast past
Cornwall, when a storm arose, and they were driven out
of sight of land.
For thirteen days they were tossed about on the ocean,
1 Enc. I?rit. says " Machim ; " Wiiisor and Fiske and Major, " Machin ; "
Irving, " Macluun."
4 CUltlSTOPIIER COLUMBUS.
and on the morning of tlie fourteenth day they came
upon a beautiful island. The young wife, overcome by
fear and remorse, had already become alarmingly ill.
Machiu carried her to the island, where lie constructed
a bower for her under a great tree, and brought her
fruits and flowers.
The crew stayed on the vessel to guard it till the
party should return. A severe storm came up, and the
ship was driven off the coast and disappeared. Anne
now reproached herself as being the cause of all this
disaster ; for three days she was speechless, dying with-
out uttering a word.
Machin was prostrated with grief and distress, that he
had brought her to a lonely island, away from home and
friends, to die. He died five days later, and at his own
request was buried by her side at the foot of a rustic
altar which he had erected under the great tree.
His companions repaired the boat in Avhich they had
come to shore, and started upon the great ocean, hoping,
almost in vain, to reach England. They were tossed
about by the winds, and finally dashed upon the rocks
on the coast of Morocco, where they were put in prison
by the Moors. Here they learned that their ship had
shared the same fate.
The English prisoners met in prison an experienced
pilot, Juan de Morales, a Spaniard of Seville. He
listened with the greatest interest to their story, and
on his release communicated the circumstances to Prince
Henry of Portugal.
This prince was the son of John the First, surnamed
the Avenger, and Philippa of Lancaster, sister of Henry
IV. of England. After Prince Henry had helped his
father in 1415 to conquer Ceuta opposite the rock of
CUUISTOPUER COLUMBUS. 5
Gibraltar, and to drive the Moors into the mountains, he
determined to give up war and devote himself to discov-
ery, even though on account of his bravery he was asked
by the Pope, Henry V. of England, John II. of Castile,
and the Emperor Sigismund, to lead their armies.
He made his home on the lonely promontory of Sagres,
in the south-western part of Portugal, built an astronom-
ical observatory, invited to his home the most learned
men of the time in naval matters, and lived the life of
a scholar. He spent all his fortune, and indeed became
involved in debt, in fitting out expeditions to the coast
of Africa, hoping to find a southern passage to the
wealth of the Indies, and to convert the barbarians to
Christianity. His motto was, "Talent de bien faire "
(Desire to do well, or the talent to do well).
Prince Henry's first success was the rediscovery of
JVIadeira in 1418, where Eobert Machin and Anne were
buried over seventy years before. The island of Porto
Santo, near Madeira, of which we shall hear more
by and by, was discovered about this time by Bartho-
lomew Perestrelo, who placed a rabbit with her little ones
on the island. Years afterward these had so multiplied
that they had devoui*ed nearly every green thing on the
island ; so much so, says Mr. Fiske, that Prince Henry's
enemies, angered that he spent so much money in expe-
ditions, declared that " God had evidently created those
islands for beasts alone, not for men ! "
Through the enterprise of Prince Henry, Cape Boja-
dor, on the western coast of Africa, was doubled in 1434
by Gil Eannes. Heretofore it had been believed that
if anybody ventured so near the torrid zone, he would
never come back alive, on account of the dreadful heat
and boisterous waves at that point.
6 CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS.
The coast was soon explored from Cape Blanco to Cape
Verde. In 1460 Diego Gomez discovered the Cape Verde
Islands, and two years later Piedro de Cintra reached
Sierra Leone. In 1484 Diego Cam went as far as the
mouth of the Congo, and the following year a thousand
miles farther ; and while the Portuguese took back hun-
dreds of negro slaves to be sold, they sent missionaries
to teach the blacks the true faith !
Prince Henry had died Nov. 13, 1460, so that he did
not live to see Africa circumnavigated by Bartholomew
Diaz or Vasco da Gama.
The then known world talked about these expeditions
of Portugal ; therefore it was not strange that Columbus,
thirty-five years old, should make his way to Lisbon,
about the year 1470. His younger brother, Bartho-
lomew, was already living in Lisbon, making, maps and
globes with great skill, Columbus is described at that
time as tall and of exceedingly fine figure, suave, yet
dignified in manners, with fair complexion, eyes blue and
full of expression, hair light, but at thirty white as snow
He had the air of one born to be a leader, while he won
friends by his frankness and cordiality.
In Lisbon, Columbus attended services at the chapel
of the Convent of All Saints. One of the ladies of rank,
Avho either boarded at the monastery, or had some
official connection with it, was so pleased with the evi-
dent devotion of the young stranger, that she sought his
acquaintance, and married him in 1473. She was his
superior in position though without much fortune, —
the daughter of the Bartholomew Perestrelo who. having
discovered the island of Porto Santo, was made its
governor by Prince Henry. Perestrelo had died sixteen
years previously, leaving a widow, Isabella Moiliz, and
CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS. 7
an attractive daughter, Philippa, the bride of Columbus.
Some historians think she was not a daughter, but a near
relative.
The newly wedded couple went to Porto Santo to
live with the mother, who naturally gave Cohimbus
all the charts, maps, and journals of his father-in-law.
These he carefully studied, becoming familiar with the
voyages made by the Portuguese. When he was not
in service on tlie ocean, he earned money as before by
making maps and charts, sending some funds to his
impecunious father, and helping to educate his younger
brother.
His wife's sister had married Pedro Correo, a naviga-
tor of some prominence, and the two men must have
talked of possible discoveries with intense interest.
Columbus, after much study, believed that there was
land to the westward of Spain and Portugal. If the
earth were a globe or sphere, then somewhere between
Portugal and Asia it was natural to suppose that there
was a large body of land. He had read in Aristotle,
Seneca, and Pliny, that one might pass from Spain to
India in a few days ; he had also read of wood and
other articles floating from the westward to the islands,
near the known continent,
IMartin Vicenti, a pilot in the service of the King, of
Portugal, had found a piece of carved wood four hundred
and fifty leagues to the west of Cape St. Vincent. The
inhabitants of the Azores had seen trunks of pine-trees
cast upon their shores, and the bodies of two men un-
like any known race.
So deeply was Columbus impressed with the proba-
bility of a western world, or rather that the eastern
coast of Asia stretched far towards the west, that he wrote
8 CIIRISrOPllER COLUMliUS.
a letter to the learned astronomer, Paolo del Pozzio dei
Toscanelli of Florence, in 1474, asking for his opinion
upon the snbject. The astronomer had already written a
letter on the same matter to Alfonso V., King of Portu-
gal, and copied this letter for Columbus, sending him
also a chart showing what he believed to be the position
of the Atlantic Ocean (called the Sea of Darkness),
with Europe on the east, and Cathay (China) on the
west.
Toscanelli had read Marco Polo's book, and he wrote
to Columbus concerning the wonderful Cathay where
the great Khan lived, and where there was much gold
and silver and spices, and a splendid island, Cipango
(Japan), where "they cover the temples and palaces with
solid gold." To reach these one must sail steadily west-
ward.
Toscanelli estimated the circumference of the earth
at about the correct figure, but thought the distance from
Lisbon to Quinsay (Hang-chow, China), westward, to
be about six thousand five hundred miles, supposing
that Asia covered nearly the whole Avidth of the Pacific
Ocean.
When Columbus had sailed about one-third of tlie way,
thought Toscanelli, he would come to " Antilia," or the
Seven Islands, where seven Spanish bishops, driven out
of Spain when the Moors captured it, had built seven
splendid cities. Below these he placed on his map the
island of " St Brandon," Avhere a Scotch priest of that
name had landed in the sixth century. None of these
fabled islands was ever found. Columbus took this chart
of Toscanelli's with him when he sailed for the New
World. The aged astronomer had encouraged Colum-
bus to persevere in a voyage " fraught with honor as it
CnBISTOPIlER COLUMBUS. 9
must be, and inestimable gain, and most lofty fame among
all Christian people. . . . When that voyage shall be
accomplished, it will be a voyage to powerful kingdoms,
and to cities and provinces most wealthy and noble,
abounding in all things most desired by us." How
literally has this come true, though Toscanelli saw only
China in the distance ! He died in 1482, ten years
before Columbus was able to make the long-desired
voyage.
Columbus, if he had not read it before, now obtained
the book of Marco Polo, published in a Latin translation
in 1485, a copy of which is now in the Biblioteca Colom-
bina in Seville, with marginal notes believed to be in
the handwriting of Columbus. He also read carefully,
as the margin is nearly covered with his notes, "Imago
Mundi," published in 1410 by Cardinal Pierre d'Ailly,
])ishop of Cambrai, or more generally known as Peter
Alliacus. He copied largely from Koger Bacon, who
had collated the writings of ancient authors to prove
that the distance from Spain to Asia could not be very
great.
Columbus believed that to reach Japan he would need
to sail onl}' about two thousand five hundred miles from
the Canaries. Happy error ! for where would he have
found men willing to undertake a journey of twelve
thousand miles across an untried ocean ? Columbus was
eager to make the voyage, but he was poor, comparatively
unknown, and how could it be accomplished ? It is said
that he sought aid for his enterprise from liis native
land, Genoa, but it was not given. King Alfonso was
engaged in a war with Spain, and therefore too busy to
think of explorations.
In 1481 Jdhu II., then twenty-five years old, came to
10 CUIUSTOFUER COLUMBUS.
the throne of Portugal, and he had the same ambitions
as his grand-uncle, Prince Henry. He knew of Marco
Polo's account of Cathay, and lie longed to make Port-
ugal more famous by her discoveries. He called men
of science to his aid, the celebrated Martin Behaim and
others, the latter having invented an improved astrolobe
enabling seamen to find their distance from the equator
by the altitude of the sun.
Behaim was a friend of Columbus ; and, whether
through his influence or not, the latter was encouraged
to lay his westward scheme before John II. The king
listened with attention, but feared the expense of fitting
out the ships, as the African expeditions had already
cost so much. Columbus, having great faith in his dis-
covei'ies, asked for his family titles and rewards that the
king was as yet unwilling to grant. The latter, however,
referred the proposition to two distinguished cosmog-
raphers, and to his confessor, the Bishop of Ceuta.
The latter opposed the spending of more money in
voyages, which he said "tended to distract the attention,
drain the resources, and divide the power of the nation."
The war in which the king was engaged with the Moors
of Barbary was sufficient "employment for the active
valor of the nation," the bishop said. The bishop was
opposed by Don Pedro de Meneses, Count of Villa Real,
who said that " although a soldier, he dared to prognos-
ticate, with a voice and spirit as if from heaven, to
whatever prince should achieve this enterprise, more
happy success and durable renown than had ever been
obtained by sovereign the most valorous and fortunate."
King John could not bear to give up the enterprise
entirely, as, if great achievements should be lost to
Portugal, he would never forgive himself. An under-
CIIRISTOPIIEE COLUMBUS. 11
handed measure was therefore adopted. The plans of
Columbus for this proposed voj'age were laid before the
king, and a caravel was privately sent over the route to
see if some islands could not be discovered that might
make the westward passage to Cathay probable. Storms
arose, and the pilots, seeing only a broad and turbulent
ocean, came back and reported this scheme visionary and
absurd. Columbus soon learned of the deceit, and
betook himself to Spain in 1485, taking with him his little
son Diego, born in Porto Santo. He left him at Huelva,
near Palos, with the youngest sister of his wife, who had
married a man named Muliar.
Authorities differ about all the early incidents of
Columbus' life before he became noted; but this disposi-
tion of the sou seems probable, and that he lived with
her while his father for seven long years besought crowns
in vain to aid liim in his grand discoveries.
Portugal lost forever the glory she might have won.
Columbus wrote later: "I Avent to make my offer to
Portugal, whose king was more versed in discovery tliau
any other. Tlie Lord bound uji his sight and all the
senses, so tJiat in fourteen years I could not bring him
to heed Avhat I said."
His wife, witli one child or perhaps two, was necessarily
left behind in Portugal, where she died soon after. Some
historians think he deserted her, but this is scarcely pos-
sible, as under such circumstances her sister would not
have been willing to keep the child of Columbus for
seven years, neither Avould his wife's relations have re-
mained his friends, coming to see him in Portugal just
after he had started on his fourth voyage, and probably
many times previously.
Columbus departed secretly from Portugal, it is sup-
12 CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS.
posed much in debt through commercial or nautical trans-
actions, as years later King John invited him to return,
assuring him that he would not be arrested on any mat-
ters pending against him.
For many months in Spain, Columbus probably sup-
ported himself by selling maps and printed books, which
Harrisse thinks contained calendars and astronomical
predictions. Yet there was ever before him the one pur-
pose of the westward voyage. He naturally made friends
among distinguished people on account of his intelligence
and charm of manner, and he used all these opportunities
to further liis one object.
In January, 1486, he seems to have entered the service
of Ferdinand and Isabella, as his journal shows. About
this time he made the acquaintance of Alonso de Quin-
tanilla, the comptroller of the finances of Castile, and
Avas a guest at his house at Cordova, and with Alexander
Geraldini, the tutor of the royal children, and his brother
Antonio, the papal nuncio. These friends, who became
interested in the alert mind and far-reaching plans of the
navigator, led to an acquaintance with Pedro Gonzales
de Mendoza, Archbishop of Toledo and Grand Cardinal
of Spain. He, of course, had great influence with the
sovereigns, Ferdinand and Isabella, and helped to prepare
their minds for a kindly reception of the projects of Co-
lumbus.
These monarchs were too busy conquering the Moors
to give the plan much consideration ; but Columbus went
before Ferdinand, and with the earnestness born of con-
viction, explained his wishes.
Ferdinand and Isabella ruled jointly over Aragon
and Castile, but while their names were stamped together
on the public coins, they had separate councils, aiui were
CHRISTOPUER COLUMBUS. 13
often in separate parts of the country, governing their
respective kingdoms.
Ferdinand was of good physique, with cliestnut-colored
hair, animated in countenance, quick of speech, and a
tireless worker.
Irving says he was ''cold, selfish, and artful. He
was called the wise and prudent in Spain ; in Italy, the
pious; in France and England, the ambitious and per-
fidious. He certainly was one of the most subtle states-
men, but one of the most thorough egotists, that ever
sat upon a throne."
Winsor says "his smiles and remorseless coldness were
mixed as few could mix them even in those days. . . .
He was enterprising in his actions, as the Moors and
heretics found out. He did not extort money, he only
extorted agonized confessions."
Castelar says "he joined the strength of the lion
to the instincts of the fox. Perchance in all history
there has not been his equal in energy and craftiness.
He was distrustful above all else ; ... ho scrupled little
to resort to dissimulation, deceit, and, in case of neces-
sity, crime." Isabella, Castelar, calls, "the foremost
and most saintly queen of Christendom."
Irving thinks Isabella "one of the purest and most
beautiful characters in the pages of history. She avus
well formed, of the middle size, with great dignity and
gracefulness of deportment, and a mingled gravity and
sweetness of demeanor. Her complexion was fair; her
hair auburn, inclining to red ; her eyes were of a clear
blue, with a benign expression, and there was a singular
modesty in her countenance, gracing, as it did, a won-
derful iiniiness of purpose and earnestness of spirit.
Though strongly attached to her husband, and studious
14 CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS.
of his fame, yet she alwcays maintained her distinct riglits
as an allied prince. She exceeded him in beauty, in per-
sonal dignity, in acuteness of genius, and in grandeur of
soul. . . .
" She strenuously opposed the expulsion of the Jews
and the establishment of the Inquisition, though, unfortu-
nately for Spain, her repugnance was slowly vanquished
by her confessor. She was always an advocate for clem-
ency to the Moors, although she Avas the soul of the war
against Granada. She considered that war essential to
protect the Christian faith, and to relieve her subjects
from fierce and formidable enemies. While all her pub-
lic thoughts and acts were princely and august, her private
habits were simple, frugal, and unostentatious.
" In the intervals of state-business she assembled round
her the ablest men in literature and science, and directed
herself by their councils, in promoting letters and arts.
Through her patronage Salamanca rose to that height
which it assumed among the learned institutions of the
age."
Isabella was not less brave in war than she was
statesmanlike in peace. Several complete suits of armor,
which she wore in her campaigns, are preserved in the
royal arsenal at Madrid.
Ferdinand referred the proposed expedition of Colum-
bus to Isabella's confessor, Fernando de Talavera, one
of the most learned men of Spain, who in turn laid
it before a junto of distinguished men, some of them
from the University of Salamanca.
The meeting was held in the convent of St. Stephen,
where Columbus was entertained during the examination.
It must have been a time of the greatest anxiety, yet
brightened by hope. He stated the case with his usual
dignity and firm belief.
CHBISTOPHER COLUMBUS. 15
To the majority of the junto such a plan seemed sac-
rilegious. Some quoted from the early theological
Avriters : " Is there any one so foolish as to believe that
there are antipodes with their feet opposite to ours ;
people who walk with their heels upward, and their heads
hancrintr down ? That there is a part of the world in
which all things are topsy-turvy ; where the trees grow
with their branches downward, and where it rains, hails,
and snows upward ? "
They opposed texts of Scripture to the earth being a
sphere, and showed from St. Augustine that if there were
people on the other side of a globe, they could not be
descended from Adam, as the Bible stated, because they
could not have crossed the intervening ocean.
Others said that if Columbus sailed, and reached India,
he could never get back, for, the globe being round, the
waters would rise in a mountain, up which it woukl be
impossible to sail. Others, with more wisdom, said that
the earth was so large that it would take three years to
sail around it, and that provisions could not be taken for
so long a voyage.
Columbus maintained that the inspired writers were not
speaking as cosmographers, and that the early fathers
were not necessarily philosophers or scientists, and he
quoted from the Bible verses which he believed pointed
to the sublime discovery which he proposed. Diego de
Deza, a learned friar, afterwards Archbishop of Seville,
the second ecclesiastical dignitary of Spain, was won by
the arguments of Columbus, and became an earnest
co-worker. Other conferences took place, but nothing
decisive was accomplished.
When the monarchs were in some protracted siege for
several months, like that at Malaga, Columbus would be
16 CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS.
summoned to a conference ; but, for one reason or another,
it would be postponed. " Often in these campaigns," says
an old chronicler, " Columbus was found fighting, giving
proofs of the distinguished valor which accompanied his
wisdom and his lofty desires."
Whenever Columbus was summoned to follow the
court, he was attached to the royal suite, and his ex-
penses provided for. During the intervals he supported
himself as before by his maps and charts. He was con-
stantly ridiculed as a dreamer, so that it is said the chil-
dren in the streets made fun of him. " He went about
so ill-clad," says Castelar, " that he was named the
' Stranger with the Threadbare Cloak.' "
In the midst of all these delays and bitterness of
soul and exposures in war, Columbus, when he was not
far from fifty years old, fell in love with a beautiful
young woman, Beatrix Enriquez Arana, of a noble fam-
ily, but reduced in fortune. Her brother was the inti-
mate friend of Columbus. In 1488, Aug. 15, a son
Ferdinand was born to Beatrix and Columbus, who
became in after years a noted student and book col-
lector, the biographer of his father, and the owner of a
library of over twenty thousand volumes, bought in all
the principal book marts of Europe. Ferdinand left
money to the Cathedral of Seville, for the care of this
library ; but for some centuries it was neglected, even
children, it is said, being allowed to roam in the halls,
and destroy the valuable treasures.
Columbus seems to have been tenderly attached to
Beatrix as long as lie lived, and provided for her in his
will, at his death, enjoining his son Diego to care for
her. She survived Columbus many years, he dying in
1506 ; and Mr. Winsor thinks she unquestionably sur-
CUlilSTOPUER COLUMBUS. 17
vived the making of Diego's will in 1523, seventeen
yeai's after his father's death.
Among the noted personages whom Columbus tried to
interest in his plans, eitlier when he first came to Spain,
as Irving and Castelar think, or some years later, accord-
ing to Harrisse, Winsor, Fiske, and others, were the
rich and powerful dukes, Medina-Sidonia and Medina-
Celi. Tliese had great estates along the seacoast, and
owned ships of their own. The former was at first inter-
ested, but finally refused to assist.
The latter, Luis de la Cerda, made sovereign of the
Canaries by Pope Clement \l., with the title of Prince
of Fortune, took Columbus to his own elegant castle and
made it his home for two years. He was a learned man,
and he and Columbus studied the stars and navigation
together. He was desirous of fitting out some vessels
for the enterprise of Columbus; but fearing that the
monarchs would oppose such a work by a private indi-
vidual, he remained inactive. Finally Columbus deter-
mined to appeal to tlie King of France for aid — he had
already sent Bartholomew, his brother, to Henry VII. of
England, to ask his help ; but Bartholomew was captured
by pirates, and was not he&rd from for some years.
Medina-Celi, fearing that some other country would
win the renown of a great discovery which he felt sure
Columbus would make, wrote an urgent letter to the
monarchs, offering to fit out two or three caravels for
Columbus, and have a share in the profits of the voy-
age ; but Isabella refused, saying that she had not de-
cided about the matter.
Columbus was growing heart-sick with his weary
Avaiting. The city of Baza, besieged for more than six
months, had surrendered Dec. 22, 1489, to Spain, Muley
18 CIIEISTOPIIER COLUMBUS.
Boabdil, tlie elder of tlie two rival kings of Granada,
giving up all his possessions, and Ferdinand and Isal)ella
had entered Seville in triumph in February of 1490.
Great rejoicing soon followed over the marriage of their
daughter, Princess Isabella, with the heir to the throne
of Portugal, Don Alonzo.
As the summer passed Columbus heard that the mon-
archs were to proceed against the younger ^Moorish king.
He had become impatient with this constant procrasti-
nation, and had pressed the sovereigns for a decision.
He was fifty-five years old, and life was slipping by, with
nothing accomplished. Talavera, who cared for little
except to see the Moors conquered, finally presented the
matter before another junto, who decided that the plan
was vain and impossible.
But the sovereigns, not quite willing to let a possible
achievement slip from their grasp, sent word to Colum-
bus that when the war was over they would gladly take
up the matter, and give it carefid attention. Columbus
determined to hear from their own lips that for which he
had waited nearly seven long years in useless hope, and
repaired at once to Seville. The reply was as before,
and, poor, and growing old, he turned his back upon
Spain to seek the assistance of France.
He went to Huelva for his boy, Diego, possibly to leave
liim with Beatrix and the child Ferdinand, then three
years old ; and when about half a league from Palos,
stopped at the convent of La Kabida, dedicated to Santa
Maria de Eabida. It belonged to the Franciscan friars,
a lonely place on a height above the ocean.
Columbus was walking — he had no money to pay for
travelling — was leading his boy by the hand, and stopped
to ask for some bread and water for his child. The friar
CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS. 19
of tlie convent, Juan Perez, happening to pass by, was
struck by tlie appearance of the white-haired man, and
entered into conversation with him. Juan Perez was a
man of much information, had been confessor to the
queen, and was deeply interested in tlie plans of Cohun-
bus. He asked him to remain as his guest at the con-
vent, and sent for his friend, Garcia Fernandez, a
physician of Palos, and a well-read man, and Martin
Alonzo Pinzon, a wealthy navigator, to talk with this
stranger. Pinzon at once offered to help furnish money
and to go in person on the hazardous voyage.
Perez, loyal to Isabella, felt that Prance ought not to
win such honor, when it lay at the very door of Spain.
He proposed to write to Isabella at once ; and Colum-
bus, with probably but little hope at this late day, con-
sented to remain until an answer was received from her.
Sebastian Rodriguez, a pilot of Lepe, and a man of
some note, was chosen to bear the precious letter. He
found access to the queen, who wrote a letter to Juan
Perez, thanking him for his timely message, and asking
that he come immediately^ to court.
At the end of fourteen days Rodriguez returned, and
tlie little company at the convent rejoiced with renewed
hopes. The good friar saddled his mule, and before mid-
night was on his way to Santa Fe, the military city
where the queen was stationed while pressing the siege
of Granada.
The letter of Medina-Celi had influenced her; and her
best friend and companion, the Marchioness INIoya, a
woman of superior ability, was urging her to aid Colum-
bus and thus bring great renown to herself and to Spain.
Juan Perez pressed liis suit warmly, with the result
that Isabella sent Columbus twenty thousand maravedis
20 CIIEISTOPIIEE COLUMBUS.
(Mr. Fiske says one thousand, one hundred and eighty
dollars of our money) to buy proper clothing to appear
at court, and to provide himself with a mule for the
journey.
Bidding good-by to the rejoicing company at La Ra-
bida, Columbus, accompanied by Juan Perez, started
early in December, 1491, on their mules, for the royal
camp at Santa Fe.
Alonso de Quintanilla, his former friend, the account-
ant-general, received Columbus cordially, and provided
for his entertainment. The queen could not receive him
just then ; for Boabdil, the last of the Moorish kings,
was about to surrender Granada, which he did January
2, 1492, giving up the keys of the gorgeous Alhambra to
the Spanish sovereigns.
At the surrender Ferdinand was dressed in his royal
robes, his crimson mantle lined with ermine, and his
plumed cap radiant with jewels, while about him were
brilliantly clad officials on their richly caparisoned horses.
Boabdil wore black, as befitting his sad defeat. He at-
tempted to dismount and kneel before Ferdinand ; but this
the latter Avouhl not permit, so he imprinted a kiss upon
Ferdinand's right arm.
After having surrendered the two great keys of the
city, Boabdil said to the knight who was to rule over
Granada, Ifiigo Lopez de Mendoza, taking from his own
linger a gold ring set with a precious jewel, and handing
it to Mendoza, "With this signet has Granada been
governed. Take it, that you may rule the land; and
may Allah prosper your power more than he hatli pros-
pered mine."
After this Boabdil met the queen in royal attire seated
upon her horse, her son, Prince Juan, in the richest gar-
CHRISTOPUER COLUMBUS. 21
ments on horseback at her right, and the princess and
ladies of her court at her left. Here Boabdil knelt before
the queen. His first-born had been kept by his enemies
as a hostage, and he was there returned to his father.
" Hitherto," says Castelar, " Boabdil had shed no tear,
but now, on beholding again the son of Moraima, his be-
loved, he pressed his face against the face of the poor
child and wept passionately of the abundance of his
heart."
The time had come for Columbus to meet Isabella.
When in her presence he stipulated that if the voyage
were undertaken, he should be made admiral and viceroy
over the countries discovered, and receive the tenth part
of the revenues from the lands, either by trade or con-
quest. The conditions were not harder than those of
subsequent voyagers, but to the courtiers and to Talavera
such demands made by a threadbare navigator seemed
absurd. Talavera represented to Isabella that it would be
degrading so to exalt an ordinary man and, as he thought,
an adventurer.
More moderate terms wQre offered Columbus, but he
declined them ; and, more sick at heart than ever, he
mounted his mule, in the beginning of February, 1492,
and turned back to Cordova and La Rabida, on his way
to France.
Alonso de Quintanilla, and Luis de Santangel, receiver
of the ecclesiastical revenues in Aragon, were distressed
beyond measure at this termination of the meeting.
They rushed into the queen's presence and eloquently
besought her to reconsider the matter, reminding her
how much she could do for the glory of God and the re-
nown of Spain by some grand discoveries. The Marchion-
ess Moya, Beatrix de Bobadilla, added all the fervor of
Ikt nature to the request.
22 CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS.
Ferdinand looked coldly upon the project. The treas-
ury of the country was exhausted by the late wars.
Finally, with her woman's heart responsive to heroic
deeds, and a far-sightedness beyond that of the doubting
Ferdinand, she said, "I undertake the enterprise for
lay own crown of Castile, and will pledge my jewels to
raise the necessary funds."
" This," truly says Irving, " was the proudest moment
in the life of Isabella ; it stamped her renown forever
as the patroness of the discovery of the New World."
Isabella did not have to part with her jewels, as the
funds were raised by Santangel from his private reve-
nues, and it is now generally believed that no help was
given by Ferdinand. It is quite probable that the queen
pledged her jewels as security for the loan by Santangel.
A courier was sent in all haste after Columbus, who
was found about six miles out of Granada, crossing tlie
bridge of Pinos. When he was told that the queen
wished to see him, he hesitated for a moment, lest the
old disappointment should be in store for him ; but when
it was asserted that she had given a positive promise to
undertake the enterprise, he turned his mule toward
Santa Fe, and hastened back joyfully to Isabella's pres-
ence.
The queen received him with great benignity, and
crranted all the concessions he had asked. He, at his own
suggestion, by the assistance of the Pinzons of Palos,
was to bear one-eighth of the expense, Avhich he did
later. The papers were signed at Santa Fe April 17,
1492, and on May 12 (his son Diego having been four days
previously appointed page to the prince-apparent) he set
out joyfully for Palos to prepare for the long-hoped-for
voyage.
CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS. 23
On an-iving at Palos he went immediately to the con-
vent of La Rabida, and he and Juan Pei-ez rejoiced
togetlier. On the morning of May 23 the two proceeded
to the churcli of St, George in Palos, where many of the
leading people had been notified to be present, and there
gave the royal order by which two caravels or barks, with
their crews, were to be ready for sea in ten days, Palos,
for some misdemeanor, having been required to furnish
two armed caravels to the crown for one year. A certiii-
eate of erood conduct from Columbus was considered a
discharge of obligation to tlie monarchs. To any person
willing to engage in the expedition, all criminal pro-
cesses against them or their property were to be suspended
during absence.
When it was known that the vessels were to go on an
untried ocean, perhaps never to return, the men were
filled with terror and refused to obey the royal decree.
Weeks passed and nothing was accomplished. Mobs
gathered as men were pressed into the service.
Finally, through tlie influence of the Pinzons, and more
royal commands, the three vessels were made ready. The
largest, which was decked, called the Santa Maria, be-
longed to Juan de la Cosa, who now commanded her,
Avith Sancho Ruiz and Pedro Alonzo Nino for his pilots.
She was ninety feet long by twenty feet broad, and was
the Admirars flag-ship.
The other open vessels were the Pinta, commanded by
i"\rartin Alonzo Pinzon, with his brother, Francisco Mar-
tin Pinzon, as pilot, and the Nina (Baby), commanded by
another brother, Vicente Yaiiez Pinzon. On board the
three ships were one hundred and twenty persons ac-
cording to Irving, but according to Ferdinand, the son of
Columbus, and Las Casas, ninety persons.
24 CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS.
Isabella paid towards this equipment 1,140,000 mara-
vedis, probably equal to about $67,500 ; wliile Columbus
raised 500,000 maravedis, or $29,500.
The vessels being ready for sea, Columbus, his officers,
and crews partook of the sacrament, and made confession
to Friar Juan Perez, and on Friday — tliis was considered
a lucky day, as Granada was taken on Friday, and the
first crusade under Godfrey of Bouillon had taken Jerusa-
lem on the same day — Aug. 3, 1492, half an hour before
sunrise, with many tears and lamentations, they sailed
away from Palos toward an unknown land. A deep gloom
came over the people of Palos, for they never expected
to see their loved ones again. For three hours Perez and
his friends watched the fading sails till they disappeared
from sight.
On the third day at sea the rudder of the Pinta was
found to be broken, and Columbus surmised that it had
happened purposely, as the owners of the boat, Gomez
Pascon and Christoval Quintero, were on board, and hav-
ing been pressed into service against their will, were
glad of any excuse to turn back.
By care she was taken on Aug. 9 as far as the Canary
Islands, where Columbus hoped to replace her by another
vessel ; but after three weeks, and no prospect of another
ship, they were obliged to make a new rudder for the
Pinta and go forward.
On the 6th of September, early in the morning, they
sailed away from the island of Gomera, and were soon
out of sight of land. The hearts of the seamen now
failed them, and rugged sailors wept like children.
The admiral tried to comfort them witli the prospect of
gold and precious stones in India and Cathay, enough to
make them all rich.
CIIRISTOPIJER COLUMBUS. 25
Seeing their terror as well as real sorrow at being
alone on the ocean, he deceived them as to the distance
from their homes, by keeping two reckonizigs, — one cor-
rect for himself, one false for them. The sailors were
constantly anxious and distrustful. They were alarmed
when they saw the peak of Teneriffe in the Canaries in
eruption, and now the deflection of the compass-needle
away from the pole-star made them sure that the very
laws of nature were being changed on this wild and
unknown waste of waters.
On Sept. 16 they sailed into vast masses of seaweeds,
abounding in iish and crabs. They were eight hundred
miles from the Canaries, in the Sargasso Sea, which was
two thousand fathoms' or more than two miles in depth.
Tliey feared they should be stranded, and could be
convinced to the contrary only when their lines were
thrown into the sea and failed to touch bottom.
Almost daily they thought they saw land ; now it was
a mirage at sunrise or sunset ; now two pelicans came on
board, and these Columbus felt sure did not go over
twenty leagues from land ; now they caught a bird with
feet like a sea-fowl, and were cei'tain that it was a river-
bird; now singing land birds, as they thought, hovered
about the ship.
They began to grow restless so often were they dis-
appointed. They were borne westward by the trade
winds, and they feared that the wind would always pre-
vail from the east, so that they would never get back to
Spain.
They finally began to murmur against Columbus, that
he was an Italian, and did not care for Spaniards ; and
they talked among themselves of an easy way to be rid of
him by the single thrust of a poniard. Columbus knew
26 CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS.
of their mutinous spirit, and sometimes soothed and
sometimes threatened them with punishment.
On Sept. 25 Martin Alonzo Pinzon thought he belield
land to the south-west, and, mounting on the stern of liis
vessel, cried, " Laud ! Land ! Senor, I claim my re-
ward ! " The sovereign had offered a prize of ten thou-
sand maravedis to the one who should first discover land.
Columbus threw himself upon his knees and gave
thanks to God, and Martin repeated the Gloria in excelsis,
in which all the crew joined. Morning put an end to
their vision of land, aiul they sailed on as before, ever
farther from home and friends.
So many times the crew thought they discerned land
and gave a false alarm, afterwards growing more discon-
tented, that Columbus declared that all such should
forfeit their claim to the award, unless land were dis-
covered in three days.
On the morning of Oct. 7 the crew of the Nina
were sure they saw land, hoisted the flag at her mast-
head, and discharged a gun, the preconcerted signals, but
they soon found that they had deceived themselves.
The crews now became dejected. They had come
2,724 miles from the Canaries, and this was farther than
Columbus had supposed Cipango (Japan) to be. He de-
termined therefore to sail west south-west, instead of due
west. If he had kept on his course he would have
touched Florida. Field birds came flying about the
ships, and a heron, a pelican, and a duck were seen ; but
the sailors mumnured more and more, and insisted upon
his turning homeward, and giving up a useless voyage.
He endeavored to pacify at first, and then he told
them, happen what might, he should press on to the
Indies.
CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS. 27
The next day the iiulicatioiis of laud grew stronger;
a green lish of a kind which lives on rocks was seen, a
branch of hawthorn with berries on it, and a staff arti-
ficially carved. Not an eye was closed that night,
Columbus having promised a doublet of velvet in addi-
tion to the prize offered by the sovereigns to the first
discoverer of land. As evening came on Columbus took
his position on the foremost part of his vessel, and
watched intently. About ten o'clock he thought he saw
a light in the distance, and called to Pedro Gutierrez
chamberlain in the king's service, who confirmed it.
He then called Rodrigo Sanchez, but by that time the
light had disappeared. Once or twice afterward they
saw it as though some person were carrying it on shore
or in a boat, tossed by waves.
At two in the morning on Friday of Oct. 12 the
Pinta, which sailed faster than the other ships, descried
the land two leagues away. Rodrigo de Triana of Se-
ville first saw it; but the award was given to Columbus,
as he had first seen the light.
A tlirill of joy and thanksgiving ran through every
heart. Columbus hastily threw his scarlet cloak about
him, and with one hand grasping his sword and the other
the cross, standing beneath the royal banner, gold em-
broidered with F. and Y. on either side, the initials of
Ferdinand and Ysabel, surmounted by crowns, lie and
liis followers put out to shore in a little boat. As soon
as he landed he knelt on the earth, kissed it, and gave
thanks to God with tears, all joining him in the Te
Dciim.
His men gathered about him, embraced him while they
wept, begged his forgiveness for their mutinous spirit,
and promised obedience in the future.
28 CHRISTOPHER columbus. .
The naked natives, filled with awe at these beings in
armor, whom they supposed had come from lieaven, —
alas ! that they sliould have been so pitifully deceived,
— fled to the woods at first, but soon came close to the
Spaniards, felt of their white beards, touched their white
skin, so unlike their own, and were as gentle as children.
When a sword was shown them, they innocently took it
by the edge. They received eagerly the bells and red
caps which Columbus offered them, and gave cakes of
bread, called cassava, parrots, and cotton yarn in ex-
change.
The island ;ipon which Columbus probably landed was
called by the natives Guanahani, now San Salvador,
one of the Bahama group. It lias never been fully
settled upon which of the group Columbus lauded, many
believing it to have been Watling's Island.
Columbus was amazed at the canoes of the people, a
single tree trunk being hollowed out sufficiently to hold
forty or forty-five men. He wrote in his journal :
" Some brought us water ; others things to eat ; others,
when they saw that I went not ashore, leaped into the
sea, swimming, and came, and, as we supposed, asked us
if Ave were come from heaven ; and then came an
old man into the boat, and all men and women, in a
loud voice cried, ' Come and see the men who came
from heaven ; bring them food and drink.' "
The people had some bits of gold about them, in their
noses and elsewhere ; and as gold was ever the dream of
the Spanish discoverer, they were eagerly questioned as to
where the precious metal was to be obtained. Columbus
understood them to say farther south, so while he be-
lieved he had touched the Indies, he must go still farther
for the wonderful Cipango.
cnuisTornER columbus. 29
He seized seven Indians and took tlieni on board to
learn the Spanish language and become interpreters.
Two of them soon escaped, as they naturally loved their
homes and their people.
Columbus has been severely censured for his course
towards the Indians, then and later; but it is becoming
in us Americans to deal leniently with the early discov-
erers, when we remember how a Christian nation has
treated the Indians through four centuries. The blame
cannot be put entirely upon Indian agents ; our people
have shown the same eager desires for their land as the
Spaniards. We have forgotten to keep our promises,
and these things have been permitted by those in exalted
official position. -
After having investigated the island upon which he
landed, Columbus reached another island Oct. 15, which
he called Santa Maria de la Conception, and on Oct.
16 another, which lie called Fernandina. The little
houses of the people were neat. They used hamacs
for beds, nets hung from posts ; hence our word ham-
mocks. They had dogs which could not bark. Colum-
bus named the next island which he found Isabella, and
then, Oct. 28, reached Cuba, where he hoped, from the
half-understood natives, that gold would be obtained
in abundance. He found luxuriant vegetation, brilliant
birds and flowers, fish which rivalled the birds in color,
a beautiful river, a country where " one could live for-
ever," he said. '"It is the most beautiful island tli.'it
eyes ever beheld, full of excellent ports and profound
rivers." The tropical nights filled him with admiration.
Nothing was wanting to the scene but the great Kublai
Khan of Cathay with his enormous wealth described
by Marco Polo, and the gold for which the Spaniards
30 CURISTOniER COLUMBUS.
agonized, as a proof to their sovereign that they had
found the westward passage to Asia.
Imagining that a great king must live in the centre of
tlie island, Columbus sent two Spaniards, Rodrigo de
Jerez and Luis de Torres, a converted Jew who knew
Hebrew, Chaldaic, and Arabic, with two Indians as
guides to the supposed monarch. They took presents
to this king, and started on their will-o'-the-wisp journey.
After going twelve leagues a village of a thousand
people was found. The natives offered them fruits and
vegetables, and kissed their hands and feet in token of
submission or adoration of such wonderful beings. The
Spaniards saw no gold and no monarch ; and, on their
return, Columbus was obliged to give up some of his
hopes about Cathay and gold-covered houses.
The natives were seen to roll a leaf, and, lighting one
end of it, put the other in their mouth and smoke it.
" The Spaniards," says Irving, " were struck with aston-
ishment at this singular and apparently nauseous indul-
gence." The leaf was tobacco, — they called it tobacos, —
and the habit of barbarians has been easily copied by
civilized men. The natives said bohio, which means
liouse, and which they applied to a populous place like
Hispaniola or Hayti ; sometimes they said quisque>/a,
that is, the whole ; and Columbus, thinking they meant
the Quinsay (Hangchow) of Marco Polo, once more
started in his search for wealth, and on the evening of
Dec. 6 entered a harbor at the western end of Hayti.
The natives had fled in terror ; so Columbus sent some
armed men to the interior, accompanied by Indian in-
terpreters. They found a village of about a thousand
houses, whose inmates all fled, but were reassured by
the interpreters, who told them that these straugers were
Clini STOP HER COLUMBUS. 31
descended from the skies, and went about making pre-
cious and beautiful presents. A naked young woman
had been seized by the Spaniards ; but Columbus gave
her clothing and bells, and released her so as to win the
others to friendliness. Her husband now came to the
nine armed men and thanked them for her safe return
and for the gifts.
While Columbus was at Hayti a young chief visited
him, borne by four men on a sort of litter, and attended
by two hundred subjects. The subjects remained out-
side of Columbus's cabin, while two old men entered with
the chief and sat at his feet. He spoke but little, but
gave tlie admiral a curious belt and two pieces of gold,
for which Columbus in return presented him with a piece
of cloth, several amber beads, colored shoes, and a flask
of orange-water. In the evening he was sent on shore
with great ceremony, and a salute fired in his honor.
Later Columbus received a request from a greater
chief, Guacanagari, that he would come with his ships
to his part of the island ; but as the wind then prevented,
a small party of Spaniards visited him and were most
hospitably received.
On the morning of Dec. 24 Columbus started to visit
tliis chief; and when they had come within a league
of his residence, the sea being calm and the admiral
having retired, his vessel, the Santa INIaria, ran upon a
sandbank and quickly went to pieces. When the cliief
lieard of the shipwreck he shed tears, sent his people to
unload tlie vessel and guard the contents, and liis family
to cheer the admiral, assuring him that everything he
possessed was at the disposal of Columbus. All the
crew went on board the little Nina, and later were enter-
tained by Guacanagari.
32 CHllISTOniER COLUMBUS.
He presented Columbus with a carved mask of wood,
with the eyes and ears of gold ; and perceiving that the
eyes of the Spaniards glistened whenever they saw gold,
he had all brought to them which could be obtained,
even his own coronet of gold, for which they gave bells,
nails, or any trifle, though sometimes cloth and shoes.
Columbus wrote, " So loving, so tractable, so peaceable
are these people, that I swear to your majesties there if
not in the world a better nation, nor a better land. They
love their neighbors as themselves ; and their discourse
is ever sweet and gentle, and accompanied with a smile ;
and though it is true that they are naked, yet their man-
ners are decorous and praiseworthy." The Pinta had
apparently deserted — Columbus and Pinzon had differed
with each other several times — for she was nowhere to
be found ; and with only the Nina, and winter coming
on, he deemed it wise to return to Spain and make a
report to his sovereigns.
The little vessel could not hold all the crew ; and sev-
eral begged to remain, as the warm climate and indolent
life suited them. A fort was therefore built from the
timbers of the wrecked Santa Maria, the Indians help-
ing in the labor ; and in ten days La Navidad, or the
Nativity, in memorial of the shipwreck on Christmas,
was ready for the ammunition and stores, enough for a
year, and for the thirty-nine who were to remain. The
command was given to Diego de Arana of Cordova, a
cousin of Beatrix, — the relatives of Beatrix, and the
money of the family, although not great in quantity, were
always at the service of Columbus.
Warning his comrades who were to be left behind not
to stray beyond the friendly country of Guacanagari, to
treat him with the greatest respect, and to gather a ton
CIIUISTOPIIER COLUMBUS. 33
of gold ill his absence if possible, Columbus, after a
sad parting, sailed homeward Jan. 4, 1493.
After two days they came upon the lost Pinta, Pinzon
explaining his desertion by stress of weather. He was
very glad to return with the admiral to Spain, although
a heavy storm coming up, they parted company, and did
not meet again till they were in their own country.
On Feb. 12 a violent storm placed Columbus in so
much danger in his open boat that, fearful lest all
should be lost, and no report of his discoveries reach
Spain, he wrote on parchment two accounts, wrapped
each in cloth, then in a cake of wax, and enclosed each
in a barrel. One was thrown into the sea, and the other
left on board the Nina, to float in case she should sink.
On the homeward journey they were obliged to put into
the Azores, where a party of five going to a little chapel
of the Virgin to give thanks for their deliverance from
shipwreck were seized by order of the Portuguese gov-
ernor of the island. They were finally released, as such
an act might make unpleasant complications with Spain.
A little later a storm drove the Nina on the coast of
Portugal, and Columbus and his crew took refuge in the
river Tagus. The King of Portugal sent for him, received
him with much honor, but tried to show that he had
trespassed upon undiscovered ground granted the king by
the Pope, After some parleying he was allowed to depart ;
and at noon, March 15, the Niiia entered the harbor of
Palos, from which she had departed seven months
before.
All business was suspended. The bells were rung, and
the returned Admiral and his men were the heroes of tlie
time. The Pinta soon arrived, having been driven by a
storm to Bayonne, from whence Pinzon wrote to the sov-
34 cnnisTOPiJER columbus.
ereigns of his intended visit to court. He kept apart
from Columbus, some historians say, from fear of arrest
for desertion, and died in his own house in Palos not
many days afterwards. The degree of nobility was
afterwards conferred upon the Pinzons by Charles V.
Columbus repaired to Seville, after sending a letter to
the sovereigns, who were with their court at Barcelona.
They replied at once, asking him to repair immediately
to court, and to make plans for a second expedition to
the Indies.
On his journey to Barcelona the people thronged out
of the villages to meet the now famous discoverer. Tliey
were eager to see the six Indians whom he had brought,
— of the ten, one had died on the passage, and three
were ill at Palos.
About the middle of April he arrived at Barcelona,
where every preparation had been made to give him a
magnificent reception. He was no longer the unknown
Italian, begging at royal doors for seven years for aid to
seek a new world ; but he came now like a conqueror who
had helped to make Spain rich and honored by his great
discoveries.
At Barcelona the streets were almost impassable from
the multitude. First came the Indians with their war-
paint, feathers, and ornaments of gold ; then birds, ani-
mals, and plants from across the seas, and then Colum-
bus on horseback surrounded by richly dressed Spanish
cavaliers.
The sovereigns on their thrones under a golden canopy,
Prince Juan at their side, attended by all the dignitaries
of court, waited to receive the Admiral. When Colum-
bus approached the sovereigns they arose as if receiving
a person of the highest rank. Bending before them,
CIiniSTOrilER COLUMBUS. 35
they raised him graciously, and bade hiin seat liimself in
tlieir presence, an unusual lienor.
At their request, he eloquently described the lands he
had found, with the great wealth that must finally come
to their throne. The sovereigns and all present fell
upon their knees, while the choir of the royal cha})el
chanted the Te Deum laudavius. When Columbus left
the royal presence all the court followed him, as well as
crowds of the people.
He renewed within his own breast a vow previously
made, that with the money obtained by these discover-
ies, he would equip a great army and secure the Holy
Sepulchre at Jerusalem from the Turks.
Columbus and his discoveries were everywhere talked
of. At the court of Henry VII. in England it was ac-
counted a " thing more divine than human." Bartholo-
mew Columbus had obtained the consent of Henry to fit
out an expedition ; but about this time Isabella decided
in its favor, so the renown of it was "* st to England.
While at Barcelona, Columbus was at all times admitted
to the royal presence, and rode on horseback on one side
of the king, while Prince Juan rode on the other. A
court of arms was assigned him. The Grand Cardinal
of Spain, Mendoza, made a banquet for him, at which is
said to have occurred the incident of the egg. A cour-
tier asked Columbus if he had not discovered the Indies,
whether it was not probable some one else would have
done so. The Admiral took an e<x,<i and asked the com-
pany to made it stand on end. Each one attempted, but
in vain, when Columbus struck it upon the table, break-
ing the end, so that it would stand upright, as much as
to say, after he had shown the way to the Indies, others
could easily follow.
36 CniilSTOPUER COLUMBUS.
Columbus must have enjoyed this courtesy, " the only
unalloyed days of happiness," saj's Wiusor, "freed of
anxiety, which he ever experienced."
Men and means were not wanting for the second voy-
age of Columbus. He did not need now to take crimi-
nals and debtors. Bishop Fonseca, archdeacon of Seville,
was put in charge of Indian affairs. iNIoney was raised
from the confiscated property of the banished Jews,
and five million maravedis were loaned from Medina-
Sidonia. Artillery amassed during the Moorish wars Avas
quickly brought forward. Men of prominent station
and rich young Spaniards, anxious for adventure, were
eager to go in the ships, besides several priests, intended
for the conversion of the savages.
Seventeen vessels were soon in readiness. Horses
and other animals, seeds, agricultural implements, rice,
and other things were provided. About fifteen hundred
persons, though many had been refused, were ready to
sail. Among them Avere Diego, a brother of Columbus ;
the father and uncle of the noble historian, Las Casas ;
Juan Ponce de Leon, who later discovered Florida, and
four of the six Indians who went to Barcelona. The
latter had been baptized, with the king and queen as
godfather and godmother.
All was now ready for the second voyage. It could
not of course be like the first. That, as Mr. Fiske
well says, is "a unique event in the history of man-
hood. Nothing like it was ever done before, and noth-
ing like it can ever be done again. No worlds are left
for a future Columbus to conquer. The era of which
this great Italian mariner was the most illustrious repre-
sentative has closed forever."
The vessels sailed on the morning of Sept. 25, 1493,
CURISTOPHEB COLUMBUS. 37
from the bay of Cadiz, and after an uneventful voyage
reached Land Nov. 3, discovering several islands, Domin-
ica, Marie-Galante, Guadaloupe, Antigua, and Forto Rico.
The natives fled in terror from the Spaniards, even leav-
ing their children behind them in their flight. These
the Spaniards soothed with bells and other trinkets. '
Their houses were made of trunks of trees interwoven
with reeds and thatched with palm-leaves. There were
many geese, like those of Europe, great parrots, and an
abundance of pineapples. The natives were cannibals
and ate their prisoners. Their arrows were pointed with
fish-bones, poisoned by the juice of an herb.
On Nov. 22 the ships arrived otf the eastern part of
Hayti, or Hispaniola. As some of the mariners were
going along the coast, they found on the banks of a
stream the bodies of a man and boy, the former with
a cord of Spanish grass about his neck, and his arms ex-
tended and tied to a stake in the form of a cross. They
at once feared that evil liad befallen Arana and his gar-
rison of thirty -nine men at La Navidad, whom they had
left the previous Christmas, eleven montlis before.
When they reached the fortress nothing was left of
it. Broken utensils and torn clothes were scattered in
the grass. They found the graves of the men, long since
dead, for the grass was growing over the mounds.
Columbus soon heard the story of their ruin. The
thirty-nine men in the fortress began to quarrel among
themselves after the departure of the Admiral, stole the
wives and daughters of the Indians, and several of them
went into the interior of the island ruled by Caonabo,
a renowned chief of the Caribs or Cannibals. These
Caonabo at once put to death, and then marched against
the fort, and in the dead of night destroyed all the in-
447317
38 CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS.
mates. Guacanagari and his subjects fought for their
guests, those in X\\e fortress having been intrusted to tlie
care of the Indian chief by Columbus, but were overpow-
ered, tlie chief wounded, and his village burnt to the
ground. All this was disheartening to the young cava-
liers who had come to find wealth and happiness.
It soon became necessary to begin another town, as
the cattle, as well as )nen, were suffering from confine-
ment on shipboard. Early in December streets were
laid out, a church, storehouse, and house for the Admiral
built of stone, and the town of Isabella was established
ou the northern shore of Hayti, in the new world.
In a short time half the fifteen hundred persons who
came from Spain were ill. They were not used to labor ;
the country was malarious; they were disappointed and
lonely, and this condition of mind wore upon their
bodies. They had all hoped for gold, and there was
none at hand, nor any prospect of wealth.
Columbus decided that, as he had heard there were
gold mines in Cibao, even though it was in Caonabo's
country, the place must be visited. He therefore sent a
daring young cavalier, Alonso de Ojeda, with a well-
armed force, to investigate the matter. He returned
with glowing accounts of gold-dust in the streams and
with a nugget of gold weighing nine ounces. Others
found gold in other localities, and the hopes of the
Spaniards were revived. It became so evident that
gold was what the discoverers desired that the natives
called it " the Christians' God."
Provisions began to grow scarce for so many persons ;
medicine, clothing, horses, workmen, and arms were
needed ; so twelve ships were sent back to Spain, with
several men, women, and children from the cannibal
CniilSTOPIIER COLUMBUS. 39
Caribbee islands, who, while they were to be converted
to Christianity, were to be sold as slaves according to
the suggestion of Columbus, and the money used to buy
cattle. It seems strange that such a religious man as
Columbus, who was looking forward to spending his
wealth to recover the Holy Sepulchre, should have sug-
gested human slavery, or, rather, it would seem strange,
liad we not in America witnessed so many Christians,
both North and South, upholding the slave-trade in
this enlightened nineteenth century. It behooves us to
be lenient toAvard the fifteenth century.
Isabella, to her honor be it said, would not consent to
the cannibals being sold as slaves, but ordered that they
should be converted like the rest of the Indians.
After the fleet had sailed to Spain, many of the men
left behind became melancholy and discontented, and a
faction determined to take some of the remaining ships
and return home. They were discovered and punished?
but an ill-feeling was created towards Columbus which
was never overcome.
In March, 1494, leaving his brother Diego in charge
of the town, Columbus started with four hundred men,
including miners and carpenters, horses and fire-arms,
to the mountains of Cibao, as he could not much longer
abstain from sending back to the monarchs the continu-
ally promised gold of Cathay. The men sallied forth
with much display, so as to impress the neighboring
Indians.
The way thither was steep and difficult, across rivers
and glens, till they reached the top of the mountains,
about eighteen leagues from the settlement. Near by he
erected a wooden fortress. At first the natives fled at
their approach, fearing especially the horses ; but later
40 CIIRISTOPIIER COLUMBUS.
they came and brought food and gold-dust, and assured
him that farther on — somewhere — were masses of ore
as large as a child's head. The Admiral told them, as
ever, that anything would be given in exchange for gold.
Columbus was surprised to find that the natives of
Hayti had a religion of their own. They believed in one
supreme being, who was immortal and omnipotent, with a
mother, but no father. They employed inferior deities,
called Zemes, as messengers to him. Each chief had a
house in which was an image in wood or stone of his
Zemi, and each family had a particular Zemi, or protec-
tor. Their bodies were often painted or tattoed with
figures of these gods. Besides the Zemes, each chief
had three idols, which were held in great reverence.
They believed that the sun and moon issued from a
cavern on their island, and that mankind issued from
another cavern. For a long time there were no women
on the island; but seeing four among the branches of
trees, they endeavored to catch them, but found them
slippery as eels. Some men with rough hands were
emracred to catch them, and succeeded.
They had a singular idea about the Flood. A great
chief on the island slew his son for conspiring against
him. He put the bones of his son into a gourd, and one
day when he opened the gourd many fishes leaped out.
Four brothers heard of this gourd, and 'came and opened
it secretly. They carelessly let it fall, when great wdiales
sprang out and sharks, and a mighty flood covered
the earth, so tliat the islands are only the tops of the
mountains.
When a chief was dying he was strangled, so that
he should not die like common people. Others were
stretched in hammocks, with bread and water at their
lieads, and abandoned to die.
CIIRISTOPIIER COLUMBUS. 41
When the new fortress, St. Thomas, was nearly built,
Columbus left it in charge of Pedro Margarite, a Cata-
lonian, and returned to Isabella. Here he found more
discontent and sickness than before. As food was grow-
ing scarce, and there was no method of grinding corn but
a hand-mill, he began at once to erect a niill, and com-
pelled the young hidalgos, or men of high blood, to work.
This produced more bitterness than ever; for they had
not come hither to a new country to labor, but to pick up
gold at their leisure. Their pride was wounded ; lack of
accustomed food and unusual bodily labor soon told on
luxurious idlers, and great numbers sank into their graves,
cursing the day on which they set sail for the Indies.
Years after, when the place was deserted, it was believed
that two rows of phantom Judalgos, richly apparelled,
walked the solitary streets, and disappeared at the aj)-
proach of the living.
To quiet his own people and to overawe Caonabo, or any
other hostile chief, Columbus sent Ojeda to take charge
of St. Thomas, and about four hundred armed men to
march into the interior under Pedro Margarite, who liad
been left at St. Thomas. Margarite was charged to be
just to the natives, but if they refused to sell provisions
to compel them, but in as kindly a manner as possible,
Caonabo and his brothers, because the former was feared
by the colonists, were to be surjjrised and secured if pos-
sible, notwithstanding that they were defending their
own country from intruders.
Columbus having settled, as he hoped, liis turbulent
comrades, made a voyage to Cuba early in April, 1494.
Inquiring, as usual, of the people for gold, they alwaj^s
pointed to the south. Columbus sailed on, and finally
discovered Jamaica. As they approached the land, as
42 CUmSTOPHEli COLUMBUS.
many as seventy canoes filled Avith Indians, painted and
adorned with feathers, uttered loud cries and brandished
their pointed wooden lances. They were quieted by the
Indian interpreters. At another time the Spaniards
fired upon them and let loose a cruel bloodhound.
Not finding- gold in Jamaica, as he had hoped, Columbus
returned to Cuba, and ran along its shore for three hun-
dred and thirty -five leagues. He discovered many small
islands, a lovely country, more kindly natives than be-
fore, who told him that toward the west lay the prov-
ince of Mangon — he was sure this was Marco Polo's
Mangi, or Southern China — and would have gone farther
but the crew insisted upon his return. So sure were
they all that this was Asia that all agreed under oath
that if any should hereafter contradict this opinion, ho
should have his tongue cut out, and receive a hundred
lashes if a sailor, and pay ten thousand manivedls if an
officer. And yet they could not help wondering why
they did not find the rich cities of Marco Polo. Colum-
bus, worn with the fatigues and anxieties of five months
of cruising, suddenly fell into a lethargy like death, and
in this condition of insensibility lie was borne into the
harbor of Isabella, Sept. 29, 1494.
On regaining conscio\isness, he found his brother P)ar-
tholomew at his bedside. After the return of the latter
from Henry VII. of England, to whom he had gone for
aid in behalf of Christopher, some years before, and
been captured by pirates, he found that his brother
had discovered the Indies, and had gone on his second
voyage. He repaired to the Spanish court, where he was
cordially received, and fitted out by the sovereigns with
three ships filled with supplies for his brother.
Columbus was overjoyed to see Bartholomew, a man
CIIlUSTOPUEIi COLUMBUS. 43
of much decision and knowledge of the sea, and quite
well educated. He immediately made Bartholomew
adelantado, an office equivalent to that of lieutenant-
go verno v.
Meantime Pedro Margarite, who had been told to make
a military tour of Hayti, was in serious trouble. The
island was divided into live domains, each ruled by a
chief. It was thickly populated, some authorities say
with a million people.
Instead of making a tour of the country, he and his
indolent followers lingered in the fertile regions near
by, and lived on the provisions furnished by the Indians,
which they could ill afford to spare. Tlie Spaniards took
the wives and daughters of the inhabitants, and con-
stant quarrels resulted.
Margarite, being of an old family, spoke with con-
tempt of Diego Columbus, left in charge at Isabella, and
also of the Admiral. Margarite drew to his side those
already disaffected toward Columbus, and, seizing some
ships which were lying in the harbor, set sail for Spain.
At court they represented that Hispaniola was a con-
stant pecuniary drain upon the sovereigns, rather than
a source of income, for Ferdinand was more anxious
even than Columbus to secure gold for his coffers ; and
they poisoned the mind of Fonseca, already somewhat
at enmity with Columbus concerning the so-called
tyrannies of the Admiral. Perhaps the real trouble was
that Columbus was not severe enough with this idle
and sensual set, wlio wished to get rich without labor.
The soldiers whom Margarite left behind him without a
leader were more lawless than before. One of the chiefs,
exasperated by their conduct, put to death ten of them
who had injured his people, and set fire to a house where
44 CIIEISTOPIIER COLUMBUS,
forty-six Spaniards were lodged. The Indians Avere be-
ginning to find out that these people had not corae to
their country from heaven.
Caonabo, an intelligent and able warrior, who from
the first had felt that harm would come to his people
unless these white men could be driven out, determined
to destroy St. Thomas, as La Navidad had been destroyed.
But he had a very brave young officer to deal with,
Alonso de Ojeda, who was a favorite of Medina-Celi, and
had fought in the Moorish wars. He always carried a
picture of the Virgin with liim, and believed that she
protected him.
Caonabo assembled ten thousand warriors, armed Avith
bows and arrows, clubs and lances, and came out before
the fortress, hoping to surprise the garrison ; but Ojeda
was ready to meet him. Caonabo then decided to starve
them by investing every pass. For thirty days the siege
was maintained, and famine stared the Spaniards in the
face.
Ojeda made many sorties from the fort, and killed
several of the foremost warriors, until Caonabo, weary of
the siege, and admiring the bravery of Ojeda, retired
from the fort. The chief now determined to invite the
other chiefs of the island to help despoil Isabella; but Gua-
canagari, the friendly chief, opposed th plan, and kept,
at his own expense, one hundred of the suffering Spanish
soldiers. This incensed Caonabo and his brother-in-law,
Behechio, who together killed one of Guacanagari's wives,
carried another away captive, and invaded his territory
with their army. The friendly chief at once reported
the plan to destroy Isabella to the Admiral.
Ojeda offered to take Caonabo by stratagem and deliver
him alive into the hands of Columbus. Taking ten bold
CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS. 45
followers, he made his way through the forests to the
home of Caouabo, sixty leagues from St. Thomas. Ojeda
paid great deference to the chief, and told him he had
brought a valuable present from his Admiral.
Caonabo received the young Spaniard with great cour-
tesy. The latter asked the Indian chief to go to Isabella
to make a treaty of peace, to which he consented, prepar-
ing to take a large body of men with him. To this
Ojeda demurred, as useless, but the march began.
Having halted on the journey, Ojeda showed the chief
a set of steel manacles resembling silver, and assured
him that these came from heaven, were worn by the
monarchs of Castile in solemn dances, and that they were
a present to the cliief. He proposed that the chief
should bathe and then put on these ornaments, and
mounting Ojeda's horse, thus equipped, surprise his
subjects.
He was pleased with the idea of riding upon a horse,
the animal which his countrymen so much feared would
eat them. Mounting behind Ojeda on horseback, the
manacles were adjusted, and Ojeda and the chief, with
the rest of the horsemen, rode before the Indians, to
show them how the steeds could prance. Then Ojeda
dashed into tlie woods, his followers closed around him,
and at the point of the sword threatened Caonabo with
instant death if he made the least noise. He was bound
with cords to Ojeda so that he could not fall off, and,
putting spurs to their horses, they started towards
Isabella.
They passed through tlie Indian towns at full gallop,
and, tired and liuugry, arrived after some days at the
Spanish settlement.
Columbus ordered that the haughty chieftain should
46 C II RI STOP II Ell COLUMBUS.
be treated with kindness and respect, and kept liim in
chains in his own house. Caonabo always had admira-
tion for Ojeda, and would rise to greet him, but never
for Columbus, as he said the latter never dared to come
personally to his house and seize him.
Caonabo's subjects were much cast down at the loss of
their chief, and one of his brothers raised an army of
seven thousand against St. Thomas. They were scat-
tered by the dashing Ojeda, and the brother of Caonabo
was taken prisoner.
In the autumn of 1494 Antonio Torres arrived from
Spain with four ships filled with supplies, and kind letters
from the sovereigns to Columbus. The Admiral deemed
it wise that these ships return as soon as possible, so as
to counteract any reports made by Margarite and his
men. To make up for the lack of gold — the ship car-
ried all he could possibly gather — he sent home, in op-
position to the expressed wishes of Isabella, five hundred
Indians to be sold as slaves in the markets of Seville.
It is true that both Spaniards and Portuguese made
large profits from the African slave trade ; that the
Moors, men, women, and children, by the thousands, were
sold into cruel bondage, and Columbus but followed the
dreadful example of his age. He had held out such high
hopes of gold from this probable Cathay, there was such
discontent already at his meagre returns, that he allowed
his conscience to be hardened, if, indeed, he had any
scruples about the matter.
Not so Isabella. While, like others of her time, intol-
erant of heretics, she felt deeply interested in this gentle
and hospitable new-found race. Five days after royal
orders had been issued for their sale, the order was sus-
pended through Isabella's influence, until the sovereigns
CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS. 47
could inquire why these Indians had been made prison-
ers, and to consult learned theologians as to whether
their sale would be right in the sight of God. Much
difference of opinion was expressed by the divines, when
Isabella took the matter into her own hands, gave orders
that they should be returned to the island of Hayti, and
that all the islanders should be treated in the gentlest
manner.
Another brother of Caonabo had raised a hostile army,
said by some to have numbered one hundred thousand,
aided by Anacaona, the favorite wife of Caonabo, and
her brother Behechio, against the town of Isabella. Co-
lumbus at once prepared to meet them with all the men
and arms at his command, and twenty fierce blood-
hounds.
A battle was fought in the latter part of March, 1495,
when the Indians were completely routed, the blood-
hounds seizing them by the throat, and tearing them in
pieces, and the horses trampling them to the earth.
Columbus, still eager for wealth for Spain, now laid
a heavy tribute upon all the conquered Indians. Those
chiefs nearth. mines were required to furnish a hawk's-
bill of gold-dust every three months, — about fifteen dol-
lars of our money, Irving thinks. Those distant from
the mines were obliged to furnish twenty-five pounds of
cotton every three months. One of the chiefs, because
he could not furnish the gold, offered to cultivate a large
tract of land for Columbus, which offer was rejected,
because gold alone would satisfy Spain. The Admiral
finally lowered the amount to half a hawk's-bill.
To enforce these measures ho built fortresses, and the
Indians, unused to labor, soon found themselves slaves
in their own land. They hunted the streams for gold,
48 CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS.
and obtained little. AVith pitiful simplicity they asked
the Spaniards when they were going to return to heaven !
Finally they agreed among themselves to leave their
homes and go into the mountains and hidden caverns,
where they could subsist on roots, and let their hated
task-masters toil for themselves. But the Spaniards
pursued them and made them return to their labors.
The friendly chief, Guacanagari, hated by his neighbor-
ing territories on account of his kindness to Columbus,
blamed by his suffering and overworked subjects, unable
himself to pay the tribute, took refuge in the mountains,
and died in want and obscurity.
As matters were going on so badly in the Indies, the
sovereign sent out Juan Aguado towards the last of
August, 1495, on a mission of inquiry. He took out four
ships, well filled with supplies. Aguado, like many
others, seems to have been unduly exalted with a little
power conferred upon him, and when he arrived at Isa-
bella, acted as though he were the governor. The dis-
affected sided with him, and even the Indians were glad
of a change of power, hoping against hope for a better-
ment of their condition.
When Aguado was ready to return to Spain, a fearful
storm destroyed all his ships ; but a new one was built,
in which he returned, and Columbus at the same time
went back in the Nina to lay his own side of the case
before the sovereigns. With them returned two hun-
dred and twenty-five sick, idle, disappointed adventur-
ers, besides thirty Indians including Caonabo. He died
on the voyage of a broken spirit.
On this voyage the winds were against them, so that
with the delay their food became so scarce that Irving
says it was proposed to kill and eat the Indians, or throw
CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS. 49
them into tlie sea to make less mouths to feed. This
Columbus sternly forbade. After three months, June
11, 149C, they reached the harbor of Cadiz. They were
not the joyous adventurers who went out almost three
years before. Columbus himself wore a robe girdled
with a cord of the Franciscans, so dejected was he in
spirit.
Columbus soon learned the state of feeling towards
himself in Spain, and felt more than ever that he must
make the Indies of profit to the Spanish treasury. He
repaired to the court in July, and was treated with
much courtesy and cordiality. The monarchs were too
greatly absorbed in preparations for the marriage of
Juana with Pliilip of Austria, and of Philip's sister
Margarita with Prince Juan, to do anything just then
toward fitting out a third expedition. An armada of
one hundred ships with twenty thousand persons on
board was sent to take out Juana to Flanders, and
to bring back Margarita. Besides, the sovereigns were
maintaining a large army in Italy to help the king of
Naples in recovering his throne from Charles VIII.
of France, and had niany squadrons elsewhere.
In the autumn six millions of maravedls were ordered
to be given to Columbus, but just about that time Pedro
Alonzo Nino sent word to the court that he had arrived
with a great amount of gold on his three ships from
Hispaniola. Ferdinand was rejoiced to keep the six
million maravedis to repair a fortress, and ordered Nifio
to pay the gold to Columbus. When Nino arrived at
court it was found that his vaunted gold was another
crowd of Indians brought over to be sold as slaves.
When the spring came the wedding of Prince Juan
was celebrated with great splendor at Burgos, and then
60 CURISTOPHER COLUMBUS.
Isabella turned her interest toward Columbus, she alone
being concerned, for the king began to look coldly on
him, and the royal counsellors were his enemies. The
queen allowed him to entail his estates, so that they
might always descend with his titles of nobility. She
granted him three hundred and thirty persons in royal
pay, and he might increase the number to five hundred.
He was also authorized to grant land to all such as
wished to cultivate vineyards or sugar plantations on
condition that they should reside on the island for four
years after such grant.
It was fortunate for Columbus that Isabella was his
friend, for he seemed to have few others, so easy is it
for the world to follow the successful, and to decry the
unsuccessful. No person seemed to wish to go on this
third voyage, or to furnish ships. Finally, at the sug-
gestion of Columbus, criminals sentenced to the mines,
or galleys, or banishment, were allowed to go to the New
World instead, and work without pay. A general par-
don was offered to scoundrels ; those who had committed
crimes worthy of death should remain two years ; lighter
crimes, one year. There could scarcely have been a
worse plan.
While matters dragged along, Isabella's only son.
Prince Juan, died, overwhelming her with grief for the
remainder of her days. Yet she still thought of Colum-
bus, and out of her own funds set apart for her daughter
Isabella, betrothed to Emanuel, King of Portugal, sent
two ships with supplies. The two sons of Columbus
who had been pages to the prince she took into her own
service.
So long was everything delayed that Columbus would
have given up any further discovery except for his feel-
CniilSTOPIIER COLUMBUS. 51
ings of gratitude to the queen and his desire to cheer
her in her afflictions.
Finally the six ships were ready, wlien in a moment
of loss of self-control, Columbus allowed his temper to
work great injury to him. He knocked down an inso-
lent man who annoyed him, and kicked him after he
was down. He regretted it, but paid dearly for it, as do
others who fail to control their tempers. The sovereigns
naturally believed that some of the stories about his
severity in the Indies Avere true ; and Las Casas attrib-
uted the humiliating measures toward Columbus, which
soon followed, to this one unmanly act.
On May 30, 1498, Columbus set sail with six vessels
from San Lucar de Barrameda, on his third voyage.
Three of these vessels he despatched directly to Hayti
with supplies, one being commanded by Pedro de Arana,
the brother of Beatrix.
With the other three he sailed to the Cape de Verde
islands, off the coast of Africa, and then as the heat of
the tropics became almost unbearable, the tar in the
seams of the ship inciting and causing leakage, and the
meat and wine becoming spoiled, he changed his course
due west and finally reached an island off the coast of
South America, which he called Trinidad, in honor of
the Trinity.
He was surprised to find such verdure and fertility.
While coasting the island, Columbus beheld toward the
South, land intersected by the branches of the Orinoco,
not dreaming that it was a continent.
He tried to allure the natives on board by friendly
signs, a display of looking-glasses and the like ; but find-
ing these of no avail, though they looked on in wonder
for about two hours with their oars in their hands,
52 CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS.
Columbus tried the power of music, at which the Indians,
thinking this an indication of hostility, discharged a
shower of arrows. This was returned by the cross-bows
of the Spaniards, when they immediately fled.
Columbus sailed into the Gulf of Paria, supposing it
to be the open sea, and was surprised to find the water
fresh. The entrance between Trinidad and the main
land he called, from the fury of the water, the Serpent's
Mouth, and the opposite pass the Dragon''S Mouth.
He soon discovered Margarita and Cubagua, afterwards
famous for pearls. He procured about three pounds of
pearls for bells and broken pieces of plates — Valencia
ware — which pearls he sent to the sovereigns as speci-
mens of the untold wealth of the new lands.
Columbus was now so afflicted by a disease in his eyes
from constant watching and sleeplessness that he was
almost blind, and he had also a very severe attack of
gout with intense suffering, which emaciated him greatly.
His food supplies, too, were nearly exhausted, so it was
necessary for him to reach San Domingo on the southern
coast of Hispaniola as soon as possible. He arrived
Aug. 30, 1498.
Sad things had happened daring his absence of more
than two years. The people at Isabella were nearly
starving for lack of food. Some were ill, but most were
too much opposed to labor to cultivate the fields. War
had broken out afresh with the Indians, and there was
mutiny among the Spaniards.
The three vessels which he had sent directly to His-
paniola, while he retained three for discovery, had been
deceived by Francisco Eoldan, who had been made judge
of the island by the Admiral. Roldan told the captains of
the three vessels, that he was in that part of the island
cniiisropiiER COLUMBUS. 53
taking tribute, and helped himself to all he wished.
Many of the men on board, being criminals forced into
the service, joined him in his mutiny. When the ships
arrived in port what remained of their provisions was
nearly spoiled.
Columbus, seeing so much disaffection, issued a proc-
lamation that all who wished could go to Spain in five
vessels about to return. The vessels lay in the harbor
eighteen days, while Columbus was negotiating with the
rebels. The Indian prisoners on board were suffering
from heat and hunger, and many died ; some were suffo-
cated with heat in the holds of the vessels. When the
ships returned Columbus wrote letters to the sovereigns
about the rebellion, and Roldan wrote letters also.
After much writing and sending of messages — Colum-
bus did not dare resort to arms as Roldan's party was so
strong — it was agreed that Roldan and his followers
should return to Spain. This they refused to do later,
and would only make peace on condition that Roldan
should be again chief judge of the island, have large
grants of land made to him and his followers, and that
it should be proclaimed that everything charged against
him and his party had been on false testimony. To
such liumiliating concessions Columbus was obliged to
submit.
Roldan resumed his office of chief judge, and was
more insolent than ever. He demanded much land
and many Indian slaves. Columbus now granted to all
colonists who would remain, Indian slaves, and each
chief was required to furnish free Indians to help cul-
tivate the lands. Thus the cruel system of rejmrtlmien-
tos, or distribution of free Indians among the colonists,
began, a measure which led to the most cruel overwork
54 CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS.
and suffering, and in the end annihilated the rightful
owners of the soil.
Damaging reports of the condition of the colonists
and the inability of Columbus to control the mutinous
set, had reached the crown. They therefore sent Don
Francisco de Bobadilla, an officer of the royal household,
to investigate matters. He had orders to receive into his
keeping, ships, houses, fortresses, and all royal property,
provided it should be proved that Columbus had for-
feited his claim to the control of such property. A
letter was sent to Columbus requiring his obedience to
Bobadilla. The latter sailed about the middle of July,
1500, for San Domingo.
When he arrived, Aug. 23, seeing the bodies of some
Spaniards whom Columbus had recently executed for con-
spiracy against his life, he concluded that the reports
of the cruelty of the Admiral were true, and at once
ordered Diego, the brother of Columbus, as the latter
was absent, to deliver up the malcontents to him. He
read his royal orders from the door of the church. As
Diego was at first unwilling to submit without the com-
mand of the Admiral, Bobadilla went at once to the
fortress and released the conspirators.
He threw Diego into prison, seized the gold, plate,
horses, and manuscripts of Columbus, and took up his
residence in the Admiral's house. Columbus was aston-
ished beyond measure, nor would he believe, until he saw
a letter signed by the sovereigns bidding him give obe-
dience to Bobadilla. In answer to a summons to appear
immediately before the latter, he departed almost alone
for San Domingo, to meet Bobadilla. When the latter
heard of his arrival, he gave orders to put Columbus in
irons, and confine him in the fortress.
CmUSTOPTIER COLUMBUS. 65
When the irons were brought all present shrank from
putting them on, such an outrage did it seem to one so
dignified and almost always so lenient and considerate.
Columbus bore it all in silence, sliowing no ill-will
against any. Fearing that the more determined Bar-
tholomew would rebel and try to rescue his brother,
Bobadilla demanded that Columbus write to Bartholo-
mew requesting him to come peaceably to San Domingo.
This Columbus did, assuring his brother that all would
be made right when they arrived in Castile. On his
arrival he was also put in irons, and the three brothers
were not allowed to communicate with each other.
Bobadilla did not visit them nor allow others to do so.
All kinds of misrule were charged against Columbus.
Even the worst among the motley crowd at San Domingo
blew horns about the prison doors, glad of any change
and any hope of ease and lawlessness. Columbus began
to suspect that his life even would be taken. When the
vessels were in readiness to carry their prisoners t'^
Spain, Alonzo de Villejo, who was to conduct them,
entered the fortress with the guard.
" Villejo," said the white-haired discoverer, " whither
are you taking me ? "
" To the ship, your Excellency, to embark," was his
reply.
" To embark ! Villejo, do you speak the truth ? "
"By the life of your Excellency, it is true ! "
The ships set sail in October, amidst the shouts of
the rabble. Both Villejo and the master of the caravel
wished to remove the chains; but Columbus said, "No;
their majesties commanded me by letter to submit to
whatever Bobadilla should order in their name ; by their
authority he has ])ut upon me these chains ; I will wear
56 CIIRISTOPIIER COLUMBUS.
them until they shall order them to be taken off, and I
will preserve them afterwards as relics and memorials
of the reward of my services." " He requested," says
his son Ferdinand, "that they might be buried with
him."
When Columbus reached Cadiz in irons the whole
population was overwhelmed with astonishment and
indignation. Those even who had been his enemies
were loud in condemnation of such treatment. These
murmurs of the people reached the ear of the court at
Granada. During the voyage Columbus wrote a letter
to Doiia Juana de la Torre, former nurse of Prince Juan,
a lady much beloved by Isabella. This was sent as soon
as he arrived. In the letter he says, " The slanders of
worthless men have done me more injury than all my
services have profited me. . . . Whatever errors I may
have fallen into, they were not with an evil intention."
When this letter was read to Isabella she realized the
wrong that had been done to Columbus, ordered that he
and his brothers be at once released, and wrote a " letter
of gratitude and affection," inviting the Admiral to
court, and sending two thousand ducats for his expenses.
The heart of Columbus was cheered. He repaii-ed to
Granada Dec. 17, and was received with great distinc-
tion. Isabella wept ; and when he saw his sovereign
thus affected he fell upon his knees, sobbed aloud, and
could not speak for some time.
The sovereigns raised him from the ground and en-
couraged him with most gracious words. They declared
that Bobadilla had exceeded their instructions and
should be immediately dismissed ; that the property of
Columbus and all his rights and privileges should be
restored.
CURISTOPUEli COLUMBUS. 67
The position of viceroy, howevei*, was not restored to
him, probably because since several other discoveries
had been made, principally l^y those who had been
assistants of Columbus, — Nino, who had been with the
Admiral to Cuba, had sailed to South America and
brought back pearls, and Vicente Yanez Pinzon had dis-
covered the Amazon River and sailed to Cape St. Augus-
tine, — Ferdinand no longer deemed it wise for so much
territory to be under one person, and that person a
foreigner.
He assured Columbus that it was not wise for him to
return for two years, since matters were in such confu-
sion; so Don Nicholas de Ovando was chosen to super-
sede Bobadilla. He went out Feb. 13, 1502, with a fleet
of thirty ships and twenty-five hundred persons. In
the early part of the voyage the fleet was scattered by
a storm, one vessel foundered with one hundred and
twenty passengers, and the others were obliged to throw
overboard everything on deck, so that the shores of
Spain were strewed with articles from the fleet. So
overcome were the sovereigns by this news, that they
shut themselves up for eight days, allowing no one to
be admitted to their presence. Most of the ships finally
reached San Domingo.
Under Bobadilla matters had gone from bad to worse.
" Make the most of your time ; there is no knowing how
long it will last," was his oft-repeated expression to
the slave-holders. The position of the Indians grew
intolerable.
" Little used to labor," says Irving, " feeble of consti-
tution, and accustomed in their beautiful and luxuriant
island to a life of ease and freedom, they sank under
the toils iinp()sctl nnon tliciii :iih1 thf severities by wliicb
58 CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS.
they were enforced. . . . When the Spaniards travelled,
instead of using the liorses and mules with which they
were provided, they obliged the natives to transport
them upon their shoulders in litters, or hammocks, with
others attending to hold umbrellas of palm-leaves over
their heads to keep off the sun, and fans of feathers to
cool them ; and Las Casas affirms that he has seen the
backs and shoulders of the unfortunate Indians Avho
bore these litters raw and bleeding from the task."
Finally, in 1502, Columbus was to make his fourth
and last voyage. He was now sixty-six, his body weak-
ened by exposure and mental suffering. His squadron
consisted of four caravels and one hundred and fifty
men. His brother and his younger son, Ferdinand,
sailed with him. He had assured the sovereigns that
he believed there was a strait (about Avhere the Isthmus
of Panama is situated), and thought that he could pass
to the Indian Ocean, and reach Hindostan westward as
Vasco da Garaa had recently reached it sailing eastward.
Columbus and his party left Cadiz May 9 or 11, 1502,
and one of his vessels having become unseaworthy, he
stopped at Hispaniola in order to purchase another or
exchange it in San Domingo. As Ovando was then in
command, Columbus had been told by the sovereigns to
stop on his way homeward rather than in going out, as
matters were still so unsettled ; but the condition of
the ship demanding it, he thought he should not be
blamed.
In the harbor, about to start for Spain, were the ves-
sels in which Ovando had sailed, ready to carry back Bo-
badilla and some of his adherents, Koldan, and others.
Bobadilla had one immense nugget of gold, Avhieli had
been found by an Indian woman, and this he intended
CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS. 59
to cany to the sovereigns, knowing that the finding of
gold was sure to cover up many sins. In one vessel were
four thousand pieces of gold, which had been set apart
by the agent of Columbus as the rightful share of the
latter.
Columbus sent word to Ovando of his arrival, and
asked permission to remain in the harbor, as he appre-
hended a storm. This was refused. Then he sent word
again that he felt sure the storm was approaching, and
hoped that the fleet might not be returned to Spain just
yet. Probably Ovando thought any suggestion about
storms was unwarranted, for no attention was paid to it,
and the fleet set sail.
The storm soon arose, the ship, having on board Boba-
dilla and his gold, with Roldan and an Indian chief
as prisoner, went down, and all the rest were wrecked or
so badly damaged that none could proceed to Spain
save one, and that the one which carried the gold of
Columbus.
The Admiral and his vessels seem to have been almost
miraculously preserved in the fearful storm, unsheltered
as they were. He sailed on past the southern shore of
Cuba, and soon reached the coast of Honduras.
Here he was surprised to find quite a superior race of
Indians. Their hatchets for cutting wood were of cop-
per instead of stone ; they had sheets and mantles of
cotton, worked and dyed in various colors. The women
wore mantles like the women among the Moors at Gra-
nada, and the men had cotton cloth about the loins.
Fearful storms prevailed for nearly two months. Tlie
seams of the vessels opened, and the sails were torn to
pieces. Many times the sailors confessed their sins to
each other and prepared for deatli. " I have seen many
60 CURISTOPUEB COLUMBUS.
tempests," says Columbus, "but none so violent or of
such long duration." Much of the time he was ill, and
worried over his son Ferdinand and his brother Barthol-
omew. " The distress of my son grieved me to the
soul," he says, *' and the more when I considered his
tender age ; for he was but thirteen years old, and he
enduring so much toil for so long a time. . . . My
brother was in the ship that was in the worst condition
and the most exposed to danger ; and my grief on his
account was the greater that I brought him with me
against his will."
They sailed along what is now the Mosquito Coast and
the shore of Costa Rica (Rich Coast), so called from the
gold and silver mines found later in its mountains.
Everywhere they heard reports of gold. They met ten
canoes of Indians, most of whom had plates of gold
about their necks, which they refused to part with.
Sometimes the Indians were hostile, and would rush
into the sea up to their waists, and splash the water at
the Spaniards in defiance ; but, as a rule, they were soon
pacified, and induced to give up their gold for a few
trinkets.
Continuing along the coast of Veragua, where they
heard that the most gold could be found, they saw for
the first time signs of solid architecture — a great mass
of stucco formed of stone and lime. Cobimbus wrote
to the sovereigns later that the people — he had gathered
this from the Indians in part, and also judged from what
he saw — wore crowns, bracelets, and anklets of gold,
and used it for domestic purposes, even to ornament their
seats and tables. Some Indians told him that the people
were mounted on horseback, and that great ships came
into their ports armed with cannon. This, indeed, must
CURISTOniER COLUMBUS. 61
be the country of Kublai Khan, whom Marco Polo wrote
about.
The coast abounded in maize, or Indian corn, pine-
apples, and other tropical fruits, and alligators sunned
tliemselves along the banks of the rivers.
Again storms came up, and the rain poured from the
skies, says Columbus, like a second deluge. The men
were almost drowned in their open vessels. Sharks
gathered round the ships, which the sailors regarded
as a bad omen, as it was believed these could smell dead
bodies at a distance, and always kept about a vessel soon
to be wrecked. Their food had been spoiled by the heat
and moisture of the climate, and their biscuits were so
filled with worms that they had to be eaten in the dark
so as to prevent nausea.
As soon as the sea was calm, Columbus determined to
ascertain the truth about gold mines. He sent Barthol-
omew into the interior with several men and three guides
whom the princi})al chief, Quibian, had furnislied him.
The guides took him, it is believed, into the territory of
an enemy, Quibian hoping thereby to save his own land
from intrusion.
Bartholomew set forth again Avith an armed band of
fifty-nine men, and found much to convince him that
gold was here in abundance. It was determined there-
fore to build a town here, Avhich should be the great cen-
tre for gold-mining. Bartholomew should remain with
the men, while the Admiral sailed to Spain for more aid.
Houses were at once started, built of wood and thatched
with the leaves of palm-trees. True, they had almost
no food, but there was maize and fruit in abundance.
Many presents were made to Quibian to reconcile him to
this intrusion ; but he was warlike, and soon gathered a
62 CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS.
force of a thousand men for the ostensible purpose of
making war upon a neighboring tribe.
This Diego Mendez, tlie chief notary, did not believe.
He volunteered therefore with another Spaniard to go to
the house of Quibian and see for themselves. The chief
was confined to his house by an arrow wound in the leg.
Mendez told the son — the latter struck hi)n a fearful
blow as he arrived, but was finally pacified — that
he had come with some ointment to heal the father. He
could not gain access to the chief, but he learned in
various ways that Quibian intended to surprise the town
at night and murder the people.
Bartholomew determined at once to march to Quibian's
house and capture him and his warriors. Taking seventy
four armed men, he started on his errand. He led the
way with five men, the others out of sight in the rear.
As Bartholomew drew near the house Quibian saw
him and requested him to approach alone. Telling
Mendez that when he, Bartholomew, should take the
chief by the arm, they should spring to his assistance,
he advanced to meet Quibian, asked about his wound,
and, under pretence of examining it, took hold of his
arm.
Immediately the four rushed to his aid, the others
surrounded the dwelling, and about fifty old and young
were seized with all their gold, amounting to about three
hundred ducats. The Indians offered any amount for
the release of Quibian, but even gold could not tempt
the Spaniards in this case. The chief was taken on
board of one of the boats ; but he managed to escape in
the night, and it was supposed that he had perished, as
both feet and hands were bound.
However, he had not drowned, and when he realized
CHRISTOPIIEE COLUMBUS. 63
tliat he was bereft of wives and children, he determined
upon revenge. He assembled his warriors and came
secretly upon the settlement, wounding several, till the
bloodhounds were let loose upon them, and they fled in
terror. Bartholomew was among the w^ounded.
Tlie Admiral meantime, unable to pass the bar, had
on board the captive w^arriors and family of Quibian.
They were shut up at night in the forecastle, several of
tlie crew sleeping upon the hatchway which was secured
by a strong chain and padlock. lu the night some of
the Indians forced this open and sprang into the sea.
Several were seized before they could escape, were forced
back into the forecastle, and the hatchway again fast-
ened. In the morning all were found dead. They had
hanged or strangled themselves, so hateful w^as this
dominion of the white men.
After a short time the Admiral, one of his caravels
being so worm-eaten that it went to pieces, and another
worthless, abandoned the fort, leaving the unwelcome
coast of Veragua, and reached Jamaica. The other two
caravels were reduced to mere wrecks, and were ready
to sink even in port.
It was necessary to send to Ovando to ask for ships
in which to come to San Domingo. Diego Mendez with
another Spaniard, and six Indians, set out on the peril-
ous journey in a canoe having a mast and sail. Once
they were taken by Indians but escaped; again they were
taken prisoners, and Mendez again escaped and made his
way back alone in his canoe to Columbus, after fifteen
days' absence.
Mendez offered to try once more if a party could be
provided to go with him to the end of Jamaica, when he
would attempt to cross the gulf to Hayti. Bartholomew
64 CTIRlsrOPIIER COLUMBUS.
therefore, with an armed band on shore, followed beside
the two canoes on the water till they were at the end of
tlie island, and then they pushed out into the broad sea.
The voyage was a terrible one. The water gave out,
and some of the rowers died of thirst and were thrown
into the sea, while others lay gasping on the bottom of
the canoes. Finally they reached a small island and
found rain-water in the crevices of the rocks. The In-
dians were frantic with delight, drank too much, and
several died.
At last they reached San Domingo, only to learn that
Ovando was at Xaragua, fifty leagues distant, whither
Mendez proceeded on foot through forests and over
mountains. Ovando blandly expressed his sorrow, and
promised aid week after week and month after month,
for a year, not allowing Mendez to leave San Domingo,
under pretence that the ships would soon be ready.
The days seemed long to wait for an answer from
Ovando. The little band with Columbus began to mur-
mur, and before he was aware of it a mutiny was at
hand. On Jan. 2, 1504, when he was a complete cripple
in his bed from gout, Francisco de Porras, captain of one
of the caravels, appeared before him and in an insolent
nmaner declared that Columbus did not intend to carry
the men back to Spain, and they had determined to
take the matter into their own hands.
"Embark immediately," said Porras, "or remain in
God's name. For my part," turning his back on the
Admiral, " I am for Castile ! those who choose may
follow me ! "
Shouts came from all sides of the vessel, " I will fol-
low you ! and I ! and I ! " while others brandished their
weapons and cried out, " To Castile ! to Castile ! " while
en It I STOP II Eli COLUMBUS. 65
some even threatened the life of the Admiral. Barthol-
omew at once planted himself, lance in hand, before the
turbulent crowd. Forras was told to go if he wished, so
taking ten canoes which the Admiral had purchased
from the Indians, about forty set sail for Hispaniola,
taking with them some Indians to guide the canoes.
When out to sea they were soon compelled to return,
and finding that they were too heavily loaded in the
rough waves, they forced the Indians to leap into the
ocean. Although skilful swimmers, it was too far from
land for them to reach it, so they occasionally grasped
the boats to gain their breath. Upon this the Spaniards
cut off their hands and stabbed them till eighteen sank
beneath the waves. Once more back upon the land, they
went from village to village, passing, as Irving says, " like
a pestilence through the island."
At length, after a year, two vessels arrived, one fitted
out by Mendez and the other by Ovando.
Columbus and his men set sail, and arrived in San
Domingo Aug. 13, 1504. The Admiral was politely
received by Ovando, and lodged in his house. While
he professed great friendship for Columbus, he pardoned
the traitor Porras.
Columbus found matters in a dreadful condition in
San Domingo. When Ovando came out to supersede
Bobadilla, Isabella had made the Indians free, so amazed
had she been at the treatment received in their slavery
under him. When Ovando saw that the Spaniards mur-
mured and would not work, he wrote to the Queen that
the Indians could only be kept from vices by labor, and
that they now kept aloof from the Spaniards, and there-
fore lost all Christian instruction.
This influenced the Queen, and she gave permission
66 CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS.
for moderate labor if essential to their good, and regular
wages. With this permission Ovando paid them the
merest pittance, made them labor eight months out of
the year, and allowed them to be lashed and starved.
When the Spaniards at the mines were eating, the In-
dians, says Las Casas, would scramble under the table
to get the bones which were thrown to them, and, after
gnawing them, would pound them up to mix with their
bread.
Those who worked in the fields never tasted flesh, but
lived on cassava bread and roots. They were brought
sometimes eighty leagues away from their homes, and
when tliree months of forced labor were over, they
would start homeward to their wives and children. All
through the journey they had nothing to sustain them
but bread, and not always that, so that they sank down
by the hundreds and died along the roadsides. Las Casas,
the noble priest, says, "I have found many dead in the
road, others gasping under the trees, and others in the
pangs of death, faintly crying, Hunger ! hunger ! "
When they reached their homes the wives and children
had usually perished or wandered away, and the desolate
husbands sank down at the threshold and died. Many
killed themselves to end their sorrows, and mothers
killed their own infants rather than that they should be
thus treated by the white men.
Whole provinces were wiped out by Ovando through
fire and sword. Behechio of Xaragua Iiad died, and
Anacaona, his sister, ruled in his place. She was called
"The Golden Flower" for her beauty and ability; she
composed most of their legendary ballads, and was ad-
mired, even by the Spaniards, for her grace and dignity.
Her subjects often had quarrels with some dissolute
CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS. 67
wliite men. Ovando resolved to put an end to Xaragua.
At tlie liead of three hundred foot-soldiers, besides
seventy horsemen and arms, he went professedly on a
visit to Anacaona. She came out to meet him with all
her leading chiefs, and a great train of women who
waved palm branches and sang tlieir national songs.
After a feast the Indians took part in games for the
pleasure of their visitors.
In return all were invited to the public square, whei-e
the Spaniards were to entertain them. The chiefs were
all gathered in the house which Ovando had occupied.
At a given signal from Ovando — a finger placed on his
breast on the image of God the Father — a massacre
began; the horsemen trampled the Indians under foot,
cleaving the ranks with their swords, set fire to the house
where the chiefs were and burned them all, and took Ana-
caona prisoner, and later hanged her in the presence of
the people she had so long befriended. In memory
of this great victory Ovando founded a town and called
it St. Mary of the True Peace !
When Columbus reached Hispaniola he was filled witli
sorrow, and wrote to the Queen, " I am informed that since
I left the island six parts out of seven of the natives are
dead, all through ill-treatment and inhumanity : some by
the sword, others by blows and cruel usage, others through
hunger. The greater part have perished in the moun-
tains and glens, whither they had fled from not being
able to support the labor imposed upon them."
Columbus must have remembered sadly that he was
the one who lirst suggested repartimientos, or distribut-
ing the labor of the Indians to their taskmasters, that
more gold might be sent to the crown, and the idle Span-
iards provided with food by the labor of the red mei], in
the fields.
68 CIlIilSTOPnER COLUMBUS.
Sad and old and ill, Columbus departed for Spain Sept.
12, 1504, and, after a stormy passage, arrived ISTov. 7.
Isabella was on her death-bed. Among her last re-
quests was one that Ovando should be removed from
office, which Ferdinand promised her (he was not removed
till four years later, since his grinding methods brought
a good revenue to the monarch) ; and that Columbus
should be restored to his possessions in the Indies, and
the poor Indians be kindly treated. Isabella was broken-
hearted with the death of her only son. Prince Juan, of
her b_eloved daughter, Isabella, of her grandson and pros-
pective heir, Prince Miguel, and with the insanity of her
daughter, Juana, and her unhappy life with Philip of
Austria. She died Nov. 26, 1504, at Medina del Campo,
in the fifty-fourth year of her age. She wished to be
buried without any monument except a plain stone, and
so directed in her will.
To Columbus the death of Isabella was a fatal blow.
He was now poor, and his rents uncollected in Hispani-
ola, probably through the connivance of Ovando. He
writes to his son Diego at court : " I live by borrowing.
Little have I profited by twenty years of service, with
such toils and perils, since at present I do not own a roof
in Spain. If I desire to eat or sleep, I have no resort
but an inn, and, for the most times, have not where-
withal to pay my bill." Later he said, " I have served
their majesties with as much zeal and diligence as if it
had been to gain Paradise ; and if I have failed in any-
thing, it has been because my knowledge and powers
went no further."
As the winter passed away and spring came, Columbus
became more and more anxious to visit court and lay his
neglects before Ferdinand. The use of mules having
CHRISTOPIIER COLUMBUS. 69
been prohibited, since by their use the breeding of horses
liad declined, Columbus on account of his age and infirm-
ities obtained permission to ride upon one as he made
this journey to Segovia to see the king.
Ferdinand received him, as Irving says, with ''cold,
ineffectual smiles," — he had never apparently any in-
terest in Columbus, — promised that his claims should
be left to arbitration, though Las Casas believed that he
would have been glad "to have respected few or none of
the privileges which lie and the queen had conceded to
the Admiral, and which had been so justly merited."
Columbus was now upon his sick-bed, still sending
petitions to the king that he would secure the viceroy-
ship to his son Diego. Ferdinand asked him to take
instead titles and estates in Castile — the New World
had by this time become too valuable to Ferdinand to
allow any man to be viceroy. Tliis Columbus declined
to do.
Finally the Admiral gave up the matter, saying, " It
appears that his majesty does not think fit to fulfil that
which he, with the Queen, who is now in glory, promised
me by word and seal. For one to contend for the con-
trary would be to contend with the wind. I have done
all that I could do. I leave the rest to God, whom I
have ever found propitious to me in my necessities."
He died May 20, 1506, about seventy years of age,
at Valladolid. His last words were " In viayms tuas,
Domine, com^mendo sjilritum mewn : Into thy hands,
Lord, I commend my spirit." He was buried in the
convent of St. Francisco at Valladolid, from whence his
body was removed in 1513 to the monastery of Las
Cuevas at Seville, where the body of his son Diego,
second Admiral and Vierroy of the Indies, was buried in
70 CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS.
1526. About ten years later the bodies of tlie two were
removed to the cathedral of San Domingo at Hispaniola.
At the close of a war between France and Spain in
1795, the Spanish possessions in Hispaniola were ceded,
to France. The Spaniards therefore requested that the
body of Columbus might be conveyed to Havana. This
• was readily granted ; and Dec. 20, 1795, in the presence
of an august gathering, a small vault was opened above
the chancel, aiul the fragments of a leaden coffin and
some bones were found, which were put into a small box
of gilded lead, and this into a coffin covered with black
velvet. The remains were conveyed with great rever-
ence to the ship which was to bear them to Havana, Jan.
15, 1796, where with distinguished military honors tliey
were buried.
In 1877, in the course of some changes in the chancel
of the cathedral at San Domingo, two other graves were
opened : one, that of the grandson, bearing an inscrip-
tion, in Spanish, " El Almirante, D. Luis Colon, Duque
de Veragua, Marques de — presumably — Jamaica." On
the other casket were carved the letters C. C. A., probably
" Christoval Colon, Almirante." Inside the cover was
an abbreviated inscription commonly translated, " The
celebrated and extraordinary man, Don Christopher
Columbus."
Within the casket was a small silver plate with the
words somewhat abbreviated, "The last remains of tlie
first Admiral, Christopher Columbus, the Discoverer."
A corroded musket-ball was also found in the casket.
As the Admiral wrote to the King while on his fourth
voyage that his wound had broken out afresh, it is con-
jectured that a ball was still in his body from some
of his earlv warfare. The autliorities at San Domingo
CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS. 71
believed that the body of the son Diego was removed to
Havana, and not that of the Admirah A German ex-
plorer, Rudolf Cronau, gave tlie matter careful study in
1890, and felt convinced that the authorities at San
Domingo were correct in tlieir belief. Dr. Charles Ken-
dall Adams, in his life of Columbus, thinks "the belief
will come to prevail that the remains of Columbus are
now at San Domingo, and not at Havana."
After the death of Columbus liis son Diego married
Maria, the daughter of Fernando de Toledo, Grand com-
mander of Leon, niece of the celebrated Duke of Alva,
chief favorite of the King, and one of the proudest
families in Spain.
Diego witli his wife, called the vice-queen, his. brother
Ferdinand, who never married, his two uncles Barthol-
omew and Diego, and many noble cavaliers came to San
Domingo. Like his father, he had continual trouble
with the colonists. He tried to do away with repartl-
mlenfos, but was unable on account of the opposition of
the Spaniards. ISTegro slaves had already been sent from
Africa to fill the places of the exterminated Indians.
The King did not give Diego his proper titles, but they
Avere granted after Ferdinand's death by his grandson
and successor, Charles V.
Don Diego at liis death, Feb. 23, 1526, left three sons
and four daughters. Don Luis, the eldest son, some
years later gave up all pretensions to the vice-royalty of
tlie New World, and received instead the titles of Duke
of Veragua and Marquis of Jamaica. Having no legiti-
mate son, he was succeeded by his nephew, Diego, son
of his l)rotlier Christoval, Avho died without children in
1578. A lawsuit then arose and was continued for thirty
years as to the titles and estates of the great discoverer.
72 CURISTOPUElt COLUMBUS.
The case was finally decided Dec. 2, 1608, in favor of
the grandson of Isabel, the daughter of Diego and ^Maria
de Toledo, Don Nuno, or Nugno Gelves de Portugallo,
who became Duke of Veragua. The male line becoming
extinct, the titles reverted to the line of Francesca, sister
of Diego, who inherited the titles from Luis, her uncle.
The value of the titles, Mr. Winsor says, is said to repre-
sent about eight to ten thousand dollars yearly, and is
chargeable upon the revenues of Cuba and Porto Rico.
Mr. Winsor thinks the career of Columbus '"'sadder,
perhaps, notwithstanding its glory, tlian any other
mortal presents in profane history."
How would those last days at Valladolid have been
cheered could he have looked forward through four cen-
turies, and seen the New World which he discovered,
honoring that discovery and the discoverer with the vast
Columbian Exposition ! How repaid for all his poverty
and sorrow would he have been could he have guessed
that even the cliildren in two hemispheres would be
taught four hundred years later the story of his life, its
perseverance, its courage, and its faith ! He made mis-
takes, as who does not? but the life of the young Ital-
ian wool-comber, studying in every moment of leisure,
and asking assistance year after year from crowned
heads till he was fifty-six years old, to make his immor-
tal discoveries, will ever be remarkable, and an inspira-
tion for all time to come.
MARCO POLO.
MAKCO POLO, born in 1254, was the eldest son of
a very rich nobleman of Venice, Nicolo Polo.
Venice was at that time a great republic, and her mer-
chants transacted business in almost all parts of the world.
The uncle of Marco, named also Marco, had a mer-
cantile house in Constantinople and at Soldaia, on the
south-east coast of the Crimea. He and his brother
Nicolo, in their trading ventures, went into the extreme
East, where no European, as far as is known, had been
before.
When Marco was a lad of fifteen he was taken with his
father and uncle on their journeys, and spent about twenty-
six years in Persia, China, Japan, India, and Russia.
On the return of the travellers in 1295, Ramusio, who
wrote in 1553, says that nobody would believe the three
men were really the Polos, they were so changed in
looks, and their garments were so unlike those worn by
the Venetians. The Polos therefore invited a large com-
pany to the mansion where they formerly lived.
" When the hour arrived for sitting down to table,"
says Ramusio, "they came forth of their chamber all
three clothed in crimson satin, fashioned in long robes
reaching to the ground, such as people in those days
wore within doors. And when water for the hands had
been served, and the guests were set, they took off those
73
74 MARCO POLO.
robes and put on others of crimson damask, whilst the
first suits were by their orders cut up and divided among
the servants.
"Then, after partaking of some of the dishes, they went
out again and came back in robes of crimson velvet, and
when they had again taken their seats, the second suits
were divided as before. When dinner was over, they did
the like with the robes of velvet, after they had put on
dresses of the ordinary fashion worn by the rest of the
company. Tliese proceedings caused much wonder and
amazement among the guests,
" But when the cloth had been drawn, and all the ser-
vants had been ordered to retire from the dining-hall,
Messer Marco, as the gayest of the three, rose from
table, and, going into another chamber, brought forth the
three shabby dresses of coarse stuff which they had worn
when they first arrived. Straightway they took sharp
knives and began to rip up some of the seams and welts,
and to take out of them vast quantities of jewels of the
greatest value, such as rubies, sapphires, carbuncles,
diamonds, and emeralds, which had all been stitched up
in those dresses in so artful a fashion that nobody could
have suspected the fact.
" For when they took leave of the Great Khan they had
changed all the wealth that he had bestowed upon them
into this mass of rubies, emeralds, and other jewels,
being well aware of the impossibility of carrying with
them so great an amount in gold over a journey of such
extreme length and difficulty. Now, this exhibition of
such a huge treasure of jewels and precious stones, all
tumbled out upon tlie table, threw the guests into fresh
amazement, insomuch that they seemed quite bewildered
and dumbfounded. And now they recognized that in
MAECO POLO. 75
spite of all former doubts these were in truth those hon-
ored and worthy gentlemen of the Ca Tolo that they
claimed to be ; and so all paid them the greatest honor
and reverence."
Another singular story is told about the shabby gar-
ments which the Polos wore on their return from the far
East. The wife of one of them gave to a beggar a dirty
and patched coat, not knowing that it had jewels in
it. The owner at once went to the Bridge of the Rialto,
and stood turning a wheel, and saying to those wlio
crowded round him, who supposed he was insane, " He'll
come, if God pleases." After two or three days the
beggar, as curious as the rest, came to see the man turn-
ing his wheel. At once Polo recognized his coat and
recovered his jewels. " Then," says the narrative, " lie
was judged to be quite the reverse of a madman ! "
The Polos were so rich that Marco was called Marco
Millioni, and his home, Corte de' Millioni.
After Marco had been in Venice two or three years,
the Genoese in 1298 fitted out a great fleet, under com-
mand of Lamba Doria, against the Venetians. ]^oth re-
publics had quarrelled in 1255 over an old church in Acre,
Syria. Nearly twenty thousand men were killed on both
sides, and Acre itself was nearly destroyed. Ten engines
shot stones weighing fifteen hundred pounds into the city,
demolishing the towers and forts. In 1294 the Vene-
tians seized three Genoese vessels, and again the repub-
lics went to war, the Genoese gaining a great victor}-,
capturing all but three of the Venetian galleys with their
rich cargoes.
The bitterness increased till, in 1298, a severe battle
was fought off the island of Curzola. The Genoese had
seventy-eight galleys, and the Venetians ninety-four
76 MARCO POLO.
under Andrea Dandolo. The fight lasted through the
day, Sunday, Sept. 7, the Genoese gaining a complete
victory, capturing nearly all the galleys, including the
flag-ship of Dandolo. In despair at his defeat, rather
than be a captive in chains of the Genoese, he refused
food, and finally killed himself by dashing his head
against a bench. The Genoese gave him a ceremonious
burial, on the return of their victorious fleet.
The Genoese lost heavily, among them the eldest son
of Lamba Doria, Octavian, who fell at the forecastle of
his father's vessel, shot by an arrow in the breast. His
comrades mourned sadly, and the courage of the men
weakened, when Lamba ran forward into the agitated
company, ordered that they cast his son's body into the
sea, saying that the land could never have offered his
boy a nobler tomb, and fighting more fiercely than ever,
though almost broken-hearted, he gained the victory.
Seven thousand persons were taken prisoners, among
them Marco Polo, who was the captain of one of the war
galleys.
Colonel Henry Yule, C.B,, who has edited the works
of Marco Polo, with extensive and valuable notes, says
that these war galleys cost about thirty-five thousand
dollars each. They had nearly or quite two hundred
rowers apiece, the toil of rowing being almost unendura-
ble, so that in more recent times it was performed by
slaves under the most cruel driving. The musicians
played an important part, as it was considered essential
to have much noise of fifes, trumpets, kettle-drums, etc.,
to give courage to the crew, and to put fear into the
heart of the enemy. A captured galley was taken into
port stern foremost, her colors dragging on the surface of
the water.
MARCO POLO. 11
While Marco was in the Genoa prison he became ac-
quainted with Rusticiano of Fisa, a man of considerable
literary reputation. The Pisans, Aug. 6, 1284, had been
defeated at Meloria, in front of Leghorn, by the Geno-
ese under Uberto, the elder brother of Lamba Doria.
Lamba with his six sons was in the iieet. Forty of the
Fisan galleys were taken or sunk, and upwards of nine
thousand Fisans were made prisoners. Many noble
ladies after this surrender came on foot to Genoa to seek
their kindred. The answer to them was, '•' Yesterday
there died thirty of them, to-day there have been forty,
all of whom we have cast into the sea : and so it is
daily."
It is probable that Rusticiano persuaded Marco to put
on paper an account of his wonderful travels, or, rather,
to dictate it to his prison companion, for we owe to the
Pisaij the very interesting record, of which Marco Folo
himself says, "that since our Lord God did mould with
his hands our first father Adam, even until this day,
never hath there been Christian, or Fagan, or Tartar, or
Indian, or any man of any nation, who in his own person
hath had so much knowledge and experience of the divers
parts of the world and its wonders as hath had this
Messer Marco ! "
After Marco had been in prison nearly a year, peace
was secured between the two republics, and he, with the
others who were alive, were restored to their own coun-
try. A treaty of peace was soon after signed between
Genoa and Fisa, and, of course, Rusticiano was freed.
A few years after this release from prison, Marco mar-
ried Donata Loredano, of a noble family, by whom he
had three daughters, Fantina, Bellela, and Moreta. In
the early part of 1324, when Marco was seventy, finding
78 MARCO POLO.
himself "to grow daily feebler through bodily ailment,"
he made his will, constituting his " beloved wife and dear
daughters trustees," and giving them most of his prop-
erty. It is probable that he died that year, and was
buried in the church of San Lorenzo.
He was urged while on his death-bed to retract some
of the strange things he had written about the countries
visited. He refused to do so, declaring that he had told
the truth. It has taken several centuries to prove what
at that time seemed largely a fable.
Marco Polo's book, Colonel Yule thinks, was written in
French, and remained for over a century in manuscript
before printing was invented. Colonel Yule has found
about seventy-five manuscripts in various languages. Of
course Marco Polo's book has been translated into a great
many languages, and is now read all over the world.
In 1260, when Marco was only six years old, his father
and mother went as far East as Cathay (China) to the court
of the great Kublai Khan. So delighted was the latter
with these Venetians that he asked them some years later
to become his ambassadors to the Pope, and beg the prel-
ate to send a hundred missionaries to his country. They
were also to bring back " some oil from the lamp which
burns on the sepulchre of our Lord at Jerusalem." The
Polos returned to Italy ; but Clement IV. was dead, and
when Gregory X. came to power, two years later, he could
send only two Dominicans, and these soon lost courage,
and gave up the long and wearisome journey.
When the Polos returned to the Great Khan the lad
Marco went with them. His mother had died, and he
greatly desired to be with his father. They wei*e three
years and a half on the journey. The Khan heard of
their coming, and sent some officials forty days' journey
MARCO POLO. 79
to meet them. All repaired to the summer palace at
Kaipiiigfu, about fifty miles north of the Great Wall,
where they were received with much ceremony. The
Khan was greatly pleased with the holy oil.
The boy Marco succeeded wonderfully in learning the
language and customs of the Tartars ; in fact, he soon
knew several languages, and four Avhich were in charac-
ters such as the Chinese. The orders of the Great Khan
were written in six languages: Mongol, Nighur (a branch
of Oriental Turkish), Arable, Persian, Tangutan (proba-
bly Tibetan), and Chinese. Marco became such a favor-
ite with Kublai Khan that he was sent on a mission to
a country six months' distant from China. Usually when
ambassadors returned they told the Khan only about
business, whereas the Khan said, " I had far liever
hearken about the strange things and the manners of
the different countries you have seen than merely the
business you went u})on."
]\[arco therefore made careful observations of the dif-
ferent people and countries, thus proving himself a wise
young man, and laying the foundation for his great fame.
On his return from his first mission he told the Khan
many strange things, at which the Emperor was so much
pleased that he said, "If this young man live, he will
assuredly come to be a person of great worth and
ability."
For seventeen years Marco was the trusted official of the
Emperor, attending to much of his private as well as pub-
lic business. Finally Marco and his father and uncle be-
came anxious to return to Venice, but the Khan refused to
think of their departure. At last, Arghun Khan of Per-
sia, Kublai's great-nephew, having lost his favorite wife,
Khatun P>ulnghan, in 1286, and mourning her sorely, sent
80 MARCO POLO.
three ambassadors to China to select a wife from her kin,
as she had left a dying request that nobody should fill
her place save one of her own family. Such messages
are sometimes forgotten, but ArghunKhan seems to have
remembered.
The ambassadors presented their desires to Kublai,
and choice was made of Kukachin, a beautiful girl of
seventeen, of unusual ability and of fine family. As the
journey overland from Peking, China, to Tabreez in Per-
sia, was long and dangerous on account of frequent wars,
the ambassadors preferred to return by sea, and begged
that the travellers, the Polos, might accompany them.
Marco had just returned from a mission to India.
Kublai reluctantly consented to their going, but provided
handsomely for the voyage, — thirteen ships, each carry-
ing as crews from two hundred and fifty to two hundred
and sixty men, — and sent friendly messages to the
kings of England, France, and Spain. They sailed from
Fokien, China, and after three months arrived at Java ;
it was more than two long years before they reached
Persia. Two of the ambassadors died on the passage,
and of the six hundred persons on board, besides the
mariners, only eight survived.
Arghun Khan had died March 12, 1291, even before
the party left China, and his brother had succeeded him.
This brother directed the Polos to bear the lady to the
son of Arghun, Ghazan Khan, who was then in the
province of Khorasan guarding the frontier with sixty
thousand men. The party reached Ghazan the last of
1293, or the first of 1294, and he, instead of his father,
married Kukachin, which was doubtless more appro-
priate, both as to age and character, for while Ghazan
was not as handsome as his father, he had many admir-
MAECO POLO. 81
able qualities as a statesman and a soldier. The young
bride from China lived only till June, 1296, a little over
two years after her marriage. She had become tenderly
attached to the Polos, and wept when they left her in
Persia and went on to Venice. They reached their
Italian home sometime in 1295.
Marco Polo's travels, with Colonel Yule's notes, fill
about one thousand large pages, and will repay a read-
ing. When it is possible, the record will be given in
Marco's own words. He first describes Armenia, in
Asia Minor, a country old long before Christ was born,
probably of Phrygian origin, which took its name from
Aram, one of its noted kings, who lived about 1800 B. C.
They consider themselves descended from Japhet, the
son of Noah.
" In this country of Armenia," says Marco, " the ark
of Noah exists on the top of a certain great mountain on
the summit of which snow is so constant that no one
can ascend ; for the snow never melts, and is constantly
added to by new falls. Below, however, the snow does
melt, and runs down, producing such rich and abundant
herbage that in summer cattle are sent to pasture from
a long way round about, and it never fails them."
People believed that Noah's ark still existed, and pieces
of the pitch were used as amulets. Mount Ararat is
16,953 feet high. It was first ascended by Professor
I'arrot, in September, 1829. Several persons have made
the ascent since that time.
To the north of Armenia Marco found Georgiana
(Georgia), which Alexander the Great could not pass
thrcjugh, on account of the sea on one side and lofty
mountains on the other, so he built a high tower at the
entrance of the defile, that the people beyond should
82 MARCO POLO.
not attack him. This, says Yule, is the Pass of Derbend,
still called in Turkish the Iron Gate, with a wall that
runs from the Castle of Derbend along the ridges of
Caucasus. The wall is eight feet thick, and twenty-six
feet high. The fortress was completed by Naoshirwan,
A. D. 542, who, with his father, erected three hundred
and sixty towers upon the Caucasian walls.
The Georgians believed themselves descended from
King David ; therefore each king was called David.
Marco found the people handsome — the Georgian
women have always been bought for wives by the
Turks, on account of their great beauty.
Marco saw cloths of gold and silk made here in great
abundance, and such oil springs " that a hundred ship-
loads could be taken at one time." These were probably
the immense petroleum wells of Baku, from which oil is
shipped all over Europe. South-east of Armenia, Marco
entered Mansul (Mosul), where cloths of gold and silk
were made, called Mosolins, and where a people lived
called Kurds, " an evil generation, whose delight it is to
plunder merchants."
Bandas (Bagdad) was found to be a great and wealthy
city, the residence of the Saracen caliphs. The city,
built about 765 by the second caliph of the Abbasside
dynasty, soon became renowned as a commercial and in-
tellectual metropolis. Haroun-al-E.aschid, the fifth caliph
of the Abbassides, a great warrior as well as patron of
letters, made it the centre of Arabic civilization.
He led an army of 95,000 men against the Byzantine
empire, ruled by Irene, and made her pay an annual
tribute. When her son refused to pay the tribute,
Haroun-al-Raschid, at the head of 135,000 men, proceeded
against him, and the Greek emperor lost 40,000 men, and
MARCO POLO. 83
acknowledged himself tributary. Again the tribute was
refused, and again Haroun ravaged Asia Minor at the
head of 300.000 men. Bagdad itself was finally taken
by Hulaku in 1258, which event Marco thus describes : —
" The Lord of tlie Tartars of the Levant, whose name
was Alaii (Hulaku), brother to the Great Khan now
reigning, gathered a mighty host and came up against
Bandas (Bagdad), and took it by storm. It was a great
enterprise, for in Bandas there were more than 100,000
horse, besides foot soldiers. And when Alaii had taken
the place, he found therein a tower of the caliphs, which
was full of gold and silver and other treasure ; in fact,
the greatest accumulation of treasure in one spot that
ever was known.
" When he beheld that great heap of treasure, he was
astonished ; and, summoning the caliph to his presence,
he said to him : ' Caliph, tell me 'now why thou hast
gathered such a huge treasure ? What didst thou mean
to do therewith ? Knowest tliou not that I was thine
enemy, and that I was coming against thee with so
great an host to cast thee forth of thine heritage ?
Wherefore didst thou not take of thy gear and employ it in
paying knights and soldiers to defend thee and thy city ? '
"The caliph wist not what to answer, and said never
a word. So the Prince continued : ' Now, then, Caliph,
since I see what a love thou hast borne thy treasure, I
will e'en give it thee to eat ! ' So he shut the caliph up
in the Treasure Tower, and bade that neither meat nor
drink should be given him, saying, ' Now, Caliph, eat of
thy treasure as much as thou wilt, since thou art so fond
of it ; for never shalt thou have aught else to eat ! ' So
the Caliph lingered in the tower four days, and then
died like a dog."
84 MARCO POLO.
The death of Mosta Sim Billah, the last of the Abbas-
side caliphs, is variously told. Some authorities say
that he was rolled in a carpet, as carpets are usually
rolled, and his limbs crushed ; others, that he was wrapt
in a carpet and trodden to death by horses.
Longfellow has put this story into verse in his "Tales
of a Wayside Inn," in the Spanish Jew's Tale of Kam-
balu.
" I said to the Kalif : ' Thou art old,
Thou hast no need of so much gold.
Thou shouldst not have heaped and hidden it here,
Till the breatli of battle was hot and near,
But have sown through the land these useless hoards
To spring into shining blades of swords,
And keep thine honor sweet and clear.
These grains of gold are not grains of wheat;
These bars of silver thou canst not eat;
These jewels and pearls and precious stones
Cannot cure the aches in tliy bones,
Nor keep the feet of Death one hour
From climbing the stairways of thy tower!'
Then into liis dungeon I locked tlie drone,
And left him to feed there all alone
In the honey-cells of his golden hive:
Never a prayer, nor a cry, nor a groan
Was heard from those massive walls of stone,
Nor again was the Kalif seen alive !
When at last we unlocked the door,
We found him dead upon tlie floor;
The rings had dropped from his withered hands,
His teeth were like bones in tlie desert sands:
Still clutching his treasure he had died;
And as he lay there, he appeared
A statue of gold with a silver beard,
His arms outstretched as if crucified."
MA ECO POLO. 85
Marco also relates how one of the caliphs of Bagdad,
hating the Christians, and desiring some pretext for per-
secuting them, told them that as they had declared that
if they had faith as a grain of mustard-seed they could
remove mountains, there must surely be that amount of
faith among them ; therefore if they did not remove a
mountain in the neighborhood, they would be put to death.
The Christians bethought themselves of a very holy
one-eyed cobbler who had put an awl into his other eye,
because that organ had led him to think evil. He prayed
in the presence of more than a hundred thousand Chris-
tians, and the mountain rose out of its place and moved
to the spot designated by the caliph ! This was probably
told to Marco, instead of his being an eye-witness of
the miracle.
From Tabreez, in the north of Persia, where there is a
ruin of a beautiful mosque of Ghazan Khan, and " where
tlie city is all girt round with charming gardens," Marco
went to Savah, about fifty miles south-west of Teheran.
Savah possessed one of the greatest libraries of the East
until its destruction by the Mongols when they first in-
vaded Persia. The three Magi, Jaspar, Melchior, and
Balthazar, who went out to worship Christ, started from
this city, and are said to be buried there in three large
and beautiful monuments side by side.
Marco travelled extensively in Persia, finding the
nomad tribes, then as now, cruel and murderous. The
Persian horses sold to India were very fine and of great
endurance. Yule tells of some that travelled nine hun-
dred miles in eleven days, and of one that went eleven
hundred miles in twelve days, including two days of
rest, making one hundred and ten miles per day. Such
horses were sold for one thousand dollars each.
86 MARCO POLO.
At Kerman Marco saw famous steel cimeters and
lances. The Turks paid great prices for them, the qual-
ity of a Kerman sabre being such that it would cleave a
European helmet without turning the edge.
From Kerman Marco journeyed to Hormos (Ormuz),
an island on the eastern shore of the Gulf of Persia.
On the way thither, through central Persia, he saw sin-
gular birds and beasts. The francolin (black partridge)
have a peculiar call wliich the peasants in Egypt think is
Arabic for "Sweet are the corn-ears ! Praised be the Lord."
" The oxen," says Marco, " are very large and all over
white as snow ; the hair is very short and smooth, wliich
is owing to the heat of the country ; the horns are
short and thick, not sharp in the point ; and between
the shoulders they have -a round hump, some two palms
hiiih. There are no handsomer creatures in the world,
and when they have to be loaded, they kneel like a camel ;
once the load is adjusted, they rise. Their load is a
heavy one, for they are very strong animals. Then there
are sheep here as big as asses ; and their tails are so
large and fat that one tail will weigh some thirty
pounds. They are fine fat beasts, and afford capital
mutton."
William Marsden, F. K. S., in his translation of Marco,
says that such sheep are found in various parts of Asia
and Africa. The tail is broad and large and often weighs
fifty pounds. Where these sheep feed in the fields, the
shepherds are obliged to fix a piece of thin board to the
under part of the tail to prevent its being torn by
bushes, and sometimes small wheels are put under this
board that the animal may have a sort of wagon in
which to carry its tail easily. The fat of this tail is
often used by the natives instead of butter.
MARCO POLO. 87
At Orniuz, formerly one of the great commercial
centres of the East, Marco describes the hot winds,
which in Italy are called II Sirocco. The heat is so
intolerable that during the hot months, from June to
September, it often kills both animals and vegetables.
During great heat, usually from nine till twelve, the
people often stay in water up to their necks.
Various travellers have described this pestilential
wind, which the people of Beluchistan call Julot or jido
(the flame). Chardin says, " The most surprising effect
of the wind is not the mere fact of its causing death,
but its operation on the bodies of those who are killed
by it. It seems as if they become decomposed without
losing shape, so that you would think them to be merely
asleep, when they are not merely dead, but in such a state
that if you take hold of any jDart of the body it comes
away in your hand, and the finger penetrates such a body
as if it were so much dust."
Marco relates this incident which happened when ^.e
was at Ormuz: "The Lord of Hormos not having paid
his tribute to the King of Kerman, the latter resolved to
claim it at the time when the people of Hormos were
residing away from the city ; so he caused a force of
sixteen hundred horse and five thousand foot to be crot
ready, and sent them by the route of Reobarles to take
the others by surprise.
" Now, it happened one day that, through the fault of
their guide, they were not able to reach the place appointed
for tlie night's halt, and were obliged to bivouac in a
wilderness not far from Hormos. In the morning, as
they were starting on their march, they were cauglit by
that wind, and every man of them was suffocated, so that
not one survived to carry the tidings to their lord. Wlien
88 MARCO POLO.
the people of Hormos heard of this, they went forth to
bury tlie bodies lest they should breed a pestilence. But
when they laid hold of thein by the arms to drag them
to the pits, the bodies proved to be so baked, as it were,
by that tremendous heat, tliat the arms parted from the
trunks, and in the end the people had to dig graves hard
by each where it lay, and so cast them in."
Scattered through Persia, Marco observed the great
Chinar, or plane-trees, which grow to an immense size,
and often stand alone, with no other tree within several
miles. Marco calls it the Arbre Sec, Dry Tree, or Arbre
Sol, Tree of the Sun. Vows were made before these
ancient trees, and pieces of cloth torn from the clothes of
the votaries were hung upon the branches. Many of these
sacred trees bore the inscription, "If you pray, you will
certainly be heard." It is generally believed that one
who injures or cuts down one of these grand trees will
soon die. Many of these Chinar trees are over a thousand
years old ; some are said to date from the seventh century.
Marco tells this story of the Old Man of the Moun-
tain : —
In the north of Persia, in the mountains, lived a sect
called Ismaelites. Their headquarters were at Alamiit
(Eagle's ISTest). The Prince of the Assassins, as his
followers were called, Ala'uddin Mahomed, dwelt in a
veritable paradise, with beautiful gardens, palaces, musi-
cal instruments, and the like. His soldiers beguiled young
men to enter his service when the latter were intoxi-
cated by hashish, a preparation of hemp. They were
taken into this charming abode where was every pleasure.
When the Prince wished to send any of his young men
on a mission of murder, he was removed from Paradise
while under the influence of hashish, and then told that
MA ECO POLO. 89
if he did tlie bidding of the Prince he should be returned,
dead or alive, to enjoy it forever.
The Assassins were pledged to the most perfect obedi-
ence. It is related tliat Henry, Count of Champagne
(titular King of Jerusalem), was on a visit to the Old
Man of Syri;x, who was a leader of the Assassins before
the time of Marco. One day as they walked together they
saw some lads sitting on the top of a high tower. The
Old Man asked the Count if lie had any subjects as obe-
dient as these ; and before the Cou]it had time to answer,
at a sign from the Sheik, the two boys leaped from tlie
tower, and were killed instantly.
Alaii (Hnlaku, the brotlier of Kubkii Khan) deter-
mined to end this band of murderers, and sent a large
force against them in 1254. They besieged the Ciustle
where the Old Man lived for three years, and it was sur-
rendered only when food was exhausted. The fortresses,
one hundred in number, surrendered, ail but two. One
of these held out from fourteen to twenty years.
Ruknuddin Khursah, at whose instigation his father,
Ala'uddin, liad been killed tliat he miglit become Prince,
was well treated by Hulaku, to whom he liad surrendered.
He w;is sent, however, to Manga Khan, elder brotlier to
Kublai, wlio, hearing of his approach, asked why his
post-horses should be fagged to no purpose, and ordered
that he should be put to deatli on the road.
Marco journeyed to Balkh, now in the nortli of Afghan-
istan, and found the ruins of palaces and other marble
buildings. Tliis city w;is devastated by the Great Gen-
gliis Klian in 1221. Though it yielded without resist-
ance, the wliole popvilation was marched by companies into
the plain, under the pretext of being counted, and then
xuassac'ii'd. All buildings capable of defence were levelled
90 j]iAi:cu POLO.
to the ground, and the rest burned. Some authorities
say the city contained no less than twelve thousand
mosques. Thus effectually did the Great Khan do his
work of conquest.
At Badaklishan, now in Afghanistan, the kings all
claimed direct descent from Roxana, the beautiful daugh-
ter of Darius, whom, it is said, her father in a dying
interview with Alexander asked the latter to marry.
The Balas rubies were found at Badakhshan. Marco says,
" The stones are dug on the king's account, and no one
else dares dig in that mountain on pain of forfeiture of
life as well as goods ; nor may any one carry the stones
out of the kingdom. But the king amasses them all,
and sends them to other kings when he has tribute to
render, or when he desires to offer a friendly present ;
and such only as he pleases he causes to be sold. Thus
he acts in order to keep the Balas at a high value ; for
if he were to allow everybody to dig, they would ex-
tract so many that the world would be glutted with
them, and they would cease to be of any value. , . .
There is also in the same country another mountain
in wliich azure is found : 'tis the finest in the world, and
is got in a vein like silver."
The present monarch still holds the monopoly of these
mines, but they are not very productive now. Yule says
about sixty years ago JNIurad Beg of Kunduz conquered
Badakhshan, and was so disgusted at the small product
from the mines that he sold nearly the whole population
of the place into slavery !
In Keshiniur (Cashmere) Marco found sorcerers wlio
could bring on changes of weather and produce darkness.
One of these hermits who could make rain and snow
at pleasure, says one of the old chronicles, ''scolded
MARCO POLO. 91
those who made a noise, for, said he to me (after I had
entered his cave and smoothed him down with a half
rupee, which I put in his hand with all humility), 'noise
here raises furious storms.' "...
Cashmere was one of the centres of Buddhist teach-
ing. In the first half of the seventli century there
were one hundred convents with about five thousand
monks.
Marco found the women brunettes and very beautiful.
Shawls are one of the chief articles of export, made
from the short hair next the skin of the sroat. Some-
times three men work for a whole year on a single shawl.
Marco crossed the sandy desert of Gobi, '-the length
of which is so great that 'tis said it would take a year
or more to ride from one end of it to the other."
Travellers in crossing hear strange sounds as of persons
talking, or drums played. Several ancient cities are be-
lieved to be buried under the sands of Gobi. In Tangut
(Tibet) jVfarco describes the manner of burying the dead.
"■ When they are going to carry a body to the burning,
the kinsfolk build a wooden house on the way to the
spot and drape it with cloths of silk and gold. When
the body is going past this building they call a halt,
and set before it wine and meat and other eatables.
All the minstrelsy in the town goes playing before the
body ; and when it reaches the burning-place, the kins-
folk are prepared with figures cut out of parchment and
paper in the shape of men and horses and camels, and
also with round pieces of paper, like gold coins, and all
these they burn along with the corpse. For they say
that in the other world the defunct will be provided
with slaves and cattle and money, just in proportion to
the amount of such pieces of papeu that has been burnt
92 MARCO POLO.
along with hira." It is probable that these paper
figures were symbols of the more ancient custom of sac-
rificing human beings and valuable possessions at the
death of a person. Every day, as long as the body is
kept in the house before burial, food is set before it,
and it is believed that the soul comes and nourishes
itself.
At Kanchow, Tibet, Marco saw very large recumbent
idols, covered with gold. They symbolize Buddha in
the state of nirvana. One in Burma is sixty-nine feet
long. One seen in the seventh century near Bamian
was said to be one thousand feet long.
Mr. Thomas W. Knox, in his book on Marco Polo,
mentions an idol in a temple at Bangkok, Siam, one
hundred and sixty feet long ; " the soles of the feet are
three and a half yards long and broad in proportion, and
each of them is inlaid with mother-of-pearl as delicately
as though it Avere a brooch or finger-ring. The figures
represented by this inlaid work are entirely fruits and
flowers, in accordance with the fable that fruits and
flowers spring from the earth wherever Buddha planted
his footsteps. It was constructed of brick and then
heavily gilded, so that one might easily suppose it to be
made of gold." There are about one thousand other
idols of various sizes in the temple at Bangkok.
The men in this city were permitted thirty wives, if
they could support them, the first wife being held in
the highest consideration. They endowed their wives
with cattle, slaves, and money. If a man disliked any
wife, " he just turned her off and took another."
Marco visited Karakorum, the Mongol headquarters
till 1256, when Mangu Khan transferred the government
to Kaipingfu, north of Peking. Karakorum is north of
MAUCO POLO. 93
the Gobi desert. It was founded in the eighth century,
and is said to have been the residence of Prester John, if
that mythical person ever existed. All Europe from the
eleventh to the thirteenth century believed that a Chris-
tian king ruled over a vast area at the East, and called
him Presbyter Johannes.
iVEarco Polo heard that the ruler of the Tartars, Genghis
Khan, a man whom he thought to be of great worth, —
probably Marco had forgotten how many countries he had
laid waste, — desired to marry the daughter of Prester
John, whereat the latter was very angry, and said to the
envoys who came for her, " What impudence is this, to
ask my daugliter to wife ! Wist he not well that he was
my liegeman and serf ? Go ye back to him and tell him
that I had liever set my daughter in the fire than give
her in marriage to him, and that he deserves death at
my hands, rebel and traitor that he is ! "
When Genghis Khan heard this message, " such rage
seized him tliat his heart came nigh to burstinc: within
him." He levied a great host, and proceeded against
Prester John as soon as possible. A dreadful battle fol-
lowed with heavy losses, and Genghis Khan gained tlie
victory. Genghis Khan, according to some authorities,
married the daughter of Prester John, and others say
his niece. He had a dream in which he was divinely
commanded to give her away, and this he hastened to
do the next morning.
Genghis Khan died during his third expedition against
Tibet in 1227, at the age of sixty-six. Some say that he
was killed by an arrow, and others that he was mortally
injured by the beautiful queen of Tibet, Kurbeljin Goa
Khatun, who then went and drowned herself in the
Hoang-Ho, which thereafter the Mongols called Khatun-
94 MARCO POLO.
gol, or lady's river. It is said that forty noble and
beautiful girls, as well as many superb horses, were
killed at his death so that they might serve him in the
other world. He was borne to his grave on a two-
wheeled wagon, the whole host escorting it, and wailing
as they went. One of his old comrades sang : —
" Whilom thou didst swoop like a falcon: a rumbling wagon now
trundles thee off:
O my king!
Hast thou in truth then forsaken thy wife and thy children and
the Diet of. thy people?
O my king!
Circling in pride like an eagle whilom thou didst lead us,
O my king!
But now thou hast stumbled and fallen, like an unbroken colt,
O my king!
This custom of killing persons to serve their superiors
in the other world was common among the Tartars.
Marco says that when Mangn Khan died, in the heart
of crowded China, all who were met on the road to the
place of burial were put to death in order that they
might serve him — twenty thousand persons in all.
The Tartar houses were circular, made of boards and
covered with felt. Whenever they wished to move to
some other town, these houses were put on wagons
drawn by twenty or more oxen, ten oxen abreast. The
distance between the wheel-tracks was often twenty
feet.
Marco says that the women did all the buying and
selling and whatever was necessary to provide for the
family, " for the men lead the life of gentlemen, trou-
bling themselves about nothing but hunting and hawk-
MARCO POLO. 95
ing and looking after their goshawks and falcons, unless
it be the practice of warlike exercises."
They ate all kinds of flesh, including that of horses
and dogs, and " Pharaoh's rats," probably the jerboa of
Arabia and north Africa. Their drink was mare's milk,
which tltey put into vessels of horse-skin, and then add-
ing some cows' milk which was sour, fermentation took
place. It was also churned with a staff which stood iu
the vessel. After three or four days the koumiss was ready
to drink. This is the beverage of the Mongols at the
present day, and is said to be a valuable tonic, especially
useful iu consumption.
They worshipped a God in heaven to whom they
prayed daily ; and besides Him they had a god, a felt or
clqth figure of whom was iu every house, with images of
his wife and children around him. When they ate their
meals they greased the mouths of the god and his family
with the fat of their meat, and then believed that these
had had their share of the dinner.
The wealthy Tartars wore gold and silk stuffs, lined
with costly furs, such as sable and ermine.
They were capable of enduring the greatest hardships.
" When they are going on a distant expedition," says
Marco, "they take no gear with them except two leather
bottles for milk, and a little earthenware pot to cook
their meat in, and a little tent to shelter them from the
rain ; and in case of great urgency, they will ride ten
days on end without lighting a hre or taking a meal.
On such an occasion they will sustain themselves on the
blood of their horses, opening a vein and letting the
blood jet into their mouths."
Their laws were severe against theft. For horse-steal-
ing they cut a man in two. For a petty theft they beat
96 3IAUC0 POLO.
him with sticks, from which beating tlie person not in-
frequently died. A man in whose possession some stolen
animal was found was obliged to restore to the owner
nine of the same value ; if he could not, his children
were seized as compensation ; " if he have no children,
he is slaughtered like a mutton," says Ibn-Battuta.
These Tartars married dead people to each other. If a
man had a daughter who died before marriage, and
another had a son who had also died before marriage,
while the coffins Avere in the house — and these were
sometimes kept for months — a wedding took place by
regular contract, with the usual presents, music, and
much ceremony. Then the papers of contract were
burned that the young people in the other world might
know it, and look upon each other as legally married.
The bodies were usually buried in the same grave. The
parents therefore felt that their families were related to
each other.
The Ingushes of the Caucasas, says one historian,
have a similar custom. "If a man's son dies, another
who has lost his daughter goes to the father and says,
' Thy son will want a wife in the other world ; I will
give him my daughter ; pay me the price of the bride.'
Such a demand is never refused, even though the pur-
chase of the bride amount to thirty cows."
Marco saw the Yak in Tibet, "wild cattle as big as
elephants, splendid creatures, covered everywhere but
on the back Avith shaggy hair a good four palms long.
They are partly black, partly white, and really wonder-
fully fine creatures, and the hair or wool is extremely
fine and white, finer and whiter than silk. Messer INIarco
brought some to Venice as a great curiosity, and so it
was reckoned by those who saw it."
MAllCO POLO. 97
Marco devotes many pages of his book to the " won-
derful niagnihcence of the Great Khan now reigning, by
name Kublai Khan," the latter word signifying " Tlie
Great Lord of Lords." Genghis Khan believed in the
genius of his young grandson, and said on his death-bed,
" The words of the lad Kublai are well worth attention ;
see all of you that ye heed what he says ! One day he
will sit in my seat and bring you good fortune such as
you have had in my day !"
Kublai was born in August, 1216, the fourth son of
Tuli, who was the youngest of Genghis's four sons by his
favorite wife, liuite Fujin. His brothers disputed his
claim to the throne, but lie maintained his right by his
superior ability. His cousin Nayan, not wishing to be
under Kublai, raised an army of four hundred thousand
men against him. Kublai also raised a large force, and
went himself to the place of battle, mounted on a great
Avooden bartizan, borne by four well-trained elephants,
his standard high aloft over him, so that all the army
could see it. His horsemen each had a foot-soldier, with
a lance, sitting behind him. Before joining in battle all
played and sang on a two-stringed instrument ; and when
the nahkaroh, or great kettle-drum, four feet in diame-
ter, began to sound, then all rushed to arms, "with their
bows and their maces, with their lances and swords, and
with the arblasts of the footmen, that it was a wondrous
sight to see. Now might you behold such flights of
arrows from this side and from that, that the whole
heaven was canopied with them and they fell like
rain."
Two of the great nakJcaro/is were usually carried ot\ an
elephant, while a man sat astride the elephant and dealt
strong blows on each drum with his hands.
98 MARCO POLO.
There were not fewer thau seven hundred and sixty
thousand horsemen, not reckoning the footmen. Kublai
was victorious, and Nayan Avas utterly routed, as no quar-
ter was given. Nay an was made prisoner, and after-
wards put to death by being tossed to and fro in a
carpet, because, as he was of the Imperial line, it would
not do to spill his blood.
Kublai, although he reigned long, never went in per-
son to battle again, but sent his sons or his officials.
Upon his successful warriors he bestowed titles, and
gave them tablets of authority. All such persons, when-
ever they went abroad, had a golden umbrella carried
high on a spear over their heads, in token of their great
rank. Each dignitary always sat in a silver chair.'
Kublai was "of good statare^jieither tall nor short ; his
complexion red and white, and his eyes black and fine."
He had four superior wives, each of whom was attended
by about three hundred charming damsels, with pages
and other attendants of both sexes. Each of these
ladies, says Marco, " had not less than ten thousand per-
sons attached to her court."
Of lesser wives Kublai had a great number, chosen
from a tribe of Tartars called Nugrot, celebrated for
their beauty. Besides beauty they were obliged to have
sweet breath, and not snore in their sleep ! Two of
Kublai's wives, including the best-beloved Jamui Kliatun,
were from this tribe. Of Kublai's twenty-two sons by
the four principal wives, the eldest, Chinkin, died when
he was forty-three, and Teimur, his third son, was named
as Kublai's successor. Chinkin's eldest son, Kambala,
squinted, so not being perfect physically, was not eligi-
ble to the throne. The second son, Tarmah, was feebk
in body.
MARCO POLO. 99
Kublai Khan lived in a magnificent palace at Cani-
baluc ( Peking ). "The hall of the palace," says Marco,
" is so large that it could easily dine six thousand peo-
ple. The outside of the roof is all covered with verniil-
ion and yellow and blue and other hues, which are fixed
with a varnish so fine and exquisite that they shine like
crystal, and lend a resplendent lustre to the palace, as
seen for a great way round."
This palace was surrounded by a high wall, one mile
in length on each side. At each corner and midway be-
tween was a fine palace where the Emperor kept his
war harness, his saddles, and everything needful for his
army ; eight palaces in all. The great wall had five
gates, no one but the Emperor ever passing out of the
middle gate. Beyond his own palace were many other
palaces for the women of the household. \\\ the great
parks around his palace were white stags, fallow deer,
gazelles, and squirrels of many kinds. A large lake over
a mile long, abounding with fish, was in his park, and an
artificial mound one hundred paces high, covered with
evergreens. The mountain itself was also covered with
some kind of mineral, giving it a green appearance.
Kubl-ai's summer palace at Kaipingfu was also very
beautiful. A wall sixteen miles long was built around
the parks, lakes, and fountains. Here the Khan kept
more than two hundred gerfalcons. He also built a pal-
ace of cane, gilt inside and outside. The canes were
tliree palms in circumference and from ten to fifteen
paces high. The palace was stayed by more than two
hundred cords of silk.
The Khan kept more than ten thousand white liorses,
" all pure white, without a speck." The milk of the
mares he and his family drank, no one else being
100 MARCO POLO.
allowed to use it, except one tribe, the Horiad, because
they had helped Genghis Khan win a victory years
before. Whenever these mares were passing across the
country, no one must go before them, but wait till they
had passed, as these animals were treated with the
greatest respect. White horses were i)resented to the
Kiian in homage on New Year's Day.
Marco saw many marvellous feats performed by the sor-
cerers, the 13acsi. There are still thousands of jugglers
in China and India, who do some wonderful things.
Marco saw the Emperor's wine cups moved about ten
paces, seemingly without hands, and offered to the latter
to drink. This was probably done by hidden machinery.
Cambaluc (Peking) is of very ancient date. It was
the capital of the kingdom of Yen 222 B. C. Genghis
Khan captured it in 1215, under the name of Yenking.
Kublai founded a new city a little north-east of old
Yenking. Tlie existing Tartar city of Peking stands
on the site of Kublai's city. The latter was eighteen
miles in circumference. Both cities together measure
about twenty-six miles. It is surrounded by walls about
thirty feet high and twenty-five feet in width. At each
of the twelve gates in Marco's time there were a thou-
sand armed men, as a guard of honor to the sovereign.
He also kept a guard of twelve thousand horsemen.
Three thousand of these guarded the palace for three
days and three nights, and these were then relieved by
another three thousand.
At the feasts of ceremony the great Khan sat at an
elevated table, with his chief wife on the left. On his
right were his sons and other kinsmen at tables, with
their heads on a level with the Emperor's feet. The
highest officials and other women sat at tables lower still,
MAIiCO POLO. 101
so that the Khan could look out upou them all. A
greater part of the officers aud soldiers sat on the carpet
while they ate, and forty thousand persons were outside
on various errands — many bringing gifts to the Emperor,
The drinking-vessels were of gold, and beautifully carved.
Those who waited upon the Khan were barons ; and
these had their mouths covered with napkins of silk
and gold, so that no breath should taint the dish or
goblet presented to the King. "When he draidc, all the
musicians played, and the company dropped on their
knees and made obeisance to him.
The Khan's greatest feasts were on his birthday and
at New Year's. He then appeared in robes wrought
with beaten gold, and his twelve thousand barons and
kniirhts wore the same color. Thirteen times a vear
the Khan presented ' suits of raiment to his retinue, so
that all might have the color which he wore.
At the New Year's feast all wore white, because they
thought white clothing was lucky. More than one hun-
dred thousand white horses, richly caparisoned, were
brought as gifts to the Khan. It was customary to
present nine times nine articles, eighty-one horses, or
eighty-one pieces of gold.
Arminius Varabery says of the marriage price among
the Uzbegs : " The question is always how many times
ni7ie sheep, cows, camels, or horses, or how many times
nine ducats the father is to receive for giving up his
daughter."
The whole of the Khan's elephants, five thousand,
covered Avith inlaid cloths representing beasts and birds,
were exhibited, each carrying on his back two coffers
fillt'd with plate required for the White Feast. These
were lollowed bv a vast n\imber of camels laden with
102 MARCO POLO.
things needful for the festivities. No wonder the peo-
ple thought theirs a wonderful empire, and their Khan
the greatest monarch of the earth. Before the feast all
the officials came to the hall of the palace, and at a
given signal bowed their faces to the floor four times,
before the Emperor " as if he were a god. Then all the
rich and costly presents are seen by the Emperor. A
lion is also brought before the Khan, which lies down
with every indication of reverence."
Marco says the Emperor was a great hunter, and kept
leopards and several lions to catch wild cattle, bears,
and stags. Eagles, also, were trained to catch wolves,
foxes, deer, and wild-goats.
The Khan had two barons, Baian and Mingan,
" Keepers of the mastiff dogs," who each had charge
of ten thousand men dressed alike, one body in red,
the" other in blue. When the Khan went hunting, he
had ten thousand men and five thousand dogs at liis
right hand, and the same number at his left hand. The
two men in charge were obliged to furnish to the court
one thousand head of game daily, from October to the
end of March.
When tlie Emperor went hunting water-fowl, he took
with him "ten thousand falconers and some five hun-
dred gerfalcons, besides peregrines, sakers, and other
hawks in great numbers."
"The Emperor is carried," says Marco, "upon four
elephants, in a fine chamber made of timber, lined
inside with plates of beaten gold, and outside with
lions' skins, because he is troubled with gout. He
always keeps beside him a dozen of his choicest ger-
falcons, and is attended by several of his barons who
ride on horseback alongside."
MARCO POLO. 103
When the Emperor reached his hunting-ground ]ie
found Ills tents pitched, ten thousand in all, and very
rich and tine. The tent in which he held court was
large enough to accommodate a thousand persons. Each
of the audience tents had three poles of spice-wood.
The tents were covered with lions' skins, and lined
inside with ermine and sable, these two being the
costliest of furs. The Tartars call the sable " The king
of furs." The tent ropes were all of silk.
Erom March to October nobody was allowed to hunt
the hare, stag, buck, or roe, •' so that even if a man were
to find one of those animals asleep by the roadside, he
would not touch it for the world!" This left an abun-
dance for the Emperor and his courtiers and their fami-
lies, from jNIarch to the middle of May.
When the hunting season was over the Khan returned
to Peking for three days only, which were spent in court
feasts, and then he retired to his summer palace until
the 28th of August and then back asrain to Pekiiif^
Under Kublai was a leading official, Achmath, who
had obtained great power over the Emperor. People
were afraid of him, because they knew that he was
unscrupulous; therefore he had acquired vast wealth
through bribes. At last the people, in the Khan's
absence, laid a plot to kill him. They sent a message to
Achmath that the Khan's son had arrived, and he must,
of course, meet him. The moment Achmath reached the
palace his head was cut off Avith a sword.
As soon as the Khan knew of it the* three leaders
concerned in the murder were publicly executed. When,
however, he learned from Marco Polo, Assessor of the
Privy Council, and others, Achmath's real character, how
immoral and dishonest he was, the Khan had him dug
lO-i MARCO POLO.
u\), his liead cut off and publicly exposed, and liis body
given to the dogs. His sons were flayed alive, while
over seven hundred persons who had shared iu his
sins were punished. All his property reverted to the
Emperor.
The Great Khan made his own paper money from the
inner bark of the mulberry-tree. His orders were car-
ried over the vast empire by means of messengers.
Every twenty-five miles was a station, — a large building,
with beds iu rich silk, and about four hundred horses.
Between these stations, every three miles, were houses
for foot-runners, who, girt with a wide belt hung with
bells, ran as fast as possible to the next station three
miles away. Other men at these stations were employed
when there was great haste, aitd these went on horses.
If the horse broke down, the rider was emjiowered to
take any horse lie found, and go on his journey.
By the Emperor's orders rows of trees were planted
along the routes of these messengers, even in the most
uninhabited places. His astrologers had told him a very
admirable thing, — that he who plants trees lives long, —
so, whether trne or not, the Khan rendered thereby a
great service to the generations after him.
Colonel Yule relates an incident of the tenth centur}-,
showing how fruit Avas sent more quickly even than by
horse-posts. Fatimite Khalif Aziz had a great desire
for some cherries from Balbek. The Wazir Yakub-ben
Kills caused six hundred pigeons to be despatched from
Balbek to Cairo, each of which carried attached to either
leg a small silk bag containing a cherry.
Kublai Khan, with all his great wealth and magnifi-
cent living, was extremely good to the poor of his realm.
He caused great crranaries to be stored with corn for
3IAIiC() POLO. 105
them in time of dearth or famine. Every poor family
could have a large warm loaf daily by coming to the
court, and about thirty thousand came each day from
year to year. He laid a tax upon wool, silk, and hemp,
and the artisans gave one day a week to make these
stuffs into clothes for the poor.
The Tartars, before they were converted to Buddhism,
never gave alms, says Marco. When a poor person
begged of them, they said, " Go with God's curse, for if
He loved you as He loves me. He would have provided
for you ! "
To the five thousand astrologei-s and soothsayers in
Peking the Khan gave food and clothing as to the poor.
Coal seems to have been abundant and cheap ; and
this was necessary, since the people " take a hot bath,"
says Marco, "three times a week, and in winter, if pos-
sible, every day."
Kublai was also just to the peasantry. One of his
sons and a few others, having become separated from the
army, stayed at a little village of Bishbaligh, where the
people gave them a sheep and wine. The next year two
of the party went that way and demanded a sheep and
wine. The people gave it, but went to the Khan and
told him they feared the thing would be done every
year. He sharply rebuked his son, and paid the people
for the sheep and wine.
Marco travelled for Kublai through Shan-si, stop})ing
at various cities. At one city the sovereign, called the
Golden King, had in his service none but beautiful girls,
who used to draw him in a carriage. Colonel Yule says,
" This precise custom was in our own day habitually
reported of the Tai-ping sovereign during his reign at
Nanking. None but women are allowed in the interior
106 . MARCO POLO.
of the palace, and he is drawn to the audience-chamber
in a gilded sacred dragon-car by the ladies."
This Golden King was at war with Prester John, and
could not conquer him. Finally, seventeen of Frester
John's court volunteered to bring him the Golden King
alive. They therefore went to the country of the latter,
and entered his service for two years, he, lueantime
becoming greatly attached to them. One day, when
they accompanied him on a pleasure party, when alone
with him, they told him that he was their prisoner and
must go to Prester John.
He begged for their compassion, but they carried him
away. Prester John was greatly rejoiced, and set the
Golden King to keep his cattle. At the end of two years
he called the Golden King before him, gave him rich
robes, and asked him, " Now, Sir King, art thou satisfied
that thou wast in no way a man to stand against me ? "
Then Prester John sent the Golden King back to his
own country with a goodly train, and the latter was
thereafter the friend of Prester John,
Marco spent some time at Singanfoo, the capital of
Shen-si, where the third son of Kublai, Mangalai, had a
great palace, the interior finished in beaten gold. This
city has been the capital of many ancient dynasties.
One of the emperors had beautiful palaces, gardens, and
parks here one hundred years before Christ. Here, in
the seventh century, were Christian churches built by the
Nestorians, as shown by a slab dug up a thousand years
afterward by some workmen, in 1625. The slab was
about seven feet by three, covered with Chinese inscrip-
tions (surmounted by a cross), telling of the missionaries
and the Emperor's approval of building a church in the
principal square of the city.
3IARC0 POLO. 107
Marco went from one province to another in China, de-
scribing the products of each and the habits of the people.
In Yun-nan he saw great serpents ten paces long and
ten palms in girth, " with eyes bigger than a loaf of
bread, and mouth large enough to swallow a man whole."
The flesh was used for food, and gall from the inside of
the animal was sold at a great price as a cure for tlie
bite of mad dogs and other ailments. The creatures
were probably crocodiles.
The natives had a barbarous custom of killing any
noted person who came among them, supposing that tlie
good name and ability of the murdered man would be
transferred to the slayers. Kublai put a stop to this cus-
tom when he conquered the people. It is said that the
ancient Bulgarians of the Volga had the same supersti-
tion. If they found a man endowed with special intelli-
gence, tliey said, " This man should serve our Lord God ; "
and straightway they put a noose around his neck and
hanged him to a tree till his body fell to pieces.
West of Yun-nan lived a people called " Gold-Teeth "
(Persian, Zar-dandan), because they covered the teeth,
upper and under, with gold plate. The men went to war
and hunted, while the women did the work. A mother
was obliged to go to work at once after her child was
born, while the father took the infant and remained in
bed or in the house with it for forty days, not once going
out-of-doors, the mother waiting upon him and doing all
the work, in-doors and out. Yule says this was the cus-
tom among some of the aborigines of the West Indies,
Central and South America, and West Africa.
Their money was gold, but for small change they used
shells. When they were ill, they sent for conjurers, who
kept the idols, and who acted somewhat after the manner
108 MARCO POLO.
of the dancing dervishes, wallowing upon the ground and
foaming at the mouth, before the offended spirit, till the
man recovered.
Marco visited Burma, and Laos, and Anam, east of
Burma. The king of the latter made war against Kublai
in 1277. The Burmese king prepared two thousand ele-
phants, with towers of timber, in each of which w^ere
from twelve to sixteen armed men. He had also sixty
thousand soldiers. The Tartar captains gave orders that
every man should tie his horse to a tree in the forest and
shoot the elephants with their arrows. The elephants,
wounded, soon fled into the woods, breaking the towers
on their backs, and injuring their riders. Then the bat-
tle -waged furiously with sword and mace, and Kublai
was victorious. Over two hundred elephants were cap-
tured by the victors.
A former king of Burma had erected two towers of stone,
one covered with gold a finger in thickness, and the other
with silver, with bells around the top of each, so that
the wind would make them sound. These towers were
beside his tomb, which was also plated with gold and
silver. As these were erected for the good of his soul,
Kublai would not allow them to be disturbed.
In the capture of Manzi, or Southern China, by Kublai,
one city, Siang-yangfu, held out for three years after the
rest of Manzi had surrendered. At the suggestion of
the Polos, mangonels were made, — machines by which
stones of three hundred weight or more could be thrown
into the city. The buildings were soon crushed and the
people surrendered.
: Marco" describes the great river Yang-tse-Kiang, more
than one hundred days' journey from one end to the
other, in some places ten miles wide, " the greatest river
MARCO POLO. 109
in the world." Amenca, with its Mississippi and Ama-
zon, had not then been discovered. Up the Yang-tse-
Kiang there passed two hundred thousand vessels yearly.
Marco saw fifteen thousand vessels on it at one time.
On the rocky eminences along the river idol monasteries
were to be seen. One on the " Golden Isle," a little island
not far from the mouth of the river, was surmounted by
numerous temples. The monastery had the most famous
Buddhist library in China. The buildings were entirely
destroyed by the Tai-pings in 1860.
Marco describes Ching-kian-foo, where two churches of
Nestorian Christians were built in 1278. In the war
between England and China, in 1842, the heroic Manchu,
commandant, seated himself among his records, and then
set fire to the building, and perished in it, rather than fall
into the hands of the English.
Travelling south-east one reaches Changchow, captured
by General Gordon in 1864. When Kublai conquered
Southern China, a company of Alans, who called them-
selves Christians, were sent to take this city. Finding
some wine after they had entered the place, they all bo-
came dead drunk, and at night the people of the city fell
upon them and slew them. This enraged Bay an, who had
charge of the Great Khan's forces, so he sent a larger
army and exterminated the whole population. Some his-
torians say that he boiled the bodies. Genghis Khan, it
is said, heated seventy caldrons after one of his victories
and boiled his prisoners. Such was war in barbarous
times.
Marco greatly admired Quinsay, which means the City
of Heaven, and which is now called Hangchow. There
were twelve guilds of different crafts in the city, and each
guild had twelve thousand houses for its workmen. In--
110 MAIiCO POLO.
side the city was a lake thirty miles in circumference,
around which the wealthy built palaces. There were
also spacious halls on two islands in the middle of the
lake, where marriage feasts were held, and where some-
times a hundred entertainments were being enjoyed at
the same time. This provision was made by the Emperor
for the pleasure of his people.
At every bridge — and Marco says there were twelve
thousand — was stationed a guard of twelve men, who
with a piece of wood and a metal basin struck the hour
of the night. In case of fire they beat the alarm, and the
guards from all the bridges near hastened thither, with
the owners of the property. No others dared leave their
houses at night, as persons were arrested if found on the
street after a certain hour.
The city of Quinsay, with sixteen hundred thousand
houses, had three thousand hot baths, each so large that
one hundred persons could bathe together. All our cities
would do well to copy in this matter the Chinese who
seven centuries ago were so wise in providing baths for
the people. A modern writer says, " Only the poorer
classes in Hangchow go to the public baths ; the trades
people and middle classes are generally supplied by the
bath-houses with hot water at a moderate charge." The
people bathe daily.
In this city was the magnificent palace of the Emperor
of Southern China. The walls enclosing the palace and
its beautiful gardens and fountains were ten miles long.
The palace contained twenty halls finished in gold,
besides one thousand chambers beautifully painted in
various colors.
In some of the pavilions the King used to entertain
ten thousand persons at a feast, which would last for
MARCO POLO. Ill
tei) or twelve days. A covered corridor, six paces in
width, led to the lake. On either side were ten courts
in the form of oblong cloisters surrounded by colonnades,
and in each cloister were fifty chambers with gardens to
each. In these chambers were one thousand young ladies
in the service of the King.
At Quinsay there were ten large markets, held in the
squares of the city three times a week, frequented by
forty or fifty thousand people. Here Marco saw all
kinds of fruits, vegetables, and meats. The pears
weighed ten pounds apiece. Colonel Yule says he has
seen pears in Covent Garden market that must have
weighed seven or eight pounds apiece, which sold for
eighteen guineas a dozen — over ninety dollars.
Colonel Yule thinks this city of Quinsay was the great-
est then existing in the world. Many other ancient
travellers confirm Marco's account of the number of
bridges (twelve thousand), the great wealth and extent
of the city — one hundred miles in circumference — the
hundreds of idol temples where from one to two thou-
sand monks lived in each, the paved squares and streets,
and the elegantly dressed people.
Marco Polo was sent by the Khan, after the latter had
conquered this city, to inspect the revenue and to see
that correct returns were made of sugar, salt, wine, etc.
Marco says about fifty million dollars were paid yearly
to the Khan. Silk paid ten per cent. No wonder that
Kublai could support twenty thousand men as keepers
of his dogs, when one city yielded such revenue as this.
Marco Polo next travelled to Cipango (Japan) Avhere
he found the people " white, civilized, and well-favored."
The palace of the king seemed to be of gold, with the
floors made in plates like slabs of stone, all seeming to be
112 MAllCO POLO.
pure gold, and by many believed to be such. Both wliite
and rose-colored pearls were in abundance. When a per-
son died, a pearl was placed in his mouth.
Kublai Khan was very eager to conquer such a rich
country, and sent a fleet with one hundred thousand men
against it. The fleet was scattered by a storm, and the
Mongols were defeated, thirty thousand men put to
death, and seventy thousand Coreans and Chinese were
made slaves. It is stated that only three men were
spared to be sent back to Kublai to tell him what liad
become of his one hundred thousand. The Great Khan
wished to send another fleet, but there was such opposi-
tion to the scheme that he abandoned it.
Marco visited Cochin China, in Anam, which became
subject to Kublai. The king liad three hundred and
twenty-six children and fourteen thousand tame ele-
phants.
Sailing fifteen hundred miles south-east, Marco reached
the island of Java, which he found to have surpassing
wealth in spices. Kublai tried to conquer Java ; but his
ambassador, Mengki, was sent back to China with his
face branded like that of a thief. A great armament
started out from the ports of Fo-kien to avenge this
insult, but they accomplished little. The death of Ku.
blai prevented any further attempt at subjugation.
In Java the Less (Sumatra) Marco found some tribes
of Cannibals who always ate their prisoners. If tlie
sorcerers told them that a sick man would die, they
smothered him, and ate him. Sometimes they exposed
their dead in coffins upon rocks by the sea. Many ele-
phants, monkeys, and the so-called unicorns were seen
in Sumatra. The Semangs of the Malay Peninsula are
said to destroy the unicorn in this manner. His whole
MARCO POLO. 113
body is often immersed in mud, with only a part of
his head visible. When the dry weather comes and
the mud hardens, it is difficult for the animal to extricate
himself. The Semangs build an immense fire over him,
and he is soon destroyed and ready to be eaten.
The natives ate rice and drank wine from the Gomuti
palm, which, when nine or ten years old, yields it from
any cut branch, three quarts a day for about two years.
In Sumatra, where Marco with two thousand men in
his company stayed five months, detained by contrary
winds, he found camphor " worth its weight in gold,"
and sago, which he and his party made into bread and
found it excellent. Says a modern writer, " The cam-
phor tree attracts beyond all the traveller's observation
by its straight columnar and colossal gray trunk and its
mighty crown of foliage, rising high above the canopy
of the forest. It exceeds in dimensions the Rosamohi,
the loftiest tree of Java, and is probably the greatest
tree of the Archipelago, if not of the world, reaching a
height of two hundred feet. . . . The camphor is found
in small quantities, one quarter to a pound, in fissure-like
hollows in the stem. Many trees are cut down in vain
or split up the side without finding camphor."
The sago is the pith of the tree, which is put into
tubs of water and stirred with a wooden spoon. The
flour sinks to the bottom, while the bran comes to the
top and 13 thrown away. One tree will sometimes yield
nearly a thousand pounds of sago, which will support a
man a year.
At tlie Andaman Islands, in the Bay of Bengal, Marco
found a tribe small in stature, "no better than wild beasts."
They were black with woolly hair, ate men alive, were
naked, and murdered the crews of wrecked vessels.
114 MARCO POLO.
In Ceylon, Marco saw precious stones, among them
some large rubies. It is said that the Emperor of Chiua,
in the fourteenth century, purchased for his cap a car-
buncle which weighed more than an ounce. When worn
at a grand levee, the lustre filled the palace ; hence it
was called the " Red Palace-illuminator."
In a high mountain in Ceylon the people believe
Adam was buried, and make pilgrimages to the grave ;
but the Buddhists think it was Buddha. In Marco's
time Buddha had been worshipped about eighteen cen-
turies. He was the son of a king, married at sixteen to
the beautiful Yasodhara, with forty thousand princesses
in his harem. He had been kept in three elegant pal-
aces away from the world, lest he should, if he once
knew the evil and sorrow in it, be led to become an
ascetic. Driving out one day in a chariot with four
white horses, he saw an old man, and learned for
the first time that old age was the portion of many.
Later he saw a leper, and then a dead man, and learned
that disease and death come to all. He left his wife
and infant son at the palace, and thereafter, till his
death at eighty, devoted himself to doing good to the
world through a life of self-sacrifice. Buddha's alms-
pot in Ceylon has been revered for centuries. A poor
man could fill it with a few flowers, but a rich man could
hardly be able with ten thousand bushels of rice. It
was still at Ceylon a few years ago, though it had been
carried to other countries several times. A sacred tooth
is still in the island, and another at Foo-Choo.
From Ceylon, Marco Polo visited India. He describes
the fishing for pearls. The fishers go out into the gulf
in vessels, and then, after anchoring, get into small boats
and jump into the water where it is from four to twelve
MARCO POLO. 115
fathoms deep, remaining as long as they can hold their
breath. They put the shells which contain the pearls in
a net bag around the waist. The time for fishing is in
March and April, just between the cessation of the
north-east and commencement of the soutli-west monsoon.
There are now, as then, shark-charmers, who are hired
to keep the sharks from harming the divers, receiving
one-twentieth of all the pearls found for their supposed
valuable services.
The natives of Eastern India were naked, save a scrap
of cloth about the loins. The King wore a piece of fine
cloth about the middle of the body, and a necklace of
precious stones, rubies, sapphires, and emeralds. From
his neck he wore suspended on a silk thread one hun-
dred and four large pearls and rubies, because he had to
say that number of prayers daily to his idols. His an-
cestors bequeathed the string of pearls to him for that
purpose. He wore also three golden bracelets set with
pearls, anklets on his legs, and rings on his toes.
This King had five hundred wives. Colonel Yule says
the necklace taken from the neck of the Hindu King
Jaipal, captured by Malimud in 1001, was composed of
large pearls and rubies, worth a lialf-million dollars !
When any king died, several barons burnt themselves
in the fire which consumed his body, so as to be his com-
panions in the other world. Until recent years women
burnt themselves at the death of their husbands.
The criminals condemned to death were allowed by
the crovernraent to commit suicide as a sacrifice to a
favorite god.
The people washed the whole body twice every day.
They fed their horses boiled meat and rice. Ghee, or
boiled butter, is said to be given now by natives to all
116 MAliCO POLO.
their horses. Some give a sheep's head occasionally to
strengthen the animals.
St. Thomas was believed to be buried at Mailapiir,
near Madras. Pilgrimages were made thither by both
Cliristians and Saracens, and earth from his tomb was
used for miraculous cures.
Marco tells of some of tlie Hindu ascetics who lived
on rice and milk, went naked because they were ''thus
born into the world and desired to have nothing about
them that is of the world," would not kill a fly or a flea
because all have souls, slept on the ground without cloth-
ing over or under them, fasted every day in the year,
and drank water only.
For any supposed insults duels were fought before the
King. They could not use the point of the sword, as
this was prohibited. All the people flocked to see the
duel, which was continued till one party was left for dead.
At Coilum (Quilon) Marco saw much Brazil wood, —
the natives plant the seeds at the birth of a daughter,
and when the trees come to maturity in fourteen or fif-
teen years, their sale becomes her dowry, — pepper, and
indigo.
''The indigo," says Marco, " is made of a certain herb,
which is gathered, and is put into great vessels upon
which they pour water and then leave it till the whole
of the plant is decomposed. They then put this liquid
in the sun, which is tremendously hot there, so that it
boils and coagulates, and becomes such as we see it."
Socotra, south of Arabia, was found to be inhabited
by baptized Christians, with an archbishop. Every ves-
tige of Christianity had disappeared when P. Vincenzo,
the Carmelite, visited it in the middle of the seventeenth
century.
MARCO POLO. 117
From India, Marco is supposed to have gone to Mada-
"•ascar, on the eastern coast of Africa, and is the first
European or Asiatic writer, Colonel Yule thinks, who
mentions the island by name. Tlie ships from India
reached Madagascar in twenty days. Among other
things of interest in these far-off islands, below Mada-
gascar and Zanzibar, was the Rukh, a bird so large
that it was reported to be able to seize elephants in its
talons, and carry them high into the air. Its featliers
were said to be ninety spans long, while the quill part
was two palms in circumference ! An egg in the Brit-
ish Museum of the Aepyornis, once in Madagascar, but
now extinct, requires two and one-half gallons to fill it,
and is thirteen and one-fourth inches long.
At Zanzibar, Marco thought " the women the ugliest in
the world, with their great mouths and big eyes and
thick noses." The staple trade was elephants' teeth.
Their sheep were white with black heads.
Abyssinia, Marco calls Middle India. He says that
the Christians in baptism used a hot iron on tlie fore-
head, though some later authorities deny that this was a
religious rite.
About the beginning of the fourth century there landed
on the coast of Abyssinia some explorers from Tyre.
They were all murdered except two, Frumentius and
Adesius. The former gathered all the Roman merchants
togethei", started a Christian church, and became Bishoj)
of Axum, then the leading place for trade in Abyssinia.
The people for some centuries were somewhat advanced
in civilization, but they have sadly deteriorated.
Marco describes Aden, in the south of Arabia, at that
time a great seaport ; Es-shehr, three hundred and thirty
miles east of Aden, where the horses, oxen, and camels,
118 MABCO POLO.
as Avell as the people, live on dried fish the whole
year through, — the cattle eating tlie little fish alive, just
as they were taken from the v/ater, — and Dhafar,
where incense is gathered from small trees, and sold for
use in churches.
Marco finishes his book with an account of Siberia, with
its immense white bears and black foxes, and its sledges
drawn by dogs, which Mr. Kennan says are half domes-
ticated Arctic wolves. When the Tartars went far north
to the Land of Darkness, as Polo calls it, they rode on
horses which had colts, leaving the latter behind. When
the Tartars had taken all the plunder they could get,
they found their way home because the mothers by
instinct knew the way back to their colts.
Finally Marco's twenty-six years of wandering and
important missions for Kublai Khan were ended, and,
rich and honored, he went back to live and die in Venice.
He was the greatest traveller of his time.
John Fiske calls IMarco Polo's book " one of the most
famous and important books of the Middle Ages. It
contributed more new facts toward a knowledge of the
earth's surface than any book that had ever been written
before."
Colonel Yule shows Polo's right to fame in that " He
was the first to trace a route across the whole longitude
of Asia, the deserts of Persia, the flowering plateaus and
Avild gorges of Badakshan, the jade-bearing rivers of
Khotan, the Mongolian steppes ; . . . the first traveller to
reveal China in all its wealth and vastness ; ... to tell us
of Tibet with its sordid devotees, of Burma, of Laos, of
Siam, of Cochin China, of Japan, the Eastern Thule,
with its rosy pearls and golden-roofed palaces ; the first
to speak of that museum of beauty and wonder, still so
2IAEC0 POLO. 119
imperfectly ransacked, the Indian Archipelago ; of Java,
pearl of islands ; Sumatra, Nicobar and Andaman ;
of Ceylon ; of India the Great, not as a dreamland of
Alexandrian fables, but as a country seen and partially
explored ; the first in medieval times to give any distinct
account of tlie secluded Christian emi)ire of Abyssinia,
and the semi-Christian island of Socotra ; to speak of
Zanzibar and the vast and distant Madagascar; . . .
of Siberia and the Arctic Ocean ; of dog-sledges, white
bears, and reindeer-riding Tunguses."
FERDINAND MAGELLAN.
ABOUT the year 1480, at Sabrosa, in the province of
Traz-os-Montes, in Portugal, was born Ferdinand
Magellan. His family was of noble birth. His father
dying early, the estates came to him, the eldest, instead
of to his brother Diego, or his sisters, Thereza, Isabel,
and Ginebra. "^^
When a lad he left his wild mountain home and was
placed at Court at Lisbon, that his education might be
under royal supervision. He became one of the pages
of the Queen, the widow of Dom Joao II. This monarch
had been a scholarly man, quite noted as a geographer,
and called "the Perfect "from his, in many respects,
admirable character.
In 1495 Dom Manoel came to the throne, and IMagel-
lan, then fifteen, passed into his service. Columbus had
just discovered the Kew World, and little was talked of
save exploration. Ships were fitted out to travel the un-
known waters and see what treasures might be found in
the far-off islands and in Asia, South America, and Africa.
Vasco da Gama had undertaken his second voyage to
India in 1502, and other explorers were starting for
Brazil, which had been discovered by Pedro Alvarez
Cabral in 1500, and to Labrador, where Caspar Cortereal
■went about the same time, and was never heard of
120
FEliDINAND 31 AG ELL AN. 121
afterwards. His brother followed him and never re-
turned.
Young Magellan was eager to join this adventurous
company, even though hardships were inevitable and
death was often the result.
In 1505 Doni Francisco d' Almeida was sent as first
viceroy to India, with a large armada. There were about
twenty ships in all, which carried fifteen hundred men-
at-arms, two hundred bombardiers, and four hundred
seamen, besides artisans of almost every kind.
Magellan, then twenty-five, bade adieu to court-life,
made his will, giving all his property to his sister
Thereza, with instructions to say twelve masses yearly
in Sabrosa for his soul, and enlisted as a volunteer under
Almeida.
Before the fleet sailed, in the great Cathedral, in the
presence of a large audience, Almeida, kneeling at
the feet of bis King, received the standard of the vice-
roy, which had been blessed by the bishop, — the royal
flag of white damask, with a crimson satin cross, bor-
dered with gold.
After the farewells were said, the King coming in
state to witness the departure, the fleet left the mouth
of the river Tagus, INfarch 25, 1505, sailed along the
coast of Africa, rounded the Cape of Good Hope in
severe storms, and landed at Sofala, on the eastern side
of Africa, where they built and garrisoned a fortress.
They arrived at Quiloa on July 22 ; and, as the African
king was not willing to be subject to Dom Manoel, Al-
meida promptly stormed the town. Next thej^ reached
the important city of Mombaza, where their ships
were fired upon. In a short time the. city was stormed
and the ten thousand IMoors overcome. The defeated
122 FERDINAND MAGELLAN.
King agreed to pay a yearly tribute of ten thousand
serafins, and presented the son of Ahueida, Doni .Lou-
ren90, with a sword and collar of pearls worth thirty
thousand cruzados. (A cruzado was forty-five cents.)
Probably Almeida reasoned that Portuguese civilization
was higher than African, and that the conquest of Africa
and India was a beneficial thing for the inhabitants, —
an idea not obsolete even in this nineteeiith century.
From Mouibaza the fleet crossed the Indian Ocean,
burnt the ships and took the possessions of the King
of Onor, who had sent Almeida an insolent message,
reached Cananore, in India, Oct. 22, where they built a
fortress, and a few days later came to Cochin, Avliere
Almeida was to assume the rank of viceroy. King
Nambeadora came in state on his elephant to meet the
viceroy, who was clad in brilliant garb, a coat of red
satin, black buskins, and an open black damask cassock
which formed a train. The King, whether at heart will-
ing or unwilling, was publicly crowned by his new
friend, the viceroy.
Once in power, Almeida sent back to Spain as many
ships as he could spare, filled with pepper and spices
from the Cochin factories, and prepared himself for a
peaceful and successful reign over the people of India.
But the peace was of short duration. The Moors
rose aorainst this new government, and collected a fleet
of two hundred and nine vessels. Dom Louren^o, the
son of Almeida, met them with eleven ships off Cananore,
INIarch 16, 1506, and a bloody battle ensued. The Por-
tuguese were successful even against such odds, and
the Moors were driven out of their ships into the sea.
"God be praised-! let us follow up our victory over
these dogs," said Dom Louren^o, and the fight was
''^'^W^ ^
M^:' '
\rm
FERDINAND MAGELLAN.
FERDINAND MAGELLAN. 123
waged to the bitter end. The next day more than
thirty-six hundred bodies were washed ashore, " forming,
as it were, a hedge." Nearly eighty Portuguese were
killed and over two hundred wounded, among the latter
young Magellan, who must by this time have had all
the adventure which he longed for.
The j\toors, finding themselves unable to cope with
the Portuguese, obtained the assistance of the Sultan of
Egypt. A severe battle was fought the last o£ Decem-
ber, 1507, in the river of Chaul, at which tlie Portu-
guese were defeated. Dom Louren^o's leg was shattered
by a cannon-ball, but he fought till his ship sank, and
perished with his men.
Two months later Almeida avenged the death of his
son in a great battle, when between three and four thou-
sand Moors and Mamelukes were slain. The Portuguese
were victorious. Among the wounded we again find
Magellan.
Almeida, greatly to his disappointment, saw himself
superseded in office by Affonso d' Albuquerque, who had
had great success on the northern shores of the Indian
Ocean over the Mussulmans. Almeida, therefore, started
for Portugal, but was killed on the journey in a battle
with the Kafirs, in wliich the Portuguese lost eleven of
their captains.
In 1509 Magellan sailed with a fleet Avhich had been
sent out to India from Lisbon to explore Malacca, a
great centre of trade. Tl»e advent of the Europeans
caused much alarm ; but the King affected to receive them
in a friendly manner, and invited the leaders to a ban-
quet. Fearing treachery, the Portuguese declined, but
were prevailed upon to send their boats ashore that they
might be filled with pepper and other goods.
124 FERDINAND MAGELLAN.
After the sailors had gone in their boats, the Malays
crowded on board the ships. At a given signal — a puff of
white smoke — those on sea and land were to be slaugh-
tered. One of the leaders, suspecting treachery, sent
Magellan in the only remaining boat to tlie flagship to
warn the captain-general. It was just in time to save his
life. The Malays on his ship were driven overboard and
the fleet escaped. The men on shore were murdered.
Two years later this treachery was avenged in the fall of
Malacca through Albuquerque. Eight hundred Portu-
guese and six hundred Malabar archers defeated twenty
thousand men. Through Malacca passed all the commerce
of the Moluccas, the Philippines, Japan, and China to the
Mediterranean ; therefore its capture made the name of
Albuquerque known far and wide.
Magellan purposed in 1510 to return to Portugal, after
an absence of five years, and left Cochin about the
middle of January. The ship in which he sailed and one
other ran at night upon a shoal of the Great Padua
Bank. It was decided to return to India, about one hun-
dred miles distant; and there was contention as to who
should go first, the crews being unwilling that the officers
only should go in the boats. Magellan, with a magna-
nimity which was characteristic of him, said that he would
remain with the crews, if those about to return would
promise to send aid. This they did, and Magellan and
the crews were rescued later.
After an expedition to Java, Celebes, and some other
islands, Magellan carried out his purpose of returning to
Portugal, after a seven years' absence. He was now
about thirty-two. He had shown himself a brave soldier,
a skilful navigator, and a fearless traveller.
■ He remained in his native land about a year, and then
FERDINAND MAGELLAN. 125
joined a great armada of four hundred ships and eighteen
thousand men-at-arms, against the Moors of Azamor in
Morocco, who had rebelled against Dom Manoel. They
were quickly subdued. In a skirmish a little later,
Magellan was hit in the leg with a lance, and made
slightly lame for life.
On April 12, 1514, the Moors attempted to retake
Azamor ; and though they were routed, leaving two thou-
sand of their men on the field, they pressed on towards
the city, only to find the walls destroyed, and the country
round about laid waste. They were soon put to flight,
over a thousand Moors made prisoners, and nearly as
many horses captured.
Magellan and another captain were put in charge of
the booty. They were accused, whether wrongly or not,
of selling cattle to the Moors, and permitting them to be
carried off at niglit. For this, or some other reason,
Magellan left Africa, and returned to Lisbon.
He sought Dom Manoel and asked for promotion and an
increase of pay — about twenty-five cents a month — for
his long-continued service. To his surprise he was told
that he had left Africa without the permission of his supe-
rior officer, and ordered at once to go back to Azamor, to
answer the charges against him. He returned, wounded
in spirit, as he felt that he had served his king long and
faithfully. At Azamor the authorities refused to pro-
ceed against him, and Magellan came back at once to
Portugal, lioping that his king would send him to India, in
some honorable position. Dom Manoel made a serious
mistake for himself and his country when he received'
the young noble coolly, and would not listen to his en-
treaties. It is said by one of the old historians that
Magellan ''demanded permission to go and live with
126
FERDINAND MAGELLAN.
some one who would reward his services. . . . The King
said he might do what he pleased. Upon this Magellan
desired to kiss his hand at parting, but the King would
not offer it to him."
It is probable that Magellan iirged upon the King a
project he had long had in mind — the passage to the
rich Moluccas, or Spice Island s^ b y sailing __ffi£s twar d
around Cape Horn, at the e xtremitj^ of So uth America,
rather~than eastward aroumTthe Cape ofGoQc T^HoiTS^"
Africa, He had used all his; sp:TTe time in studying
maps and charts. He knew that navigators had sailed
far alonsr the South American coast , and that Vasco
Nunez de Balboa had looked u pon a great ocean (the
i*acitic) troin the mountains ill~ETie^sthmus of Darien,
now ranama. Balboa fell upon his knees at the time of
his discovery, Sept. 25, 1513, thanking God, and took
possession of the whole seacoast in the name of Spain.
Four years later, at the age of forty-two, he and four
faithful friends were beheaded on the trunk of a tree, on
the unjust charge of treason, through petty jealousies of
his superiors in office,
Magellan's int^himte friend. Francisco Serrao. was
t hen Ij vjng in tbr Mnbifci" He had been wreck ed
some time previously upon a deserted island, infested
by pirates. As s oon'as_ these latter saw the wreck the y
" iandecl, intending to capt ure, t^^ f^nrvivnrs. Serrao kep t
iTis men hidde n near the beach, and when the pirates
liad left their vess el, the Spaniards took possession of it,
Tlie fhieves saw that they would be without food or
water, and begged for protection, which tli ey recei ved
al jber a promise that t iiey wouFd repair theSpaniards'
wrecked v essel. All reached the^MoT u ccas in safe^ ,
and Serrao remained there for life, writmg to Magellan
FERDINAND MAGELLAN. 127
tjiat "T ie had discov ered yet another ne w world, lar ger
aiul richer than that fou nd by Vasco da Gama .'' Ma,?_e l-
tlxn wro^back that he wou ld coiue] thither, '• if not bv .^^J.
'way of Fortugal, tlieii by way of Spain." 1^
Dom. Mauoel was not wise enough to remember that
there were other nations interested in navigation besides
Portugal, and that all power does not rest in any one
person, however prominent. For Magellan to remain
in Portugal under Dom Mauoel was to see his hopes
thwarted, and his life unsuccessful. He determined,
therefore, to bid adieu forever to his own country and
enter the service of the great Emperor of Spain, Charles
V. For this course lie was always condemned by the
Portuguese : declared to be a monster, and a traitor to
his king, and one willing to sow discord between the
two nations. Yet he did what Columbus and others ,
did — when one king refused t o aid, they sought another _
crowned head.
Magellan reached Seville, in Spain, Oct. 20, 1517, not
discouraged by the ingratitude of liis own ruler, but
anxious lest Charles V. should look upon a westward
passage to the S pice Islands as visionary and futile.
Magellan was received into the home of Diogo Bar ^
bosa, a Portuguese, alcaide of the arsenal, a relation,
'possrblyli couiTn, where he remai ned for three months .
Barbosa had serv ed Spain fourteen years, had been one
of the discoverers of the islands Ascension and St.
Helena, and, like his son, Duarte Barljosa, was a skiiie c
naviga tor. With all Magellan's absorption in his plans
to discover new worlds, he .found time to fall in lov e,
with Be atrix Parbosa, th e beautiful daughter of his host,
a nd was married at the age of thirty-seve n [before he
went to court at Valladolid, probably taking his young
bride with liim.
128 FERDINAND MAGELLAN.
Mag ellan laid his ])lans first bfi X pre the Casa de C ^n-
tratacion^ but as this Portu ^uese_wasj)nly one of many
who had sch emes to equip vessels for explorat ion, no
attention was paid to the matter. Magellan learned
what everybody learns sooner or later, — that there is no
easy road to success -, that he who is unwilling to over-
come obstacles would better never undertake any matter
of importance. One of the three chief officials of the Cc isa
de Contrata cion,. J uan de Aranda, was wiser than h is
fellows, or perha])s m ore drawn to tlie slen der and lame^
Portugu ese, a nd had faith in ~ the westward pa ssage.^
Thrmigh him o pportunity was made of pr ese nting
the_jnatierjnot_only to Sauvage, the Lord High Chan-
cellor, Cardinal Adrian of Utrecht, Fonseca, Bishop of
Burgos, but to Charles V. himself, then onlv eighteen.
Magellan and a sch olarlx.fHpTirl, "R,nv Faleiro. taking
their globe wit h themTexplained to the King their pur -
pose, andlT sked that he would fit out the shipTaFh is
own ex pense, rewardi ng the explorers as he. thpugl^t
best; or wealthy"fnencls_ wonld provide the ships fo r
them, if t he King would give them the trade and own er-
ship~of the lands discovered by them.
The King, not unmindful, perliaps, that his grand-
mother, Isabella, had aided Columbus, and thus brought
everlasting honor to herself, ^ p^^^sed to provide an
armada of fi ve ships, to be provisioned lor two years ,
wTtTrtwo hundr ed and thirty-four officers and crews,. ^p
olher explorers should be sent to the Spice Islands J QX
ten Years ; the t erritory of the King of Portugal shou ld
not be int ruded upon; and Magellan and his friend Faleiro
should receive o ne-twentieth par t oi the profit of their
disc overies, and b e governors of the islands — discovery ^^'
evidently, always meaning conquest.
FERBINA ND MA G ELL AN.
129
But the fitting-out of the armada was not to be an
easy thing after alh Tlie Court at Portugal was greatly
incensed when they learned that Charles V. (whose
sister Eleanor, twenty, was about to become the third
wife of Dom Manoel, aged fifty) was to befriend a navi-
gator whose cause they had refused to consider.
They wrote earnest appeals to Charles ; they sent
messengers to Magellan begging him not to persist in
liis enterprise, and thus sin against God and his king ;
and when words did not avail, an effort was made to
assassinate him, which proved unavailing.
After much delay the armada was finally made ready :
the San Antonio, one hundred and tw enty tons ; Trini-
(lad. one hundred and ten tons ; CoTidUpl^JTrrr ninety
tons ; V i ctoria, eightv-five tons ; Santiago^ seventy-fi ve
tons. Even when all was ready Magellan was mobbed,
it was believed by some emissaries of the King of
Portugal.
At last, nearly two years after he ca me toS pain, he
heard mass in the church of Santa Maria d e la Vic -
toria in Seville, and sailed down tlie "river with hi^
fleet, Auir. 10, 1519.
Remaining at the Port St. Lucar
de F>arrameda for a month, he made his will, giving the
lands he sliould discover to his little son J joxiu^^p, thei>
six m onths old, one-tenth of his inc ome to three con-
ventsTand, in case of the death of his son, one-fourth
to his wile, besides the return of the dowry wliich she
i)rouu-ht him at her" marriage, six hun d reoPbh ousan d
maravedis. On the day of his burial three poor men
were to be clothed, and food given to them and to
twelve others, ''and a gold ducat as alms for the souls
in purgatory."
On Sept. 20, 1519, the lleet sailed away, amid the
130
FERDINAND MAGELLAN.
jbooming of cannon f i-om ships and sliore, destined t o
make the first voyage around the vvor] d.
^lagellan was in the Trinidad, as was also his brothe r-
in-law, Duarte Barbosa . The shii)S carried nearly s ix
thoiisanrl pftP'^da of p owder, a thousand lances, tw o
hundred pikes, three hundred and sixty dozen arrows ,
ninety-five doze n. d art_s, many cannon, and much armo r
for the men. Evidently while Magellan hoped to Chris-
tianize the peoples whom he should^ find, he had othe r
measj^ires in reserve besi( lps persnasitm.
The ship carried many charts , OQiima sses, ^ ^l ^e^^g ,
and quantities of g oods , for barter : knives, o ver two
tliousancrpounds of quicksilver, twent y tho usand bell s,
ivory, velvets, and glass. Several scholars had joine d
the expedition, among them an Italian, Antonio Piga -
fetta, who kept a valu able journal and published it o n
his return"
The fleet sailed towa rds t he Canary Islands, stopping
for wood and water at Tenerift'e, then alongjbhe African
coast, past Cape Verde and Sierra Leone, su ffgjiiLg:^son:ie-
what f rom heavy storms, and having rain for sixty days
while they were in the vicinity of the equator. / Their
course was so slow that the rations of the men w ere
reduce d to two quarts of water per day, and t he bread
to one pound and a half
Taking a westerly course, they crossed the Atlantic,_
arrived near Perna mljuco in "Soiitli ^ America. Nov. 29.
r ounde d Cape Frio, and e ntered the harbor at Rio _de
Janeiro.
They~found the n atives friendly, willing to exchange
enough fisli for tp7n men for a looking-gla ss, a large
"basket of sweet potatoes t orabe ii^or one of their chil-
~ dren or several fowls for a big knife, 'j^e people lived
FERDINAND MAGELLAN. 131
in long, low huts ^__at g the flosh of their pj iptu^p^, and
were nearly nakecL wearing a sort of apron of parrot s'
f eathers . Monkeys and birds of gorgeous plumage
abounded.
JVTass was twice said on s h ore by the Span iards, in
which the natives joined, kneeling and r aising the ir
hands to iieaven, from whence t hey beli eved the pale
laces liaTTTCrme, bringing rain with them , as i t had not
rain ed for tw o montlis previous to the arrival of the
ships.
The fleet sailed away Dec. 26, follow ing the coast, so
that no inl et or strait should be overlo oked w hich might
he continent. Arriviiig_at the
R40 d.^ ^ Plata, tli ey landed, and caught a quantity o f
fish. One night an Indian, dressed in goat-skins, came
in a canoe to the ship. jNIagellan gave him a cotton
shirt and some other articles, hoping that he would
return and bring his friends, but he never came back.
When the Spaniards attempted to catch some of the shy
natives, they proved too fleet for them.
Going farther south, they found great numbers, o f
" se a_ wolves," pr obably^eals, and killed many. The
wiivter was coming on, and storms were very severe,
carrying away parts of~their ships^ After weeks of
' siift'ering they ancliored in Port St. Julian, Ma,fCh^3l.
Food was scarce, anci th e diminished ration s caused
g reat complainin g. Thec old Avas intense, and some
hruldied froni ex posure. They beggecTof MagcllaTPto
go l)ack to Spam , lest they all shoul d perish, as evident ly
1;iiu1 gfrofplu^.l f; ii- :\.\v:\Y to the Soutli PoIc, and there
was no hope o f enterin<.^ tlie Pacific Ocean .
__M^i; iG]lan censured them for t heir lack of c ourage,
and said, for himself, he was determined to die rather
132
FEE DIN A ND M . IGELL A N.
than return. 'X liere were plenty of fish and birds in
the bay for food, and it' they would push on, wealth
and honor wer e before them.
" J[i k)iLa~trme the men were content, but co ld and suffer-
ing brouQ:ht acrain their natural results. ^The men de -
(tiai-ed they were not sailin^r towards the Mol uccas, b ut
to a land of ice ; tliat as Magellan was a Portuguese ,
lie dia not care If ci-ews of Spaniards perished. Fearing
tb£-4M^jj£lL ce of such ^mxirmuri ng, the captain-general
arrested the complaine rs. But it was too late ; a nni-_
tiny had alre ady been arrang ed. At night the captain
oFthe Conce pcion, Gaspar Quesada, Jua n de Cartag ena,
the ^ egrnxd-aj Mce^ ^""^^ ove7 thirty^lirmed men boarded
the San Antonio, placed the captain^^'AJU ciLu ti e Mes^
quita, m irons, killed~the master, and cleare d the dec k
ofttm-SlTip" f or""acTtrnT: — 'rhe^ ¥iTTtui l Lt, ^vTHi Louis de
M endoza at its head, joined the insurgents .
As soon as jVIaffaUan Jieard^tliat th ypp nf h'f^ fi^^ ships
had turned ag ainst , him, he resolved upoii _decisi ye meas -
ures. All seemed lost, — no western passage discovere d,
anxL ji return to Spain, if at all, in disgrace. Many a
man would have quailed before~~such odds
Magellan.
A skiff with fi ve men bearing con cealed weapons was
despatched to Mendoza, of t he Victoi-ia, summoning hi m
to the Trinida d to me et Magellam AsJie_retusedto_go,
he was fiistantly stalDEeS^tcTdeath. Another boat with
II ir-| ■ . ,___
fi fteen picked men under Duarte Barbosa, brother-in-law
of Magellan, app ear ed at once alongsid e the Victoria,
b oarded he r, and compell ed the surrender of her crew .
Then the Trinidad, the V ictoria, and the Santia^
stationed "th emselves at the^nt rance of the port to
VVlfen
N
so
FERDINAND MAGELLAN.
133
t he form er came i n siirlit the Trinidad fired upon he r
NvitJi-l ara'e TxnnGard.s, an d ^^ho wn.-^ hom- ded by the cre w
ojM dij^ Vi^ ^txvrin,. Quesad a and liis helpers ^weiie-seiz ed
and put in ir on-s ; f orty men were condenined ti LAeatli
f or treason, but were ])ardoned . Quesada was belieade d,
and his body quartered, as was th at of Mendoza, wlii le
J uan de Car tasj^ena and a priest were left among the
s avages, perhaps to share an equally dreadful fate.
These measures seemed very severe ; but if tji^jnsur-
s^£uts_hadj?eei
jts had
to put Magellan in aTi''0T)eu
j)ermitte(
nry'iTudson among the icebergs of Hud
boat, as was
son Bay, to die of hunger and cold, or had they killed
their leader, as they intended, others might have found
the westward passage, but not Magellan.
The Santiago, now that the mutiny was quelled, w as
sent ahead_to examine the coast and look carefully for
_ Uie eagerly ex pecte d strait which ^oul d le ad them i nto
the Pacifi c. She sailed to the Rio de Santa Cruz, sixty
miles away, where she found abundance of fish and
seals, or sea-wolves, weighing five hundred pounds. A
sudden and violent storm came on, and the ship went
to j)ieces. The crew, thirty-five in number, without
})rovisions, had to make their way as best they could
seventy miles through the Avilderness to their comrades.
When they reached the river Santa Cruz, it Avas decided
that two only should cross on the little raft which they
liad made, while the rest encamped to wait for the ships.
For eleven days the men made their solitary journey,
fording marshes, cutting their way through forests, and
living on roots and leaves. At length, thin and worn,
tliey reached their comrades.
Magellan did not dare risk his vessels, so he sent
a party of twenty-four men with food to the starving
134
FEli DIN AN n MA GKLLA N.
company. They could find no water, and were obliged
to melt snow for drink. At last all were brought back
in safety, but much broken in health by exposure.
Af ter remaining: for weeks in Port St. Julian with o u t
seeing a single inhabitant, the sailors w^ere asto nished
one jlay_by tlie coming of a gigan tic Indian, so tall that
the Spaniards came only ^Ho thelevel oniis~waistbeIt."
His face was painted red, liis hair white, yellow circles
were around his eyes, and his covei-ing was the skin of
the guanaco. He was shown, among other things, a
large steel mirror, and, seeing himself in it, was so
astonished that, springing backward, he knocked over
four of the Spaniards. Still, he was not displeased at
knowing how he looked, for he accepted a mirror as a
present.
After this other natives came, several women among
them, leading small guanacos by a string as they would
dogs, with the purpose of enticing other animals of the
same kind, so that the men might shoot them with their
arrows.
The Pii i^pmi^its^^re fouiul^_La_ be a strange peo ])le,
ejliiu^L Jj^ts with ^nl ^ropping to s kin them, livia g^-uiugtly
on raw meat, thrusting arrows down their throats when
theyjveri
when.
11, or cutting themselves acl'oss" the forehead
Magellan, desirous of securing some of these savages
for Charles V., practised a deception, which seemed far
from right. When some of the Indians came on board
the Trinidad, he loaded them with presents, and then
showed them how a pair of irons could be fitted to the
legs. These irons were at once riveted by a hammer,
and the men were prisoners.
When they found they had been deceived, they in-
FEIiDINAND MAGELLAN. 135
voked Setebos, their Great Spirit, and called in vain for
their wives, as the Spaniards understood by their signs.
Magellan sent two Indians bound to the shore in charge
of some armed Spaniards. One Indian escaped, though
he was wounded in tlie head. When they reached the
liuts of the natives, the other Indian spoke a few words
to the women, who, instead of going to the ship, imme-
diately fled into the forest.
A fter sppiulin;; between three and fo ur months in Port
S ^_J]11^l]l, ^^"^ fl"^ ^ ^ni]pd for the Santa Cruz River, whe re
they obtained an abundance of lisli,and dried it.
When October came M ao -flhi.n found tlie weathe r so
much warmer, and the winter b roken, tliaLJligX-i^^^^"-
started in earnest for th e westwai; d_^^passage. On O ct-
21, 1520, tliey " saw an opening like unto a bay ." \Xho
fleet w:ls ordered to enter, and the Concepcion and t he
San Anto nio were sent on in adv ance to see if it w ere
iiFde ed astrait . A fearful storm came on, and it was
feared for a time that tlie vessels were lost. Finally
t hey jetunied. tlieir masts gay with flags, ha v i i ig foun d
tl iat the inle t, or bay, extended for a very great distance.
]\lage]lan now sailed farther on, well assured in his
own mind that the long-sought strait was found. After
a month had gone by, on Nov. 21, he issued an o rder
d emanding of his ca])tains and ]nlots their views a bo u t
continuing the voyage. All were f or going onward
e?{Cept lt,sr.ev.'.o Gom es, the pilot of tlie San Antonio!
l ie sa id now that they had found tlie strair,, they might
all perish be tore tne iMoluce a Islands wuic reatired, as
'nobotly knew the width of the I'aclhc.
iVlagellan, who Jiad evidentlv been testing their cour-
age and perseverance, replied that " if they had to ea t
the leatlier on the ships' yards, he would still go on and
136 FERDINAND MAGELLAN.
(Uscoverjvli at h e had promised t he EmperorJ ' He de-
chired that no one under pain of death should discuss
tlie difficulties before them, knowing that discontent
doubles if we dwell upon our obstacles.
The )^ Rnil^'l ^n.g^ d and, Nov. 28, they emerged from
tlie strait, afterward named Strait of Matrellan in honor
of its di scoverer, an d looked upon the great Pacifio O cean.
So overioyed were they that Magellan we pt, as well^ as
his companions. Guns were fired, and thanks were
returned to Gfotl and t he Virgin jNIary.
With this great joy came an unexpe cted sorrow.
Gomes and the San Antonio, the largest of the ship s,
and carrying the larger part of the stores, had desertecf
and rgturhed to iSpaiiu He and his companions had
stabbed the faithful Captain Mesquita, and put him in
irons, and then turned the vessel homeward. On May
6,1521, she reached the port of Seville. The Patagonian
prisoner, one of the two whom Magellan had allowed to
be bound, died on the passage.
The other Patagonian, who was on board the Trinidad,
died ahotit the time they reached the Pacific. "When
he felt liimself gravely ill, of the malady from which he
afterwards died," says Pigafetta, the Italian, " he em-
braced the cross and kissed it, and desired to become a
Christian. We baptized him and gave him the name of
Paul."
The navigators were thirty -eight days passing throug h
the strait. The land to the south having many fires,
they called it "Tierra del Faego," land of fire, which
name it has always retained. The tempests were over,
and for three month s and twenty day t-ViPy <:;^,i1prL- aTi a
s inooth and a^^pai-ently boun d less ocean, without a sin gl e
storm. No wonder Magellan named it the Pacific.
FERDINAND MAGELLAN.
137
^f fcer^two months' sailinty th ey came to an island, b ut
it was uninhabited, a nd eleven days alter another^_but
t hey found neither food nor Av ater. Their condition had
be come d istressing. _The wat ^r "n board was t'^o ofF^^"-
s iyp. tq toi i^h. and their biscuits were full of worms.
id_ indeed eat the '' leather on the ships' yards,"
lad determined to do ratifer than tu7nl5ack.
They_s£i£te aied the l eather b y lettinp^ it hang over board
th ree or four _^_da^s^^^F ^en _coolved it on the embers.
Sawdust w as used for food, and they ate rats Avith avidity .
Scurvy broke out, and many died._ Only tliree of th e
five ships Avere left, and the number of sailors oji these
w as daily lessened .
i^ks Avore on, until finally. March 6. land Ava s
s ighted, aim a nlvinber of pra us, que er-looking boat s,
Avith i)almdeaf sails, like latee n sai ls, came out to meet
thenu Tlie ^S paliiards h ar.< riit^ppvycTPri fli" M arianne o r
Ladroile Islands.
Great Avas their rejoicing to find fresh fruit and vege-
tables. Theji ^at ives were thievi sh, and greatly annoyed
Magellan by takin^ the skiff under the stern of the flag-
ship, and, indeed, A vhatever they could lay their hands on.
Driving them off the ships, th ey sent back sto nes an d
b urning to rches. The next day Magellan burned one of
their villag es and several of tlieir boats,"~kiiied seven or
eight men, regained his own skiff, and took whatever
provisions he Avished.
The native s Avere unacquainted Avith the use of boAvs
and arrows, aTid when one of their number Avas wo unded ,
h e AA;x>uTd draw the arr oAv oui ot Ills body and look at it
wistfully, Avhich touched the hearts of the explorers.
The people had no clot hing except aprons of ba rk.
They livetl in wood hiits, thatched Avith fig-leaves ; their
138 FERDINAND MAGELLAN.
food was for ^lie most part figs, fish, and bii'ds\ ; tli e i r
• ^^eapous, Ions sticks with sharpene d fish-bones at t he
ends.
The fleet left the Ladrones, and on March 16 reached
the Phili})pin^s. an danchored on the little ishxnd of
Snluan. T he natives were very friendly, bringing coco a-
nuts, oranges, bananas, fowls, and pal m wine, in retu rn
for which they received red ca ps, looking-glasses, bells,
and other tilings . Their chief came Avith them, wearing
jarge gold e ar-rings and rich gold bracelets.
The sick sailors were put on shore in two large tents ;
and each day Magellan went to visit them, giving them
cocoanut milk to drink with his own hands.
After nine days the flee t sailed to Leyte Tsla nd. where
Magellan's slave, Enrique of Malacca, found that the
people understood his INIalay tongue. The shy natives
A voitld not at first c ome to the flagship, so ^lagrel Ian put "
some pre sents on aTpIank and pushe d it towar ds th em.
A little later the King came, and brought fish and rice
in person to the Admiral, in return IMagellan gave him
a Turkish red and yellow robe, with a red cap, a nd~th ey
became friends through the ceremony of blood-brothe r-
"hood ; that is, eacli one taste s the blood of the oth e r,
drawn from the arm . The King was shown the armor of
the men, their swords and guns, and the maps and charts
which Magellan had studied so closely. After a dinner
together, wliich the King seemed to enjoy, two Spaniards
went on shore, and the King entertained them.
Pigafetta, who was one of them, thus describes the
visit: "The King took me by the hand, while one of his
chiefs took my comrade's, and we were led in this man-
ner under a canopy of canes, where there was a halangai,
or canoe, like a galley, on the poop of which we sat, con-
FERDINAND MAGELLAN. 139
versing by signs, for we had no interpreter. The King's
followers remained standing, armed with swords, dag-
gers, spears, and shields. A dish of pork with a large
vessel full of wine was brought, and at each mouthful
we drank a cup of wine. If, as rarely happened, any
was left in our cups, it was put into another vessel. Tlie
King's cup remained always covered, and no one drank
from it but he and I. . . .
"Before the hour of supper I presented to the King
the many presents I had brought with me. . . . Then
came supper-time. They brought two large china dishes,
the one filled with rice, the other with pork in its
gravy. We ate our supper with the same ceremonies
and gestures as before. We then repaired to the palace
of the King, in shape like a sort of hay-loft or rick, cov-
ered with banana leaves, and supported on four large
beams, which raised it up from the ground, so that we
had to ascend to it by means of ladders. On our arrival
the King made us sit upon a cane-mat with our legs crossed
like tailors on a bench, and after half an hour a dish of
fish was brought, cut in pieces and roasted, another of
freshly gathered ginger, and some wine. The King's
eldest son having entered, he was made to sit next me,
and two more dishes were then brought, one of fish, with
its sauce, and the other of rice, to eat with the prince.
" For candles they used the gum of a certain tree called
anlme, wrapped up in leaves of the palm or banana. The
King now made a sign to us that he desired to retire to
rest, and departed, leaving the prince with us, in whose
company we slept on cane-mats with cushions stuffed
with leaves."
In the morning the Spanish guests departed, the King
and thev kissini? each other's hands.
140 FERDINAND MAGELLAN.
When Easter came, March 31, mass was said w ith
much ceremony, the Indian King and his brother kiss-
ing the_c ross,^aud kneeliiig_^ith joined hands as did the
Spaniards . A cross and crown of thorns was set upon a
hill that the Indians might thereafter see and adore it.
Wishing to visit other islands for gold and spices, the
King offered to be their pilot ; but from excessive eating
and drinking he slept all one day, and then they were de-
layed, as he had to gather his rice harvest. In this the
Spaniards helped, and all being ready, the fleet deDartgd
April 4, and entered the port of Sebu Sunday, April 7. .t^%S
They found a beautiful island, abounding in fruit,
with birds of brilliant plumage, and quite large and busy
villages. Their customs were most interesting to the
explorers. Mr. George M. Towle, in his " Life of Magel-
lan," thus describes a Sebu funeral, the circumstances
gathered from the old chronicles : —
" The chief's corpse was laid in a chest in his house ;
around the chest was wound a cord, to which branches
and leaves were tied in a fantastic fashion, while on
the end of each branch a strip of cotton was fastened.
The principal women of the island went to the house of
mourning and sat around the corpse, wrapped in white
cotton shrouds from head to foot ; beside each woman
stood a young girl, who Avafted a palm-leaf fan before
her face.
''Meanwhile, one of the women was engaged in cut-
ting the hair from the dead man's head with a knife.
His favorite wife all this time lay stretched upon his
body, with her mouth, hands, and feet pressed close to
his. As the woman concluded her hair-cutting, she broke
into a low, dismal, wailing song, which the others after
awhile caught up. The attendants on the mourners then
FERDINAND MAGELLAN. 141
took porcelain vases with burning embers on them, upon
which they kept sprinkling myrrh, benzoin, and other
perfumes, that formed a cloud of incense in the room.
"These ceremonies and mournings continued for seve-
ral days ; meanwhile, the body was anointed with oil of
camphor to preserve it ; and at the end of the mourning
period it was solemnly deposited in a kind of tomb, made
of wooden logs, in the neighboring forest."
A treaty was made with the King of Sebu ^ y blo od-
bl-otherhood, and then Magellan made them an add ress
th rough an i nterprete r. _ Anxious to win all the isla nds
of t he sea, not only for Sixuii^but for the Roman Cc itho-
lic faitj^j^he ur ged the ir becoming Christians, not throu gh
fear, nor the wis h to please the Spaniards, but .becau se
il^ , was right.
The King soon expressed ajvisJi_JjxJ3©-a.JIhn&ti4n,
and on April 14, on a scaffolding in the centre of the
town, th e ceremony of bapt ism took peace. Magellan
came in state with forty men in armor, and the King and
more than fifty others, dressed in white, and all were bap-
tized. Magellan and the King sat in two velvet chairs,
one red and the other violet.
The Queen and forty of her ladies were baptized the
same day, she receiving the name of Joanna, after
the mother of Charles V., and the King, Carlos, after the
Emperor. Pigafetta gave to the queen a carved figure of
the Virgin and child, which she seemed greatly to prize.
She was young and quite pretty, wearing a black and
white robe, and a large hat made of palm leaves. About
eight hundred persons were baptized the same day, and
later all the inhabitants of Sebu, and some on the neigh-
boring islands, several thousand persons in all.
They were told that they must burn all their idols, wood
142 FERDINAND MAGELLAN.
images, liollowed out behind, and arms and legs apart,
with broad face and four teeth like those of a wild
boar. Most of them were burned.
The idols were retained, however, in the house of a
nephew of the King, a valiant warrior, who was very ill.
Magellan informed the King that if the nephew were bap-
tized, he would at once recover, and if this were not the
case, he would forfeit his head. A procession was ar-
ranged in the square where the cross had been set up, and
soon reached the sick man's house, where it was found
that he could neither speak nor move. Magellan, not
doubting that his prayer for the man would be answered,
baptized him, and asked how he felt. He replied much
better, and in five days rose from his bed recovered, and
burned his idols.
Magellan, overjoyed at suc h professions of Christian-
ity, offered to protect the Kingfrom a ny^sloyal subj ects
oiyantagonlbiLici rulers, — a rash thing to do, but his entTTu-
siasm in chnstUUlizihg the people was as great as his
desire to circumnavigate the globe, and find the westward
passage to the Moluccas. He felt grateful to the King
of Sebu, and a sense of honor seemed to impel him to this
unfortunate promise.
Otip- q\ t.h ^ minor chiefs^ Silapulapu^ rebelling, Magel-
l an sent an ex pedition again st hiiu^wh ich burnt one of
his villages, aii^ gi'ect"ed a cross over the^sEes. it "is
not strange that their associatiolis with the cross there-
after were not pleasant, and that they determined upon
revenge.
Ma gellan was urged by his fr iends not to proceed
further^ in the matter; but iie resolved not only to piTii-
ish thj^in, but to conquer all Tor the newly converte'd
FERDINAND MAGELLAN.
143
A t iiiiduiglit, April 26, 1521. IMagellan with sixty men
iiiTHree boats, an d the King of Sebu with about one
tliousaiu i men in twenty or more war canoes, started for
t he little ishuid of Ma ctan. Mage llan preferred not to
shed bloo d, and sent a message to Sila])ulapu tlTITt— rl-iie
Avould submit and pay tribute,~all would be w^ll, but if
not, " he would learu how our lances wounded."
The Indians sent word back tliat " if the Spaniards
had lances so had they, albeit only reecls~~and stakes
I y^ — , 11 I I ■ II I
h^ dened bv fi re ; that they were ready for them."
When morning came the king of Sebu begge d to lead
the assaul t, wit h his th ousand men ; but Magellan, over-
eontident. and wishing to s how the Tndiahs howliis men
co uld tight, ordered the King an d his meirT(rremaTn°in
the canoes, wh ile he and fo rty-eight Spaniard s lancled,
A pril 27, 1521. and attacked the rebels. ThT^olher
twelve of ]\ragellan's men re mained to guanTThe" bdaR.
The Spaniards were at once surrou n7Ied~1jT"frOTTr"fifteeTh
hu ndred to six tho usand natives, ^vllo threw ston"es"and
javelins at those portions of the bodv^ n^t°coverecrbv
armor.
Some of the S paiiinvrjc; f^fii^fire^Jot he houses, w hich
made the natives more furious than ever. They singled
out Magellan, the l eader, f'^y th^ir persistent a^ck.
An arrow had pierced his right ieg;^id seeing that an
advance wa s hnpossible, he ordered a re|reat, but irwas
t00^iTItC ''^ M0St_0f t'l ^ Spniiim-doHprl frmr, sucll uhequal
warfare^^ nly ri^ o r eight staying by t heir comniai ider.
Fighting hand to haiul, they reached the s hore, ^ ^gel-
^uTfftce had his helmet torn off, and received a spear
W ()nnd in th e right arm. A l.ainl.nrf gy>pnv 'tvng mn nito
lHS _fn-ce a lso, and he in turn plunged his lance into the
breast of his pursuer! "i'he enemy, seeing that he con 1 d
144 FERDINAND MAGELLAN.
not draw out his sword on account of the wound in h is
riglit arm, rus hed upon him and struck a blow on th e
left [eg, which made liim fall forward on liis face. The
end had come. T hey ran \\v v> tliTmio-li ?^nrl throup^h wit h
i ron-p ointed s])ears a nd cimeters. Eight of his men lay
dead beside him and four Christian Indians. " His obsti-
n ate resistance," says Pigaietta, " had no other aim'than
t o give time for the re treat of his men ."
It seemed pitiful to die in this manner after facing all
the perils of the sea, without reaching the Moluccas, or
circumnavigating the globe ; but he had discovered the
westward passage, and had pointed out the way around
the world to all future travellers.
Wlien word was brought to the King of Sebu that
Magellan was killed, he wept like a child. He had left
his canoes and gone to the aid of his pale-faced friend,
but it was too late.
The Spaniards sailed back to Sebu, well-nigh crushed
that their leader was gone. They offered any amount
desired for the body ; but Silapulapu declared that it
should always be kept as a token of their victory, and
the bones of the great navigator never left Mactan. A
monument has been erected there to his memory.
Thus perished the man of noble family, the fearless,
indomitable, unselfish Magellan. " In the history of
geographical discovery," says Dr. F. H. N; Guillemard
(late lecturer in geography at the University of Cam-
bridge), in his Life of Magellan, "there are two great
successes, and two only, so much do they surpass all
others, — the discovery of America and the circumnavi-
gation of the globe. Columbus and Magellan are the
only possible competitors for the supremacy." Lord
Stanley of Alderley, in his "First Voyage round the
FERDINAND MAGELLAN. 145
World," calls Magellan "undoubtedly the greatest of
ancient and jnodern navigators ; " and Dr. Guillemard adds
that it " is an opinion which a careful investigation
obliges us to accept."
Magellan's family soon followed him. The little son
llodrigo died six months after his father, September,
1521, and his wife, Beatrice, broken-hearted for her child
and her liusband, — a second child was dead at its birth,
after Magellan's departure , — died in less than a year
after her Imsband, March, 1522.
The first work of the disheartened explorers was to
select a leader to guide the fleet towards the Moluccas,
now that Magellan had fallen. Two were chosen,
Duarte Barbosa, the brother of Beatrice, and Joao
Serrao, his faithful friend and the brother of Francisco.
Other troubles were before them. The King of Sebu
had found that the great Spaniards whom he had sup-
posed came from heaven were mortal like himself. TJie
successful Silapulapu had sent word that unless he
broke his alliance with the Spaniards and renounced
Christianity, he would invade his kingdom. The Malay
slave interpreter, Enrique, becoming disaffected towards
Barbosa, told the King that his masters were going to
attack the town and carry the King into captivity.
Ferliaps it was quite natural for the King to have
some doubts about his new-made friends ; and while they
in turn did not entirely trust him, still they were unpre-
pared for his treachery. He sent word that he had some
jewels which he wished to give to the King of Spain,
and invited Barbosa and several officials to dine with
him. Barbosa decided to accept the invitation, and took
twenty-eiglit armed men with him.
The King met them graciously, and thp}- at last forgot
146 FKUUINAND MAGELLAN.
their suspicions. Suddenly the King sprang from liis
seat and plunged a dagger into Barbosa's breast, and at
the same instant each Spaniard was slaughtered by an
Indian. Only one escaped towards the boat, Serrao.
Just as he came near, the savages caught and bound
him ; but they offered to release him if those on the
ships would give two cannon and some merchandise.
Serrao begged for his shipmates to save him ; but they
paid no attention to his cries, and sailed away as fast as
possible. Serrao was at once stabbed to death. The
cross on the hillside was torn down, and the natives
returned to their idols.
The fleet at this time was not half as large as when
they left Seville, — then over two hundred and seventy ;
now one hundred and fifteen. The Concepcion was so
unseaworthy that she had to be burned. Only the Vic-
toria and the Trinidad remained.
These two ships sailed along the western coast of
Mindanao, wliere they found the King friendly. He
drew some blood from his left hand, putting it on his
face, breast, and tongue, and the Spaniards did the same.
The King invited them to his long, low hut, where they
had fish and rice ; and they also visited the Queen, sur-
rounded by her slaves. She was weaving a mat, and
left her work to play for the visitors on a sort of timbrel.
She wore many gold rings and bracelets, and in the King's
house several of the utensils were of solid gold.
They next reached Palawan, and found to their de-
light, as they had only food enough for eight days,
an abundance of pigs, goats, yams, cocoanuts, and rice.
On June 21 they started for Borneo, and, after a time,
entered its capital, Brunai, where they found about
twenty-five thousand people — some of the old histori-
FERDINAND MAGELLAN. 147
ans say one luindred thousand — living in houses built
on piles in the water. Tlie chiefs came out to meet
them in gayly painted boats, bringing presents of honey,
eggs, wooden vessels filled with betel, which the natives
chewed, and arrack, a drink made from rice.
The Spaniards sent liandsome presents to the King, —
a Turkish coat of green velvet, a chair of violet velvet,
a glass vase, gilt goblet, etc., with a pair of slippers and
silver case of pins for the Queen, besides presents for
the chief courtiers.
Twelve natives, richly dressed, met the Spaniards with
two great elephants, covered with silk, on whose backs
were palanquins, on which the visitors were offered
seats. The natives carried porcelain vases covered with
silk napkins. These were to receive the presents in-
tended for the King.
The palace of the King was a large house, reached by
a broad flight of steps. The walls were hung with bril-
liant silks. He was very rich, and many of his house-
liold articles were of pure gold. Three hundred of the
King's guard, with daggers drawn, their hilts of gold
studded with gems, their fingers covered with rings,
were stationed in the hall leading to the royal apart-
ment. This the Spaniards could not enter, but could see
the monarch, about forty years old, and his little son,
surrounded by a number of wiv^es. They were not al-
lowed to speak to the King in person ; but they could
give their message to a chief, and he to another, and he
in turn to the prime minister, who stood by the King's
side. They were obliged to join their hands above their
heads, raise first one foot and then the other, make three
low bows to the King, and then kiss their hands to him.
After the presents were laid at his feet, some rich silk
148 FERDINAND MAGELLAN.
and brocade were sent to the Spaniards, and they were
offered cloves and cinnamon to eat. After this a chief
entertained them with a repast of chickens, peacocks,
veal, lish, rice, and arrack. The rice they ate with gold
spoons. They were provided with wax candles, and
even with oil lamps.
Astonished at what they had seen, the Spaniards re-
mained for a month, and held traffic with the people.
They rode in the King's barges, and the houses of the
chiefs were offered for their use. The Kinec never left
his palace except for hunting, so he did not visit the
ships.
The inhabitants were nearly naked, were followers of
Mahomet, skilful in making porcelain and china, and
rich in various products.
After a month in Borneo, the ships sailed for the
Moluccas. They were soon obliged to put in to a har-
bor for repairs. After this they sailed south-east, and
Nov. 8, 1521, saw the high peaks of Ternate and Tidor.
" The pilot," says Pigafetta, " told us that they were the
Moluccas, for the which we thanked God, and to comfort
us we discharged all our artillery. Nor ought it to cause
astonishment that we were so rejoiced, since we had
passed twenty-seven months, less two days, always in
search of these Moluccas, wandering hither and thither
for that purpose among innumerable islands."
They anchored in twenty fathoms, close to the shore
of Tidor. Almanzor, the King, received them most cor-
dially. He was a stately monarch, never bowing his
head, so that in entering the cabin of tlie Trinidad, he
was obliged to do so from the upper deck, so as not
to stoop. His servants carried golden vessels of water,
betel, and other necessaries, and his son bore his sceptre
FERDINAND MAGELLAN. 149
before him. He had two hundred wives, each noble
family being obliged to furnish one for the King. These
women were carefully guarded, and any man found near
their house was put to death. The King ate alone, or
with his Queen, a wife considered superior to the other
two hundred.
The friend of Magellan, Francisco Serrao, to whom
he wrote that " he should come to the Moluccas, if not
by way of Portugal, then by Spain," was dead. He
was poisoned, it was said, by the King of Tidor, because
Serrao, who was captain-general of the King of Ternate,
conquering the former, made him give his daughter to
the King of Ternate as his wife.
One of the sons of the King of Ternate came with
the widow of Serrao and her two little children to the
fleet.
Trade was soon begun with the natives. Several of
the kings made treaties, and sent presents to Charles V.
One king desired to send over four thousand pounds of
cloves as his present ; but the sliips were already so
laden with spices, that Espinosa, the captain of the
Trinidad, did not dare take any more. Among the presents
sent by this king were some skins of the bird of Para-
dise. The Mohammedans, who traded with the natives,
had told them that this bird was born in Paradise, wliere
were the souls of those who died. As so many wonder-
ful things were in this abode of souls, they accepted
the Mohammedan religion to be allowed to share in
these comforts.
Dec. 18 the ships, filled to overflowing with spices,
started homeward, sorry to leave the beautiful Moluc-
cas. The Victoria started first, and the Trinidad
attempted to follow her. A bad leak was discovered,
1£0 FERDINAND MAGELLAN.
and she was obliged to remain and unload her cargo.
Sad farewells were said, and the Victoria went on
alone.
She sailed south-east to the island of Timor, and then
across the Indian Ocean for the Cape of Good Hope.
The ship was poor, and delay was occasioned by frequent
repairs. The meat on board spoiled for lack of salt, and
the sailors were reduced to living on rice. Scurvy came
to decimate their numbers. Nearly one-third of the Span-
iards died, and nine of the thirteen natives. They had
scarcely enough men left to work the ship.
At last, after three years lacking twelve days, Sept.
8, 1522, they anchored once more at the port of San
Lucar de Barrameda, and next day sailed up the river to
Seville in Spain. The Victoria brought home twenty-
six tons of cloves, besides cinnamon, nutmegs, and other
spices. Crowds gathered to welcome the first circum-
navigators of the globe ; cannon were fired, and there
was great rejoicing, as it Avas supposed that all were lost.
The next day they walked barefoot, carrying tapers, to
the churches of Santa Maria de la Victoria and Santa
Maria de Antigua, and gave thanks for a safe return.
The Emperor Charles V. sent for the little band of
explorers to come to Valladolid, where he gave them a
public welcome. Each person received a handsome pen-
sion, and Juan Sebastian del Cano, the captain of the
Victoria, five hundred ducats yearly and a coat-of-arms.
This device consisted of two cinnamon sticks, three nut-
megs, and twelve cloves with a globe, and the words
"Primus circumdedisti we" (Thou first encompassed
me.) Two Malay kings supported the shield. The nav-
igators were surprised that they had lost a day in their
reckoning. The Emperor submitted the matter to an
FERDINAND MAGELLAN. 151
astronomer, who showed that travelling with the sun
from east to west, they lost time, and from west to east,
they gained time.
The Victoria made one more voyage to the West In-
dies. She was again sent to Cuba, and must have gone
to pieces in some gale, as neither she nor her crew was
ever heard of afterwards.
After the Trinidad had been repaired at the island of
Tidor, Espinosa decided to sail eastward across the
Pacific again, hoping to reach the Spanish settlement
at Panama. After \Veeks of severe storms, he was
obliged to return to the Moluccas. Three-fifths of Ins
men had died from an epidemic on board, brought on by
poor food and exposure ; only nineteen were left out of
fifty-four.
On their return to Tidor they found that the Portu-
guese had come with seven vessels and three hun-
dred men under Antonio de Brito and demanded of the
King why he had admitted Castilians, when the Portu-
guese had been there so long before. Espinosa was
obliged to surrender his men and ship to de Brito ; yet
as Spain and Portugal were apparently friendly, he
hoped for fair treatment. The vessel soon went to
pieces in a storm, but the Portuguese saved her timbers
and used them in building a fortress.
Antonio de Brito wrote to his Kinir concerning: the
officers of the Trinidad that he thought it would " be
more to your Highness's service to order their heads
to be struck off than to send them to India. I kept
them in the Moluccas, because it is a most nnliealthy
country, in order that they might die there, not liking
to order their heads to be cut off, since I did not
know whether your Highness would be pleased or not."
152 FERDINAND MAGELLAN.
This certainly did not look very promising for Espi-
nosa and his men.
They were obliged to go to work for the Portuguese,
until the end of February, 1523, when, with the excep-
tion of two carpenters whom de Brito needed, they were
allowed to start homeward.
They were first taken to Banda. Four were lost in
getting there. The others were detained in Banda for
four months, and then sent by way of Java to Molacca.
Four died there. Five months later they were sent to
Cochin in India in two or more «hips. The junk in
which three sailed was never heard of. When the others
reached Cochin, the vessel which went back to Portugal
once a year had already gone. Disheartened, two of
them hid themselves on board another ship bound for
Portugal. At Mozambique, having been discovered, they
were put ashore with the intention of sending them
back to India, but one died and the other secreted him-
self again on a ship, arrived at Lisbon, and was thrown
into prison. He was finally released by order of the
King.
Only three were left out of the Trinidad's company :
Espinosa, the captain, Mafra, a seaman, and Master
Hans, bombardier of the Victoria. The latter soon died,
and Espinosa and Mafra were kept in prison for seven
months after their arrival in Portugal. Finally Espi-
nosa was released and appeared before Charles, who
made him a noble, and gave him a life pension of three
hundred ducats.
The westward passage through the Strait of Magellan
had been discovered, and the way round the world ascer-
tained, but only through fearful suffering and the loss of
over two hundred lives.
FERDINAND MAGELLAN. 153
John Fiske, in his delightful and scholarly " Discov-
ery of America," calls this voyage of Magellan's " the
most wonderful in history ; . . . doubtless the greatest
feat of navigation that has ever been performed, and
nothing can be imagined that would surjmss it except a
journey to some other planet."
SIR WALTER RALEIGH.
SIR WALTER RALEIGH, soldier, colonizer, states-
man, poet, courtier, was born in 1552 at Hayes, in
the eastern corner of South Devon, England. He was
descended from one of the noted families of the realm,
who by reason of much forced contribution to royalty,
and perhaps also through too costly manner of living,
had become somewhat reduced in their estates.
His mother, Catherine, " a woman of noble wit and
of good and godly opinions," was a Roman Catholic in
the time of Queen Mary, but his father, Walter, was a
Protestant.
In the persecutions under this Queen, among the here-
tics shut up in jail previous to their being burned was
Agnes Prest, whom Mrs. Raleigh visited with the hope
of converting her. The fearless Agnes told the gentle-
woman to seek the body of Christ in heaven and not on
earth, and that the sacrament was only a remembrance
of his death. "As they now use it," she said, ''it is
but an idol, and far wide from any remembrance of
Christ's body, which will not long continue, and so take
it. good mistress."
When Mrs. Raleigh came home she told her husband
that she never heard a woman talk so simply, godly, and
earnestly, " insomuch that if God were not with her, she
154
SIR WALTER RALEIGH.
SIR WALTER RALEIGH. 155
could not speak such things. I was not able to answer
her : I who can read, and she cannot." This probably
went far towards making Mrs. Raleigh a Protestant.
Both parents are buried in Exeter Cathedral.
The son Walter — he had an older brother, Carew,
and a sister Margaret — entered Oriel College, Oxford,
about 1568, when he was sixteen years old. Here he
was liked for his wit as well as his scholarship, becom-
ing "the ornament of the Juniors and a proficient in
oratory and philosophy."
He left college early to engage in the religious wars
of the time. Queen Elizabeth, sympathizing with the
persecuted Protestants of France, permitted men and
money to be sent to their aid. Young Raleigh, active
and full of courage, went in a troop of a hundred gentle-
men volunteers, well mounted, led by his cousin, Henry
Champernowne, with the motto, " Flnem det mihi virtus "
(Let valor decide the contest).
Mr. Edward Edwards, in his life of Raleigh, says that
although the men were sent to France by Queen Eliza-
beth and her ministers, each soldier wore on his breast a
scroll with words explaining that if he were captured
and hanged, he had met his fate, "for having come,
against the will of the Queen of England, to the help of
the Huguenots ! " Such duplicity seems to have been
common in those days.
Little is known of Raleigh's part in these battles for
five or six years. He says, however, in his " History of
the World," referring to these times, " I saw in tlie
third civil war of France certain caves in Languedoc
which had but one entrance, and that very narrow, cut
out in the midway of higli rocks which we knew not
how to enter by any ladder or engine, till at last, by
156 SIR WALTER RALEIGH.
certain bundles of straw let down by an iron chain, and
a weighty stone iu the midst, those that defended it
[Catholics] were so smothered as they surrendered them-
selves, with their plate, money, and other goods therein
hidden."
As Raleigh was not killed at the dreadful massacre of
St. "Bartholomew, 1572, when one hundred thousand
people were massacred by order of Charles IX., at the
instigation of his mother, Catharine de' Medicis, it is
probable that he found refuge in the house of the
English ambassador, Walsingham, with young Sir Philip
Sidney and others.
Raleigh remained in France until after the death of
the young King, Charles IX., May 30, 1574, at the age of
twenty-four. Mr. William Oldys, in his life of Raleigh,
1733, and Mr. Arthur Cayley, 1805, assert that Raleigh,
on his return to England, took part in the wars of the
Netherlands, especially at Rimenant, in August, 1578.
Don John of Austria had been appointed governor of
the Low Countries by his brother, the King of Spain.
His tyranny became offensive to the people ; and Eliza-
beth, fearful of Spanish increase of power, aided the
Netherlands. The latter gathered an army near the
village of Rimenant. Don John at the head of about
thirty thousand men rushed upon them, when the latter
made believe that they were retreating. Don John,
excited with the hope of this easy victory, pushed rap-
idly onward, and soon came upon their real camp with
nineteen thousand soldiers. He was completely routed,
and survived his defeat only two months.
About this time — 1578 — Sir Humphrey Gilbert, half-
brother to Raleigh, the son of his mother by a former
marriage, was preparing to make explorations along the
sin \valti:r ualeigh. 157
Atlantic coast. He was a graduate of Oxford, governor
of the province of Munster, a retined and scholarly man,
and had great influence over Ealeigh.
As Henry VII. had lost his opportunity of discovering
the New World, Isabella of Castile having assisted Colum-
bus just before his brother Bartholomew had gained the
promise of aid from Henry, the English naturally desired
some share in the new-found lands. John Cabot sailed
from Bristol, England, May, 1497, with two ships and
three hundred men, and after going seven hundred
leagues found land, probably the island of Cape Breton,
at the eastern extremity of Nova Scotia. He sailed
along the coast three hundred leagues to Florida. Peter
Martyr says, " Cabot directed his course so far towards
the North Pole that even in the month of July he found
monstrous heaps of ice swimming on the sea, and in
manner continual daylight; yet saw he land in that tract
free from ice, which had been molten. Therefore he
was enforced to turn his sails and follow the west. . . .
He sailed so far towards the west that he had the island
of Cuba on his left hand."
It is probable that Sebastian Cabot, the son of John,
was with hina on this or a later voyage. In Winsor's
''Narrative and Critical History of America" one finds
a valuable account of the Cabots.
England, from these discoveries, felt that she had a
right equally with Spain to colonize the new country.
Indeed, it is difficult to find the "right" of any nation
to dispossess the Indians, except in the old adage that
" might makes right."
In the autumn of 1578, Sept. 23 (according to Mr. J. A.
Doyle's "English Colonies in America" ), Gilbert sailed
from Dartmouth, England, for Newfoundland, with eleven
158 SIR WALTER RALEIGH.
ships and enough food for a year, with the hope of
founding a colony. One of the ships leaked and had to
be left at home, and seven more soon deserted. There
was a sea-fight with the Spaniards in which Kaleigh took
part, and Gilbert was finally obliged to return home, after
the loss of one of his largest ships. That Raleigh went
to the West Indies before tliis is probable, as there was
a volume, now lost, entitled "Sir Walter Raleigh's Voy-
age to the West Indies."
In 1583, June 11, Gilbert sailed again to Newfound-
land. He had lost so much by the previous unsuccess-
ful voyage that he was obliged to sell a large part of
his landed estate. Raleigh gave two thousand pounds
to fit out a ship which bore his name, the Ark Raleigh.
Two hundred and sixty men were enlisted — masons, car-
penters, miners, and those of other trades — in this fleet
of five ships. As Raleigh was already at court, and had
become a favorite with Elizabeth, she would not spare
him lest he be in another " dangerous sea-fight ; " but she
sent good words to Gilbert in departing, " wished as great
goodhap and safety to his ship as if herself were there in
person," asked him to send her his picture by the hand of
her handsome young courtier, Raleigh, and gave him "an
anchor guided by a lady " to wear at his breast.
Two days after starting from Plymouth, the Ark
Raleigh, having a contagious fever on board, went back
to shore. In the latter part of July the fleet reached
Newfoundland, and Gilbert took formal possession in
the Queen's name. Thirty-six ships of many nations
were in St. John's harbor trading in codfish and whale-
oil, but these seem to have promised w^illing allegiance
to the Queen. The arms of England engraved on lead
were fixed on a pillar of wood. Gilbert then granted
SIR WALTER RALEIGH. 159
parcels of land to each person for a yearly rent, as they
''found no inhabitants, which by all likelihood have
abandoned these coasts, the same being so much fre-
quented by Christians," says an old Chronicle. The
savages had by this time become well convinced that
tlie "Christians" had not come from heaven to bring
them blessings, as they had at first supposed.
Gilbert enacted three laws : tlie first that the Church
of England should be the recognized church ; that if any-
thing were attempted prejudicial to her Majesty's right
of those territories, the offender should be executed for
high treason 5 and if anybody should utter words against
her Majesty, he should have his ears cut off and his
property confiscated.
Many of the men soon became ill in the new countries ;
and several, tired of work as were the Spaniards under
Columbus, deserted and went home on some fishing-
vessel. Gilbert finally sent home the sick on the ship
Swallow, and with the rest of the fleet sailed south-
ward for exploration.
After seven days out the Delight, the only large
ship of the fleet, with most of the provisions and cloth-
ing on board, struck a rock and went to pieces in sight
of the other ships. Only sixteen men were saved from
the wreck, and these were without food or water. They
found their way back to Newfoundland and later to
England.
The weather grew worse, food became scarce, and on
Aug. 31 Gilbert sailed homeward liimself in the Squir-
rel, of ten tons' burden, tlie smallest of the fleet. He
was urged to go in a better vessel, but he said he would
not forsake the little company with whom he had shared
so many perils. A severe storm overtook them Sept. 9.
160 SIR WALTER RALEIGH.
Gilbert sat abaft with a book in his hand, calling out to
the men on the Golden Hind, " Be of good heart, my
friends ! We are as near to heaven by sea as by land."
At midnight his lights disappeared, and his ship sank
beneath the waves. Only one vessel, the Golden Hind,
returned to Falmouth, the other ship having gone down
with the Squirrel.
Ealeigh meantime had been busy in the wars in Ire-
land. In the insurrection in Munster, under the Earl of
Desmond, Raleigli helped to subdue the Irish, believing
then, as was the usual belief at that time, "that the Irish
were like nettles, sure to make those smart who gently
handled them, and must be crushed to prevent stinging."
Coming upon a party of rebels, and seeing one of them
with a great bundle of withes, Ealeigh asked what they
were for. " To have hung up the English churls,"
was the reply. " Well," said Raleigh, " but they shall
now serve for an Irish kern," and immediately, says
Oldys, commanded that the rebel " be tucked up in one
of his own neckbands." Tlie rest were put to death in
some manner.
These Avere times of little mercy on either side. At
the siege of Fort del Ore in the bay of Smerwick in
Kerry, for three days Raleigh had the principal com-
mand, and on the fourth it was given to John Zouch,
afterwards killed in a duel. On this day the Italians
who were aiding the Irish waved the white flag, and
cried out, " Miser icordia ! Mi&er'icordia ! " The garrison
begged that their lives might be spared if they surren-
dered ; but stern Lord Grey would give no quarter, and
at least six hundred men were at once put to deatli by
the sword. Raleigh and INIackworth were ordered by
Grey to enter and " fall straiglit to execution." All the
sin WALTER BALEIGII. 101
Irish, both men and women, were hanged. Two of
" the best sort " had their arms and legs broken before
being hanged on a gallows on the wall of the fort.
Raleigh was fearless and brave, and though severe, he
was only like most others of the time. Such severity
bore its own bitter fruit iu Ireland in the centuries which
followed.
Raleigh gained much local fame by the rescue of a
friend from a river into which his horse had thrown him.
He and six companions while crossing a stream were to
be seized if possible by the rebels, who had a force twenty
times his own. Raleigh dashed through the rebel crowd
and crossed the river, when the cries of his companion
for help made him turn back. Raleigh helped him up ;
but Moyle, his friend, in attempting to mount his horse,
fell on the other side into deep mire, and had to be helped
a second time. Not one of Raleigh's men was secured
by the rebels.
Raleigh for a short time was Governor of Munster and
later of Cork. While at the latter place he set out with
ninety men to capture Lord Roche at his castle, Bally-
in-Harsh. Five hundred of tlie townspeople, learning
of the approach of Raleigh, had hastened to the castle
to defend the owner. The young soldier — he was now
about twenty -eight — soon put them to flight. He en-
tered the castle, took Lord and Lady Roche and their
attendants twenty miles to Cork in the darkness, over a
rocky and diificult passage, and did not lose a single man
in the skirmish, only one dying from a fall in the dark
journey homeward. Lord Roche became a faithful sub-
ject of the Queen, and three of his sons died in her
service.
After two years in Ireland, Raleigh was delighted to
162 SIR WALTER RALEIGH.
leave it for the court. When, some years later, the Earl
of Desmond was beheaded (his brother, Sir John, was
hanged, his body fixed on the gates of Cork, and his head
sent to London ; his younger brother. Sir James, was
also hanged, drawn, and quartered, and the fragments of
his body hung in chains over the gates of Cork), his land
and that of his confederates, over five hundred and sev-
enty thousand acres, passed to Elizabeth, who gave it to
some of her subjects, Raleigh receiving twelve thousand
acres in the counties of Cork and Waterford. He finally
sold it to Richard Boyle, afterward Earl of Cork.
How young Raleigh became the favorite of the Queen
at court, or was brought especially to her notice, is iiot
certainly known. Fuller, who was a schoolboy boy when
Raleigh died, in his " Worthies of England " tells this
story. The Queen was at Greenwich; '^ Her Majesty
meeting with a plashy place, made some scruples to go
on ; when Raleigh (dressed in the gay and genteel habit
of those times) presently cast off and spread his new
plush cloak on the ground, whereon the Queen trod gently
over, rewarding him afterwards with many suits for his
so free and seasonable tender of so fair a foot-cloth."
After this he wrote with a diamond on a window-glass,
where the Queen could see it, —
" Fain would I climb, yet fear I to fall."
She soon after wrote beneath it, —
"If thy heart fail tliee, climb not at all."
Perhaps a more probable reason of his being liked by
her was his wit and manly bearing when summoned be-
fore the lords to answer in a dispute between himself and
Lord Grey. " He had much the better in telling of his
SIR W ALTER RALFAOn. 163
tale," says Sir Eobert Naiinton, later Secretary of State
under James I., '' and so much that the Queen and the
lords took no small mark of the man and his parts. . . .
Raleigh had gotten the Queen's ear at a trice ; and she
began to be taken with his elocution, and loved to hear
his reasons to her demands, and, the truth is, she took
him for a kind of oracle, Avhicli nettled them all."
Kaleigh was a man of fine physique, six feet tall, dark
hair, which very early became gray, a face unusually
bright and alert, with, as Naunton says, "a good presence
in a handsome and well-compacted person ; a strong nat-
ural wit, and a better judgment; with a bold and plausi-
ble tongue, whereby he could set out his parts to the best
advantage."
His clothes were of the richest material, and much
covered with gems. A fuU-lengtli portrait of liim shows
a white satin pinked vest, close-sleeved to the wrist, a
brown doublet embroidered with pearls, a sword-belt also
embroidered in the same manner, the dagger on his right
hip enriched with jewels, the black feather of his hat
with a ruby and pearl, his fringed garters of white satin,
and his buff-colored shoes tied with white ribbons. His
shoes Avere so bedecked with jewels that one author says
they were Avorth '' six thousand six hundred gold pieces."
His pearl hat-band and another jewelled article were once
stolen from him at Westminster ; and these, says Mr,
Gosse, were worth, in money at that time, one hundred
and thirteen pounds. Doubtless much of this display Avas
to please the Queen, who, despite her learning and un-
questioned ability, Avas extremely fond of dress, having
in later years, as Agnes Strickland says in her " Life of
Elizabeth," "three thousand gowns and eighty Avigs of
divers colored hair." Under her tutor in early life, Roger
164 SIR WALTER RALEIGH.
Ascham, she had become proficient in several languages.
"French and Italian slie speaks like English," he wrote ;
" Latin with fluency, propriety, and judgment. She also
spoke Greek with me frequently, willingly, and mode-
rately well. . . . She read with me almost the whole of
Cicero and a great part of Livy. . . , The beginning of
the day was always devoted by her to the New Testa-
ment in Greek, after which she read select orations of
Isocrates and the tragedies of Sophocles, which I judged
best adapted to supply her tongue with the purest dic-
tion, her mind with the most excellent precepts, and her
exalted station with a defence against the utmost power
of fortune."
He wrote later "that there were not four men in Eno:-
land, either in church or the state, who understood more
Greek than her Majesty."
Sir Robert Naunton said of Elizabeth : " She is of
personage tall ; of hair and complexion, fair, and there-
withal well-favored, but high-nosed ; of limbs and feature,
neat ; of a stately and majestic comportment." Bacon
spoke of her "great dignity of countenance, softened
with sweetness." She knew that her white, slender
hands, with long fingers, were beautiful.
At this time, 1582, Raleigh, the court favorite, was
about thirty, and the Queen nearly fifty. The Earl of
Leicester (Robert Dudley) had long been the favorite, so
much so that it was supposed that she would marry him.
Before her coronation, when she entered London on horse-
back, dressed in purple velvet, he rode beside her. She
invested him with the Order of the Garter, made him
jVIaster of the Horse, constable of Windsor Castle and
forest, and keeper of the great park during life. His
wife, Amy Robsart, whom he had married with great
SIR WALTER RALEIGH. 165
display in the reign of Edward VI., the brother of Eliza-
beth, was not allowed at court, lest the Queen should
not bestow upon him so much attention. Her death at
Cumnor Hall, Berkshire, by falling down-stairs, was be-
lieved by many to have been caused by the earl. She must
at least have died broken-hearted. That Elizabeth liked
Leicester there is no doubt; for she remarked to the
French ambassador laughingly, " I cannot live without
seeing him every day ; he is like my lap-dog, so soon as
he is seen anywhere they say I am at hand ; and wher-
ever I am seen, it may be said that he is there also."
But she probably never seriously intended to marry him
on account of his inferiority in rank to herself ; for she
said, " The aspirations towards honor and greatness
which are in me cannot suffer him as a companion and
a husband." She had often declared that she would not
marry at all, and if she did, " not a subject, for she had
it in her power to wed a king if she pleased, or a power-
ful prince."
It seemed as though every nation offered her its leader
as a husband ; but she refused all, sometimes because
she thought England would not like a foreign prince,
but more often because she could not like them herself.
Leicester, probably in 1572, after Amy Robsart's
death, had married privately a high-born lady of the
court, a cousin of the Queen, Douglas Howard, the young
widow of Lord Siiefiield. After she had borne him a
son and a daughter, it is said that he attempted to poi-
son her, that he might marry Lettice Knollys, also
a cousin of the Queen, and wife of the Earl of Essex.
Finally he divorced Douglas Howard and married Let-
tice Knollys after she became a widow. Her hus-
band died in 1576, his death also attributed to poison
through the agents of Leicester.
166 SIR WALTER RALEIGH.
In July, 1575, Leicester gave to Elizabeth the won-
derful entertainment which Sir Walter Scott has de-
scribed in his novel ''Kenil worth." She with her ladies,
forty earls, and seventy other principal lords were feted
for eighteen days at this beautiful palace. It is said
that the Queen had bestowed this year upon Leicester
fifty thousand pounds, so that he felt obliged to make
the reception sumptuous.
As she and her royal train entered the gate, a poeti-
cal porter made an address to her, calling her —
" A peerless pearl!
No worldly wight, I doubt — some sovereign goddess, sural
In face, in hand, in eye, in other features all,
Yea, beauty, grace, aud cheer — yea, port and majesty,
Show all some heavenly peer with virtues all beset."
When the Queen arrived on the bridge before the lake
on one side of the castle a lady with two nymphs came
up to her on a movable illuminated island, bright with
torches, and she also made a poetical address. On the
great temporary bridge, twenty feet by seventy, in front
of the castle, were seven pairs of jjillars with mythologi-
cal deities standing beside them, offering the Queen all
the supposed "good things" of the realm. On the tops
of the first pillars were cages of live bitterns and cur-
lews ; on the second, great silver bowls, full of apples,
pears, cherries, and nuts ; the third, wheat and other
grains ; the fourth, red and white grapes ; the fifth, sil-
ver bowls of wine, and so on. A poet in radiant costume
explained all this to the queen.
All the clocks were stopped at the instant of her
arrival, so that none should take note of time while the
royal loved one remained. In the evening the fireworks
SIR WALTER RALEIGH. 1G7
were so profuse and grand that they were seen for
twenty miles away.
Eacli day the Queen hunted or witnessed fights
between dogs and bears — " bear-baiting," when the
dogs were let loose upon thirteen bears in a court,
where, says Laneham in his " Kenilworth," " there was
plucking and tugging, scratching and biting, and such
an expense of blood and leather between them as a
month's licking, I ween, will not recover."
Sunday mornings the Queen attended church, and in
the afternoon witnessed theatrical plays, or pageants on
the lake. Happily, times have changed under Victoria !
All this did not win a royal bride ; for Elizabeth said
soon after to a person who pleaded for Leicester, " Shall
I so far forget myself as to prefer a poor servant of my
own making to the first princes in Christendom ? "
Leicester did not like Raleigh, because the Queen
showed the latter much attention. She gave him con-
trol over the wine trade — each vintner was obliged to
pay him twenty shillings a year for a license to sell
wines — Avhereby Raleigh received two thousand pounds
a year, equivalent to about twelve thousand pounds at
the present time, says Mr. Gosse. She also gave him
two estates and a grant to export woollen broad-
cloths, from which his yearly income, Mr. Gosse
thinks, was eighteen thousand pounds of Victorian
money. In 1585 he was appointed lord wardeii of the
stannaries, in which position he greatly lessened the
hardships of the miners in the west of England. The
same year he became lieutenant of the county of Corn-
wall, and soon afterwards vice-admiral of the counties of
Cornwall and Devon. In 1587 he became captain of the
Queen's guard.
168 SIR WALTER RALEIGH.
Other rich estates were now given to Raleigh, An-
thony Babington, descended from a family rich and
noble since the time of Edward I., was accused and
convicted — conviction in those days did not always
mean proven guilty — of an attempt to put Elizabeth off
the throne. He was beheaded and his estates confis-
cated. To Raleigh were given by the Queen three manors
in Lincolnshire, together with lands and tenements at
West Terrington and Harrick in the same county, tlie
manor of Lee in Derbyshire, and several tenements ; lands
and tenements at Kingston and at Thrumpton, in Notting-
hamshire ; and his dwelling-house and land called Bab-
ington's Hall.
Raleigh also leased of the Queen, for his city resi-
dence, Durham House, a vast fourteenth-century palace,
where Elizabeth had lived while her brother, Edward VL,
was alive. She reserved a few rooms for herself.
Besides all this wealth, he was now busy with the
work of a statesman, having been sent to Parliament as
one of the two members from the county of Devonshire.
Daring all these years he was so much occupied that
he took only five hours each night for sleep, though
he would steal four hours for reading. He was a poet,
writing much that was considered admirable in that
age. He was the intimate friend of Spenser, the author
of the "Eaerie Queene," and obtained for him the favor
of Elizabeth. The latter granted Spenser three thousand
acres in Cork, out of the Earl of Desmond's estate, and
a yearly pension of fifty pounds. He lost this estate in
the rebellion under the Earl of Tyrone, and died poor.
Raleigh was so besought to use his influence with
the Queen for places of trust or power, that once, when
he asked a favor, she replied, " When, Sir Walter, will
SIR WALTEll HA LEIGH. 169
you cease to be a beggar ? " to which he, with quick wit
aud courtesy, replied, " Wheu your gracious Majesty
ceases to be a benefactor."
All this time, while Kaleigh was in favor with the
Queen, and Leicester was jealous and revengeful in con-
sequence, England was urging Elizabeth to marry, or to
indicate who should be her successor, in case of her death.
She usually answered the Commons in some non-commit-
tal fashion, saying that she thought marriage "best for a
private woman, but as a prince, she endeavored to bend
her mind to it ; and as for the matter of the succession,
she promised that they should have the benefit of her
prayers ! "
At last, after much talk about her marriage with
Charles IX. of France, and later, with his brother
Henry, and then with a still younger brother, Alen^on,
she seemed to be willing to wed the last one. His face
was badly marked by the small-pox, but the French
ambassador assured the Queen that, aside from this,
"he was a paragon above all the other princes in the
world," and that a physician in London could cure any-
body so pitted, and he would soon make Alen^on " beau-
tiful and worthy of her favor."
He was twenty-two years younger than the Queen,
small ill stature, and exceedingly plain in looks, — always
a great objection to Elizabeth, who was a lover of beauty.
However, he wrote ardent letters, and came in person to
press his suit. Elizabeth called him her " poor frog,"
and had made " one little flower of gold, Avith a frog
thereon, and therein mounseer, his phlsnomye, and a
little pearl pendant." These words were written in one
of her wardrobe books.
The Duke of Alen^on, now become Francis, Duke of
170 Slli WALTER RALEIGH.
Anjou, was elected sovereign of tlie Low Counti-ies. She
assisted him with one hundred thousand crowns, and
sent a splendid escort, to join that fi-om France, to
accompany her boy-suitor to Antwerp. Ealeigli was
one of the leaders in this stately assemblage. He re-
mained some time at Antwerp, and brouglit back mes-
sages from William, Prince of Orange, to Elizabeth,
The people of England were so incensed at this in-
tended marriage, that the ladies of honor wept; the
noble Sir Philip Sidney wrote her against her marriage
" with a Frenchman and a papist, in whom the very com-
mon people know this, that he is the son of the Jezebel
of our age," — his mother was Catharine de' Medieis, —
and a book was written against it. The Queen had the
hands of both the author, John Stubbs, and the publisher
cut off with a butcher's knife and mallet in the market-
place at Westminster. Stubbs was then confined in the
Tower, and, broken in health, he died in France soon
afterwards.
Still the Queen could not stand against the voice of
her subjects, and refused tlie Duke, who flung the ring
which she had given him to the ground, exclaiming
"that the women of England were as changeable and
capricious as their own climate or the waves that en-
circled their island." After a troublous rule in the
Low Countries, he fled to France and died at his Castle
of Chateau Thierry, June 10, 1584.
While Raleigh was aiding the Queen both in Parlia-
ment and at Court, he was following in the footsteps of
his brother, Sir Humphrey Gilbert, in his attempts
to colonize the New World for England. He obtained
from Elizabeth, in 1584, a grant to him and his heirs
like that which had been given to Gilbert, " to discover
SIR WALTER RALEIGH. 171
such remote heathen and barbarous lands, not actually
possessed by any Christian prince, nor inhabited by
Christian people, as to him or them shall seem good. . . .
They shall enjoy forever all the soil of such lands or
towns in the same, with the rights and royalties, as well
marine as other . . . with full power to dispose thereof
in fee simple . . . reserving always to Us, for all service,
duties, and demands, the fifth part of all the ore of gold
and silver there obtained after such discoverv."
Raleigh fitted out two ships, some say at his own ex-
pense, to go to the New World and investigate the best
locality for a colony. These ships, under the command
of Captains Philip Amadas and Arthur Barlowe, sailed
April 27, 1584. To the latter we are indebted for an
account of the enterprise preserved in Hakluyt's " Voy-
ages." To the compiler of these voyages, Richard Hak-
luyt, both England and America owe a debt of gratitude.
When at Westminster School, he visited his cousin,
Richard Hakluyt, a scholar in cosmography and promoter
of navigation. He tlien became so interested in such
studies that while at Christ Church, Oxford, he read in
seven languages all the discoveries he could find, and be-
came so eminent that he was asked to give lectures on
navigatioTi. He resided five years in France, making the
acquaintance of noted sea-officers and merchants. He
collected and published, in 1589, his first volume of
voyages, and in 1599 and 1600 the work enlarged
to three volumes. These books have been a treasure-
house for all later historians.
The vessels reached the West Indies June 10, and,
sailing south-easterly, by July 2 they " smelt so sweet and
so strong a smell, as if we had been in the midst of some
delicate garden abounding with all kinds of odoriferous
172 SIB WALTER liALEIGU,
flowers, by which we were assured that the land could
not be far distant." They soon came to the coast, and
sailed along it for one hundred and twenty miles before
they could find any entrance or river. They entered the
first one that appeared, and took possession of the land
in the name of the Queen.
They supposed that it was the continent, but soon
learned that it was an island, about twenty miles long
and six broad, called Roanoke. The land was " so full
of grapes, as the very beating and surge of the sea over-
flowed them, of which we found such plenty, as well
there as in all places else, both on the sand and on the
green soil, on the hills as in the plains, as well on every
little shrub as also climbing toward the tops of high
cedars, that I think in all the world the like abundance
is not to be found."
The woods were full of deer, conies, and hare, " and
the highest and reddest cedars in the world." They
were three days on the island before they saw any
natives, and then one small boat having three persons
in it. One of the men came on board the ship, and re-
ceived a shirt and hat, ate meat, and drank wine. As
soon as he reached his own boat he began to fish, and
in a half-hour it was " as deep as it could swim," which
load he brought to the ship in return for their courtesy.
The next day the King's brother, Granganimeo, came
with forty or fifty men. The name of the King was
Wingina, and the country Wingandacoa. Mr. William
Wirt Henry, in Winsor's " Narrative and Critical His-
tory of America," thinks that the natives did not under-
stand when asked the name of the country, and that
" Win-gan-da-coa " means " You wear fine clothes ! "
Granganimeo gave them cordial welcome, "striking on
SIR WALTER RALEIGH. 173
liis head and breast, and afterwards on ours, to show we
were all one, smiling and making show the best he could
of all love and familiarity." They gave the Indian
gifts, and soon after traded for chamois and deer skins,
he choosing in exchange for twenty skins a tin dish,
which he immediately hung about his neck, after making
a hole in the brim.
Granganimeo soon brought his children to the boat
with his wife. She is thus described : " well-favored, of
mean stature, and very bashful ; she had on her back a
long cloak of leather, with the fur-side next to her body,
and before her a piece of tlie same ; about her forehead,
she had a band of white coral ; ... in her ears she had
bracelets of pearls hanging down to her middle, and
those were of the bigness of good i:)eas." Whenever
she came to the ship she was attended by forty or fifty
women.
The King's brother sent every day deer, fruits, melons,
pease, walnuts, cucumbers, beans, and other gifts. Bar-
lowe and seven others landed at Koanoke, and the wife of
Granganimeo gave them a cordial reception. He was
not at the village at the time. She commanded her
people to draw the white men's boat on shore, and told
others to carry these men on their backs to the dry
ground. '' When we were come into the outward room,
having five rooms in her house, she caused us to sit
down by a great fire, and after took off our clothes and
washed them, and dried them again ; some of the women
plucked off our stockings and washed them, some washed
our feet in warm water, and she herself took great pains
to see all things ordered in the best manner she could,
making great haste to dress some meat for us to eat."
She gave them boiled and roasted venison, boiled and
174 SIR WALTER RALEIGH.
roasted fisli, melons, and the juice of the grape. She
begged them to tarry all night ; but, as they were few in
number, they were afraid. She therefore gave them
their supper to take in earthen pots into the boat, some
mats to cover them from the rain, and sent thirty women
besides several men to sit all night on the bank beside
the boat. No wonder Barlowe wrote, "We found the
people most gentle, loving, and faithful, void of all guile
and treason, and such as live after the manner of the
golden age."
Raleigh laid before the Queen the report of this fertile
country after the ships had returned in the autumn, and
she, because it was discovered under a virgin queen,
named it Virginia. She also knighted Raleigh. Her
gift of the control of the wine-selling of the country was
that he might have funds to found an English colony in
the new lands of the virgin queen. Elizabeth was very
careful about bestowing titles, and during her reign, of
about forty-four years, created but six earls and eight
or nine barons.
Early in the following year, 1585, Raleigh sent out his
first colony of one hundred and eight settlers in a fleet
of seven ships, under command of Sir Richard Grenville.
After establishing the colony, it was to be left under
Ralph Lane as governor. Mr. Doyle calls the latter "a
well-born adventurer. . . . He had offered to raise an
English contingent for the Spanish King against the
Turks. Failing that, he had offered to serve the King of
Fez against the Spaniard. If he might not serve under
the banner of Rome or Islam, he Avas Avilling to fight
for the Protestant faith under the Prince of Orange. . . .
In scarcely a document does his name appear in which
he is not an applicant for some office under the Crown.
SIR WALTER RALEIGIJ. 175
At one time lie is an equerry at Court and a hanger-on
to Leicester."
They set sail April 9, 1585, and reached the coast of
Florida June 20, anchoring for a time at Wococon, an
island near Koanoke, and July 11 crossed over to the
mainland. They explored the coast to Secotaii, an
Indian village some sixty miles south of Roanoke, and
were well received by the savages. On their way back
a silver cup was stolen, and with needless severity to
the offenders, the English " burned and spoiled their
corn and town, all the people being fled." It was self-
evident that such a company would not long have peace
Avith the Indians.
A settlement was begun at the north-east corner of the
island of Roanoke. After a time the Indians and they
were no longer friends. Granganimeo was dead, and his
brother Wingina, now called Pemissapan, was an enem}^
Tlie English had no seed corn, and perhaps were too
much like the Spaniards, nnwilling to do hard work.
"Because there were not to be found any English cities,
nor such fair houses, nor at their own wish any of their
accustomed dainty food, nor any soft beds of down or
feathers, the country was to them miserable."
Lane made explorations, when the spring came, to the
north and south of the settlement. His men had a
quarrel with the Chowanoks, and took pi'isoner their
king, Menatonon, impotent in his limbs, but a " very
grave and wise man."
Learning from the Indians that there were pearls
near the mouth of the river Moratoc (Roanoke), Lane
determined to set sail up this river. Their food gave
out, and they killed their two mastiffs, boiling the flesh
of the dogs with sassafras leaves.
176 SIR WALTER RALEIGH.
Pemissapan had laid his plans for the inassacre of tlie
settlement. lie had reckoned upon the aid of Skico, the
son of Menatonon, as Lane had once condemned Skico
to death for attempting to escape, but he had afterwards
been kind, and Skico was faithful to the whites, and
divulged the plans of the red men. Pemissapan and his
chief were in turn surprised by Lane. The latter on
giving the watchword to his followers, Christ our victory,
shot the Indians or cut off their heads. " Thus," says
Lane, "they had, by the mercy of God for our deliver-
ance, that which they had purposed for us."
On June 8 Sir Prancis Drake and a fleet of twenty-three
sail, returning with spoils from San Domingo and Cartlia-
gena, touched at the new settlement. Lane asked him
to leave a ship and some boats with provisions, and to
take home the sick to England. The Prancis, a vessel
of seventy tons, was sent to Lane, but a storm drove her
out to sea, and she was seen no more. Drake offered to
send the Bonner, of one hundred and seventy tons ; but
the settlers, becoming discouraged, begged to be taken
back to England. To this Drake consented. When the
boats were taking the men out to the ships, the sea
became so rough that most of their goods, drawings,
books, and writings were necessarily thrown overboard.
They reached Plymouth, England, July 27, 1586.
Soon a vessel of a hundred tons sent by Raleigh,
well filled with supplies, arrived at Roanoke, but finding
the settlement deserted, .returned to England. Three
weeks later Grenville came with three ship-loads of food,
and unwilling to lose control of the country, left fifteen
men with supplies for two years. Lane's men in tlie
ships of Drake brought back tobacco, which soon came
into general use. The legend has been often told of
SIR WALTER RALEIGH. 177
Ealeigh smoking in his study, when his servant came in
with a pot of ale, and seeing Raleigh, as he supposed,
on fire, from the smoke coming out of his mouth, threw
the ale over him, and rushed down-stairs to the family
exclaiming that " his master was on fire, and before
they could get up would be burnt to ashes."
Though the results of this second voyage and first
attempt to plant a colony were discouraging, Raleigh
sent out a second colony in May, 1587, consisting of one
hundred and fifty householders, under Captain John
White. Twelve men besides White were incorporated
as the " Governor and Assistants of the city of Raleigh."
Seventeen of the company were women, of whom seven
were unmarried. The fleet of three ships reached Hat-
teras July 22, when White took forty of his best men
ashore to search for the fifteen left by Sir Richard Gren-
ville the previous year. They found only the bones of
one man.
From the Indians they learned that the warriors of
Pemissapan had determined to revenge his death. Two
of their chief men asked that two white men should
come to them unarmed, for a conference. They came,
and one of the savages immediately struck one white
man over the head with his wooden sword. The other
fled to his company, and all tlie whites gathered into
one house. This the Indians set fire to, and in the en-
suing skirmish all the whites were killed, or fled, no
one ever knew where. White and his men found also
the fort which had been built by Lane razed to the
ground, and the " nether rooms of the houses, and also
the fort, overgrown with melons of divers sorts, and
deer within them feeding on those melons."
The houses of the little settlement on Roanoke Island
178 Slli WALTER RALEIGH.
were soon rebuilt. Aug. 18 a child was born to Eleanor,
the daughter of Governor White, and Ananias Dare, and
being the first white child born in Virginia, she was
called Virginia Dare.
When his little granddaughter was nine days old,
White returned to England to give a report of the col-
ony and bring out supplies. This journey was much
against his wishes, as he preferred that some other per-
son should go, but they would not consent. His good-
by proved a final one.
He found England on his return preparing every ship
to meet the threatened invasion of the Spanish Armada.
Finally April 22, 1588, Sir Walter sent out two small
pinnaces, the Brave and the Koe, with provisions and
fifteen planters.
*' These vessels," says Oldys, '•' minding more to make
a gainful voyage than a safe one, ran in chase of prizes,
till at last one of them was met with by a couple of
strong men-of-war off Rochelle, about fifty leagues to
the north-east of Madeira, where, after a bloody fight,
the English were beaten, boarded, and rifled. ... In this
maimed, ransacked, and ragged condition the said ship
returned to England in a month's time ; and about three
weeks after returned the other, having perhaps tasted of
the same fare, at least, without performing the intended
voyage, to the distress of the planters abroad and dis-
pleasure of their patron at home."
Eor a whole year no relief was sent, and when at last
Goveruor White returned with three vessels the settle-
ment had disappeared. Remnants of their goods were
found, and also the name " Croatoan," an island, carved
on a big tree, five feet from the ground, according to an
agreement before AVhite's departure, that if they went
SIR WALTER RALEIGH. 179
away, they should indicate in what direction. The sor-
rows of that lonely year were never revealed. Long after-
wards it was told that a company of white people were
kept in slavery by the Indians, and finally massacred at
the instigation of Powhatan. Only seven — four men,
two boys, and a young maid (perhaps Virginia Dare) —
were preserved alive by a friendly chief. From these
were descended the Hatteras Indians. They had gray
eyes, found among no other tribes.
Fourteen years later Raleigh fitted out a ship at his
own expense, and placed over the crew Samuel Mace of
Weymouth, who had twice sailed to Virginia, to searclv
for the lost colonists, but it was of no avail. Ealeigh
gave up the attempt to colonize Virginia; but he said,
" I shall yet live to see it an English nation," and his
prophecy was realized. He had spent forty thousand
pounds on his American enterprises, and, though misfor-
tunes darkened his own pathway, his perseverance and
hope lightened the way for others. Better than any one
of his time, he saw England's unlimited possibilities iu
the New World, and tried to grasp them for his country
and his queen.
England was now, 1588, absorbed in her preparations
to meet what the Spaniards called their " Invincible
Armada." Elizabeth believed that Philip II., the hus-
band of her sister Mary, had never felt friendly since
her refusal of him after her sister's death, thirty years
before. Philip II. asserted his claim to the English
throne through the Lancaster line.
Among the bitterest opponents of Spain was Raleigh.
He was one of tlie nine commissioners who met to
consider the best means of repelling the threatened
invasion. He Avent at once to Cornwall and Devon to
180 SIR WALTER RALEIGH.
gather men for the contest. He helped fortify the
coast.
On May 29, 1588, the Armada sailed out of Lisbon,
with from one hundred and forty to one hundred and
fifty ships, under the command of the Duke of Medina
Sidonia, with over thirty thousand soldiers, between
eight and nine thousand sailors, and over twenty-four
hundred cannon. The fleet was destined for the coast
of Flanders, where Alexander Farnese, Prince of Parma,
was stationed with about thirty-five thousand men and
boats. This force was to be landed on the Isle of
Thanet, at the mouth of the Thames, under the protection
of the Armada.
Leicester was sent with twenty-three thousand men
to Tilbury to oppose the landing of Parma. Another
army of thirty-two thousand foot and two thousand
horse was raised to defend the person of the queen. So
sure was Philip II. of victory, that he " gave great
charge to Duke IMedina and to all his captains that
they should in no wise harm the person of the Queen,
and that the Duke should, as speedily as he might,
take order for the conveyance of her person to Rome,
to the purpose that his holiness, the pope, should dispose
thereof in such sort as it should please him."
Meantime Elizabeth, without fear, was visiting her
camp at Tilbury, and making speeches to her soldiers.
" When she came upon the ground," says Miss Strickland,
" she was mounted on a stately charger, with a marshal's
truncheon in her hand, and, forbidding any of her retinue
to follow her, presented herself to her assembled troops,
Avho were drawn up to receive their stout-hearted liege
lady on the hill, near Tilbury church. She was attended
only by the Earl of Leicester and the Earl of Ormond,
SIR WALTER RALEIGH. 181
who bore the sword of state before her ; a page followed
carrying her white plumed regal helmet. She wore a
polished steel corslet on her breast."
Riding bareheaded between the lines, she said, "My
loving people, we have been persuaded by some that are
careful of our safety to take heed how we commit our
selves to armed multitudes for fear of treachery ; but, I
do assure you, I do not desire to live to distrust my
faitlif ul and loving people. Let tyrants fear : I have
always so behaved myself, that under God I have placed
my chiefest strength and safeguard in the loyal hearts
and good-will of my subjects ; and, therefore, I am come
amongst you, as you see at this time, not for any recrea-
tion and disport, but being resolved, in the midst and
heat of the battle, to live or die amongst you all — to lay
down for my God and for my kingdoms and for my
people, my honor and my blood even in the dust. I
know I have the body of a weak, feeble woman ; . . .
rather than any dishonor should grow by me, I myself
will take up arms — I myself will be your general,
judge, and rewarder of every one of your virtues in the
iield." They received her with acclamations of joy, and
were ready to die for her, as they all knew her courage
and ability.
The Spanish Armada, in the form of a crescent, seven
miles long, sailed up the channel. The English suffered
all the ships to pass by, and then attacked them in the
rear. Vessels of every kind had come from all parts of
England, so that nobles, merchants, and all classes with
any sort of ship at their command were gathered to save
the flag. The English now had one hundred and eighty
sail under Admiral Howard.
At the suggestion of the Queen, it is said, Lord How-
182 SIR WALTER E A LEIGH.
ard took eight of his least seaworthy ships, smeared
their rigging with pitch, filled them with gunpowder, set
them on fire, and in the darkness of midnight, Aug. 7,
floated them out toward the Spanish fleet.
The slaughter was dreadful. Some of the Spanish
ships caught tire, and the explosions were deafening. A
storm came up and drove many of the ships upon the
French coast. The English followed swiftly, as their
vessels were lighter and more easily handled than the
Spanish galleons. Four thousand men were killed by
the shot and shell in one day.
Many Spanish ships fled towards the Norway coast,
and the English followed till their ammunition gave
out. On the Irish coast seventeen ships and more than
five thousand men perished. Fierce storms did the rest
of the devastating work. As Ealeigh himself says, "A
great part of them were crushed against the rocks ; and
those others who landed were notwithstanding broken,
slain, and taken, and so sent from village to village,
coupled in halters to be shipped into England ; wliere
her Majesty, of her princely and invincible disposition,
disdaining to put them to death, and scorning either to
retain or entertain them, they were all sent back again
to their own country to witness and recount the worthy
achievements of their invincible navy.^' Only a little
more than fifty of the ships reached Spain. '' There was
not a famous or worthy family in all Spain," says Hak-
luyt, "which in this expedition lost not a son, a brother,
or a kinsman ! "
There was the greatest rejoicing all through England
at the victory. In November her Majesty went in state
to St. Paul's to a public thanksgiving for the result and
to listen to a sermon from the words, " Thou didst blow
SIR WALTER li A LEIGH. 183
with thy winds and they were scattered." She was
seated in a triumphal car, like a throne, under a canopy
supported by four pillars, drawn by milk-white horses.
Close to her rode Kobert Devereux, Earl of Essex, Master
of the Horse. (His widowed mother had married Lei-
cester, who had died Sept. 4, 1588, on his way to Ken-
ilworth, angered at his queen because she had not
made him Lord-Lieutenant of England and Ireland for
his services against the Armada.)
Thousands of people witnessed the great procession.
When the people cried "God save your Majesty!" she
said, "God save you all, my good people ! Ye may well
have a greater prince, but ye shall never have a more
loving prince."
Many medals were struck in commemoration of the
victory. One was a fleet under full sail, with the
words, " Venit, vld'it, fugit^^ — "It came, it saw, it fled."
Another bore tlie device of fire ships scattering the
Spanish fleet, and the words, '■^ Dux fcemina factV^ —
"It was done by a woman," in remembrance of the sug-
gestion of Elizabeth, which proved so valuable.
Raleigh was praised and rewarded, not only for his
brave fighting, but for his invaluable advice to Lord
Howard not to grapple and board the Spanish ships as
he was urged to do. He wrote later in his " History of
the "World," that the "Lord Charles Howard would have
been lost in 1588 if he had not been better advised than
a great many n:ialignant fools were that found fault with
his demeanor. The Spaniards had an army aboard them,
and he had none [none well drilled for service] ; they
had more ships tlian he had, and of higher building and
charging; so that had he entangled himself with those
great and powerful vessels, he had greatly endangered
184 SIR WALTER RALEIGU.
this kingdom of England. Yov twenty men upon the
defence are equal to a hundred that board and enter."
During the next few years after the destroying of the
Armada, there were frequent captures of S]3anish ships
as prizes on the seas. Sir Walter fitted out several
vessels which did great damage, enriched him, and made
him hated more than ever by Spain.
Leicester during life had never felt friendly to
Raleigh, and it is said had sent the young Essex, the
son of his wife, to Court, with the hope of lessening
the influence of Raleigh with the Queen. He was a
handsome, brilliant youth, but little past twenty, while
the Queen was much over fifty. He was extravagant,
being already twenty-three thousand pounds in debt, im-
pulsive, generous, and fearless. When brought to Court,
at the age of eleven, the Queen offered to kiss him,
which he refused. When he Avas again at Court in offi-
cial capacity, he seems quickly to have won her admira-
tion, as some of the people about the Court said, '' When
she is abroad, nobody is near her but my Lord of Essex ;
and at night, my Lord is at cards, or one game or
another with her till tlie birds sing in the morning."
He, too, was opposed to Raleigh ; being disturbed at some
supposed neglect by tlie Queen to his sister, he wrote to
a friend that it was done to him, "only to please that
knave Raleigh, for whose sake I saw she would both
grieve me and my love, and disgrace me in the eyes of
the world."
Elizabeth would not hear him speak a word against
Raleigh, although, he says, "I spoke, what of grief and
choler, as much against him as I could ; and I think he,
standing at the door, might very well hear the worst that
I spoke of himself. In the end, I saw she was resolved
SIR WALTER RALEIGH. 185
to defend him, and to cross me. ... I told her *I had
no joy to be in any place, but was loath to be near about
her, when I knew my affection so much thrown down,
and such a v/retch as Raleigh highly esteemed by her.'
. . . The queen, that hath tried all other ways, now will
see whether she can, by these hard courses, drive me to
be friends with Raleigh, which rather shall drive me
to many other extremities."
Both these men soon came under the royal displeas-
ure. Essex had secretly married in 1591 Frances Wal-
singham, tho widow of Sir Philip Sidney, the soldier
whom Essex had made his model, though the latter
fell far short of the pattern. She was the only
daughter of the celebrated statesman Sir Francis
Walsingham, who had been one of Elizabeth's truest
counsellors. The Queen on account of this marriage
banished Essex from her presence for several months,
and would not let him be Chancellor of Oxford, which
so distressed him, and wounded his pride, that while
away at war he wrote to a friend, " If I die in the
assault, pity me not, for I should die with more pleas-
ure than I live with ; if I escape, comfort me not, for
the Queen's wrong and unkindness are too great."
The next year, 1592, her other favorite, Raleigh, com-
mitted a similar offence by a love affair with Elizabeth
Throgmorton, a maid of honor, the daughter of Sir
Nicholas Throgmorton, who had served Elizabeth with
marked ability as her ambassador in France. He had
been banished by Queen Mary, and nearly lost his life.
When Elizabeth came to the throne he was a trusted but
bold adviser. Having differed with Throgmorton, she
became angry, and said, " Villain, I will have thy head ! "
to which the statesman calmly replied, " You will do well,
186 sin WALTER li A LEIGH.
madam, to consider, in that case, how you will after-
wards keep your own on your shoulders."
Raleigh and Elizabeth Throgmorton were at once
imprisoned in the Tower, and were privately married,
whether before or after this time is not known. For
four years Raleigh was under the displeasure of the
Queen. If she could not marry Raleigh, a subject, she
evidently wished nobody else to marry him.
Oldys thus describes the picture of the woman who
won Raleigh's heart, and who kept it to the end of life,
making a true wife and devoted mother to their two chil-
dren, Walter and Carew. It was painted about eight
years after their marriage. " It represents lier a fair,
handsome woman, turned perhaps of thirty. She has on
a dark-colored hanging-sleeve robe, tufted on the arms ;
and under it a close-bodiced gown of white satin, flow-
ered with black, with close sleeves down to her wrist.
She has a rich ruby in her ear, bedropped with large
pearls ; a laced whisk rising above her shoulders ; a
bosom uncovered, and a jewel hanging thereon, with
a large chain of pearls round her neck, down to her
waist."
Raleigh, with his heretofore active life, chafed at his
imprisonment. Ambitious, successful, rich, and perhaps
withal fond of the Queen, who had so honoi-ed him above
almost all others in the realm, he constantly bewailed
his fate, saying that his heart would break if he could
not see his sovereign, " whom I have followed so many
years with so great love and desire in so many journeys."
Before Raleigh was sent to the Tower, early in 1592,
he planned an expedition to retaliate upon the Spaniards
by seizing their rich carracks from India, and attacking
-heir pearl treasuries at Panama. He and his associates
SIB WALTER RALEIGU. 187
furnished thirteen vessels at great expense, and the
Queen added two ships of war. Sir Walter was made
Admiral of the fleet. They were long delayed by storms,
and the Queen, thinking herself unwise to spare so valu-
able a man for such a dangerous enterprise, sent orders
for him to resign and return and let Sir Martin Frobisher
have his place. He, however, felt it impossible to turn
back at first, as he had arranged the enterprise, but being
badly damaged by a storm off Cape Finisterre, a part of
the fleet went to the Azores to intercept the Spanish ships
from India, and a part to cruise near the coast of Spain.
One of the largest "Indian Carracks,".Madre de Dios,
the " Mother of God," was taken by Raleigh's ship, The
Roebuck. Her cargo was estimated to be worth five
hundred thousand pounds, in carpets, silks, rubies, pearls,
ivory, musk, spices, and other precious things from
India. She was the most famous plate-ship of the times,
and carried sixteen hundred tons. Philip II. had told
his men to sink her rather than let her fall into the
hands of the English.
She was plundered at every port, and the sailors had
helped themselves to treasures ; but when she entered
Dartmouth, Sept. 7, she had over one hundred and forty
thousand pounds' worth of valuables on board.
The officers and men were indignant when they reached
England and found Raleigh in the Tower. The feeling
was so intense that he was released temporarily, and
came with his keeper to Dartmouth to superintend the
unloading of the prize.
'' His poor servants, to the number of one hundred and
forty goodly men, and all the mariners," writes Sir Robert
Cecil, "came to him with such shouts and joy, as I never
saw a man more troubled to quiet them in my life. But
188 SIB WALTER RALEIGH.
his heart is broken ; for he is extremely ijensive longer
than he is busied, 171 ivhich he can toil terribly. . . . When-
soever lie is saluted with congratulations for liberty, he
doth answer ' No, I am still the Queen of England's poor
captive.' " When his half-brother, Sir John Gilbert,
came to see him, Sir John wept.
Ealeigh received little or nothing in return for his
great expenditure save the increased hatred of Spain.
But being, in a measure, forgiven by the Queen, he re-
tired to liis beautiful estate of Sherborne, where for two
years he set out trees, orchards, gardens, and groves, and
enjoyed the quiet of home life with the woman he really
loved. It is believed that he was the first to bring orange-
trees into England and the first to plant the potato in
Ireland, on his estates there. In 1594 their son Walter
was born at Sherborne.
By this time it was known that Spain was growing
rich out of the colonies planted in the New World. The
hopes of Columbus a century before were now having
fulfilment. The Spaniards, as ever, in search of gold,
believed there was a city or country in the northern part
of South America in Guiana called " El Dorado," or the
Golden City. Some of their travellers reported seeing
an Indian chief, on a solemn occasion, anoint his body
with turpentine, and then cover himself with gold-dust.
Others reported that many of the natives, before their
great feasts, covered themselves with white balsam, which
they called Curcai, and powdered themselves with gold-
dust till they looked like statues of gold.
Francisco Lopez de Gomara wrote that in Manoa, the
capital of the empire of Guiana, in the house of Inga,
the Emperor, " all the vessels were of gold and silver,
both on the table and in the kitchen ; that in his ward-
SIR WALTER RALEIOU. 189
robe were hollow statues of gold which seemed giants ;
and the figures, in proportion and bigness, of all the
beasts, birds, trees, and herbs that the earth brings forth,
and of all the fishes that the sea or waters of his king-
dom breeds. Finally, there was nothing in his country
whereof he had not the counterfeit in gold."
Many parties of Spaniards had lost their lives in this
search for gold. Gonzalo Pizarro, the brother of the
conqueror of Peru, in 1540 set out with three hundred
and forty Spaniards and about four thousand Indians
from Quito. They journeyed two thousand five hundred
miles, and finally returned disappointed. "They had
eaten their saddles on the road ; their horses were long
dead ; their arms broken and rusted ; the skins of wild
beasts hung loosely about their limbs ; their matted locks
streamed down their shoulders ; their faces liad been
blackened by a tropical sun ; their bodies wasted by
famine."
Raleigh never feared hardship, but courted adventure.
He, too, determined to find out if Guiana were really one
great gold mine. In the year 1594 he sent out Captain
Jacob Whiddon to explore the Orinoco River and its
tributaries. He was hindered in his work by the Spanish
Governor of Trinidad, Antonio de Berreo, and returned
with little accomplished.
The next year, Feb. 6, 1595, Raleigh set sail with five
ships and one hundred officers and soldiers, besides the
crews, to make the search for himself. He arrived
March 22. Berreo had given orders that no Indian
should go on board of Raleigh's ships under penalty of
being hanged and quartered. However, the Spaniard
had been so brutal in his treatment of the natives, that
many came to Raleigh and begged his protection. The
190 8IB WALTER RALEIGH.
latter attacked and took the town of Saint Joseph, —
Berreo he made a prisoner, ■. — where he found bound to
one chain, five Indian chiefs who had been cruelly tor-
tured and were at the point of death. Berreo put broil-
ing bacon on the bare limbs of his victims.
Kaleigh left his ships in the Gulf of Paria and pro-
ceeded in some small boats to explore Guiana. Berreo
used all his blandishments to prevent him from going,
as he had intended to go himself later. He told Raleigh
that he possessed already ten images of fine gold, which
he was to send to the King of Spain.
On this exploring tour Raleigh and his men suffered
much, as he said in his report, now reprinted in Hak-
luyt's " Voyages," " being all driven to lie in the rain and
weather in the open air, in the burning sun, and upon
the hard boards, and to dress our meat, and to carry all
manner of furniture in them. Wherewith they were so
pestered and unsavory, that what with victuals, being
mostly fish, with the wet clothes of so many men thrust
together, and the heat of the sun, I will undertake there
was never a prison in England that could be found more
unsavory and loathsome."
They were absent from their ships a month, in and
out of the various branches that formed the great Ori-
noco, eleven hundred and twenty miles long, which
receives four hundred and thirty-six rivers and two
thousand smaller streams. They found the people, says
Sir Walter, " goodly and very valiant, and have the most
manly speech and most deliberate that ever I heard of
what nation soever. In the summer they have houses
on the ground, as in other places. In the winter they
dwell upon the trees, where they build very artificial
towns and villages." " The river Orinoco rises thirty
"o^
SIR WALTER RALEIGH. 191
feet/' says Sir Walter, " and covers the islands through
several mouths of the year."
" The religion of the Epureraei is the same which the
Ingas, emperors of Peru," says Raleigh, " used, which may
be read in Cieca, and other Spanish stories : how they
believe the immortality of the soul, worship the sun, and
bury with them alive their best-beloved wives and treas-
ure, as they likewise do in Pegu in the East Indies, and
other places.
"The Orono Koponi bury not their wives with them,
but their jewels, hoping to enjoy them again. The Ar-
wacas dry the bones of their lords, and their wives and
friends drink them in powder. In the graves of the
Peruvians the Spaniards found their greatest abundance
of treasure ; the like also is to be found among these
people in every province, . . .
"Their wives never eat with their husbands, nor
among the men, but serve their husbands at meals, and
afterward feed by themselves."
However, a woman of ability seems to have taken an
important position among them, as she does in any land
or time, as Raleigh speaks of the wife of a chief, who
" did not stand in awe of her husband, but spoke and
discoursed, and drank among the gentlemen and captains,
and was very pleasant."
Sometimes Raleigh's company were stranded on the
sand ; sometimes the high trees grew so close to the
river banks as to make the air stifling, and they were
nearly famished, before they could find birds " of all col-
ors, — carnation, orange-tawny, purple, green, watchel, —
and of all other sorts," which they used for food. They
saw many alligators, and a young negro who belonged
to the company, having leaped out to swim, was devoured
192 SIR WALTER RALEIGH.
before their eyes. Some canoes were captured full of
bread, the owners having disappeared in the woods, and
this food proved a great blessing.
They saw hundreds of natives, men and women, and
the English gained their good-will, as Sir Walter allowed
no stealing, and the penalty for an insult to the wife or
daughter of a savage was death.
The Spaniards not only stole women, but trafficked in
them, buying from the cannibals girls of twelve or fourteen
for three or four hatchets apiece, and selling them
in the West Indies for from fifty to a hundred crowns
each.
The Indians never forgot Raleigh, and inquired tenderly
about him long years after he was in his grave.
A chief, Topiawari, one hundred years old, told Sir
Walter much about the people, and gave his only son for
a hostage to be sent to England, in proof of his friendli-
ness and willingness to help them in the future, when
they should come with more men to visit the great city of
Manoa. Ealeigh left in exchange for the Indian boy, Hugh
Goodwin, who desired to learn the language. He could
not have been devoured by a tiger, as some authorities
say, as twenty-two years afterwards Raleigh met him,
and he had almost forgotten English. Francis Sparry
volunteered to stay with the lad, Hugh, and returned
to England in 1602.
In Sparry's account of his adventures south of the Ori-
noco, he records the purchase " of eight young women,
the eldest whereof was but eighteen years of age, for
one red-hafted knife, which in England had cost me a
halfpenny." He could not have made such a transaction
under Raleigh.
Raleigh was charmed with the country : " The deer
SIR WALTER RALFAGII. 193
crossing in every path," he says, " the birds towards the
evening singing on every tree witli a thousand several
tunes, cranes and herons of wliite, crimson, and carna-
tion, perching on the river's side, the air fresh with a
gentle, easterly wind."
But the hardships, on the whole, discouraged the men,
and they Avere obliged to retrace their way to the ships,
a severe storm nearly destroying them and their boats,
without a sight of " El Dorado," which Raleigh was sure
existed, but which has never been found.
On his return to England in the fall of 1595 he hoped
to be received at Court for liis exploration and glowing
words about his Queen to the Indians, — he had "dilated
at large," he says, " on her greatness, her justice, lier
charity to all oppressed nations, with as many of the
rest of her beauties and her virtues as either I could
express or they conceive," — and her praise in a volume
soon published concerning this voyage, wliich was trans-
lated into Latin, German, and French. It was a graceful,
glowing narrative, and Mr. Gosse says: "As it was the
first excellent piece of sustained travellers' prose, so it
remained long without a second in our literature."
It is thought by some that Raleigh, on his return,
brought into England the pineapple, so called because it
resembles the cones of the pine-tree^ concerning which
James I. said, " It was a fruit too delicious for a subject
to taste of ! "
Elizabeth, however, had not forgotten Raleigh's love
for Miss Throgmorton, and he was allowed to remain at
Sherborne with no word of approval from her. Sir Wal-
ter mourned, and knew "the like fortune was never
offered to any Christian prince." It was evident that
Elizabeth did not wish to be secondary even in the heart
194 SIR WALTER RALEIGU.
of a subject. She could, in a measure, forgive Essex, a
youth of twenty, for marrying, but not Sir Walter, a man
of forty.
The next year, 1596, Raleigh sent Captain Laurence
Keymis, who had been with him the previous year, to
Guiana, and he explored the coast from the north of the
Orinoco to the Amazon. Before the year was passed he
sent another ship under Captain Leonard Berry, wishing
to keep alive his intercourse with tlie Indians, and hoping
to interest his Queen later. He attempted to send thir-
teen vessels two years later, in 3598, under his half-
brother, Sir John Gilbert, but the plan was for some
reason defeated.
England was again busy in chastising Spain. As Philip
II. had made a vow " to avenge the destruction of the
Armada on Elizabeth, if he were reduced to pawn the
last candlestick on his domestic altar," it seemed best to
cripple his power once for all. June 1, 1596, a fleet of
ninety-three English vessels and twenty-four Dutch, with
nearly sixteen thousand men, set sail for Cadiz to attack
Spain on her own ground. Essex and Admiral Charles
Howard commanded the ships, and Raleigh and Lord
Thomas Howard joined in the council of war.
The Admiral and Essex determined to land the sol-
diers and attack the town before they assaulted the
Spanish fleet. When Raleigh arrived Essex was disem-
barking the men. There was a lieavy sea, and some of
the boats sunk. Raleigh at once came on board of
Essex's ship, and in the presence of the officers protested
against such a course as endangering the whole armies.
He said, " The most part could not but perish in the sea
ere tliey come to set foot on ground ; and if any arrived
on sliore, yet were, they sure to have their boats cast on
SIR WALTER RALEIGn. 195
their heads, and that twenty men in so desperate a
descent would liave defeated them all."
The Earl of Essex yielded to Raleigh, and begged him
to convince the Admiral. Raleigh at once went to him,
and, gaining his consent, called out to Essex, Litramus,
when the impulsive Essex cast his plumed hat into the
sea for joy. The officers accepted Raleigh's plan of
attack, and it was decided that he should lead with his
ship, the War Sprite.
At the break of day the English vessels swept into the
harbor. Before them lay seventeen galleys, the fortress
of St. Philip and other forts, besides six great galleons
and ships, about fifty-seven in all.
The fight lasted six hours, and was terrible. Two
great Spanisli sliips, the St. Philip and St. Thomas, burned
themselves rather than fall into the hands of the En^r-
lish. "They tumbled into the sea," says Sir Walter
" heaps of soldiers, so thick as if coals had been poured
out of a sack in many parts at once, some drowned, and
some sticking \\\ the mud. . . . Many drowned them-
selves; many, half-burnt, leaped into the water, very
many hanging by the ropes' ends by tlie ship's side under
the water, even to the lip ; many swimming with griev-
ous wounds stricken under water, and put out of their
pain."
Raleigh had an especial desire to be revenged on the
St. Philip, which had helped cause the death of his cousin.
Sir Richard Grenville, who was formerly engaged w'ith
Raleigh in the expeditions to Virginia. Grenville had
gone to the Azores in a fleet in 1.591 to help capture
some Spanish ships. The English were surprised by tlie
Spaniards, and the Revenge, the ship of Grenville, Avith
one hundred men, sustained for fifteen hours the guns of
190 SIR WALTER RALEIGH.
fifteen ships, and repulsed them all, one of the most re-
markable battles in English naval history. The St. Philip,
the great Spanish galleon, did the most damage. The
Revenge was cut down to the hull, her deck covered
with shattered bodies. Grenville was moved against his
will to a Spanish ship, and soon died, exclaiming in Span-
ish, " Here die I, Eichard Grenville, with a joyful and
quiet mind, having ended my life like a true soldier that
has fought for his country, queen, religion, and honor."
Raleigh was so wounded in the leg during the sea-fight
that he could not help attack the town, but as he could
not bear to be left behind, he was carried into Cadiz on
the shoulders of some of his men.
Cadiz at this time was a large and handsome city,
the chief See of the bishop, and had a fine college —
Essex brought back the famous library of the Bishop of
Algarve and gave it to Sir Thomas Bodley. It is now in
the Bodleian Library at Oxford. The city soon surren-
dered. The people had liberty to take with them what-
ever goods or clothes they could carry, which permission,
says Oldys, "produced a remarkable example in a beau-
tiful young Spanish lady, who, leaving all that was
precious and valuable, bore away her old and decrepit
husband upon her back, whom before she had hidden
from the danger of the enemy ; herein imitating the
piety of the Bavarian women after the conquest of their
country by the Emperor Conrad III."
The next morning Raleigh desired to follow the fleet
of forty carracks, bound for the Indies, which lay in
Puerto Real road, as they were said to be worth twelve
millions. In the confusion no answer was returned.
In the afternoon the merchants of Cadiz and Seville
offered two millions if the fleet could be spared. Mean-
SIR WALTER RALEIGH. 197
time the Duke of Medina Sidonia set fire to the fleet,
and all was destroyed.
Many who had captured rich Spanish prisoners were
given large ransoms. Raleigh got nothing for liis brav-
ery, except, as he sa3's, " a lame leg and a deformed. I
have not wanted good words, . . . but I have possession
of naught but poverty and pain."
The Queen did not take him back to Court till
almost a year after the successful battle of Cadiz, from
which Spain never rallied.
It was soon learned that the King of Spain was to
make one more effort to invade England and Ireland.
In the spring of 1597 he fitted out a fleet, winch the
storms scattered as they did the Armada.
Meantime Elizabeth resolved upon the so-called is-
lands voyage, to intercept the Spanish plate-fleet at the
Azores. She sent one hundred and twenty ships with six
thousand soldiers. Essex was commander-in-chief, and
Raleigh rear-admiral. Fayal was to be taken by Essex
and Raleigh, and other ports by various commanders.
Essex sailed first, but Raleigh reached the harbor before
the earl. The people at once began to leave the town,
while the fort opened fire, and six companies of men
opposed the landing of the English. Raleigh waited
two days for Essex to arrive, when his men became so
impatient for the attack, that he promised to lead them
the third day if Essex did not come.
On the fourth day, with a party of two hundred and
sixty men, Raleigh pushed his boats to the landing-place.
This was guarded by a mighty ledge of rocks, some forty
paces long into the sea, with a narrow lane between two
walls. The men stood back dismayed when they saw
the defile, and the shot poured upon them ; but Raleigh
198 SIR WALTER RALEIGU.
rebuked them, as Oklys says, ''Clambering over the
rocks, and wading through the water, he made his way
pellmell through all their fire, with shot, pike, and sword
up to the narrow entrance, where he so resolutely pur-
sued his assault, that the enemy, after a short resistance,
gave ground ; and when they saw his forces press faster
and thicker upon them, suddenly retiring, they cast
away their weapons, and betook themselves to the hills
and woods."
Then Raleigh led his forces into the town ; and when
some of the new soldiers slirank from the contest, — two
had their heads taken off by big shot, and many were
wounded, — Raleigh went to the very front, though he
was " shot through the breeches and doublet-sleeves in
two or three places." When they had passed the forts
it was found that the inhabitants of the town. Villa
Dorta, had fled, leaving such things as could not be
removed suddenly. The town contained about five hun-
dred stone houses and many choice gardens. Among
those who fought bravely were Captain Laurence Key-
mis, who had been with Raleigh in the voyage to
Guiana.
The next morning Essex arrived, and was very angry
because Raleigh had not waited for him, and had already
won all the glory. Peace was finally made between tlie
two leaders, and the fleet returned to England with three
good prizes, laden with cochineal and other merchandise,
and some ships from Brazil. The King of Spain lost
through this expedition eighteen ships, including two
of his best galleons. Raleigh returned to his place in
Parliament, with his health much broken. He was soon
made governor of Jersey, with the gift of the manor of
St. Germain on that island.
SIB WALTER RALEIGH. 199
For a year or more Raleigh and Essex had not been
friends. The latter, impulsive, and with a temper not
under control, had lost the favor of the Queen, who had
always petted him like a spoiled child. She had made
him general of her armies, when everybody knew he was
too young and inexperienced. Whenever the Queen
made appointnaents which did not suit him, he feigned
illness, and would not appear at Court.
In a council meeting when the, as usual, disturbed
condition of Ireland was being discussed, the Earl of
Essex was so strenuous in his desires, that the Queen,
forgetting her womanly dignity, boxed him on the ear,
saying, " Go, and be hanged ! "
At once Essex grasped his sword-hilt, when the ad-
miral, Charles Howard, stepped between them. The
Earl declared " that he would not have taken that blow
from King Henry, her father, and that it was an indig-
nity that he neither could nor would endure from any
one ! " He was forgiven later, and returned to Court.
Essex had at one time saved the life of the Queen,
by discovering the plot of her physician, Lopez, who was
a Jew. Two confederates confessed that Lopez, through
the Spanish court, was to poison the queen for fifty
thousand crowns. Lopez died on the scaffold affirming
" that he loved the Queen as well as he did Jesus Christ,"
an assertion ill-received by the people who knew his
religious faith.
In March, 1599, Essex was appointed Lord-Lieutenant
of Ireland. His enemies were pleased to get him away
from Court, so that they could have more influence with
the Queen; but he seems to have found the position
utterly distasteful, for he wrote Elizabeth : " From a
mind delighting in sorrow ; from spirits wasted with
200 SIR WALTER RALEIGH.
passion ; from a heart torn in pieces with care, grief,
and travail ; from a man that hateth himself, and all
things else that keep him alive, — what service can your
Majesty expect, since any service past deserves no more
than banishment and proscription to the cursedest of
islands."
The Earl of Tyrone was in rebellion. Essex, with
a desire to restore tranquillity to the distracted nation,
had a conference with Tyrone, and sent his requests
to her Majesty. She, surrounded by advisers who
hated Essex, and Ireland as well, could not say bit-
ter things enough about such a pacific attempt. Finally
Essex determined to return and see the Queen in person.
As soon as he had reached her at her palace at Non-
such, in the early morning, he went directly to her apart-
ments, (and knelt before her " covering her hands with
kisses." ) She received him with some marks of favor,
though she was still displeased, especially that he should
have left Ireland without asking her leave. She ordered
him to consider himself a prisoner in his apartment till
his conduct should be investigated. Through such petty
acts as this, England learned later that in the hands of
no one man or woman can any great amount of power be
trusted. Tyrants are easily made.
Essex was removed in a day or two to the lord-
keeper's charge at York-house, and the Queen went to
Kichmond. Lady Walsingham went and made humble
suit that Essex might write to his wife (who was Frances
Walsingham), as she had just given birth to an infant,
but the stern Queen refused. So much in anger was she
that she walked the floor, exclaiming, "I am no Queen —
that man is above me ! Who gave him command to
come here so soon ? I did send liim on other busi-
SIE WALTER RALEIGH. 201
ness ! " When lie became ill, she would not permit his
own physician to attend him ; and yet if she ever
loved anybody, it was young Essex.
On her birthday Essex wrote her : —
Vouchsafe, dread Sovereign, to know there lives a man, though
dead to the world and in himself exercised with continued tor-
ments of body and mind, that doth more true honor to your thrice
blessed day [anniversary of her accession to the throne] than all
those that ajjpear in your sight. . . .
For they that feel the comfortable influence of Your Majesty's
favor, or stand in the bright beams of your presence, rejoice partly
for Your Majesty's, but chiefly for their own happiness. Only
miserable Essex, full of pain, full of sickness, full of sorrow,
languishing in repentance for his offences past, hateful to himself
that he is yet alive, and importunate on death, if your favor be
irrevocable : he joys only for Your Majesty's great happiness and
happy greatness ; and were the rest of his days never so many,
and sure to be as happy as they are like to be miserable, he would
lose them all to have this happy seventeenth day many and many
times renewed, with glory to Your Majesty and comfort of all your
faithful subjects, of whom none is accursed but
Your Majesty's humblest vassal,
Essex.
The wife of Essex finally came to beg for him, and
brought the queen a jewel ; but it was returned, and the
haughty monarch sent back word " that she must attend
her Majesty's pleasure by the lords of the council, and
come no more to Court."
Essex had now become very ill, so that his life was
despaired of. Some of the privy council urged the
Queen to forgive him, while others urged his being sent
to the Tower, or beheaded. Twice a warrant was made
out for his removal to the Tower, but the Queen would
not sitrn it. She so far relented as to allow his wife to
'O'
202 SIR WALTER RALEIGU.
come daily to see him, and ordered her own physician
to take him some broth with the message " that if it
were not inconsistent with her honor, she would have
come to visit him herself."
Tlie enemies of Essex were busy preparing pageants
of all kinds, that Elizabeth might forget the earl, and
that the people might also forget him, for he was popu-
lar because of his bravery and generosity. The Queen
outwardly seemed to enjoy them, but she was in private
greatly dejected.
At last Essex, after a partial return to health, was
tried before the commissioners for a whole day. AVhen
accused of treason he protested, with his hand upon his
heart, " This hand shall pull out this heart when any
disloyal thought shall enter it." He was pardoned, but
forbidden to appear at Court, Afterwards he wrote
urging that the license from wines — about fifty thou-
sand pounds yearly — be renewed to him as he was
deeply in debt ; but this wish was not granted,
Essex at last, humble and penitent though he had
been, began to murmur at the Queen. She certainly had
shown anything but a lovable nature to the man whom
she had seemingly idolized. "The Queen," he said,
" has pushed me down into private life. I will not be
a vile, obsequious slave. The dagger of my enemies
has struck me to the hilt. I will not be bound to their
car of triumph."
It was reported to the Queen that he said she was an
" old woman, crooked both in body and mind." His house
became the centre of the disaffected. He wrote private
letters to the King of the Scots, afterwards James I.,
to urge his being recognized as successor to the throne,
a matter Elizabeth never wished to hear about.
SIR WALTJiJR RALEIGH. 203
Whether with or without reason, he believed that
Raleigh was a bitter enemy. He had written to the
Queen when he was in Ireland, deprecating the fact that
Lord Cobham, Raleigh, and others " should have such
credit and favor with Your Majesty when they wish the
ill success of Your Majesty's most important action,
the decay of your greatest strength, and the destruction
of your faithfullest servants."
This, of course, was not true, however much he might
have believed it, for Raleigh was always loyal to his
sovereign. If Raleigh really thought it advisable that
the earl should die, as would seem from a letter to Sir
Robert Cecil —
(" If you take it for a good counsel to relent towards
this tyrant, you will repent it when it shall be too late.
. . . The less you make of him, the less he shall be able
to harm you and yours ; and if her Majesty's favor fail
him, he will again decline to a common person. Lose
not your advantage ; if you do, I read your destiny.")
then Raleigh experienced the Bible words literally :
" With what measure ye mete, it shall be measured to
you again." The letters of Essex to James I. embittered
that monarch against Raleigh, — he always thought that
Cecil and Raleigh helped to bring " my martyr Essex "
to the grave, — and paved the way for his own sad fate.
It had been planned at Essex House, the home of the
earl, that a chosen few should go around to the palace
of the Queen, seize the gate, rush into her presence, and
on their knees beg her to remove the adversaries of
Essex from her council. If she did not consent to this,
Essex would call a parliament and demand justice.
Feb, 7, 1601, Essex received a summons to appear be-
fore the privy council, his actions having caused con-
204 SIR WALTER RALEIGU.
c^rn. He was advised by his friends to make his escape,
but he determined to appeal to the people, knowing how
much they loved him.
On Sunday morning, Feb. 8, Essex had three hundred
followers at his house. That very morning Sir Ferdi-
nando Gorges, a cousin of Kaleigh's, had been sent for
by the latter to meet him at Durham House. Essex
advised that they meet on the Thames. They did so,
when Ealeigh urged Gorges to escape, as there was
a warrant out for his arrest. Sir Christopher Blount,
who had married the mother of Essex after her second
husband, Leicester, was dead, shot at Raleigh four times
as he was going back to his boat to Durham House, with
the desire either to kill or to capture him.
About ten o'clock on this Sunday morning the lord
chief-justice and a few others came to Essex House, and
inquired why so many persons were gathered in the
court. Essex then told his wrongs, and rushing out with
his followers down Fleet Street, cried, '' England is sold
to Spain by Cecil and Kaleigh ! Citizens of London,
arm for England and the Queen ! " Waving his sword,
he shouted, " For the Queen ! for the Queen ! "
The people did not rise, as he had foolishly expected.
The streets were soon barricaded, and he was declared a
traitor.
The Queen was at dinner when told that Essex was
trying to arouse the city. Her attendants were greatly
alarmed ; but she proposed going to oppose the insurgents,
saying " that not one of them would dare to meet a sin-
gle glance of her eye. They would flee at the very
notice of her approach."
That night Essex and his men were arrested and
lodged in Lambeth Palace, and the next day confined in
the Tower.
SIR WALTER RALEIGH. 205
After an all-day trial Essex was condemned to death.
He said, " I am not a whit dismayed to receive this doom.
Death is welcome to me as life. Let my poor quarters,
which have done her Majesty true service in divers
parts of the workl, be sacrificed and disposed of at her
pleasure."
The story of the ring which Elizabeth gave to Essex
with the promise "that if ever he forfeited her favor, if
he sent it back to her, tlie sight of it would ensure her
forgiveness," has been disputed, tliough it was vouched
for by the descendants of tlie Careys, closely related to
the Queen. Lady Elizabeth Spelman, a relative, thus
relates it : —
" When Essex lay under sentence of death, he deter-
mined to try the virtue of the ring by sending it to the
Queen, and claiming the benefit of her promise ; but
knowing lie was surrounded by the creatures of those
•who were bent on talcing his life, he was fearful of trust-
ing it to any of liis attendants. At length, looking out
of his window, he saw, early one morning, a boy whose
countenance pleased him, and liim he induced by a bribe
to carry the ring, which he threw down to him from
above, to the Lady Scroope, his cousin, who had taken
so friendly interest in his fate. The boy, by mistake,
carried it to the Countess of Nottingham, the cruel sister
of the fair and gentle Scroope ; and as both were ladies
of the royal bed-chamber, the mistake might easily occur.
The countess carried the ring to her husband, the lord-
admiral, who was the deadly foe of Essex, and told him
the message, but he bade her suppress both."
The Queen seems to have expected that Essex would
send some message ; for it was long before she could be
prevailed upon to sign the death-warrant, and even after
206 SIR WALTER RALEIGH.
she had done so she revoked it. Finally she ordered
the execution to proceed. He was beheaded Feb. 25,
IGOl. Elizabeth told the Duke de Biron, who came over
at the head of a state embassy from France, " that not-
withstanding Essex's engaging in open rebellion, he
might still, by submission, have obtained her pardon,
but that neither his friends nor relations could prevail
on him to ask it."
What must have been the horror of Elizabeth when,
two years later, the dying Countess of Nottingham,
according to Lady Spelman, told her the true story of
the ring, and said she could not die in peace till she had
craved the pardon of the Queen ! Elizabeth, in great
anger as Avell as grief, shook, or some say struck, the
dying woman in her bed, exclaiming, " God may forgive
you, but I never can ! "
After the death of Essex, the people ceased to welcome
their Queen as rapturously as before, for he had been
the popular idol. She herself became dejected after he
was beheaded. She told the Count de Beaumont from
France, "that she was aweary of life," and wept as she
talked of Essex. One of the Queen's household wrote,
" She sleepeth not so much by day as she used, neither
taketh rest by night. Her delight is to sit in the dark,
and sometimes with shedding tears, to bewail Essex."
In the spring of 1603 the great Queen was near the
end of life. When Robert Carey, the Earl of Monmouth,
her kinsman, came to see her, during the visit he says,
" She fetched not so few as forty or fifty great sighs. I
was grieved at the first to see her in this plight ; for in
all my lifetime before I never saw her fetch a sigh, but
when the Queen of Scots was beheaded." Towards the
end she said, " I wish not to live any longer, but desire
to die."
SIR WALTER RALEIGH. 207
After a long prayer by the Archbishop of Canterbury
at her bedside, she fell asleep and never woke, dying
about three o'clock on the morning of March 24, 1603.
With the death of Elizabeth, E-aleigh's power came to
an end. As Captain of the Guard he had seen Essex
die, and at first stood near the scaffold hoping Essex
would speak to him, but as he did not he had retired to
the armory. Essex asked for him later, and Ealeigh
always regretted that he was not near to receive his
message of peace. Christopher Blount, who had at-
tempted to kill Raleigh, on the scaifold asked his for-
giveness, saying, '•' Sir Walter Raleigh, I thank God that
you are present. I had an infinite desire to speak with
you, to ask your forgiveness ere I died. Both for the
wrong done you, and for my particular ill-intent to-
wards you, I beseech you to forgive me ; " and Raleigh
answered, " I most willingly forgive you, and I beseech
God to forgive you, and to give you his divine comfort."
James I., the son of Mary Queen of Scots, now came
to the throne. He had a difficult place to fill. The
Roman Catholics hoped for favors which they could
never obtain under Elizabeth. The Protestants were
guarding every point, lest the Catholics gain the ascend-
ancy. James, self-conceited, fancied himself the peace-
maker of Europe. He did intend to keep the peace,
which was perhaps the best thing in his weak nature.
Mr. Samuel Rawson Gardiner, the historian, says of
him : " James had too great confidence in his own
powers, and too little sympathetic insight into the views
of othei's, to make a successful ruler, and his inability
to control those whom he trusted with blind confidence
made his court a centre of corruption."
Fontenay, a French writer, says : " He speaks, eats,
208 SIR WALTER RALEIGH.
dresses, and plays like a boor, and he is no better in the
company of women. He is never still for a moment,
but walks perpetually up and down the room, and his
gait is sprawling and awkward ; his voice is loud, and
his words sententious. He prefers hunting to all other
amusements, and will be six hours together on horse-
back. . . . His body is feeble, yet he is not delicate ;
in a word, he is an old young man. . . . He is prodi-
giously conceited and he underrates other princes. . . .
He told me that, whatever he seemed, he was aware of
everything of consequence that was going on. He could
afford to spend time hunting, for that when he attended
to business, he could do more in an hour than others
could do in a day."
James was prejudiced against Raleigh, partly through
the unscrupulous Lord Henry Howard, the bitter enemy
of Raleigh, and Essex before him, and partly because
Sir Walter was an uncompromising foe to Spain, while
James desired to make peace with Spain, even planning
to marry his son to the daughter of Philip III.
When Raleiirh came to court to ask James to continue
his commissions as Lieutenant of Cornwall and Warden
of the Stannaries, the King received him coldly, making
a coarse pun on his name, as he said, " On my soul, man,
I have heard but rawli/ of thee." He soon told his sec-
retary, Sir Thomas Lake, to prepare some permits for
Sir Walter, and added, " Let them be delivered speedily,
that Raleigh may be gone again." Raleigh was soon
deprived of his position as Captain of the Guard, and
Durham House was restored to the Bishop of Durham.
Raleigh had spent two thousand pounds upon it.
The next time he saw the King, Raleigh talked with
him about prosecuting the war with Spain, — offered to
SIB WALTER RALEIGH. 209
raise two thousand men at his own expense, and to
invade Spain at their head. He could not have known
that the King was always playing two parts, — trying
to calm England, who liked the Scot none too well, and
at the same time kneeling to Spain, whom most of the
English hated.
Raleigh was still at Court, and on the morning of July
17, 1603, was walking on the terrace at Windsor, waiting
to ride with the King, who was about to hunt, when Sir
Eobert Cecil, who had made himself a favorite with
James, came to Raleigh, and said he was wanted in the
Council Chamber, to be questioned concerning some
matter.
And this was the matter. The English Catholics had
two agents, or pretended agents, two priests, William Wat-
son and Erancis Clarke, who were to labor with the King
for increased toleration for their religion. While they
petitioned the King on one hand, Cecil was on the other
saying to James, " It would be a horror to my heart to
imagine that they that are enemies to the gospel should
be held by you worthy to be friends to your fortune." To
the English, James talked of " Jesuits, seminary priests,
and that rabble ; " to the Pope, he spoke of concessions
and great good-will.
Such duplicity, or lack of courage, in time brought its
mitural reward. Thousands were angered. Finally a plot
was arranged by Watson and Clarke, called " The Priests'
Treason," Several joined with them : George Brooke,
a graduate of King's College, Cambridge, the dissolute
brother of Cecil's wife ; Sir GrilSn Markham, of a prom-
inent family but himself a spendthrift ; Lord Thomas
Grey de Wilton, a young man under thirty, scholarly, a
Protestant, and much beloved ; and Anthony Copley, third
210 SIR WALTER RALEIGH.
son of Sir Thomas Copley, He was a fearless man, as
Topliffe wrote to Queen Elizabeth, " The most desperate
youth that liveth. Copley did shoot a gentleman the last
summer, and killed an ox with a musket, and in Horsham
Church drew his dagger at the parish priest."
These men had planned that James I. should be seized
at Greenwich and carried to the Tower, where he should
be asked for three things : " 1. For their pardon ; 2. For
toleration of their religion ; 3. For assurance thereof to
prefer Catholics to places of credit, as Watson to be
Lord Keeper ; Grey, Earl Marshal ; Brooke, Lord Treas-
urer ; and Markham, Secretary." The King was to be
kept in the Tower a year, till the changes were accom-
plished. Grey was opposed to Papists, but wanted the
King to subscribe to " Articles " which would limit his
power, and place the government more in the hands of
the people. This plot was also called " The Surprising
Treason."
This plot was betrayed by John Gerard, a Jesuit, who
believed that by submission to James all Catholic disa-
bilities were soon to be removed without force. He had
been a Catholic missionary to England, and had been
imprisoned in the Tower for his ardent labors, but had
escaped by swinging along a rope over the Tower ditch.
He evidently did not understand James's character.
Copley was arrested towards the end of June, 1G03,
and told of all the others, who were at once taken
into custody. It soon came out that George Brooke,
Grey, and others were in another plot, with Lord Cob-
ham (Henry Brooke), the brother of George. He had
married the widow of Henry, twelfth Earl of Kildare,
and daughter of the Earl of Nottingham. It is said that,
though wealthy, after Cobham's fall "she abandoned
SIR WALTER RALEIGH. 211
him, and would not give him the crumbs that fell from
her table."
Lord Cobham was an enemy of Essex, and the latter
had coupled his name with Raleigh's when he wrote to win
the favor of James before the death of Elizabeth. Cob-
ham had no liking for James, and knew James's ill-
feeling towards him.
There was for a long time a desire on the part of many
that Lady Arabella Stuart should come to the throne
instead of James. She was his first cousin, the daughter
of Charles Stuart, descended from Margaret, sister of
Henry VII L Charles's brother had married Mary, Queen
of Scots. Arabella stood, therefore, in the same relation
to the throne as did James. Elizabeth had feared her,
and James feared her even more, because he was an
alien, while she was born on English soil.
At one time Cobham meditated seriously how Arabella
could succeed Elizabeth ; but, after meeting her, he wrote
to Cecil, " I resolved never to hazard my estate for her."
She was shamefully treated by James : put in prison
in 1609, on account of a rumor that she was to marry
somebody, and James feared a possible heir to the throne.
Feb. 2, IGIO, she became engaged to William Seymour,
descended from Mary, sister of Henry VIII. They
were brought before the council, and promised not to
marry without the consent of the King. Knowing that
they would never receive this, they were privately mar-
ried. Seymour was arrested and put into the Tower.
Arabella escaped in man's clothing, but was taken and
confined in the Tower also, where she remained for five
years, till her death, Sept. 25, 1G15.
But if Cobham had given up the Arabella Stuart pro-
ject, ho had planned another with Charles, Count of
212 SIR WALTER RALEIGH.
Ai-emberg, Minister of the Archduke Albert, now sover-
eign of the Spanish Low Countries. This was to help
on the peace between Spain and England, by putting
" good sums of money where they would have taken
great hold," as Lord Cecil, Secretary of State, wrote to
Sir Thomas Parry, ambassador in France.
Aremberg was to get five or six hundred thousand
crowns from Spain and a large amount from France ; and
this was to be used among the discontented, to buy their
influence on the side of peace. He offered Kaleigh ten
thousand crowns ; Grey was to have as much, and others
in like proportion.
However degrading such a plan, it was no uncommon
thing in those times. We find Count de Beaumont
writing to his King, Henry IV. of France, urging that he
be allowed to give " pensions " and gifts to English states-
men. He writes to his King : " The Spanish ambassa-
dor makes no scruple to bargain for the treaty openly,
offering pensions and money to the grandees of this king-
dom for the purpose of promoting it."
"The great extent," says Mr. Edwards, "to which
Spanish bribes were accepted has long been one of the
foulest scandals of a scandalous reign. Evidence of the
corruption of some of the statesmen who took a promi-
nent part in the prosecutions of 1603 is old and trite.
Recent researches in the archives at Simancas have estab-
lished, beyond controversy, the fact that amongst those
who lived and died as pensioners of Spain was the Lord
Treasurer, Salisbury."
That such methods are not entirely obsolete in the
nineteenth century, it is only necessary to recall to mind
the Credit Mobilier in America and the Panama Canal
scheme in France.
SIR WALTER RALEIGH. 213
Ealeigh and Cobham were intimate friends, and Raleigh
knew of the visits between Aremberg and Cobham, though
probably not the full plans. They were both arrested on
a charge of treason, and accused of attempting to put
Arabella Stuart on the throne, and to use the money in
raising an army to do away with the " King and his
cubbs " (which language George Brooke at first affirmed,
but denied on the scaffold). It was asserted, but never
proved, that Arabella was to write separate letters to the
Archduke of Austria, the King of Spain, and the Duke
of Savoy, promising if she obtained the crown to estab-
lish a firm peace between England and Spain, tolerate
the Eomanists, and be governed by the three powers in
contracting marriage.
The resulting trial was one of the most interesting
ever held in England, as well as one of the most unfair.
One of the judges, Gawdy, said afterwards, on his death-
bed, "The justice of England has never been so injured
and degraded as by the condemnation of Sir Walter
Raleigh ; " and this has been the verdict of the great
lawyers in the succeeding generations.
Cobham denied that he had any such intent about
Arabella; and she, in the great trial at Winchester, in
Wolvesey Castle, the ancient Episcopal palace, protested
through the Earl of Nottingham, " upon her salvation,
that she never dealt in anv of these things."
When Raleigh was at first called before the council,
and was asked about Cobham, he cleared him of all,
as he wrote Cobham by his faithful servant. Captain
Keymis. He further said to the council, "Whatever
correspondence there was between Cobham and Arem-
berg, La Renzi [a merchant who was in attendance on
Count Aremberg] might be better able to give account of
214 SIR WALTER RALEIGH.
it, therefore advised to the calling upon him," but added
that "he knew of no intelligence between them, but
such as might be warranted." This also he wrote to
Cecil.
When Cobham was examined he acknowledged that
he desired to go to Spain to raise the money, but had no
thought of Arabella Stuart. It was to be used as " pen-
sions," which was probably true, though it was believed
by some that he intended also to use it to help the
"Priests' Treason," and so get the more liberal govern-
ment which Lord Grey desired.
When, for the purpose of entrapping him, the letter
of Raleigh was shown him, — altered, it is feared, to suit
the purpose of his enemies, — he at once felt that he had
been betrayed by Raleigh, and accused the latter of in-
stigating the plot, and of being the occasion of his whole
discontent.
When they were both in the Tower, Raleigh wrote Cob-
ham urging that he deny his unjust statement. Through
the suggestion of the servant of Raleigh, Cotterell, Cob-
ham left his window ajar at night, and the letter of
Raleigh, tied round an apple, was thrown into Cobham's
room. In half an hour the following letter of retraction
was written and pushed by Cobham under his door and
was carried to Raleigh : —
" Now that the arraignment draws near, not knowing
which should be first, you or I, to clear my conscience,
satisfy the world, and free myself from the cry of your
blood, I protest upon my soul, and before God and his
angels, I never had conference with you in any treason ;
nor was ever moved by you to the things I heretofore
accused you of. And, for anything I know, you are as
innocent and as clear from any treasons against the King
SIR WALTER RALEIGH. 215
as any subject living. . . . And so God deal with me
and have mercy on my soul as this is true."
Again he accused Ealeigh and again he retracted.
Raleigh denied before his accusers, Nov. 17, 1603,
every one of these indictments. "I was accused to
be a practiser with Spain — I never knew that my
Lord Cobham meant to go thither. I will ask no mercy
at the King's hands, if he will affirm it. Secondly, I
never knew of the practices with Arabella. Finally,
I never knew of my Lord Cobham' s practice with Arem-
berg, nor of their ' surprising treason.' " He knew of
their visits to each other, and had already told them so.
He also said, " Lord Cobham offered me ten thousand
crowns of the money, for the furthering the peace
between England and Spain ; and he said that I should
have it within three days. I told him, 'When I see
the money, I will make you an answer.' For I thouglit
it one of his ordinary idle conceits, and therefore
made no account of it." If Cobham and Aremberg
had talked of money for an army, which is doubtfu\
Raleigh evidently knew nothing of it. He asked to
have Cobham brought face to face before him, but this
was denied him.
The Attorney-General, Sir Edward Coke, was brutal
in his treatment. He said to Raleigh, "Thou art a
monster; thou hast an English face, but a Spanish
heart. ... I will prove thee the rankest traitor in all
England. . . . Thou hast a Spanish heart, and thyself
art a spider of hell."
The whole trial was a barbaric farce. Raleigh pleaded
eloquently, as it was for his life, but he was condemned
before the trial.
Lord Chief justice Popham, in giving sentence of
216 SIR WALTER RALEIGH,
death, was as brutal as Coke, and both were hissed by
the people.
The following was the sentence, brutality, or even
capital punishment, doing as little good to society in
those days as it ever has afterwards : '' Since you have
been found guilty of these horrible treasons, the judg-
ment of this court is, that you shall be led from hence
to the place whence you came, there to remain until the
day of execution ; and from thence you shall be drawn
upon a hurdle through the open streets to the place of
execution, there to be hanged and cut down alive ; and
your body shall be opened, your heart and bowels
plucked out, and your private members cut off, and
thrown into the fire before your eyes ; then your head
to be stricken off from your body, and your body shall
be divided into four quarters, to be disposed of at the
King's pleasure ; and God have mercy upon your soul ! "
It is said that some of the jury were so " touched
in conscience as to demand of Kaleigh pardon on their
knees."
After the sentence, Raleigh asked the Commissioners to
request the King that " Cobham might die first," for he
said, " Cobham is a false and cowardly accuser. He can
face neither me nor death, without acknowledging his
falsehood." He also asked that his death " be honorable
and not ignominious." The two persons who brought the
news of the sentence to James were Roger Ashton and
a Scotchman. " One," says Sir Dudley Carleton, after-
wards Viscount Dorchester, "affirmed that never any
man spoke so well in times past, nor would do in the
world to come ; and the other said, that whereas when
he saw him first, he was so led by the common hatred,
that he would have gone a hundred miles to have seen
SIR WALTER RALEIGU. 217
him hanged ; he would, ere he parted, have gone a thou-
sand to have saved his life."
Nov. 29, Watson and Clarke, the priests, were exe-
cuted. " They were bloodily handled," says Carleton,
''for they were both cut down alive; and Clarke, to
whom more favor was intended, had the worse luck ; for
he both strove to help himself, and spoke after he was
cut down. They died boldly both. . . . Their quarters
were set on Winchester gates, and their heads on the
first tower of the castle." George Brooke was beheaded
Dec. 6, saying at the last, " There is somewhat yet hid-
den, which will one day appear for my justification."
Markham, Grey, and Cobham were to be beheaded Dee.
10, and Raleigh, Dec. 13, as James could not bring him-
self to destroy the man against whom nothing was
!> roved till after Cobham had faced death.
Kaleigh had before this, about July 20, after the sen-
tence, attempted to commit suicide, — not that he feared
death, but he could not bear to have his enemies triumph
over him. Just before he wrote his wife a touching
letter : —
" That I can live never to see thee and my child more !
— I cannot. . . . That I can live to think how you are
both left a spoil to my enemies, and that my name shall
be a dishonor to my child! — I cannot, . . . For my-
self, I am left of all men that have done good to many.
All my good turns forgotten ; ... all my services, haz-
ards, and expenses for my country — plantings, discov-
eries, fights, councils, and whatsoever else — malice hath
now covered over. I am now made an enemy and traitor
by the word of an unworthy man. . . . Woe, woe, woe
be unto him by whose falsehood we are lost ! He hath
separated us asunder. He hath slain my honor, my for-
218 SIR WALTER RALEIGH.
tune. He hath robbed thee of thy husband, tliy child
of his father, and me of you both. O God ! thou dost
know my wrongs ! . . .
" I bless my poor child, and let him know his father
was no traitor. Be bold of my innocence, for God, to
whom I offer life and soul, knows it."
He recovered from his wound ; and wlien the time
for execution came, in December, again he wrote her in
the Tower a farewell letter : —
" My love I send you that you may keep it when I am
dead, and my council, that you may remember it when
I am no more. . . . And seeing it is not the will of
God that ever I shall see you in this life, bear my de-
struction gently and with a heart like yourself.
" First, I send you all the thanks m}- heart can con-
ceive, or my pen express, for your many troubles and
cares taken for me [she had pleaded day and night for
his release] which, though they had not taken effect as
you wished, yet my debt is to you nevertheless ; but
pay it I never shall in this world.
" Secondly, I beseech you, for tlie love you bear me
living, that you do not hide yourself many days, but by
your travel seek to help your miserable fortunes, and
the right of your poor child. Your mourning cannot
avail me that am but dust. . . .
''Eemember your poor child for his father's sake, that
comforted you and loved you in his happiest times.
Get those letters (if it be possible) which I wrote to
the lords, wherein I sued for my life ; but God knoweth
that it was for you and yours that I desired it, but it is
true that I disdain myself for begging it. And know it,
dear wife, that your son is the child of a true man. . . .
" I cannot write much. God knows how hardly I stole
SIR WALTER RALEIGH. 219
this, time, when all sleep. . . . My true wife, farewell.
Bless my i30or boy ; pray for me. My true God hold
you both in His arms.
" Written- with the dying hand of sometime thy hus-
band, but now (alas !) overthrown.
" Yours that was, but now not my own,
"W. Raleigh."
The time drew near for execution. Sir Griffin Mark-
ham was first brought to the scaffold about ten o'clock
on the morning of Dec. 10. A napkin was offered him
to cover his face, but he refused, saying, "I can look
upon death without blushing." Just as he had made
himself ready for the axe, James sent his page, John
Gibb, with a reprieve for two hours. He was led away
in amazement, and Lord Grey was brought to the scaffold.
Grey knelt and prayed in the rain, and then said he
had never plotted treason. He urged the King not to
let the brand of traitor rest on his name for the sake of
the " unstained blood which we have spilled at the head
of your ancestors' armies, and for that loyalty of four
hundred years, during which the House of Wilton was
untouched." A reprieve also came for him at the last
moment.
Lord Cobham came next ; and though he had shown
fear and trembling at the trial, he was prepared to meet
death calmly. He again accused Raleigh. The sheriff
now stayed the execution, and called back IMarkham and
Grey, and told them that the King had decided to spare
their lives. The people shouted their applause, and the
prisoners were removed to the Tower. Raleigh, too, went
back to prison.
Lord Grey died in the Tower, July 9, 1614, just as
he was entering the twelfth year of his imprisonment.
220 SIR WALTER RALETGE.
Lord Cobham died poor and miserable, Jan. 24, 1619.
He had been released from the Tower for a short time
on account of his health, and died of paralysis after a
year's helplessness. Markham was released and went to
Brussels, where he was so poor that " he was constrained
to pluck out the inlaid silver of the hilts of his sword to
buy flour to make a hasty-pudding for his dinner," sa3'S
Oldys in his notes. He afterwards found service under
the Archduke Albert.
For more than twelve long years Raleigh lived in the
Tower, and found happiness as best he could in books.
For a man with his active life the confinement must .
have been well-nigh unbearable. At first he gave much
time to the study of chemistry and experiments in that
science. He then began his great and learned "His-
tory of the World." He was confined in what is now the
Bloody Tower, above the principal gate to the Inner
Ward. For a time Lady Raleigh and her son Walter
were permitted to remain in the Tower, but when the
plague broke out in 1604 they were obliged to go away
for safety.
Lord Cecil tried in vain to keep some of Sir Walter's
property from confiscation. There were a dozen persons
who eagerly tried to get possession of the beautiful
Sherborne estates. Lady Raleigh went to court in 1608,
holding her boys by the hand — Walter then fourteen, and
little Carew, four, born in the Tower after his father was
in prison, — and on her knees begged Sherborne for her
children; but James brusquely replied, "I maunhae the
lond ; I maun hae it for Carr," who was a young favor-
ite of the King, becoming afterwards Earl of Somerset.
The King finally purchased Sherborne for his son,
Prince Henry. Lady Raleigh was promised eight thou-
SIR WALTER RALEIGH. 221
sand pounds for her life interest in Sherborne ; but the
interest was irregailarly paid, and later the principal was
mostly lost in the expedition to Guiana. She had an
annuity of four hundred pounds a year, which was fre-
quently unpaid.
Raleigh's health failed, and various efforts were made
for his release, but none succeeded. Finally there was a
rift in the cloud. Prince Henry, the broad-minded son
of a uarrow-minded father, partly through pity and
partly from his appreciation of a fine intellect, had be-
come fond of the imprisoned statesman. He was, in
1610, sixteen years old, while Raleigh was fifty-eight.
He often visited Raleigh, and conferred with him about
politics, ship-building, and foreign policy. He consulted
him about his marriage with a Princess of Savoy, and
would not consent to it because Raleigh thought it
unwise, as " the Dukes of Savoy were of the blood of
Spain, and to Spain those dukes have always been ser-
vants," said Raleigh. It was generally believed that
Prince Henry had received the Sherborne estates only
that he might bestow them upon his friend. He said,
" No man but my father would keep such a bird in a cage."
At the coming Christmas, 1612, the prince had obtained
with great difficulty from his father a promise of libera-
tion for Raleigh. But six weeks before this, to the dis-
may and sadness of the whole of England, Nov. 6, the
noble youth died of typhoid-fever, at the age of eighteen.
James I. gladly forgot his promise to his dead boy, and
the prison doors closed forever on Sir Walter Raleigh.
No, they opened once more, but the path led to the block.
All these years the conditions of Raleigh's prison life
grew harder. His garden was taken away from him,
where he had enjoyed the study of botany, his wife was
222 sin WALEli II A LEIGH.
seldom allowed to see him, and his health yearly grew
poorer. Often he was for two hours, he wrote Cecil,
now become Earl of Salisbury, " without feeling or motion
of my hand and whole arm," and, '^ every second or
third niglit in danger either of sudden deatli, or of the
loss of my limbs or sense ; " but Salisbury was no longer
a friend, and James I. was only hoping " that man
Raleigh will die before I do." The wife of James, Anne
of Denmark, was always the friend of Raleigh, and tried
to obtain his release ; but she had no influence with
James, partly because she had become a Romanist, and
partly because he became tired of any affection after a
time.
It is thought that Raleigh began the "History of
the World " in 1607, and seven years after, in 1614, lie
gave the first volume of 1,354 closely printed pages to
the public. Tins brought the Avorld's history only down
to the conquest of Macedon by Rome. It was a marvel
of diligence, showing that Raleigh could " toil terribly,"
and would have filled, says Mr. Gosse, " thirty-five such
volumes as are devised for an ordinary modern novel."
The next year, 1615, James commanded the suppres-
sion of the book, because it was '•' too saucy in censuring
the acts of kings." Ninias, son of Queen Semiramis,
who " had changed nature and condition with his mother,
proved no less feminine than she was masculine ; " and
James read between the lines, as he thought, or probably
some jealous person thought for him, tliat this was a
true picture of James I. and his mother, Mary, Queen of
Scots.
Raleigh then wrote " The Prerogative of Parliament,"
an argument in favor of the King against liis evil advis-
ers; but anything from Raleigh's hand was unwelcome,
SIR WALER RALEIGH. 223
and he was forbidden to publish it. Ten years after his
death it appeared. His " Observations on Trade and
Commerce," in favor of free trade, was suppressed
because James was a protectionist.
One can scarcely imagine the wearisomeness of the
years that saw manuscript after manuscript piled up, from
a fertile and brilliant mind, with no power to bring
them before a world which it strove to influence.
One of the best known of Sir Walter's several works
is his " Instructions to his Son and to Posterity." The
first edition which Oldys saw was published fourteen
years after Raleigh's death, 1632. It went through sev-
eral editions. In the chapter on " Clioice of Friends,"
he says : " If thy friends be of better quality than thy-
self, thou mayst be sure of two things : the first, that
they will be more careful to keep thy counsel, because
they have more to lose than thou hast ; the second, they
will esteem thee for thyself, and not for that which thou
dost possess. But if thou be subject to any great van-
ity or ill (from which I hope God will bless thee), then
therein trust no man ; for every man's folly ought to be
his greatest secret. . , .
" The next and greatest care ought to be in the choice
of a wife. And the only danger therein is beauty, by
which all men in all ages, wise and foolish, have been
betrayed. ... If thou marry for beauty, thou bindest
thyself all thy life for that which perchance will never
last nor please thee one year; and when thou hast it, it
will be to thee of no price at all." Raleigh thought the
best time for his son to marry was " toward thirty. And
though tliou canst not forbear to love, yet forbear to
link ; after awhile thou shalt find an alteration in thy-
self, and see another far more pleasing than the first,
224 SIR WALTER RALEIGH.
second, or third love." About talking, Sir Walter says :
" He that cannot refrain from much speaking is like a
city without walls, and less pains in the Avorld a man
cannot take than to hold his tongue ; therefore if thou
observest this rule in all assemblies, thou shalt seldom
err. Eestrain thy choler, hearken much, and speak lit-
tle ; for the tongue is the instrument of the greatest
good and greatest evil that is done in the world. . . .
Never spend anything before thou have it : for borrow-
ing is the canker and death of every man's estate." Con-
cerning wine-drinking, Sir Walter admonishes his son :
" Take especial care that thou delight not in wine, for
there never was any man that came to honor or prefer-
ment that loved it ; for it transformeth a man into a
beast, decayeth health, poisoneth the breath, destroyeth
natural heat, bringeth a man's stomach to an artificial heat,
deformeth the face, rotteth the teeth, and, to conclude,
maketh a man contemptible, soon old, and despised of
all wise and worthy men, hated in thy servants, in thy-
self and companions ; for it is a bewitching and infec-
tious vice. . . .
" Whosoever loveth wine shall not be trusted of any
man, for he cannot keep a secret. Wine maketh man
not only a beast, but a madman ; and if thou love it, thy
own wife, thy children, and thy friends will despise
thee."
Men in James's cabinet had died and others had taken
their places. Raleigh had never lost sight of Guiana,
its gold mines yet to be found, and its shores to be col-
onized for his beloved England.
At last he got the ear of Sir George Villiers, Duke of
Buckingham, the favorite at that time, and Secretary Sir
Ralph Winwood. Mr. Edwards says Raleigh gave two
silt WALTER RALEIGH. 225
individuals fifteen hundred pounds, — seven hundred
and fifty apiece, — a large sum in our money, — to in-
fluence the proper persons ; besides he promised much
gold from Guiana, if he were only permitted to go there
and obtain it.
James could never say " no " to the favorites then in
power; so that Raleigh, at their solicitations, was finally
released Jan. 30, 1G16, — he had been in the Tower for
almost thirteen years, — that he might, under a keeper,
live in his own house, aud prepare for a new expedition
to Guiana.
For fourteen months, though much broken in health,
he was busy with his pet scheme. His all was staked
upon it. Lady Raleigh sold some land which she owned
and gave her husband twenty-five hundred pounds.
The eight thousand pounds from the Sherborne estate
were called in. Five thousand pounds were borrowed,
and Raleigh's friends furnished fifteen thousand more.
He built one large ship and called it the Destiny — a
fitting name. He collected other vessels and furnished
them with ordnance. Meantime Spain, which knew
Raleigh's hatred, was closely watching the expedition.
The Spanish ambassador, Gondomar, had James well
under his thumb. He flattered him, and wrote him in
gratitude, " that a Spaniard should have been and should
still be a councillor, not merely in your Majesty's Privy
Council, hut in your j^'ivate Closet itself, doth not only
exceed all possible merit of )nine, but also exceeds
all the services that I can possibly have been able to
render to your Majesty." Meantime he wrote to his
friends how inordinately vain and egotistical was the
king of England !
Gondomar hated Raleigh. He feared that Raleigh
226 sin WALTER RALEIGH.
would capture a plate-fleet if opportunity offered, and he
was utterly opposed to his visiting Guiana at all, as the
Spaniards were already there. He liiially persuaded
James to give him a pledge that no harm should be
done to the Spaniards in Guiana, or Raleigh's life should
pay the penalty. James allowed Gondomar to forward
to Madrid the proposed route of the Destiny and other
private matters.
James must have known that in all human probability
the Spaniards would meet and contest the claim of the
, English to even laud in the country, saying nothing of
taking away their gold; but he loved money so well that
a gold mine would have enabled him to be very inde-
pendent with " our dear brother tlie King of Spain," as
he called him. That Raleigh did not return witli gold
probably sealed his fate.
James at the same time kept his friendship with his
"dear brother," as Raleigh says, by sending word to
him ''the very river by which 1 was to enter, to name
my ships, number, men, and my artillery ; " and Philip
III. at once wrote letters to all parts of the Indies
and to Guiana, to prepare for Raleigh. Duplicity could
not go much farther than it went in James I. But he
had a marriage in mind of his son Charles with the
infanta of Spain : " You must demand with lier," said
James to his agents, "two million crowns, and you are
not to descend lower than so many crowns as may make
tlie sum of five hundred thousand pounds besides the
jewels." The marriage was broken off by Spain, and
Charles married Henrietta Maria, daughter of Henry IV.
of France.
Tlie fleet of seven vessels sailed for Guiana at the
beginning of April, 1617 ; young Walter Raleigh, the son
sin WALTER RALEIGH. 227
of Sir Walter, going as captain of the Destiny, Other
sliips were added at Plynioutli. Storms very soon scat-
tered the vessels. One was lost, and several were forced
to take refuge in Falmouth harbor for a time. Later on
in the journey a sickness, like a plague, broke out, and
many of the officers, as well as sailors, died. Raleigh
himself came very near death from a fever. On Nov.
14 the fleet anchored at the mouth of the Cayenne River
on the eastern coast of South America,
The Indians remembered Raleigh's visit twenty years
before. He wrote Lady Raleigh, Nov. 14 : —
" Sweet Heart, — I can yet write unto you with but
a weak hand. . . , To tell you that I might be here
king of the Indians were a vanity ; but my name hath
still lived among them. Here they feed me with fresh
meat and all that the country yields : all offer to obey
me. Commend me to poor Carew, my son."
Raleigh's own health preventing his going in person,
lie sent Captain Keymis, with five hundred men in five
smaller ships, up the Orinoco River to search for the
mine. They were given instructions to do their best
to reach the mine without conflict with the Spanianis.
"When they returned they would find him dead or
alive. If you find not my ships, you shall find their
ashes. For I will fire, with the galleons, if it come to
extremity; but run will I never."
The ascent of the Orinoco took twenty-three days.
Despatches from Madrid, through Gondomar, had already
been sent concerning their coming. The Spaniards fired
first upon them as they attempted to land on the bank
of the river, some distance from the supposed mine.
The English returned the fire ; and young Raleigh, only
twenty-tlirco, was killed at the head of his men.
228 SIR WALTER RALEIGH.
Wounded by a musket-shot, he pressed on, bleediii,q
and using his sword, when he was felled to the ground
by the but-end of a musket in the hands of a Spaniard.
His last words were : " Go on ! May the Lord liave
mercy upon me, and prosper your enterprise !"
The Spaniards were driven back into their town of
San Thome, built about twenty miles from its site
twenty years before, when Raleigh took Berrio, the
Spanish governor, prisoner. The Spaniards were de-
feated, and several houses were burned. Young Raleigh
was buried in the little church of San Thome, far away
from home and friends.
Young Raleigh was a brave youth, the idol of both
parents. He had been made to suffer for his father's
downfall. He was engaged to an heir of Sir Robert
Basset, descended from King Edward IV. This girl
was a ward of Raleigh, who managed her estate of
three thousand pounds a year — about fifteen thousand
of our money. After Sir Walter's disgrace she was
taken away from the son and married Henry Howard,
the son of Lord Treasurer Suffolk. He died suddenly
at table, and she afterwards married William Cavendish.
Duke of Newcastle. " He would never have wedded
her," says an old writer, <' if young Walter Raleigh had
been alive, conceiving her, before God, to be his wife,
For they were married as much as children could be."
Captain Keymis then pushed on towards the mine,
but the Spaniards fired upon him from the woods,
several men were killed, and, his force becoming dis-
heartened, with the young Raleigh dead and the admiral
Sir Walter, likely to die, Keymis gave up the search for
the mine, and reluctantly returned to the ships.
The meeting between Raleigh and Keymis, with the
SIB WALTER EALEIGU. 229
news of the deatli of his son, was a sad one. Raleigh
wrote his wife : " God knows I never knew what sorrow
meant till now. ... I shall sorrow the less because I
have not long to sorrow, because not long to live."
When Keymis told the story of the failure to reach
the mine, Sir Walter, in bitterness of soul, replied,
"that Keymis had undone him, and that his credit was
lost forever." Sir Walter knew only too well that gold
alone would satisf\^ King James.
Raleigh blamed the captain so. much that the latter
was greatly cast down. Afterwards he came to Raleigh,
saying that he had written an excuse to the Earl of
Arundel, and begged Raleigh to allow of his apology.
The latter refused, whereupon Keymis replied, " I know
not, then, sir, what course to take," and went to his
cabin, where he at once killed himself by a pistol and
a knife.
Raleigh now determined to go in search of the mine
himself, but his men mutinied and refused to go. On
the journey homew^ard they were scattered again by
severe storms.
When the Destiny, Sir Walter's ship, arrived in Plym-
outh, Lady Raleigh hastened to meet her heart-broken
husband. They started towards London ; and when they
had gone about twenty miles they were met by Sir
Lewis Stukeley, a kinsman of Sir Walter's, who de-
clared that he had come to arrest him and his ships,
and they all returned to Plymouth. Captain King, a
faithful servant of Raleigh, begged him to escape to
Paris, and, overpersuaded, a bark was engaged and
Raleigh entered it, but when a little way out he deter-
mined to return and take the consequences.
Meantime Gondomar, hearing of the San Thome affair,
280 SIR WALTER RALEIGH.
hastened to the King, but was told that he was engaged.
He sent a message that he might be allowed only one
word, and, pennission being granted, rushed into the
Audience Chamber, and cried out, " Piratas ! Piratas !
Plmtas ! "
Raleigh stated the case of ''Piracy" well, when he
Avrotehis "Apology" to be laid before the King and the
country. " If it be now thought to be a breach of peace, the
taking and burning of a Spanish town in the country, if
the country be the King of Spain's, it had been no less a
breach of peace to have wrought any mine of his, and to
have robbed him of his gold. If the country be the
King's, I have not offended ; if it be not the King's, I
must have perished if I had but taken gold out of the
mines there." James I. allowed him to go to Guiana,
and now James was to punish him for going.
Raleigh arrived in London Aug. 7. He now bribed
Stukeley and a French physician who was with him to
help him to escape to France. They accepted the bribe,
rowed out towards the French ship, and then told him
that they had betrayed him. Stukeley was always called
Sir Judas Stukeley after this. When Stukeley com-
plained to the King that some one spoke ill of him,
James replied, " Were I disposed to hang every man that
speaks ill of thee, there would not be trees enough in
all my kingdom to hang them on." Later he fled the
country for stealing, or clipping coin. He died a maniac
in 1620, on the lonely Isle of Lundy.
Raleigh passed through the form of an examination
(James havin*:^ proclaimed "an horrible invasion of the
town of San Tliome," . . . and " the malicious breaking
of the peace which hath been so happily established ") ;
but Philip III., through Gondoraar, had already demanded
his death.
SIR WALTER RALEIGH. 231
Raleigh again entered the Towei- Aug. 10, 1718. On
the 28th of October, at eight in the morning, he was
brought hastily to Westminster, being commanded to rise
from his bed, where he was ill with the ague. A servant
reminded him that the combing of his hair had been for-
gotten. "Let them kem it that are to have it," said
Raleigh with a smile.
At the hearing at Westminster he was told by Francis
Bacon, who was at enmity with him, that he was to be
executed on the old charge of treason in 1603. (Bacon
three years later was impeached for bribery and fined
forty thousand pounds, besides losing his office.)
Raleigh begged for a little delay, to finish some writ-
ing; but the King had ordered that all things be done
quickl}^, and had gone away lest he be besought for par-
don. Much of this time, says Edwards, when he was not
hunting or horse-racing, James was writing "Meditations
on tlie Lord's Prayer ! "
Later in the day, on this Thursday, the 28th, Lady
Raleigh heard of the trial, and hastened to her husband.
They talked together till midnight, he calming her heart-
break with his clieerfulness and resolution. He told her
he could not trust himself to speak of their dear little
Carew. Her last words to him were that she had obtained
permission to have his precious body for burial. He
smiled and said, " It is well, dear Bess, that thou mayest
dispose of that dead wliich thou hadst not always the
disposing of when alive."
He wrote on the fly-leaf of his Bible the night before
his execution : —
" E'en such is time! which takes in trust
Our youth, our joys, and all we have;
And pays us naught but age and dust,
Which ill the dark and silent grave,
232 SIR WALTER RALEIGH.
When we have wandered all our ways,
Shuts up the story of our days.
And from which grave, and earth, and dust,
The Lord shall raise me up, I trust."
In the morning he passed cheerfully tlirough the vast
throng of people to the block. Seeing an old man bare-
headed, he took from his own head a night-cap of cut
lace which he wore under his hat, and threw it to him
with the words, " You need this, my friend, more than
I do."
" He was the most fearless of death that ever was
known," said Dr. Townson, his spiritual adviser, " and
tlie most resolute and confident ; yet with reverence and
conscience."
On the scaffold he spoke eloquently for nearly a half-
hour, showing his innocence and asserting that the world
would yet be persuaded of it. Friends lingered long on
the scafford, loath to leave one of nature's noblemen and
one of England's greatest and bravest. He gently dis-
missed them, saying, " I have a long journey to go,
therefore I must take my leave of you."
After he had prayed, he said, " I die in the faith pro-
fessed by the Church of England. I hope to be saved,
and to have my sins washed away by the precious blood
and merits of our Saviour, Christ."
The executioner was affected, and asked to be forgiven
for what he was about to do. Raleigh placed both hands
on the man's shoulders, and assured him of his forgiveness.
He then laid off his cloak, and asked to see the axe.
The man hesitated. Raleigh again said, " I prithee
let me see it. Dost thou think that T am afraid of
it?"
Pie touched the edge with his finger, and kissed the
SIR WALTER RALEIGH. 233
blade, saying, " It is a sharp medicine, but one that Avill
cure me of all diseases." Soon he added, " When I stretch
forth ray hands, despatch me."
The executioner then cast down his own cloak that Sir
Walter might kneel upon it. When asked whicli way he
would lay his head upon the block, he replied, " So the
heart be right, it matters not which way the head lies."
Raleigh knelt, prayed for a moment, laid his head towards
the east, and then stretched forth his hands. The execu-
tioner seemed benumbed. Raleigh stretched them forth
again, but no blow came.
" What dost thou fear ? " said Raleigh. " Strike, man,
strike ! " Two blows fell, but the first had done its
bloody work.
Tlie severed head was placed in a red bag and given to
Lady Raleigli. This she embalmed and kept with her
while she lived, giving it to her sonCarew when she died.
It was probably buried with him at West Horsley, in Sur-
rey, where he had an estate.
The body of Sir Walter she interred in St. Margaret's,
in which church, in 1882, after a lapse of two centuries,
a beautiful memorial window was placed in memory of
the man so unjustly beheaded, the man who helped to
make North America English instead of Spanish, as the
forerunner of the Virginia colony ; whose treatment of
the Indians was above reproach, in an age of harshness
and immorality; one of the bravest of Englishmen, and
one of the most remarkable of his time.
Lady Raleigh lived till 1G47, twenty -nine years after
the death of Sir Walter. Though she did not see the
unfortunate Charles I., the son of James, perish on the
scaffold, Jan. 30, 1649, she saw the Stuarts overthrown.
The vacillating and unrighteous policy of James I. bore
its legitimate fruit.
234 SIR WALTER RALEIGH.
Carew Raleigh, the son, after graduating from AVadham
College, Oxford, came to court, by favor of his kinsman,
William, Earl of Pembroke. James disliked him, as he
" appeared to him like the ghost of his father " — no
wonder that James's conscience troubled him. After
the King's death, a year later, Carew returned and
begged to have .his estates restored to him. Charles I.
instead gave him four hundred pounds a year, after the
death of his mother, who had received that amount while
living. He inarried Lady Philippa, the rich widow of
Sir Anthony Ashley, and had two sons and three daugh-
ters. He was in Parliament during Cromwell's time.
At the restoration of Charles II. his elder son, Walter,
was knighted, but died soon after. Carew Kaleigh died
in IGGG, at the age of sixty-two.
SIR JOHN FRANKLIN, DR. KANE,
C. F. HALL, AND OTHERS.
" "'VFO officer could have been found in tlie marine of
-i-^ any country who combined more admirable qual-
ifications for the duties of an explorer," says Dr. Elisha
Kent Kane in his ''United States Grinnell Expedition."
"To the resolute enterprise and powers of endurance
which his former expeditions had tested so severely, Sir
John Franklin united many delightful traits of character.
With an enthusiasm almost boyish, he had a spirit of
large but fearless forecast and a sensitive kindness
of heart that commiserated every one but himself. He
is remembered to tliis day among the Indians of North
America as 'the great chief who would not kill a mos-
quito.' " He is remembered, too, by all the world, as
the man for whom a heroic woman spent nearly her whole
fortune and her whole life, moving two continents by
her prayers and her appeals, to search for her husband
in the frozen regions of ISTorth America.
In the little town of Spilsby, in Lincolnshire, Eng-
land, April 16, 1786, was born John Franklin, the
youngest son in a family of ten children — four boys
and six girls.
The father, Willingham Franklin, was engaged in
mercantile pursuits, and seems to have had enough
money to educate his children well, though the family
235
23G SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS.
lived simply, in a one-story house. One son, the second,
Sir Willingham Franklin, educated at Oxford, became
a judge of the Supreme Court of Judicature in Madras,
and died at the age of forty -five. Another son, Major
James Franklin, became distinguished in the army, was
skilled in science, and a Fellow of the Royal Society,
dying at the age of fifty-one.
John was sent to a preparatory school at St. Ives, in
Huntingdonshire, and at twelve to the Louth grammar
school, with the expectation of his good mother, Hannah,
that he would become a clergyman.
But the lad seems to have had other thoughts in his
mind. At ten years of age, having a holiday, he and
a companion went to the shore of the North Sea, about
ten miles from their home. The sublimity of the ocean
greatly impressed John; and he then and there resolved
to be a sailor, as has many another boy before and
since, forgetful or unconscious of the hardships before
them.
Disappointed at his choice, but desiring to cure him
of his wish to go to sea, as school had become distaste-
ful to him, the parents sent him on board a merchant
ship to Lisbon and back. Charmed with the blue waters
and pleased with the kindness of the captain, who liked
and petted the cheerful, enthusiastic boy, he became
more than ever infatuated with a sailor's life.
His earnest entreaties Avere at last acceded to; and
John obtained a place on His Majesty's ship, Polyphe-
mus, March 9, 1800, as a first-class volunteer. He was
now fourteen years old. A year later the Polyphemus
with eighteen line-of-battle ships and many other ves-
sels, was engaged in the conflict off Copenhagen, which
Lord Nelson declared "the greatest victory he ever
SIR JOHN FRANKLIN.
SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS. 237
gained . . . the most hard-fought battle and the most
complete victory that ever was fought and obtained by
the navy of this country." The Polyphemus boarded
and took possession of two ships, losing six killed and
twenty-four wounded. The boy who craved adventure
Avas having it to his heart's content.
Soon after the battle young Franklin was appointed
one of six midshipmen on the ship Investigator, bound
for exploration in the Southern Hemisphere. This posi-
tion came through a relative, Captain Matthew Flinders,
also from Lincolnshire, already somewhat known as an
explorer and scientific student.
The Investigator sailed from Spithead, July 18, 1801,
and anchored in King George's Sound in Western Aus-
tralia, Dec. 8. Then the ship sailed along the south
shore, making surveys, and naming islands, bays, and
inlets — two islands of the St. Francis group were
named in honor of the boy navigator, then fifteen yeai's
of age, the Franklin Isles ; another in Spencer Gulf,
Spilsby Island, after his birthplace, while a large bight
was named Louth Bay, and two more islands Louth
Islands, after the old grammar school, founded by
Edward VI. in 1552, where the youth had studied books
with his heart full of longing for the sea. Captain Flin-
ders must have felt strangely drawn to the lad who was
so eager in his geographical studies and such an apt
scholar for the work in hand.
On their arrival in Sydney Cove an observatory was
set up on shore, where all the astronomical observations
were taken. Franklin was made assistant to Mr. Samuel
Flinders, brother of the captain, and was called jokingly,
though not inaptly, " Tycho Brahe," after the celebrated
Danish astronomer.
238 SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS.
Later the east coast of Australia was carefully ex-
jilored. After nearly two years, the ship's company
having become much reduced by sickness and several
deaths, through scurvy from lack of fresh food and
from much exposure, the old Investigator being aban-
doned as unseaworthy, Captain Flinders sailed for Eng-
land in the Porpoise. Young Franklin was made master s-
mate July 21, 1803.
Six days after, the Porpoise had sailed from Australia
she was wrecked on the reefs. The crew were saved,
with the charts and books of the expedition, though
the latter were damaged by the salt water. These charts
Avere spread out to dry upon the sand, and Franklin and
others thoughtlessly drove over them the sheep which
were saved alive from the ship. The marks, it is said,
are still to be seen upon them in the Eoyal Colonial
Insitute in London.
The shipwrecked men erected some tents on the
beach, and prepared to live as best they might till relief
should possibly come. Captain Flinders and thirteen
men started in a six-oared boat, saved from the wreck,
for Sydney, seven hundred and fifty miles away. They
carried provisions for three weeks. It was doubtful if
the little craft could ever weather the sea ; but by skil-
ful management she reached the desired port and ob-
tained three vessels, one bound for China, and two
government schooners, which sailed to the wreck and
picked \ip the anxious and disabled company.
Franklin was carried to China, while Captain Flinders,
touching at ^Mauritius for water and provisions, was made
a prisoner of war by the French Governor, He was
detained for six years and a half. On his release he
wrote the narrative of his expedition, and, worn by his
am JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS. 239
privations and unjust imprisonment, he died July 19,
1814, on the very day that liis book was published.
Franklin sailed for England in a large squadron filled
with the merchandise of China and Japan. On the
journey they were attacked by a French squadron of
men-of-war, but the latter were defeated by the mer-
chant ships. After a little more than three years,
Aug. 7, 1804, Franklin was once more in the one-story
house at Spilsby, and Hannah Franklin was listening
intently to the perils of her son, and rejoicing at his
safe return.
In a few weeks he was on board the Bellerophon, help-
insr to blockade the French fleet in the harbor of Brest.
On the 21st of October, 1805, he was in the great battle
of Trafalgar, the Bellerophon taking a leading part,
losing in the conflict her captain, John Cooke, and
twenty-seven other men, while one hundred and twenty-
seven were wounded. Franklin evinced conspicuous
zeal and activity as signal midshipman, and was one
of the few in the stern of the ship who escaped
unhurt.
From the Bellerophon, Franklin was transferred to
the Bedford, and was made an acting lieutenant Dec. 5,
1807. She cruised for some weeks off Lisbon, and
helped to escort the royal family of Portugal from Lis-
bon to lirazil, to which country they fled for safety when
Marshal Junot invaded Portugal. For two years they
were stationed on the coast of South America, return-
ing to England in August, 1810. Three months later,
Nov. 27, 1810, Franklin's mother died at Spilsby, at
the age of fifty-nine. She had seen her son at twenty-
four respected and promoted. She could not know how
the lad born in the quiet home was to be talked of and
240 SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS.
mourned throughout the world. She had reared him in
her own earnest faith ; she could trust his future.
During the next three years Franklin cruised in the
West Indies, and was engaged in the attack on New
Orleans in our war of 1812 with England. In clearing
Lake Borgne of the American gun-boats so that the
English could land their armj^, Franklin was wounded,
and received a medal for his bravery. Later in the war
he showed great courage.
In 1815, on his return to England, Franklin was trans-
ferred to the Forth, and made first lieutenant under
Captain Sir William Bolton. After peace was concluded
the navy was reduced, and Franklin, on half-pay, had
leisure to devote himself to scientific study.
From early times there had been talk of a north-west
passage to Cathay (China) and India, by sailing from
Europe above North America in the Arctic Circle, and
thus crossing from the Atlantic to the Pacific Ocean ; also
a north-east passage above Russia. Tragedy had attended
nearly every voyage. Sir Hugh Willoughby and his fro-
zen crew met their fate in a Lapland harbor in try-
ing to solve the north-east passage. William Barentz,
the Dutch navigator, in liis third voyage in 1596, per-
ished off Icy Cape, Alaska. Henry Hudson, with his
orders to "go direct to the North Pole," reached 80°
30' off the coast of Spitzbergen, naming the north-west
point Hakluyt Headland. No other vessel went so far
to the northward for one hundred and sixty years.
'•' From a commercial point of view," says Captain
Albert Hastings Markham, R. N., in his life of Frank-
lin, '' Hudson's voyage must always be regarded as a
great success; for the report that he made of the numer-
ous whales and walruses he had seen led to the estaU-
SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS. 241
lisliment of that lucrative and prosperous fishery whicli
has, with varying success, been prosecuted to the present
day. The east coast of Greenland, discovered by Hud-
son, was not again visited by any known navigator for
the space of two hundred years."
On Hudson's third voyage, 1609, in search of the
north-west passage, he discovered the river which bears
his name, and on his fourth voyage, 1610, sailed through
Hudson's Straits and several hundred miles on the great
Hudson Bay. He wintered on Southampton Island in
the northern part of the bay, and in the spring again
started for the Pacific. But his men mutinied, and
cruelly putting their commander with his only son and
six sailors, all ill, into an open boat, left them to per-
ish amid the icebergs. Some of the mutineers reached
England in safety, six were killed by the Indians, and
some starved to death. At home they were despised
and died unlamented. Six years later, 1616, William
Bafiin discovered Baffin's Bay.
Largely through the influence of Sir John Barrow,
Secretary of the Admiralty, England was again inter-
ested not only to try to discover the north-west passage
and reach the Xorth Pole, but to undertake these thinsrs
partly in the interests of science, rather than the never-
ending chase for the gold of Cathay and the wealth of
the Indies.
Lieutenant John Eoss and Lieutenant Edward Parry'
were chosen to search for the north-west passage, and
Commander David Buchan with Lieutenant John Frank-
lin to reach, if possible, the North Pole.
Buchan had already explored considerable of New-
foundland, and Franklin had had experience in Aus-
tralia. Buchan commanded the Dorothea, of five hundred
242 SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS.
and seventy tons, and Franklin the Trent, of two hundred
and fifty tons. Both ships carried provisions for two
years and plenty of instruments for deep-sea soundings
and astronomical observations. They sailed out of the
Thames April 25, 1818. In just a month. May 24, the
ship sighted Bear, or Cherie Island, south of Spitzber-
gen, and proceeded, according to their directions from
the Government, to seek the North Pole by sailing
between Spitzbergen and Greenland.
The ice soon became so thick on the ships that it was
necessary to cut it away by axes from the bows, and the
ropes were much covered. June 3 they were in Magda-
lena Bay, on the north-west coast of Spitzbergen. Here
they surveyed the harbor, shot seals and walruses which
basked in the sun on the huge broken pieces of ice, saw a
great glacier, believed to be a quarter of a mile in cir-
cumference, slide into the sea from a height of two
hundred feet, — its weight was computed to be over four
hundred thousand tons, — and then sailed around the
northern shore of Spitsbergen, and near Red Bay were
beset in the great ice pack which stretched away to the
north.
After several days the ice loosened and the ships
anchored in Fair Haven, a little to the west of Red Bay.
They shot forty reindeer and several eider ducks, thus
providing fresh meat for the men.
Early in July the ships again put to sea, and reached
eventually 80° 34' north, but could go no farther on ac-
count of the impenetrable mass of ice. In an attempt to
go westward the ships were caught in a gale of wind,
and so battered by the ice floes, — great broken pieces,
— that Franklin determined to drive his ship into the
pack to escape destruction. When she struck the pack,
Slli JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS. 243
the men lost their footing, the masts bent, and tlie
vessel staggered from side to side.
"Literally tossed from piece to piece," wrote Captain
Beechey, then first lieutenant of the Trent, " we liad
nothing left but patiently to abide the issue, for we
could scarcely keep our feet, much less render any
assistance to the vessel. The motion was so great that
the ship's bell, which in the heaviest gale of wind had
never struck by itself, now tolled so continually that it
was ordered to be muffled, for the purpose of escaping
the unpleasant association it was calculated to produce."
On the following morning it was found that the
Dorothea was even more badly damaged than the Trent,
the port side being driven in. Though Franklin desired
to press forward in the search for the Pole, Captain
Buchan did not dare to take liis vessel to England, un-
accompanied by another ship, therefore both returned
on Oct. 22, not having accomplished their desire, but
having provided a useful experience for the yet to be
distinguished Arctic navigator, Franklin.
The other expedition under Ross and Parry sailed
through Davis Strait, up Baffin's Bay, and sixty miles
into Lancaster Sound ; but the weather being bad, they
returned to Eugland in October of the same year. Ross
thought there was land beyond, so that this water was
Lancaster Bay, but Parry believed it to be a sound, thus
continuing the north-west passage.
Franklin and Parry were both eager to make another
voyage of research, and accordingly in May, 1819, two
expeditions started from England. Parry had two ships,
the Hecla and Griper, the latter commanded by Lieuten-
ant Liddon. In about a month they reached Davis
Strait, passed through Baffin's Bay, and on Aug. 4,
244 SIB JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS.
entered Lancaster Sound. Proceeding farther west,
they came to a strait which they named Barrow Strait,
after Sir Jolm Barrow of the Admiralty. Here their
progress was barred by solid ice, and they were obliged
to sail south through Prince Regent Inlet, which leads
into Boothia Gulf.
Again stopped by ice, they retraced their course, and
found an open passage through Barrow Strait. On their
iiorth side they discovered a channel which they named
Wellington Channel, and on Sept. 3 they crossed
the 110th meridian of west longitude, which passes
through Melville Island in Melville Sound. Here the
ice again stopped them, and cutting a channel in it for
two miles, Parry took his ship through to winter quarters
on the south side of Melville Island. This place he
called Winter Harbor. The men were made happy by
the fact that they had earned the reward of five
thousand pounds offered by Parliament to any person
or ship sailing far enough west to cross the 110th
meridian.
Parry explored the country about him, using a light
cart dragged by men. Sir F. Leopold M'Clintock found
the marks of the wheels more than thirty years after-
wards.
The next summer, finding it impossible to push
through the ice, and not having provisions for anotlier
winter, Parry returned to England, where he was pro-
moted to the rank of commander, and made a Fellow of
the Royal Society. He undertook a second voyage in
1821, again sailing in the Hecla, with the ship Fury as
escort, hoping to find the north-west passage through
Hudson's Strait and Fox Channel ; but they were unable
to get beyond a strait which leads into Boothia Gulf,
SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS. 245
which he named Fury and Hecla Strait. There they
wintered, and returned to England in the summer of
1823.
Meantime Franklin started from England, May 23,
1819, to make his wonderful journey through the then
unknown North American lands. He was accompanied
by Dr. John Richardson, a scientific man, Mr. George
Back, and Mr. Robert Hood, midshipmen and artists
both, and John Hepburn, a sturdy sailor. They were
carried to Hudson Bay in one of the Hudson Bay
Company's ships, Prince of Wales, and after being nearly
shipwrecked, reached York Factory on the south-west
coast of the Bay, Aug. 30, after a three months' voyage.
Here they took one of the transports of the company,
a light boat about forty feet long, requiring a crew
of from nine to twelve men. When these boats cannot
pass over the rapids in the rivers, they are carried round
the falls by the men.
The party started from York Factory on the noon of
Sept. 9, 1819. Tlie first day they travelled twelve
miles, six by boat, and then they were obliged to drag
it by hand, walking along a steep and slippery bank.
They arose at five the next morning, all eager for the
march.
Franklin notes in his journal the beauties of nature
in this autumn month, on Steel River. " The light yellow
of the fading poplars formed a fine contrast to the dark
evergreen of the spruce, whilst the willows, of an inter-
mediate hue, served to shade the two principal masses
of color into each other. The scene was occasionally
enlivened by the bright purple tints of the dog-wood,
blended with the browner shades of the dwarf birch,
and frequently intermixed with the gay yellow flowers
246 SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS.
of the shrubby cinquefoil. With all these charms the scene
appeared desolate from the want of the human species."
Later they found Indians on the verge of starvation,
some having been reduced to eating members of their
own family.
At the end of nearly two months, Oct. 23, the party
reached Cumberland House, on the Saskatchewan River,
after a toilsome journey of seven hundred miles, over
marshes and across lakes, their clothes often wet all
day long.
Unable to obtain guides and hunters at this point, as
he had hoped, Franklin, with Back and Hepburn, pressed
on towards Fort Chippewyan, on Lake Athabasca, where
he hoped to find men to accompany him, leaving
Richardson and Hood to winter at Cumberland House.
This winter journey of eight hundred and fifty-seven
miles with dogs and sledges was a cold and dreary one.
"The tea froze in the tin pots before we could drink it,
and even a mixture of spirits and water became quite
thick by congelation." The provisions became so scanty
that the poor dogs had " only a little burnt leather."
The snow-shoes, made "of two light bars of wood,
fastened together at the extremities, and projected into
curves by transverse bars," were from four to six feet
long and about one foot and a half wide, weighing two
pounds each. The feet become very sore and much
swollen after long travelling.
Wolves abounded. Here and there the carcasses of deer
were found, the wolves driving the herd with hideous
yells over a precipice, and then feeding on their mangled
bodies at their leisure.
Finding an Indian hut on the journey and a pile of
wood near by, they hoped it covered provisions. Remov-
SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OllIEUS. 247
ing the upper pieces of wood, they found the dead body
of a woman, clothed in leather, and beside her, " her
former garments, the materials for making a fire, a fish-
ing-line, a hatchet, and a bark dish." These she was sup-
posed to need in the other world.
Five families of the Chippewyan tribe were found in
a destitute condition. " They had recently," says Frank-
lin, " destroyed everything they possessed, as a token of
their great grief for the loss of their relatives in the pre-
vailing sickness. It appears that no article is spared by
these unhappy men when a near relative dies; their
clothes and tents are cut to pieces, their guns broken,
and every other weapon rendered useless, if some per-
sons do not remove these articles from their sight, which
is seldom done. Mr, Back sketched one of the children.
This delighted the father very much, who charged the
boy to be very good now, since his picture had been
drawn by a great chief."
The Chippeways think their first ancestor was a dog.
The Chippeway widow, says Dr. Richardson, carries a
bundle of rags or a doll constantly in her arms, after the
husband dies, she calling this bundle her husband. When
her relatives think she has mourned long enongh, per-
haps a year, she is at liberty to marry again.
In this long journey Franklin thought one of the
greatest evils was that of " being constantly exposed to
witness the wanton and unnecessary cruelty of the men
to their dogs, who beat them unmercifully, and habitually
vent on them the most dreadful and disgusting impreca-
tions." Such treatment was all the more to be depre-
cated, because "these useful animals are a comfort to
them by the warmth they impart when lying by their
side or feet, as they usually do."
248 SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS.
Lieutenant Greely, in his " Three Years of Arctic Ser-
vice," tells what kindness will do for these dogs. They
bought at Godhaven, Greenland, '•' stout surly animals of
apparently incurable viciousness." Some months later
he says : " Our dogs would now never be recognized as the
same wolfish, snapping, untamed animals obtained at the
Greenland ports. Good care, plenty of food, and kind
treatment had filled out their gaunt frames, put them in
good working condition, and made them as good-natured,
appreciative, and trustful as though they had never been
pounded, half-starved, and generally abused from their
puppyhood upward. Half-starved animals, who have
never been kindly spoken to, and who have been cruelly
beaten on the slightest pretence, necessarily assume in
self-defence a threatening and vicious attitude toward
all comers." Greely' s dogs were fed regularly once a
day, and " we never found it necessary to maltreat them
to insure fair behaviors at feeding-time." Lieutenant
Peary in his Greenland exploration fed his dogs once a
day, and, as seen at his lectures, they were gentle and
kindly creatures.
Hall says, in his " Arctic Research Expedition," that
the Eskimos are usually kind to puppies, as they wish
them for future service. Sometimes they treat them
better than their children. During one of his sledge
journeys he says, " I found that two puppies formed a
part of our company. Their mother was an excellent
sledge-dog of our team. The pups were carried in the
legs of a pair of fur breeches, and they rode on the sledge
when travelling. Every time we made a stop they were
taken out of their warm quarters and given to the mother
for nursing. When we arrived at our encampment,
Sharkey built up a small snow-hut for the parent dog
and her offspring."
SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS. 249
These dogs assist in the hunts for seal, walrus, and
bear. Barbekark, a most intelligent dog, belonging to
Hall, killed a reindeer, and by his jumping and peculiar
actions finally forced the men to go to the spot, where
they found the dead animal, and brought it to the com-
pany for food.
When Hall was exhausted in a sledge journey Barbe-
kark " would dance round me," he says, <' kissing my face,
placing himself by my side, where I could pillow my
head upon his warm body. ... He would bound toward
me, raise himself on his hind-legs, place his paws upon
my breast, and glance from me toward the vessel." Bar-
bekark was brought home by Hall to the United
States.
The Eskimos use their dogs in summer as pack-
animals. " T have seen," says Gilder, in " Schwatka's
Search," a fine large dog tluxt would carry two saddles
of reindeer meat, or the entire forequarters of two rein-
deer. His back would be bent low beneath the burden
he bore, but still he would struggle along, panting the
while, and regarding his master with a look of the deep-
est affection whenever he came near him, yet ever ready
to fight any other dog that got in his way."
Dr. Richardson and Mr. Hood joined the party again
in July, and all proceeded to Fort Providence, on the
northern shore of Great Slave Lake. They now had with
them twenty-six men, principally Canadian half-breeds,
three women to make the fur clothes, and as many chil-
dren. Several Indians in their canoes also joined the
party to hunt and fish for them.
After travelling five hundred and fifty-three miles, they
were obliged to settle for the winter, as the Indians would
not proceed farther, prophesying death from cold and
250 SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS.
starvation. The place where they erected tlieir log
buildings they called Fort Enterprise.
Very soon after their huts were built, the walls and
roofs plastered with clay, the reindeer disappeared from
that locality, and fish began to fail them. These froze as
soon as taken out of the nets ; very soon the nets them-
selves were found empty. The Hudson Bay Company's
posts had not been able to furnish them the provisions
they had jDromised.
It became necessary for Back to return to Fort Chippe-
wyan for supplies. He started Oct. 18, with three or four
persons, and returned March 17, after a five months' jour-
ney of eleven hundred and four miles on snow-shoes,
with no covering at night save one blanket and a deerskin,
with the thermometer once at fifty-seven degrees below
zero, and sometimes without food for two and three days
at a time. The Indians who went with him were very
generous, often not tasting a fish or bird which they
caught, but giving it to Back with the self-sacrificing
words, "We are accustomed to starvation, but you are not."
The party lived largely on a weed or lichen gathered
from the rocks, called tripe de roche. One night while
they were eating it, " I perceived," says Mr. Back in his
journal, "one of the women busily employed scraping an
old skin, the contents of which her husband presented us
with. They consisted of pounded meat, fat, and a greater
proportion of Indian's and deei^'s hair than either; and, *
though such a mixture may not appear very alluring to an
English stomach, it was thought a great luxury after three
days' privation in these cheerless regions of America."
The feet of the dogs became raw with the jagged ice,
and Back made shoes for them, which, however, came off
frequently in the deep snow.
SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS. 251
At length, with what food Bcack had been able to pro-
cure, Franklin and his party left Fort Enterprise June
14, 1821, with two large canoes and several sledges,
crossing lakes and hills, and finally sailing on the Cop-
permine River to the sea. They arranged with an Indian
chief, Akaitcho, to accumulate a large supply of provis-
ions at Fort Enterprise, in case they should return there
the following winter.
Their feet were torn by the ice and sharp-pointed
stones, and the feet of the dogs left bloody marks ; they
were tormented with swarms of mosquitoes, and their food
was mouldy from being wet ; but they pushed on hope-
fully through the three hundred and thirty-four miles, for
they were nearing the Arctic Ocean, which they had longed
to reach. On July 21 they launched their canoes on the
ocean, for the journey eastward along the coast line.
During the journey from Fort Enterprise they killed
several musk-oxen. ''These," said Franklin, " like the
buffalo, herd together in bands, and generally frequent
the barren grounds during the summer months, keeping
near to the banks of the river, but retire to the woods in
winter. . . . Wlien two or three men get so near a herd
as to fire at them from different points, these animals,
instead of separating or running away, huddle closer
together, and several are generally killed ; but if the
wound is not mortal they become enraged, and dart in
the most furious manner at the hunters, who must be
very dexterous to evade them. They can defend them-
selves by their powerful horns against the wolves and
bears, which, as the Indians say, they not unfreqently
kill."
Dr. John Richardson says of hunting this animal : " The
shaggy patriarch [the leader] advanced before the cows,
252 SIR JOUN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS.
which threw themselves into a circular group, and, lower-
ing his shot-proof forehead so as to cover his body, came
slowly forward, stamping and pawing the ground with his
fore-feet, bellowing, and showing an evident disposition
for fight, while he tainted the atmosphere with the strong
musky odor of his body."
When wounded by a ball, " he instantly faced about,
roared, struck the ground forcibly with his fore-feet, and
seemed to be hesitating whether to charge or not." The
men were glad when they saw him climb the snow-cov-
ered mountain, followed by the cows.
Greely, in his " Three Years of Arctic Service," tells
of the securing alive of four calves in a band of musk-
oxen, at Discovery Bay, in Robeson Channel, far north of
Smith Sound. " The calves were brought in from the top
of the mountain, eighteen hundred feet above the sea,"
says Greely. "Every effort was made to raise the
calves, which soon became tame and tractable. They
ate milk, corn-meal, and almost any food that was given
them. ... In a short time they became very fond of
Long and Frederik, who generally cared for them, and
would follow them around and put their noses into the
men's pockets for food. I had intended to send them to
the United States by the visiting vessel of 1882. When
the long nights came it was impracticable to give them
exercise, and probably from this cause, despite our care,
they died."
Greely tried to save the calves by sending them to
Bellot Island, near by. When one was untied he died
immediately. " The other was taken up into the ravine,
following Long like a dog, but, despite all efforts, the men
were unable to leave him there ; he ran after the sledge
and returned to the station. After arriving near the
SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS. 253
house he followed Long everywhere, and was finally car-
ried to his old pen. He died the next day."
The Franklin party saw a few Eskimos who fled at
tlieir approach, leaving an aged man who was too infirm
to follow tliem. He was bent and white-haired. " When-
ever Terragaunoeuck received a present," says Franklin,
" he placed each article first on his right shoulder, then
on his left ; and when he wished to express still higher
satisfaction, he rubbed it over his head. He held hatch-
ets and other iron instruments in the highest esteem.
On seeing his countenance in a glass for the first time, he
exclaimed, ' I shall never kill deer more,' and immedi-
ately put the mirror down. . . . These Eskimos strike
fire with two stones, catching the sparks in the down of
the catkins of a willow. . . Their cooking utensils are
made of pot-stone, and they form very neat dishes of
fur, the sides being made of thin deal bent into an oval
form, secured at the ends by seaming, and fitted so nicely
to the bottom as to be perfectly water-tight. Tliey have
also large spoons made of the horns of the musk oxen."
Terregaunoeuck gave each person a piece of dried meat,
which, though highly tainted, was at once eaten, as this
was a token of peaceable intention.
After reaching the Arctic Ocean, they explored the
coast for five hundred and fifty-five miles, and would
gladly have gone farther, but meeting no Eskimos who
could provide them with food, and killing only some
bears and two small deer, they turned back on the 22d of
August, at a point which Franklin named Point Turna-
gain, on Dease Strait, six and one-half degrees east from
the mouth of the Coppermine River.
It was a perilous journey in their light canoes, and
most of the Indians refused to take it, having no faith
254 SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS.
that such boats could live amid the blocks of ice and in
the storms.
Soon after starting they landed on an island where the
Eskimos had stored up fishing implements and winter
sledges, with dressed seal, musk ox, and deer-skins.
" We took from this deposit," says Franklin, " four seal-
skins to repair our shoes, and left in exchange a copper
kettle and some awls and beads."
At several places where Eskimos had been encamped,
leaving either sledges or skins till their return, Franklin
left presents of knives and beads, to show the friendship
of the white men. This was but in accordance with the
nature of the man so universally beloved and so univer-
sally lamented.
They explored a gulf and named it Coronation Gulf in
honor of George IV., who had recently come to the
throne. Hood River was named after Franklin's young
companion. Some islands he called Porden, after Miss
Eleanor Anne Porden, the daughter of an eminent archi-
tect, and a girl of much talent. When Buchan and
Franklin made their first trip in the Dorothea and the
Trent to the Arctic regions, she wrote a sonnet on the
expedition, which led to her acquaintance with Franklin,
and a deeper interest in him and his journey. She soon
after wrote a poem, assuming the character of an Es-
kimo maiden, begging Franklin to return to the North.
Perhaps he could read between the lines that his return
to England would be equally welcomed.
On the departure for Fort Enterprise it was decided
to take the shortest route overland, one hundred and
forty-nine miles in a straight line. The stores and books
were to be left in boxes en cache; that is, covered up with
a pile of stones away from the wolves, while each man
^7/.' JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS. 255
bore on liis shoulders about ninety pounds' weight in
amniunition, nets, hatchets, astronomical instruments,
blankets, kettles, and two canoes.
On the evening of the day on which they started they
killed a cow from a drove of musk oxen, but the men
were too heavily laden to carry more than a small portion
of the flesh. This was unfortunate, as food soon became
scarce.
Early in September snow fell three feet deep, and
storms were frequent. The last piece of pemican was
gone. This food was prepared, says Sir John Richard-
son, in his " Arctic Searching Expedition," " from beef of
the best quality, cut into thin steaks, from which the
fat and membranous parts were pared away, was dried
in a malt kiln over an oak fire, until its moisture was
entirely dissipated, and the fibre of the meat became fri-
able." After being ground- in a mill, it was mixed with
equal weight of beef-suet or lard. Sometimes Zante
currants or sugar were added. The tents and bedclothes
were frozen, and all began to suffer from insufficient food.
Franklin writes in his journal, " I was seized with a
fainting fit, in consequence of exhaustion and sudden
exposure to the wind ; but after eating a morsel of port-
able soup, I recovered so far as to be able to move on.
I was unwilling at first to take this morsel of soup, which
was diminishing the small and only remaining meal of
the party ; but several of the men urged me to it, witli
much kindness."
The larger of the two canoes became so broken through
the falling of the man who carried it that it was valueless.
They therefore used it to build a fire to cook the last of
their soup and arrow-root, a scanty meal after three days'
fasting. In the afternoon they gathered some ti'ipe de
256 SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS.
roche from the rocks, and with half a partridge each,
which liad been shot diiring tlie day, they made a sup-
per, cooked by a few willows dug from beneath the snow.
They slept that night and all the succeeding nights
upon their shoes and socks, to prevent them from freezing.
They forded rapid rivers, often up to their breasts in
water, and sometimes carried over one passenger at a
time in their leaky canoe. One of the men walked all
night to hunt a herd of musk oxen wliich he had seen,
but was enabled to bring back only four pounds of a
deer, the rest of wliich had been devoured b}^ wolves.
Finally, in a herd of musk oxen, they killed a cow
which was skinned and cut up at once. "The contents
of its stomach were devoured upon the spot, and the
raw intestines," writes Franklin. " A few willows
whose tops were seen peeping through the snow in the
bottom of the valley Avere quickly grubbed, the tents
pitched, and supper cooked and devoured with avidity.
This was the sixth day since we had had a good meal,
the trljje de roche (lichens), even when we got enough,
only serving to allay the pangs of hunger for a sliort
time ; " and he adds, '' This unpalatable weed was now
quite nauseous to the whole party," and produced sick-
ness among them.
The men were qrowing so weak after three weeks on
the march that it became necessary to lighten the bag-
gage by leaving the books and several of the instruments
on the way. Dr. liichardson was also obliged to leave
his specimens of plants and minerals.
In crossing a river three hundred yards wide, the canoe
was overturned in the middle of the rapid, and being
righted and entered, she struck a rock and went down ;
but they were able to rescue her, though Franklin's port-
SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS. 257
folio, with his journals, meteorological and astronomical
observations made during the descent of the Coppermine
River and along the seacoast, were lost. One of the
men, Belanger, was nearly drowned and dragged senseless
through the rapid by a small cord belonging to one of
the nets. When rescued he was rolled in blankets, and
two men undressed themselves and went to bed with
him; but he did not recover warmth and sensation for
several hours.
On Sept. 15 a deer was killed, and this gave cause
for thanksgiving. When this was gone they ate the
skin. "We were now," writes Franklin, '• almost ex-
hausted by slender fare and travel, and our appetites
liad become ravenous. We looked, however, with hum-
ble confidence to the great Author and Giver of all
good, for a continuance of the support which had
liitherto been always supplied to us at our greatest
need." Evening prayers were read at the close of each
weary day.
The sun had not shone for six days, and the helpers
were becoming discouraged, and even threatened to
throw away their bundles. They did indeed throw
away the broken canoe, and could not be induced to
carry it again, and the officers had become too weak to
do so after the refusal of the men. "The latter halted
among some willows," says Franklin, "where they had
picked up some pieces of skin and a few bones of deer
that had been devoured by the wolves last spring. They
liad rendered the bones friable by burning, and eaten
tliem as well as the skin ; and several of them liad
added their old shoes to the repast." The officers also
" refreshed themselves by eating their old shoes and a
few scraps of leather."
258 SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS.
After eight days of famine tliey killed five small deer,
and "every heart was filled witli gratitude." They then
prepared to make a raft of willows to cross the Copper-
mine River, forty miles from Fort Enterprise.
The cold increased and the men became careless, and
scattered in different directions for hunting. When they
shot partridges, they secreted them from the officers,
fearing starvation. Finally the raft was completed, and
Dr. Richardson, after several fruitless attempts by the
men to cross, attempted to swim with a line about his
body. He soon became benumbed with the cold, — he
was reduced to skin and bone for lack of food, and so
could not bear the exposure, — and sank before their
eyes. They instantly pulled upon the line, and he was
drawn in almost lifeless. He was restored ; but, his
whole left side being deprived of feeling, did not come
to its natural condition till the following summer.
Finally a kind of canoe Avas made out of the painted
canvas in which they wrapped their bedding, and it
was covered with pitch gathered from the small pines
which grew near. Meantime the men had found the
putrid carcass of a deer which had perished in the cleft
of a rock in the spring, and it was devoured at once.
Again they found "the antlers and back bone of a deer
which had been killed in the summer. The wolves and
birds of prey had picked them clean, but there still
remained a quantity of the spinal marrow which they
had not been able to extract. This," writes Franklin,
" although putrid, was esteemed a valuable prize, and
the spine being divided into portions, was distributed
equally. After eating the marrow, which was so acrid
as to excoriate the lips, we rendered the bones friable by
burning, and ate them also,"
SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS. 259
The company liad now become so weak that some
walked by the support of a stick. They coukl talk of
little else but the dire need for food.
They crossed the river in the little canoe, one at a
time being drawn over; but at each passage it tilled with
water, and their clothes and bedding were wet and fro-
zen. They now ate the remains of their old shoes and
whatever scraps of leather they had, and pressed for-
ward in 'tlie deep snow, some falling at almost every
step. At last some became benumbed and speechless,
and their companions Avere unable to carry them. Death
stared the whole party in the face.
Finally it was decided to leave Kichardson and Hood
with faitliful John Hepburn to help them to gather
what trijie de roche they could, while Franklin and
the rest pushed on towards Fort Enterprise. After they
''had united in thanksgiving and prayers to Almighty
■God," the forlorn party started Avith the hope of linding
succor and relieving these three companions.
Unable to carry the tent, they cut it up, and the next
night crept close together, but could not keep warm in
the deepening snow. Perrault, one of the men, had
become so dizzy that he could not stand, and J. B.
Belanger and Michel an Iroquois begged to return to
llichardson and Hood, which was reluctantly permitted.
About two miles farther on Fontano, an Italian, fell
down utterly exhausted, and was allowed to find his way
back, if possible, to the other men.
The Franklin party was now reduced to four men
besides himself, Adam, Peltier, Benoit, and Samandre.
They collected some tripe de roche, and partook of their
only meal in four days. They saw alierd of reindeer, but
their only liunter, Adam, was too feeble to pursue them.
260 SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS.
At length the starving company readied Fort Enter-
prise. What was their horror to find no deposit of pro-
visions, as Akaitcho, the chief, had promised, and no
trace of Indians. Tlie whole party gave way to a flood
of tears. They found a note from Mr. Back, who had
reached the place two days before with St. Germain, Sol-
omon Belanger, and Beauparlant, that he had gone in
search of Indians.
They learned afterward the reason why Akaitcho had
failed to keep his word in leaving provisions. Though
disbelieving that the white men would come back alive, he
entrusted the matter to his brother Humpy, who with
his men failed to get a supply of ammunition from Fort
Providence, and were obliged to turn old axes into balls.
Several of the leading hunters were drowned, and some
actually starved. Some writing was left on a plank for
Franklin showing these reasons ; but as the house had
become opened and a home for wild beasts, the writing
had become destroyed.
Franklin and his party then looked round at Fort
Enterprise for something to eat, and to their great joy
found some deer-skins which had been thrown away dur-
ing their former residence. Some bones were also gath-
ered from the ash heap. They i)nlled up the floors of
the little house for a fire.
Scarcely were they seated at the fire, when Belanger
came, almost speechless and covered with ice, with a
note from Back that he could find no trace of Indians.
Franklin determined at once to search himself for
Indians, as this was their only hope for life, and took
with him Eenoit, and Augustus who had strayed away
from the party and was now returned. They parted
sadly from their companions, but Franklin says "There
Slli JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTUERS. 261
was far move calmness and resignation to tlie Divine
will evinced by every one than could have been ex-
pected." Franklin broke his snow-shoes, and was
obliged to return to the Fort while the men went on.
Adam was ill, and Sauiandre too despairing and Aveak
to help, both weeping all day long. Peltier gathered
the wood, and Franklin cooked whatever skins he could
find under the snow. Their strength declined, and when
once seated they had to help each other to arise. But
all the time Franklin conversed cheerfully, and bade
them hope for relief.
A herd of reindeer passed, but nobody could fire a gun
without resting it upon some support. They could no
longer cut wood, being unable to lift the hatchet. At
this juncture Dr. Richardson and Hepburn entered.
They had a sad story to relate, Mr. Hood, the artist,
liad been shot by Michel,- the Iroquois, in the back of
the head. Dickersteth's " Scripture Helj) " was lying
open beside the body, and it is ])robable that the bril-
liant and warm-hearted young officer was reading it at the
time he was shot. It now became probable to Eichard-
son that the Indian, Michel, had killed and eaten Jean
F>aptist Belanger and Perrault, and that the supposed
deer-meat which he brought to the tent was portions of
their bodies. Michel became surly, threatened Hepburn,
and Avould not obey orders. He said, "It is no use
liuiiting, there are no animals ; you had better kill and
eat me." Fearing for their own lives, Dr. Richardson
shot him through the head. Credit, Fontano, and Vail-
lant, three other helpers, were also dead on the way.
Richardson became so exhausted on the journey to the
fort that he fell frequently, and was saved only by the
faithful Hejiburu. As soon as they arrived, tlie latter
262 SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS.
killed a partridge, and after holding it before the fire
for a few minutes, it was divided equally to each man.
" It was the first flesh any of us had tasted," says Frank-
lin, " for thirty-one days." . . . The doctor having
brought his prayer-book and Testament, some prayers
and portions of Scripture, appropriate to our situation,
were read, and we retired to bed."
Peltier and Samandre soon died from exhaustion, and
the rest were unable to bury them. Adam wa,s so low
that Franklin remained constantly by his side, and slept
by him at night to keep some warmth in his emaciated
body.
Nov. 4 Franklin found but three bones, and returned
fatigued to the house. The doctor and Hepburn were
now unable to rise without each helping the other.
They all uttered fretful expressions, which were no
sooner spoken than atoned for. They still read the New
Testament, and prayed morning and evening, — a pitiful
circle of worshippers in that cheerless hut, — but it
" always afforded us the greatest consolation," says
Franklin, " serving to reanimate our hopes in the mercy
of the Omnipotent, who alone could save and deliver
us."
Nov. 7 they heard the report of a gun, and then saw
three Indians close to the house. Dr. Ricliardson and
Franklin "immediately addressed thanksgiving to the
throne of mercy for this deliverance." Adam could not
comprehend it ; he was so weak ; he tried to rise, but
sank down again.
The Indians had been sent by Mr. Back from Akait-
cho's encampment, which he had finally reached, and
brought dried deer-meat, some fat, and a few tongues.
Deliverance had come at last, and they were saved from
Slli JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS. 2G8
starvation. One Indian returned to Akaitcho to tell about
their condition, while two, Crooked-Foot and the Rat,
stayed to give the most watchful care to the white men,
feeding them as if they were children.
Meantime the journey of Back and his men had been
replete with hardships. They lived on bones and skins
abandoned by the wolves on account of the severity of
the weather. Poor Beanparlant fell and froze to death
on the journey. Their feet were cracked, their faces
and fingers frozen, and they barely escaped death.
When Franklin and his men were somewhat recov-
ered, they moved on towards Fort Providence. " The
Indians," he says, " treated us with the utmost tender-
ness, gave us their snow-shoes, and walked without
themselves, keeping by our sides, that they might lift
us when we fell."
Finally they reached the encampment of the chief,
Akaitcho, where they were warmly welcomed, the chief
cooking for them with his own hands. They reached
Fort Providence Dec. 11. Letters awaited them from
England. Franklin, Back, and Hood had been pro-
moted, the former to be commander, the two latter to
be lieutenants. Alas, that Hood's had come too late !
Adam, the interpreter, joined himself to the Copper
Indians, and the rest of the i^arty, with dogs and sledges,
reached York Factory on tlio Hudson Bay, July 14, 1822,
having made by land and water one of the most perilous
journeys on record, of five thousand five hundred and
fifty miles. Franklin reached England after an absence
of about three years. He was immediately made a Fel-
low of the Royal Society for his valuable contributions
to science in the way of exploration aiitl discovers, and
was honored throughout England for his bravery, his
264 SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS.
self-sacrifice, and heroic character. His book, published
the following year, modest, clear, and most interesting,
was widely read.
He was at this time, says one of his relatives, in
expression, ''grave and mild, and very benignant ; his
build, thoroughly that of a sailor; his stature, rather
below the middle heiglit ; his look, very kind, and his
manner very quiet, thougli not without a certain dignity,
as of one accustomed to command others." He had also
great cheerfulness, and a self-reliance which marked him
as a natural leader of men.
Commander Parry voiced the general feeling when he
wrote him : "Of the splendid achievements of yourself
and your brave companions in enterprise, I can hardly
trust myself to speak, for I am apprehensive of not con-
veying what, indeed, can never be conveyed adequately
in words — my unbounded admiration of what you have,
under the blessing of God, been enabled to perform, and
the manner in which you have performed it. . , . In you
and your party, my dear friend, we see so sublime an
instance of Christian confidence in the Almighty, of the
superiority of moral and religious energy over mere
brute strength of body, that it is impossible to contem-
plate your sufferings and preservation without a sense
of reverential awe ! . . . Your letter was put into my
hand at Shetland, and I need not be ashamed to say that
I cried over it like a cliild."
Franklin had another reason for happiness and grati-
tude. He had won the heart and promise of marriage
of the young poet, Eleanor Anne Porden. She had
published an epic poem in two volumes called "Coeur de
Lion," and a scientific poem called " The Veils," for
which she was made a member of tlie Institute of Paris.
SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS. 265
She was highly esteemed, and drew about her a charm-
ing circle of intellectual men and women. Once when
at the Royal Institute in London she heard some one
remark, " that those ladies better be at home making
puddings." With a smile, she answered, turning
towards him, " We made those before we came out ! "
They were married Aug. 19, 1823. At this time slie
was twenty-six years of age, and he eleven years her
senior, being thirty-seven. Before marriage she prom-
ised him never to deter him from accepting any position
of hardship, and she kept her word.
The next year their only cliild was born, June 3, 1824,
to whom was given the name of her mother, Eleanor.
Eight months afterwards Franklin was leaving the bed-
side of a dying wife, to make a second expedition over
the same starvation route which he had taken less than
three years before. He carried with him a flag, a silk
Union Jack, wrought by her fragile hands in her illness,
with strict injunctions that it should not be unfolded
till he was in the Arctic Sea. She urged his going, but
knew that the good-by was final. She died six days after
his departure.
Captain Parry was about to make his third voyage in
searcli of the North-west Passage, and Captain Franklin
proposed another land expedition to the mouth of the
Mackenzie Kiver, when one part of the company should
come eastward along the coast to the Coppermine River,
and the other part should explore the coast to the west-
ward. A third expedition, under Captain Beechey, was
to proceed to Kotzebue Inlet in Bering Strait, with the
object of meeting Franklin as he journeyed west from
the mouth of the Mackenzie River, while Dr. Richard-
son, his former companion, came eastward.
266 SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS.
Pranldin and his party left England Feb. 16, 1825,
and after reaching New York, travelled through the
States and Canada, arriving at the Saskatchewan River,
June 15. He had already heard of the death of his
lovely young wife.
The party reached Fort Resolution on Great Slave
Lake, July 29. Here they .met Humpey, tlie brother of
the chief Akaitcho, and some other prominent Indians,
who shook hands with Franklin, pressing his hand against
their hearts, and exclaiming, " How much we regret
that we cannot tell what we feel for you here!" On
Aug. 2 they entered Mackenzie River, which was over
two miles broad, and in five days reached Fort Korman.
Lieutenant Back of the previous expedition, and Mr.
Dease of the Hudson Bay Company, were commissioned
to proceed to Great Bear Lake, east of the river, and
build a house for the winter. Dr. Richardson was to
explore the northern shore of the lake. Franklin and
Mr. Kendall (who afterwards married Miss Kay, the
niece of Mrs. Franklin) with an Eskimo interpreter,
Augustus, of the former voyage, a native guide, and a
crew of six Englishmen, sailed towards the mouth of the
Mackenzie.
The sea was reached in six daj^s. Here Franklin un-
furled the silken flag of his beloved Eleanor. He wrote
to her sister : " Here was first displayed the flag which
my lamented Eleanor made, and you can imagine it was
with heartfelt emotion I first saw it unfurled ; but in a
short time I derived great pleasure in looking at it."
They returned to the winter quarters, which had been
named in the absence of the commander Fort Franklin,
and passed the season quite comfortably. They exam-
ined all the country round, and made scientific observa-
SIR JOUN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS. 267
tions. Franklin wrote Sir R. J. Murchison : " We have
got Conybeare and Phillips, Phillips and Jameson on
Mineralogy, and Humboldt on the superposition of
rocks. ... I have been delighted with Dante, and so
have my companions ; but I must confess there is fre-
quently a depth of thought and reasoning to which my
mind can hardly reach — perhaps these parts will be
better comprehended on re-perusal. It seems clear
that Milton, as well as other poets, have borrowed ideas
from his comprehensive mind."
Franklin established a school for the men and others
in camp, which the officers taught. The men built a
large boat in their leisure hours, which was called the
Reliance.
In early summer the party made ready for travel.
Late in May the white anemones blossomed abundantly.
Mosquitoes became '' vigorous and tormenting." Four-
teen men under Franklin and Back, in the boats Lion
and Reliance, started westward on the seacoast July 7,
1826. That very day about three hundred Eskimos
in their little canoes, or kayaks, which hold one
person each, gathered about them, and wished to
trade. One of the kayaks was overturned and its
owner plunged headforemost into the mud ; but he was
kindly cared for by Augustus, the Eskimo interpreter,
who wrapped him in his own great-coat. The man and
the great-coat disappeared later.
The Eskimos now rushed into the Lion and Reliance,
stealing all they could lay their hands upon, and hand-
ing the articles to the Avomen, who hid them. Two or
three of the larger Eskimos grasped Franklin by the
wrists and forced him to sit between them. "The third
took his station in front to catch my arm whenever I
268 SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS.
attempted to lift my gun," says Franklin, "or the
broad dagger which hung by my side. The whole way
to the shore they kept repeating the word ' teyma,' beat-
ing gently on my left breast with their hands, and press-
ing mine against their breasts. As we nearedthe beach,
two omiaks [larger boats for women and children] full of
women arrived, and the teymas and vociferations were
redoubled."
The Eskimos now became so importunate that the
crews beat them off with the large ends of their mus-
kets, but Franklin had given orders previously that no
blood should be shed. Finally they got away from the
thieving crowd. " I am still of opinion that, mingled as
we were with them," said the commander, " the first
blood we had shed would have been instantly revenged
by the sacrifice of all our lives." Both the crews, follow-
ing the example of their leader, had shown the utmost
coolness as well as bravery.
Later in the journey they met Eskimos who wove
pieces of bone or shells in their noses, and on each side
of the under lip circular pieces of ivory with a large
blue bead in the centre. When unable to procure
ivory, stones were substituted.
'' The dress of the women," writes Franklin, " differed
from that of the men only in their wearing wide trousers
and in the size of their hoods, which do not lit close to
the head, but are made large for the purpose of receiv-
ing their children. These are ornamented with stripes
of different colored skins, and round the top is fastened
a band of wolf's hair, made to stand erect. Their own
black hair is very tastefully turned up from behind
to the top of the head, and tied by strings of white and
blue beads, or cords of white deer-skin. It is divided in
SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS. 269
front so as to form on each side a thick tail, to wliich
are appended strings of beads that reach to the waist.
The women were from four feet and a half to four and
three-quarters high, and generally fat." Lieutenant
Back sketched one of these women, and she testified her
pleasure by smiles and jumps. The men were more
sedate about their portraits, " but not less pleased than
the women," says the journal of Franklin. The natives
call themselves Tnuits — not Eskimos — from the word
inuk, meaning a man.
The weather was foggy ; they were detained often by
ice, and finally, when about half-way to Icy Cape, where
Captain Beechey was to meet them on his way up from
Bering Strait, Franklin and his party, seeing that they
could not possibly reach Beechey before winter, when
all would probably perish, turned back, Aug. 18, calling
the place Return Reef. He had travelled along the coast
three hundred and seventy-four miles. Captain Beechey
reached Icy Cape the middle of August, one hundred
and sixty miles from the point where Franklin turned
back.
They reached Fort Franklin Sept. 21, having travelled
2,048 miles since they started. They found that Dr.
Richardson and his party had explored the coast from the
Mackenzie to the Coppermine Rivers, 863 miles, — 1,908
miles in all, by land and water, — the doctor naming a
bay which they discovered Franklin Bay, saying, as he
i)estowed the name, " After having served under Captain
Franklin for nearly seven years in two successive voyages
of discovery, I trust I may be allowed to say that, how-
ever high his brother officers may rate his courage and
talents, either in the ordinary line of his professional
duty, or in the field of discovery, the hold he acquires
270 SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS.
upon the affections of those under his command, by a
continual series of the most conciliatory attentions to
their feelings, and an uniform and unremitting regard to
their best interests, is not less conspicuous." Dr. Rich-
ardson had gathered valuable geological data and natural
history collections with Mr. Drummond. The latter had
travelled to the Rocky Mountains, and endured great
hardships in the journey. In a solitary hut built by
himself on the mountains, he collected two hundred
specimens of birds and animals, and more than fifteen
hundred plants.
Dr. Richardson made a careful study of the different
tribes which he met. " Among the Kutchin tribe the
women," he says, " in winter do all the drudgery, sucli as
collecting the firewood, assisting the dogs in hauling the
sledge, bringing in the snow to melt for water, and, in
fact, perform all the domestic duties except cooking,
which is the man's office ; and the wives do not eat till
the husband is satisfied. In summer the women labor
little, except in drying meat or fish for its preservation.
The men alone paddle, while the women sit as passen-
gers ; and husbands will even carry their wives to the
shore in their arms, that the}^ may not wet their feet."
The Tinne tribe do not altogether preclude women from
eating with men, " though in times of scarcity the man
would expect to be first fed, as it is a maxim with them
that the woman who cooks can be well sustained by lick-
ing her fingers."
Yet, says Dr. Richardson, these women have influence
over the men, "and they seldom permit provisions or
other articles to be disposed of without expressing their
thoughts on the matter with much earnestness and volu-
bility."
SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS. 271
Some tribes have a unique method of courtship.
" Early in the morning," says Richardson, " the lover
makes his appearance at the abode of the father of the
object of his choice, and, without a word of explanation,
begins to heat the bath-room, to bring in water, and to pre-
pare food. Then he is asked who he is, and why he per-
forms these offices. In reply he expresses his wish to
have the daughter for a wife; ... he remains as a
servant in the house a whole year. At the end of that
time he receives a reward for his services from the
father, and takes home his bride."
Among some of the Eskimos, as in North Green-
land, Kane says, the bride is carried off by force. The
girl betrothed to Jens was carried off three times, but
she managed to keep her troth. "In the result," says
Kane, " Jens, as phlegmatic and stupid a half-breed as I
ever met with, got the prettiest woman in all North
Greenland."
The whole Franklin party wintered again atEort Frank-
lin, the thermometer being sometimes at fifty-eight below
zero. Feb. 20, 1827, Franklin started homeward, reach-
ing Enghmd Sept. 26, 1827, after an absence of more than
two years and seven months.
For scientific observations and exploration of over a
thousand miles of the unknown coast of North America
Franklin was presented with the gold medal of the Paris
Geographical Society, valued at twelve hundred francs,
for "the most important acquisition to geographical
knowledge " during the year. Two years later, April 29,
1820, he was knighted, becoming Sir John Franklin, and
in the following July received the honorary degree of
D.C.L. from the conservative University of Oxford. Later,
in 184G, he was elected Correspondent of the Institute of
Fi'^uce in the Academy of Sciences.
272 SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS.
A little over a year after his return to England, Nov.
5, 1828, Franklin, then forty-two years old, married Jane
Griffin, thirty-six years of age, second daughter of John
•Griffin, Esq., of Bedford Place, London, a lady of fine
intellect, and of wealth, and a helper in all possible ways.
She became a mother to the only child of Sir John, little
Eleanor, four and a half years old.
Meantime Parry, who was to act in concert with Frank-
lin if they came near to each other, had sailed in the
Hecla and Fury on his third voyage from England, May
19, 1824, some months before Franklin. They passed
through Baffin's Bay, into Lancaster Sound ; and the ice
preventing his pushing forward, he was obliged to win-
ter at Port Boven, on the east side of Prince Regent Inlet.
This was his third winter in the Arctic regions. " All
is dreary monotonous Avhiteness," he writes, " not merely
for days or weeks, but for more than half a year to-
gether. Whichever way the eye is turned it meets a
picture calculated to impress. upon the mind an idea of
inanimate stillness, of that motionless torpor with which
our feelings have nothing congenial; of anything, in
short, but life. In the very silence there is a deadness
with which a human spectator appears out of keeping.
The presence of man seems an intrusion on the dreary
solitude of this wintry desert, which even its native ani-
mals have for awhile forsaken."
The sun was absent from the view of Parry and his men
for one hundred and twenty-one days, and the thermom-
eter was below zero for one hundred and thirty-one days.
They did not break out of the ice till July 20, and
very soon after the Fury went to pieces on the shore.
The place where she struck was called Fury Beach, on
the east side of Prince Regent Inlet; and her provisions
SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS. 273
were left there, wliile her officers and crew went back to
England on the Hecla.
Unsuccessful in finding the North-west Passage, Parry
sailed two years later, on his fourtli voyage, with the hope
of reaching the North Pole. He left England April
3, 1827, and reached Spitzbergen in May, when two boats,
Enterprise and Endeavor, left the ship Hecla, and under
Parry and Lieutenant James C. Ross, went northward.
After a toilsome journey of 978 geographical miles —
1,127 statute miles — over ice-floes and through deep
snow, travelling at night on account of snow-blindness,
they reached latitude 82° 45', a higher position than any
other navigator at that time had attained, and then
started homeward, arriving in England at nearly the same
time with Eranklin from his American coast-line expe-
dition in 1827.
Little more was done by the government for some
years in Arctic research. In 1829 the Victory, fitted out
by Sir Felix Booth, was commanded by Sir John Ross
and his nephew, James Ross, for the discovery of tlie
North-west Passage. Sir Felix gave seventeen thousand
pounds towards the enterprise, and Sir John Ross three
thousand pounds.
They sailed through Lancaster Sound and into Prince
Regent Inlet, where, after examining three hundred
miles of undiscovered coast, they went into winter quar-
ters at Felix Harbor on the east coast of Boothia in
Boothia Gulf. The next year they made several sledge
journeys, one to King William Island, which land has
since possessed a melancholy history. They named the
northern point Cape Felix, and twenty miles to the
south-west Victory Point, from which place they returned
to their ship. Six of their eight dogs were dead
274 SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS.
from exhaustion, and tliey themselves were nearly
famished.
After a second winter in the ship, James Eoss discov-
ered the position of the North Magnetic Pole on the
western shore of Boothia, in latitude 70° 5' 17 " in the
spring, and other journeys were made. The ship was
still locked in the ice, and they spent a third winter
upon her.
They determined at last to abandon her, knowing that
they could not survive much longer. Scurvy had broken
out, and some had died. They left the ship April 23,
1832, and went northward through Prince Regent Inlet,
hoping to be saved by some whaling-vessel, but none ap-
pearing they were obliged to return and winter as best
they could at Fury Beach, and live on the provisions left
by Parry, when the Fury was wrecked in the summer of
1825, seven years before.
After the fourth winter " their situation," writes Ross,
" was becoming truly awful, since, if they were not lib-
erated in the ensuing summer, little prospect appeared of
their surviving another year. It was necessary to make
a reduction in the allowance of preserved meats ; bread
was somewhat deficient, and the stock of wine and spirits
was entirely exhausted." As early in the summer as
possible they worked their way to Lancaster Sound,
where they were finally picked up by the whaler, Isa-
bella. Ross had some difficulty in making his story be-
lieved on board, as he had been reported dead two years
before. Their arrival in England in the autumn of 1833
was hailed with great joy.
In the spring of the year in which they were rescued,
1833, Captain George Back, who had served so heroically
under Franklin, undertook a search expedition for the
SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS. 215
missing navigator, Sir John Ross. The company crossed
over from Hudson Bay, arriving at Fort Resolution, on
Great Slave Lake, Aug. 8. They suffered greatly from
sand-flies and mosquitoes. " It is in vain," says Back in
his account of his journey, " to attempt to defend yourself
against these puny bloodsuckers : though you crush thou-
sands of them, tens of thousands arise to avenge the death
of their companions, and you very soon discover that the
conflict which you are waging is one in which you are sure
to be defeated. So great at last are the pains and fatigue
in buffeting away this attacking force, that in despair
you throw yourself, half-suffocated, in a blanket, with
your face upon the ground, and snatch a few minutes of
sleepless rest. ... As we dived into the confined and
suffocating chasms, or waded through the close swamps,
they rose in clouds, actually darkening the air. To see
or to speak was equally difficult, for they rushed at
every undefended part, and fixed their poisonous fangs
in an instant. Our faces streamed with blood, as if
leeches had been applied."
Back and his company determined to reach the sea by
one of the unexplored rivers, the existence of which was
known, but nothing of its source or character. They
passed the winter on Great Slave Lake, at Fort Reliance.
Bands of starving Indians lingered about them, as
they could obtain nothing by hunting, and hoped for
relief from the white men. They would watch every
mouthful taken by the men at their meals, but utter no
word of complaint. It was impossible to give relief to
all, but even small portions of mouldy pemican, which
had been saved for the dogs, were gratefully received.
"Famine with her gaunt and bony arm," says Back,
"pursued them at every turn, withered their energies,
276 SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTIIEUS.
and strewed them lifeless on the cold bosom of the
snow. , . . Often did I share my own plate with the chil-
dren whose helpless state and piteous cries were pecu-
liarly distressing. Compassion for the full-grown may,
or may not, be felt, but that heart must be cased in steel
which is insensible to the cry of a child for food."
The food of the white men finally became so reduced
that it is doubtful if they would have survived had it
not been for Akaitcho, the chief, who brought them some
meat. He said, " The great chief trusts in us, and it is
better that ten Indians perish than that one white man
should perish through our negligence and breach of faith."
Augustus, the Eskimo interpreter, hearing that Cap-
tain Back was again in the country, set out on foot
from Hudson Bay to join him; but either exhausted by
the journey, or starved, or frozen in the blinding storms,
he never reached Back, for his bleached body was found
on the way afterwards. He was " a faithful, disinter-
ested, kind-hearted creature," said Back, " who had won
the regard, not of myself only, but, I may add, of Sir J.
Franklin and Dr. Richardson also."
Tne winter passed at Fort Reliance was cold in the
extreme, the weather seventy degrees below zero, and
even lower. " With eight logs of dry wood on the fire,"
says Back, " I could not get the thermometer higher than
twelve degrees below zero. Ink and paint froze. The
skin of the hands became dry, cracked, and opened into
unsightly and smarting gashes, which we were obliged
to anoint with grease. On one occasion, after washing
my face within three feet of the fire, my hair was clotted
with ice before I had time to dry it."
Towards the end of April, as the company were pre-
paring for the search, the welcome news came that Ross
SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS. 277
and his men had been saved by the Isabella. Now that
they were in the wilds of North America, they were
obliged, however, to push on their explorations.
On July 8, with their boat-load of provisions and ten
persons, they proceeded to sail down the Great Fish
Kiver, which they found abounding in rapids and bowl-
ders, — live large rapids in a distance of three miles, — a
river five hundred and thirty geographical miles in
length, broadening out into five large lakes, without a
single tree oti the whole line of its banks.
On their return up the river they again wintered at
Fort Reliance, and returned to England Sept. 8, 1835,
after an absence of two years and a half. Back was
knighted, becoming Sir George Back, and given the
gold medal of the Royal Geographical Society for dis-
covering the Great Fish River, whicli thereafter bore
his name, and navigating it to the Arctic Sea. Back's
Great Fish River has a mournful history in connection
with Sir John Franklin, and will always be pathetically
associated with King William Island.
All this time Sir John Franklin was not idle. In
1830, Aug. 23, he was appointed to the command of
the twenty -six-gun frigate Rainbow, for service in the
Mediterranean, So well beloved was he by his men,
that the ship was called the Celestial Rainbow, and the
sailors named her Franklin's Paradise.
As by the rules of the uavy his wife could not be in
the ship with him, she travelled with friends in Syria,
Palestine, and Egypt, rejoining him when he was sta-
tioned at any city. She had already travelled exten-
sively in Europe with her father.
Franklin exerted great influence in the troubled condi-
tion of Greece at this time. He was frequently called
278 SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS.
upon to help preserve order and to protect the inhabit-
ants. For his services during the War of Liberation
he was made a Knight of the Redeemer of Greece, by
King Otho, and a Knight Commander of the Guelphic
Order of Hanover, by England.
" To your calm and steady conduct may be attributed
the preservation of the town and inhabitants of Patras,"
wrote Admiral Sir H. Hotham to Franklin, " the pro-
tection of commerce, and the advancement of the benev-
olent intentions of the Allied Sovereigns in favor of the
Greek nation."
After this he was offered the Lieutenant-Governorship
of Van Diemen's Land, now Tasmania, and accepted
with permission to resign in case of war. He and Lady
Franklin, with Eleanor, now thirteen years old, and a
favorite niece of Lady Franklin, Miss Sophia Cracroft,
sailed in the ship Fairlee, reaching Hobart Town in
January, 1837. No sooner was Franklin established in
his home than he began to devise projects for the good
of the people under his control. He begged the Home
Government for a charter for a large college. On the
recommendation of Dr. Arnold of Eugby, Rev. J. P.
Gell was sent out from England to organize such an
institution. The Legislative Council voted £2,500 to
begin the matter, and the corner-stone was laid by Sir
John at Norfolk House, Nov. 7, 1840.
Quarrels by different religious denominations and
local jealousies, some wishing the college to be built at
Hobart Town, made the Imperial Government withdraw
its support, and the college had to be given up. Mr.
Gell, however, established an excellent school at Hobart
Town, to which Lady Franklin gave four hundred acres
of land and Sir John contributed five hundred pounds.
SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS. 279
Mr. Gell afterwards married Eleanor, the only child of Sir
O"ohn, who died in 1860, when her husband was vicar of
St. John's, Notting Hill.
Sir John founded a Scientific Society at Hobart Town,
Avhicli is now the Royal Society of Tasmania. Its object
was to treat of natural history, agriculture, and the like.
The papers contributed by the members were })ul)lished
at his expense. He also built the Tasmania Museum, to
contain collections made in natural history. He raised
a monument in South Australia, in conjunction with the
government there, to his old friend Captain Flinders,
with whom in his youth he had helped to explore the
Australian coast. It is a granite obelisk, placed on a
high hill, and is a landmark for sailors. It was char-
acteristic of Franklin tliat he never forgot a friend.
Franklin gave much attention to surveys and explo-
rations, and looked carefully after the welfare of the
convicts, there being a very large penal settlement
near Hobart Town. Lady Franklin also took the deep-
est interest in the convicts. She corresponded with
Elizabeth Fry, about the women. She bought large
tracts of land, on which she established immigrants,
paying all their first expenses, providing implements
for work, charging a nominal rent for the land, and
giving the opportunity of purchase. At the end of
three years many had paid all their indebtedness.
When the ships Erebus and Terror, in 1839, — the
same ships in which Sir Jolni sailed later in his last
expedition to the Arctic Sea, — were sent under Sir
James Ross to the Antarctic continent for magnetic ob-
servations. Sir John rendered very valuable assistance,
superintending the creation of the magnetic observatory
in Tasmania, and making many of the observations.
280 SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS.
The observatory was later put in charge of Franklin's
nephew, Lieutenant Kay.
The Erebus and Terror were absent from England
four years in the Antarctic seas, making valuable contri-
butions to our knowledge of that still, for the most part,
unknown world. The ship Terror was commanded by
the lamented Captain F. R. M. Crozier. Only a little
time before she had crossed the ocean under Captain
Back, still in search of the North-west Passage, had
reached Salisbury Island in Hudson's Strait, been frozen
in off Cape Comfort in Fox Channel, and was driven
about from September to March, at the mercy of gales
and ice floes, and finally v/ent back in a sinking condi-
tion to England Avhere she was thoroughly repaired.
After being Governor in Tasmania for over six and a
half years, Franklin returned to England on account of
jealousies of those under him, and consequent disaffec-
tion. Some officers had been removed for "obstinacy of
temper," and injustice in police matters, and this also
caused ill feeling. The greatest crowd ever seen in the
colony, headed by the Bishop of Tasmania, followed
him and his family to the ship, and bade him a
tearful good-by. He was greatly beloved by the people
of Hobart Town, who have erected a statue in his honor,
and who gave £1,700 to Lady Franklin to help in the
search for him after his last Arctic voyage.
Nearly the whole northern line of seacoast in North
America had now been surveyed ; and all that was want-
ing to complete the North-west Passage was a space
north and south of about three hundred miles between
Barrow Strait, beyond Lancaster Sound, and Simpson's
Strait, at the southern extremity of King Wl'lliam
Island. It was hoped that it was a channel navigable
SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS. 281
for ships, but nobody knew. Franklin used to point on
tlie map to Simpson's Strait and say, " If I can but get
down there, my work is done ; thence it 's plain sailing
to the westward."
When the subject of another Arctic expedition was
agitated. Sir John asked to lead it, on the ground that
he was the senior Arctic officer alive who was free to take
the place, and had explored more in North America than
any other one person. Lord Haddington, First Lord of
the Admiralty, remarked to Sir Edward Parry, the navi-
gator, " Franklin is sixty years old. Ought we to let
him go ? "
" My lord," answered Parry, '' he is the best man I
know for the post ; and if you don't let him go, he will,
I am certain, die of disappointment."
Afterward Lord Haddington said to Sir John, that as
he had already done so nobly for his country, he might
be inclined to let a younger man take his place, as he
was now sixty years of age.
"No, my lord," was Franklin's ardent response; "you
have been misinformed — I am only fifty-nine ! "
He said also, " No service is nearer to my heart than the
completion of the survey of the north coast of America
and the accomplishment of a north-west passage."
The ships Erebus and Terror were made ready for the
voyage, Franklin in command of the Erebus, and his
second officer. Captain F. E.. M. Crozier, in command of the
Terror. Commander James Fitzjames was second in
the Erebus under Franklin. Dr. IL D. S. Goodsir. assist-
ant surgeon, was an eminent naturalist on the Erebus.
He succeeded his brother John (Professor of Anatomy
in the Edinburgh University) in the curatorship of the
Koyal College of Surgeons, and resigned to go in tlie
282 SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS.
Erebus for scientific investigation in the Arctic regions.
His younger brother, Eobert, twice visited the Polar seas
in search of his brother, Dr. Goodsii", who perished with
Sir John.
Captain Crozier, Fellow Royal Society, now forty-eight,
had been with Parry in three polar voyages, with Sir
James Ross, both in the Arctic and the Antarctic Seas,
and was especially skilled in the science of terrestrial
magnetism. Rear-Admiral McClintock says his " noble-
ness of character and warmth of heart had ever won for
him universal esteem and affection."
Captain Fitzjames, " an able, popular, and accomplished
officer," says Captain Markham, had distinguished him-
self in the Syrian campaign of 1840. In the Chinese
hostilities of 1842 he was five times gazetted for brave
conduct. He received four bullet wounds at the capture
of Ching-Kiang-Foo, one bullet passing through his body.
His sketches and his writings both showed him to be
a man of marked talent.
Commander Graham Gore, First Lieutenant of the
Erebus, was with Admiral Sir George Back in the Arctic
voyage of the Terror in 183G, and present at the capture
of Aden in 1839. He was even in temper and of great
stability of character.
Lieutenant John Irving of the Terror had spent several
years in Australia, and had served in the navy for sev-
enteen years. He was a talented draftsman.
Lieutenant H. T. D. Le Vesconte, of the Erebus, served
with distinction in the Chinese war, and was made lieu-
tenant for his bravery.
Lieutenant Charles F. des Voeux, mate of the Erebus,
had served in the Syrian war of 1840, under Sir Charles
Kapier. These have been mentioned among other able
SIR JOUN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS. 283
officers because their names will appear again in the his-
tory of the voyage.
The Erebus and Terror had on board twenty-three
officers and one hundred and eleven men — in all one
hundred and thirty-four persons. The ships carried pro-
visions for three years.
They left England May 19, 1845, all in good spirits,
Fitzjames wrote home to the son of Sir John Barrow :
" Sir John Franklin is delightful, active, and energetic,
and evidently even now persevering. What he has bee7i
we all know. I think it will turn out that lie is in no
way altered. He is full of conversation and interesting
anecdotes of his former voyages. I would not lose him
for the command of the exjiedition ; for I have a real
regard, I might say affection, for him, and believe this is
felt by all of us."
Again he wrote : '' Of all men he is the most fitted
for the command of an enterprise requiring sound sense
and great perseverance. I have learnt much from him,
and consider myself most fortunate in being with such a
man, and he is full of benevolence and kindness withal."
Later he wrote of Sir John's disbelief in an open Polar
Sea: "He also said he believed it to be possible to
reach the pole over the ice, by wintering at Spitzbergen,
and going in the spring before the ice broke up and
drifted to the south, as it did with Parry on it."
Captain Crozier wrote home, — one of the last letters
ever received from the expedition, — when they had
reached the Whale Fish Islands, July 4, near the island
of Disco, on the west coast of Queenland : " All is get-
ting on as well as I could Avish. Officers full of youth
and zeal, and, indeed, everything going on most smoothly.
... If we can do something worthy of the country which
284 SIE JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS.
has so munificently fitted us out, I will only be too
happy ; it will be an ample reward for all my anxieties,
and believe me, Henry, there will be no lack of them."
The ships sailed from the Whale Fish Islands on July
10. On July 26 they w^ere seen by Captain Dannet, of
the Prince of Wales, a whaler from Hull, made fast to
the ice in jMelville Bay, on the west coast of Greenland.
This is the last date on which the ships were ever seen,
so far as is known.
They sailed on, as later years have shown by the dis-
coveries, through Baffin's Bay into Lancaster Sound.
Unable to go westward into Barrow Strait, probably at
that time on account of ice, they went northward up
Wellington Channel. After going one hundred and fifty
miles they were compelled to return through a newly
discovered channel to the west, separating Cornwallis
and Bathurst Islands, and leading into Barrow Strait.
They spent the winter on Beechey Island, a little towards
the east, at the entrance of Wellington Channel. They
had already explored three hundred miles of new coast-
line. Three of their men died that winter ; and their
graves, found five years afterwards, revealed the fact
that they had wintered there. The next summer, IS-IG,
they must have pushed their way down Peel Strait, be-
tween North Somerset and Prince of Wales Land, lead-
ing towards Simpson's Strait. They passed Boothia
Felix, and when within twelve miles of King William
Island, Sept. 12, 1846, both ships were held fast in the
ice. They spent this winter not so happily as the pre-
vious one, and the summer of 1847 came ; still the ves-
sels remained hoplessly beset by the ice. This second
summer must have been a sad and weary one.
We now know that on ISIonday, j\Iay 24, 1847, two
SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS. 285
officers, Gore and Des Voeux, with six men, left the ships
to explore the country, and probably went down the west
coast of King William Island, towards Cape Herschel,
where they would look upon Simpson's Strait, and know
that the North-west Passage was found, though their
ships could not yet sail through the ninety miles of ice
to the strait.
Sir John Franklin, the beloved leader, died this sum-
mer, June 11, 1847. Where he was buried we shall
never know ; probably a hole was cut in the ice not far
from the ships, and thither the mourning party bore
him.
Sickness and death began now to thin tlieir ranks.
They hoped that the sun tliis summer would certainly
free the ships ; but tliough it did not, the ice in whicli
tliey were packed began to move toward the south. This
was indeed comforting, when lo ! as autumn came on, it
ceased to move, and they were ice-locked as before, per-
haps not more than sixty miles from the desired haven
of Simpson's Strait and the jSTorth-west Passage.
The third long winter dragged by. Commander Gore
and eiglit other officers died, and twelve men, twenty-one
in all, so that there were one hundred and five left.
When spring came they were sure that their only chance
for life was to abandon the ships, and perhaps reach
some post of the Hudson Bay Company.
They left the ships April 22, 1848, and journeyed
with a couple of boats on sledges, Crozier and Fitzjames
at the head, to Point Victory, fifteen miles from tlie
ships. They were three days in taking this short journey,
whether from the deep snow or on account of their own
weak bodies, will never be known. On April 26 they
started across King William Island, for Back's Great
286 SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS.
Fish River. Only their bones, scattered all over the
western and southern parts of the island and the adja-
cent mainland, tell the horrors of that dreadful march,
one of the saddest stories to be found in history.
After Franklin and his ships had been absent for two
years, having left England May 19, 1845, people began
to be anxious about their safety. It was remembered
that they had provisions for three years only, and it
would probably require a year for other ships to reach
them.
In the summer of 1847 arrangements were made for
the Hudson Bay Company to send to their northern-
most stations food for one liundred and twenty men
for seventy -five days, so that the crews, if they had
abandoned their ships, might receive it. Alas ! that it
liad not been pushed forward to where the men were sta-
tioned, too weak to come to the food.
In 1849 the government offered a reward of twenty
thousand pounds to any one of any nation who should
rescue the lost men ; ten thousand pounds to any wlio
should rescue a part of them ; or ten thousand pounds
to any who should ascertain their fate. Lady Franklin
offered three thousand pounds to anybody who should give
reliable information concerning them, dead or alive.
Already relief expeditions had been fitted out ; June
12, 1848, one under Sir James Clarke Ross, with the
ships Enterprise and Investigator, to search the north
and west coasts of North Somerset and Boothia,
north shore of Barrow Strait, and the shores of Prince
Regent Inlet. The first winter, at the juncture of
Barrow Strait, Lancaster Sound, Prince Regent Inlet,
and Wellington Channel, they caught fifty white foxes
in traps made of empty casks, and putting copper
SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS. 287
collars around tlieir necks on wliich collars the position
of the relief ship was engraved, freed them, Avith the
Jiope that some might be caught by the crews of the
Erebus and Terror. After excursions made all summer,
without avail, — they were at one time but three hundred
miles from the point where the Erebus and Terror lay
abandoned, — a house was built of the spare spars of both
ships, twelve months' provisions with fuel were left be-
hind, and a vessel large enough to convey Franklin's
whole party to some whaling-vessel.
The ships were now caught in the ice pack, and from
Sept. 1 to 25 were floated through Lancaster Sound to
the western shore of Baffin's Bay, when the pack broke
up, and the men hastened to England, thankful for their
preservation.
Sir John Richardson, who had been with Franklin in
both his land expeditions, started in 1848 to search the
coasts of North America between tlie Mackenzie and
Coppermine Bivers, and returned the following year,
1849, after having left provisions at various points
though he heard nothing of the lost slups.
On the return of the Enterprise and the Investigator
under Sir James Boss, they were at once refitted and
sent, under Captain Bichard Collinson and Commander
Bobert M'Clure (who had served Avith Back in the Terror
in 183G), through Bering Strait to investigate Wollaston,
Victoria and Baidcs' Lands, and Melville Island. Collin-
son passed witliin twenty miles of the Erebus and
Terror in their ice prison. Tlie Investigator, under
jM'Clure, sailed through Brince of Wales Strait, between
Banks' Land and Brince Albert Land (wintering in the
Strait in 1850) into Melville Sound, also round the west
and north coasts of Banks' Land, tlirough Banks' Strait
288 SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS.
into Melville Sound. They passed two winters frozen
into the ice in the Bay of God's Mercy on the northern
shore of Banks' Land, when they were rescued by a
sledge party from the Resolute under Captain Austin.
They abandoned the Investigator, and were taken to
England, after a fourth winter in the Arctic regions, by
the ship Phoenix. They had thus made the north-west
passage from the Pacific to the Atlantic Ocean (as
Melville Sound connects with Barrow Strait). M'Clure
and his crew received the ten thousand pounds offered
by the government for the discovery. It was afterwards
ascertained that Franklin's men actually reached Simp-
son's Strait; therefore to Franklin has been awarded
the honor of first discovering the ISTorth-west Passage.
The Resolute and Assistance, under Captains Austin
and Ommanej^, respectively, were sent to the shores of
Wellington Channel and the coasts of Melville and
Parry Islands. The latter ship was abandoned ; and the
former was picked up at sea by Captain James Budding-
ton of ISTew London, Conn., brought to the United States,
and presented to England by a joint resolution of Con-
gress, Aug. 28, 1856. The gift was tendered to the
Queen in person by Captain Hartstene, who afterwards
rescued Dr. Kane. The different searching parties,
under Captain Austin, examined fifteen hundred miles
of coast line, of which eight hundred and fifty had not
been known before. One of the parties, under Lieu.ten-
ant Brown, explored the western shore of Peel Strait,
and was within one hundred and fifty miles of the place
where the Erebus and Terror were abandoned ; but they,
of course, did not know that they were on the direct
route followed by Franklin. It was most unfortunate
that no cairns — heaps of stones with letters under
SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS. 289
them — had been placed along their route, else possibly
theii- bodies, at least, might have been recovered.
Several expeditions were fitted out at private expense.
Admiral Sir John Boss, then in his seventy-fourth year,
went out in the Felix, with his own yacht, the Mary, of
twelve tons, as tender, and searched a portion of Corn-
wallis Island, west of Wellington Channel.
Lady Franklin equipped, largely at her own expense,
the ninety-ton schooner Prince Albert, under Comman-
der Forsyth, to explore the shores of Prince Regent
Inlet. They found the inlet blocked with ice, and
explored the coasts of Prince of Wales Island and
North Somerset.
In the autumn of 1850 no less than fifteen vessels,
besides land expeditions, were searching for Sir John
Franklin. Interest and anxiety grew to fever heat.
Lady Franklin, in the spring of the previous year,
April 4, 1849, had written to President Taylor of the
United States, asking the American people to join in
the search for lier husband. ''I address myself," she
wrote, " to you as the head of a great nation, whose
power to help me I cannot doubt, and in whose disposi-
tion to do so I have a confidence which I trust you will
not deem presumptuous. . . I am not without hope that
you will deeui it not unworthy of a great and kindred
nation to take up the cause of humanity which I
plead, in a national spirit, and thus generously make it
your own. . .
" The intense anxieties of a wife and a mother may
have led nio too press too earnestly on your notice the
trials under which we are suffering, yet not we onlji,
but hundreds of others."
The President and the American people as w(dl wore
290 SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS.
deeply interested in the noble Franklin. It took prac-
tical shape in the mind of a wealthy merchant in New-
York, Henry Grinnell, Esq., at whose home Lady
Franklin had visited when in America.
He pnrchased and titted out two vessels, the Advance
of one hundred and forty-four tons, and the Kescue of
ninety-one tons ; the former commanded by Lieutenant
Edward J. De Haven, who had been with Lieutenant
Wilkes in the United States exploring expedition of 1838
in the Antarctic Ocean, and the second under Master
Samuel P. Griffin, both of the United States Navy.
The vessels for the " United States Grinnell expedi-
tion " sailed from New York May 22, 1850. Before
sailing, officers and men signed a bond not to claim,
under any circumstances, the twenty thousand pounds
offered by the British Government for the finding of
the Franklin expedition.
Dr. Elisha Kent Kane, an accomplished naval officer
and scholar of Philadelphia, at this time thirty years of
age, was appointed surgeon of the Advance, and on his
return wrote a most interesting book concerning the
journey. He had travelled extensively in China, Egypt,
and various parts of Europe, had rendered valuable
scientific aid in the United States Coast Survey, and
was admirably fitted to observe, and to describe what he
saw.
After an imprisonment for twenty-one days in the ice
in Melville Bay, off the west coast of Greenland, where,
says Kane, " Since the year 1819, from which we may
date the opening of Melville Bay, no less than two
hundred and ten vessels have been destroyed in attempt-
ing its passage," they crossed Baffin's Bay. Here Kane
counted two hundred and eight icebergs within th?
/^■'- ..^^ ^A^6 yt. C -
SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS. 291
horizon — Sir Jolm Ross had measured one in this bay-
three hundred and twenty -five feet higli by twelve hundred
feet long. Kane pushed on into Lancaster Sound as far
as Wellington Channel, and found on Cape Kiley, Aug. 25,
1850, two cairns. In one of these cairns was a letter,
deposited the previous day, stating that Captain Om-
maney of the Assistance (in company with Captain
Griifin of their own consort, the Rescue, according to
the official rejjort of De Haven) had discovered traces
of an encampment on Cape Riley, and at Beechey
Island, ten miles from Cape Riley. This was the first
knowledge obtained concerning the Franklin party, after
a constant search for three years.
Dr. Kane carefully examined the indications of an
encampment at Cape Riley. He found, he says, " Four
circular mounds, or heapings-up, of the crumbled lime-
stone, aided by larger stones placed at the outer edge,
as if to protect the leash of a tent. ... In a line Avith
the four mounds was a lart;-er enclosure, trianccular in
shape. Some bird bones and one rib of a seal were found
exactly in the centre of this triangle, as if a party had
sat around it eating ; and the top of a preserved-meat
case, much rusted, was found in the same place."
Some twenty or thirty yards from this place " were
several pieces of pine wood about four inches long,
painted green and white, and in one instance puttied ;
evidently parts of a boat, and apparently collected as
kindling wood."
Captain Penny of the sliip Lady Franklin, who was
also searching in Wellington Channel, and Dr. Goodsir,
the brother of the Erebus surgeon, discovered scrai)s of
newspaper, l)earing date 1844; and two other fragments,
each with the name of one of Franklin's olH(;ers in pencil j
292 SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS.
one name was " McDonald," assistant surgeon of the Ter-
ror. Captain Penny's men also found a dredge, ''as if
to fish up missing articles," some footless stockings, tied
at the lower end to serve for socks, an officer's pocket,
velvet-lined, torn from the garment, etc.
Sir John Ross in the Felix now joined his partj^, and
they proposed to search the neighboring country. While
tliey were planning, one of Penny's men ran towards
tliem exclaiming, " Graves, Captain Penny ! graves !
Franklin's winter quarters ! "
All hurried over the ice, and on Beechey Island found
three graves. The mounds were coped with limestone
slabs, and there were headstones. They faced towards
Cape Riley, distinctly visible across the cove. Inscrip-
tions had been cut with a chisel : the first read : —
Sacred
to the
Memory
of
W. Braine, Pt. M.,
n. M. S. Erebus.
Died April 3d, 1846,
Aged 32 years.
" Clioose ye this day whom ye will serve."
Joshua, eh. xxiv. 15.
The second was : —
Sacred
to
the memory
of
John IIaktweli., A. B. of II. M. S.
Erebus,
Aged 23 years.
" Thus saith the Lord, consider your ways."
IlAGGAT, i. 7.
SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS. 293
The third was inscribed : —
Sacred
to
the memory
of
John ToiiuiNOTON,
who departed this life
January 1st A. d. 18-46,
on board of
II. M. ship Terror,
Aged 20 years.
Near the graves was a piece of wood, more than a foot
in diameter, and two feet eight inches high, which liad
evidently been used for an anvil-block. Near it was a
large blackened space, covered with coal cinders, iron
nails, spikes, and the like, "clearly the remains of the
armorer's forge."
About four hundred yards from tlie graves, were
evidences of an observatory, with large stones fixed as
if to support instruments ; and a few hundred yards
lower down the remnant of a garden, "still showing the
mosses and anemones that were transplanted by its
framers." A quarter of a mile from this point were more
than six hundred preserved-meat cans, arranged in order
and filled with limestone pebbles, perhaps to serve as
ballast on boating expeditions.
These tins were labelled " Goldner's patent." As an
enormous quantity of such cans supplied to the navy were
afterwards found to contain putrid meat, it is probable
that many of these were useless, and thus the supply of
food for the three years had been greatly reduced.
Besides all these, fragments of canoes, rope, tarpau-
lins, casks, iron-work, "a blanket lined by long stitches
with common cotton stuff, and made into a sort of rude
294 SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS.
coat," a pair of Caslimere gloves, "laid out to dry, with
two small stones upon the palms to keep them from
blowing away," and other things were found. The
tracks of a sledge were also clearly defined, pointing
towards the eastern shores of Wellington Sound, also
towards Cape Riley, as though several journeys had
been taken.
It is probable tliat records telling of their journey
were deposited in the cairns, but none have ever been
found.
The ships of De Haven were caught fast in the ice off
Wellington Channel, and drifted out into Baffin's Bay
during the winter. They had already sighted and named
Grinnell Land, to the west of Greenland, which was
afterwards explored by Captain ISTares of England in
1876, and Greely in 1881-84. The Advance and Kescue
returned to New York in the fall of 1851.
The whole world was now more than ever interested
to learn the fate of Franklin and his men. Dr. Kane
commanded a second Grinnell expedition in search of
Franklin, the money being provided from his own means
and the proceeds of his lectures, assisted with ship and
money by Mr. Grinnell, and ten thousand dollars from
Mr. George Peabody of London. The Advance left New
York May 30, 1853, with seventeen persons on board.
Aug. 7 Kane reached the headland of Smith's Sound,
believing that an open polar sea was beyond, and that
the Franklin part}^ had gone to the far north up the Wel-
lington Channel.
Kane and his ship were frozen into the ice in Rens-
selaer Harbor, off the north-west coast of Greenland,
where they remained for the winter. The thermometer
was as low as sixty -eight degrees below zero, and the
sin JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS. 295
whole ship's company suffered from scurvy. More than
fifty of Kane's valuable dogs died from brain disease.
He says in his account of the second expedition, Feb. 21,
"My dogs, that I had counted on so largely, the nine
splendid ISTewfoundlanders .and thirty-five Eskimos of
six months before, had perished ; there were only six sur-
vivors of the whole pack, and one of these was unfit for
draught."
Kane wrote a month before in his journal : " Tlie
influence of this long, intense darkness was most de-
pressing. Even our dogs, although the greater part of
them were natives of the Arctic circle, were unable to
withstand it."
Going on deck in the early morning, and feeling his
way, he said, " Two of my Newfoundland dogs put their
cold noses against my hand, and instantly commenced
the most exuberant antics of satisfaction. It then oc-
curred to me how very dreary and forlorn must these
poor animals be, living in darkness, howling at an acci-
dental light, as if it reminded them of the moon, and
with nothing, either of instinct or sensation, to tell them
of the passing liours, or to explain the long-lost day-
light. They shall see the lanterns more frequently."
Five days later he wrote : " The mouse-colored dogs,
the leaders of my Newfoundland team, have for the
past fortnight been nursed like babies. No one can
tell how anxiously I watch them. They are kept
below, tended, fed, cleansed, caressed, and doctored;
to the infinite discomfort of all hands. To-day I give
up the last hope of saving them. Their disease
is as clearly mental as in the case of any human
being."
Exploring expeditions were sent out from the ship.
20(3 SIR JOHN FliANELIN AND OTHERS.
One of tliese parties nearly died from cold and exhaus-
tion, and indeed two of the men, Peter Schubert and Jef-
ferson Temple Baker died, after being rescued by Kane,
and all except one suffered for a time from unbalanced
minds,
Kane came near losing his own life as well as his dogs
in one of these various expeditions. The animals fell
through the ice sixteen feet below him. "The roaring
of the tide," he says, " and the subdued wail of the dogs,
made me fear for the worst. I had to walk through the
broken' ice, which rose in toppling spires over my head,
for nearly fifty yards before I found an opening to the
ice-face, by which I was able to climb down to them. A
few cuts of a sheath knife released them, although the
caresses of the dear brutes had like to have been fatal
to me, for I had to straddle with one foot on the fast ice
and the other on loose piled rubbish."
Three expeditions were made during early spring and
summer towards the north, reaching Cape Constitution in
Kennedy Channel.
The killing of a bear by Hans, although necessary for
food for the men, afforded a touching illustration of the
fondness of a mother for her cub. " The bear fled," says
Dr. Kane, " but the little one being unable either to
keep ahead of the dogs or to keep pace with her, she
turned back, and, putting her head under its haunches,
threw it some distance ahead. The cub safe for the
moment, she would wheel round and face the dogs, so
as to give it a chance to run away ; but it always stopped
just as it alighted, till she came up and threw it ahead
again ; it seemed to expect her aid, and would not go on
without it."
After a mile and a half the little one was so tired that
SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS. 297
tlie mother halted till the men came up to her. " When
the dogs came near her, she would sit upon her haunches
and take the little one between her hind legs, fighting
the dogs with her paws, and roaring so that she could
have been heard a mile off. She would stretch her neck
and snap at the nearest dog with her shining teeth,
whirling her paws like the arms of a windmill." . . .
Hans shot her, when "the cub jumped upon her body
and reared up, for the first time growling hoarsely.
The dogs seemed quite afraid of the little creature, she
fought so actively and made so much noise.'' The men
were obliged to shoot the cub at last, as she would not
quit the body even when she was dying.
Gilder, in " Schwatka's Search," tells of a bear carry-
ing its cub on her back till, being shot, the cub " clung to
her poor wounded body with touching tenacity. It was
heart-rending to see him try to cover her body with his
own little form, and lick her face and wounds, occasion-
ally rising upon his hind legs and growling a fierce
warning to his enemies."
Charles F. Hall, the explorer, tells in his " Second
Arctic Expedition " a bear story universally believed
by the Eskimos about Hudson Bay : " Many moons
ago an Innuit woman obtained a polar bear cub but two
or three days old. Having long desired just such a pet,
she gave it her closest attention, as though it were a son,
nursing it, making for it a soft, warm bed alongside her
own, and talking to it as a mother does to her child.
She had no living relative, and she and the bear occu-
pied the igloo alone.
" Koon-ik-jooa, as he grew up, proved that the woman
had not taught him in vain ; for he early began to hunt
seals and salmon, bringing them to his mother before
298 SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS.
eating any himself, and receiving liis share from lier
hands. She always watched from the hill-top for his
return ; and if she saw that he had been unsuccessful, she
begged from her neighbors blubber for his food. She
learned how this was from her lookout; for if successful,
he came back in the tracks made on going out, but if
unsuccessful, always by a different route.
"Learning to excel the Innuits in hunting, he excited
their envy ; and, after long years of faithful service, his
death was resolved upon. On liearing this, the old
woman, overwhelmed with grief, offered to give up her
own life if they would but spare liim who had so long
supported her. Her offer was sternly refused."
She told the bear what the wicked men were to do,
and begged him to go away, but not so far that she could
not come to him for a seal or other meat which she
would need.
" Not long after this," says the story, *' being in need
of food, she walked out on the snow-ice to see if she
could not meet her son, and soon recognized him as one
of two bears who were lying down together. He ran to
her, and she patted him on the head in her old familiar
way, told him her wants, and begged him to hurry away
and get something for her. Away ran the bear, and in
a few moments the woman looked upon a terrible fight
going on between him and his late companion, which,
however, to her great relief, was soon ended by her son's
dragging a lifeless body to her feet. With her pauna
(long knife) she quickly skinned the dead bear, giving
her sou large slices of the blubber, and telling him that
she would soon return for the meat Avhich she could not
at first carry to her ir/loo, and when her supply should
again fail she would come back for his help. This she
SIR JOUN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS. 299
continued to do for a long, long time, the faithful bear
always serving her, and receiving the same unbroken
love of his youth."
It soon became evident that Kane must pass another
weary winter frozen in Smith's Sound, in Rensselaer Har-
bor. " It is hoi-rlble," Avrote Kane, — '•' yes, tliat is the
word — to look forward to another year of disease and
darkness to be met without fresh food and without fuel.
I should meet it with a more tempered sadness if I had
no comrades to think for and protect."
Besides the disease and darkness they had another
foe. "If I was asked," says Kane, " Avhat, after darkness
and cold and scurvy, are the three besetting curses of our
Arctic sojourn, I should say, Rats, Rats, Rats. A
mother-rat bit my finger to the bone last Friday, as I
was intruding my hand into a bear-skin mitten which
she had chosen as a homestead for her little family. I
withdrew it, of course, with instinctive courtesy ; but
among them they carried off the mitten before I could
suck the finger.
" Last week I sent down Rhina, the most intelligent dog
of our whole pack, to bivouac in their citadel forward; I
thought she might at least be able to defend herself,
against them, for she had distinguished herself in the
bear-hunt. She slept very well for a couple of hours on
a bed she had chosen for herself on the top of some iron
spikes. But the rats could not or would not forego the
horny skin about her paws ; and they gnawed her feet
and nails so ferociously that we drew her up yelping and
vanquished." Kane himself used the rats for food,
and thus prevented frequent attacks of scurvy.
As winter approached Kane erected a signal beacon,
or cairn, on Observatory Island, near by, painting in big
300 SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS.
letters, on a cliff, the ship's name. Advance. In a hole
in a rock Avas placed a record of their journey up to this
time, enclosed in glass and sealed with melted lead, and
close by the graves of the two deau seamen.
The record written Aug. 14, 1854, showed that nine
hundred and sixty miles of coast-line had been delineated,
with over two thousand miles of travel, " all of which
was upon foot or by the aid of dogs. . . . Greenland has
been traced to its northern face, whence it is connected
with the farther north of the opposite coast of a great
glacier."
Seven of the party now left the ship, including Dr.
Hayes, the leader, with the hope of reaching Upernavik,
on the west coast of Greenland, directly in the line of the
Baffin's Bay whalers. After three months they returned,
having journeyed three hundred and fifty miles with the
thermometer at fifty degrees below zero, living for some
weeks in an Eskimo hut in the crevice of a rock, almost
without fire or light, often for Aveeks together with noth-
ing to eat but moss gathered from the snow-covered rocks,
and finally reached the Advance more dead than alive.
The second winter on the Advance was a sad one for
all. The dogs died. Jan. 3 Kane wrote :
"I am feeding up my few remaining dogs very care-
fully ; but I have no meat for them except the carcasses
of their dead companions. . . . One of these poor
creatures has been a child's pet among the Eskimos.
Last night I found her in nearly a dying state at the
mouth of our tossut, wistfully eying the crevices of the
door as they emitted their forbidden treasure of light
and heat. She could not move, but, completely subdued,
licked my hand. ... I carried her in among the
glories of the moderate paradise she aspired to."
SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS. 301
The supply of food was nearly exhausted. Twice with
the greatest suffering and with five half-starved dogs
"hardly able to drag themselves," they attempted to
reach the nearest Eskimo settlement at Etah, ninety
miles away, to obtain meat, but failed. All the party
were ill save five men. " Our sick are worse," Kane
writes in his journal. " Hemorrhages are becoming com-
mon. My crew, — I have no crew any longer, — the ten-
ants of my bunks, cannot bear me to leave them for a
single watch."
Two rabbits were killed by Kane and the Eskimo
Hans Christian (a youth of nineteen who had embarked
with Kane from Greenland). These rabbits were the first
meat they had had in ten days, and were eaten raw. In
February a deer was caught, and thankfully devoured.
March 6 Hans started for the Eskimo settlement,
but found them in a starving condition, having killed
and eaten all of their thirty dogs except four.
This condition of things is not very infrequent, as the
Eskimos are improvident. Kane tells of an Eskimo
camp found in 1830 by some boat-crews from a whaler.
Everything seemed deserted. Looking into the huts,
they found " grouped around an oilless lamp, in the atti-
tudes of life, four or five human corpses with darkened
lips and sunken eyeballs, but all preserved in perennial
ice. The frozen dog lay beside his frozen master, and
the child, stark and stiff, in the reindeer hood which envel-
oped the frozen mother."
Hans with one of the Etah hunters killed a large
walrus, thus providing meat for them as well as for the
starving crew at Rensselaer Harbor. With the close of
April, Kane made his last effort to explore Kennedy
Channel, and pushed up far enough to see the great
glacier, stretching towards the north and east.
302 SIB JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS.
Towards the close of May, 1855, Kane and his men
said good-by to the ship fast in ice, nine feet tliick and
with two whale boats, Hope and Paith, eacli twenty-four
feet long, drawn on sledges eighteen feet long, and one
smaller boat, they commenced their journey down the
frozen coast of Greenland. Four men were unable to
move. Dr. Kane drove the dog team, and twelve men
drove the sledges.
Their condition was pitiable. Once they were on the
point of killing two of their valuable dogs, to preserve
their lives. Christian Ohlsen, aged thirty-six, died on
the journey. One boat was necessarily used for fuel.
After eighty-three days of a most perilous journey,
they arrived at Upernavik, Greenland, and were taken
on board the Danish ship Mariane, which touched at God-
havn, prior to landing them at the Shetland Islands.
On the evening of July 11, the day on which they
were starting for Europe, a steamer drew near, and they
recognized the beloved stars and stripes. The boat Faith
was lowered from the Mariane, — Kane was carrying her
home to America as a precious token of their preserva-
tion, — and in her they went out to meet Captain Hart-
stene of the ships Release and Arctic, sent out by the
United States from New York, May 31, 1855, to rescue
Kane if yet alive. Hartstene had volunteered for the
service, and nobly wrote to the Secretary of our Navy :
"To avoid further risk of human life in a search so
extremely hazardous, I would suggest the impropriety of
making any efforts to relieve us if we should not return."
Hartstene had searched all summer for the missing
party, going within thirty miles of Rensselaer Harbor,
and on their journey southward learned from the Eski-
mos at Etah that Kane was still alive.
8111 JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS. 303
Dr. Kane reached New York Oct. 11, 1855. He
prepared his narrative of the journey for the press, the
sales of the book the first year reaching sixty-five
thousand copies. He wrote to his friend and publisher,
George W. Childs : " The book, poor as it is, has been my
coffin."
He was urged to undertake another journey, but his
broken health was against it. His mother also opposed
it. He said, " Other persuasion I can resist, but this
settles the question."
He received many rewards from both Great Britain and
America. The queen's medal was struck for both the
officers and men of the Advance, and the British govern-
ment presented Mr. Grinnell with a large and costly
silver vase. Kane received the medal of the London
Society from Admiral Beechey, E. N. ; but that of the
Paris Society came too late, for he died at Havana, Cuba,
Feb. 10, 1857, at the age of thirty-seven. His mother
was at his bedside and read to him the Bible, accord-
ing to his often-made request, or repeated to him such
verses as " Tlie Lord is my Shepherd," or " Let not your
heart be troubled."
He died as he had lived, in faith and hope, the words
he had characteristically given to his boats. He said
in his Narrative: •'•' I never lost my hope. ... I never
doubted for an instant that the same Providence which
had guarded us through the long darkness of winter was
still watching over us for good, and that it was yet in
reserve for us — for some: I dared not hope for all —
to bear back the tidings of our rescue to a Christian
land."
Kane's body lay in state at Independence Hall, Phila-
delphia, and was buried with distinguished honors.
304 SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS.
Now that it was known that Franklin had spent
first winter on Beechey Island, and chat three graves of
his men had been fonnd there, Lady Franklin conld not
rest until a further search was undertaken.
As soon as the Prince Albert returned with the infor-
mation, she was re-equipped by Lady Franklin and sent
out in 1851, under command of Captain Kennedy, to
explore Prince Regent Inlet, as this inlet had been
blocked with ice when the Prince Albert attempted pre-
viously to explore it. Under Kennedy was Lieutenant
Bellot of France, who volunteered for the service ; but he
was drowned while leading a sledge party in Wellington
Channel, Aug. 17, 1853. Kennedy made the complete
circuit of North Somerset.
Lady Franklin fitted out the steamer Isabel, under
Commander Inglefield, in the autumn of 1852, Avhich
returned after having sailed to the head of Baffin's Bay.
Several other ships of search were sent out in the years
1853-54.
Dr. John Kae, under the Hudson Bay Company, had in
1846-47 explored from Fort Churchill on the west coast
of Hudson Bay to the Gulf of Boothia, and later, the
coasts of Wollaston and Victoria Lands. In 1853 he was
sent around Committee Bay, at the lower part of Boothia
Gulf and to the coasts of Boothia Isthmus.
He wintered in Repulse Bay, south of Melville Penin-
sula and of Committee Bay, and in the spring of 1854
commenced his explorations. On April 20, 1854, he
met some Eskimos in Pelly Bay, in the western part of
Boothia Gulf, from whom he obtained some articles
which belonged to Franklin and his men. From them
he obtained the following information, as given in his
official report to the admiralty: ''In the spring four
^IR JOUN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS. 305
wmxers past (spring, 1850) [probably 1848] a party of
' white men/ amounting to about forty, were seen travel-
ling southward over the ice and dragging a boat with
them, by some Eskimos who were killing seals near the
north shore of King William Land, which is a large
island. None of the party could speak the Eskimo
language intelligibly, but by signs the natives were
made to understand that their ship, or ships, had been
crushed by the ice, and that they were now going to
where they expected to find deer to shoot. From the
appearance of the men, all of whom except one officer
looked thin, they were then supposed to be getting
short of provisions, and purchased a small seal from the
natives.
'• At a later date the same season, but previous to the
breaking-up of the ice, the bodies of some thirty per-
sons were discovered on the continent, and five on an
island near it, about a long day's journey to the north-
west of a large stream, which can be no other than
Back's Great Fish River. . . . Some of the bodies had
been buried (probably those of the first victims of the
famine), some were in a tent or tents, others under
the boat, which had been turned over to form a shelter,
and several lay scattered about in different directions.
Of those found on the island one was supposed to have
been an officer, as he had a telescope strapped over his
shoulders, and his double-barrelled gun lay underneath
iiiin.
• "From the mutilated state of many of the corpses
and the contents of the kettles, it is evident that our
wretched countrymen had been driven to the last
resource — cannil)alism — as a means of prolonging
existence.
306 SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS.
"There appeared to have been an abundant stock of
ammunition, as the powder Avas emptied in a lieap on
the ground by the natives out of the kegs or cases con-
taining it, and a quantity of ball and shot was found
below high-water mark, having probably been left on the
ice close to the beach. There must have been a number
of watches, compasses, telescopes, guns (several double-
barrelled), etc., all of which appear to have been broken
up, as I saw pieces of those different articles with the
Eskimos, together with some silver spoons and forks. T
purchased as many as I could get. . . .
" None of the Eskimos with whom I conversed had
seen the ' whites,' nor had they ever been at the place
where the bodies were found, but had their information
from those who had been there, and who had seen part
of the party when travelling."
The government award of £10,000 was given to Dr.
Rae for his discovery, though Lady Franklin was not
satisfied, as nothing very definite was yet known con-
cerning Franklin and the ships. The government now
ceased its efforts, as by this time, says Mr. A. H. Beesly,
in his life of Franklin, about £800,000 had been ex-
pended in ships, etc., for the Franklin search. About
4,300 miles liad been sledged. Lieutenant M'Clintock
estimates the amount expended by England in the
Franklin search as £982,000, while the United States
spent a quarter of a million dollars.
Lady Franklin had already sent out four ships largely
at her own expense ; and now she sent out another
almost entirely at her own cost, the steam yacht Fox, of
177 tons, — paying £2,000 for her, — Captain M'Clintock
commanding. Associated with him were Lieutenant
Ilobson, R. N., and Captain Allen Young, who not only
SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS. 307
offered his services graUiitously, but contributed largely
from his own private fortune towards the expenses of
the expedition. Provisions were taken for two years
and four months. Captain M'Clintock went without
instructions other than as Lady Eranklin said, to re-
cover, if possible, "some of the unspeakably precious
documents of the expedition, public and private, and the
personal relics of my dear husband and his companions."
Lady Franklin wrote M'Clintock :
"It will be yours [the honor] as much if you fail
(since you may fail in spite of every effort) as if you
succeed ; and be assured that, under any and all clrcuwr-
stances whatever, such is my unbounded confidence in
you, you will possess and be entitled to the enduring
gratitude of your sincere and attached friend,
Jane Franklin.
Carl Petersen, the Eskimo interpreter for Captain
Penny and Dr. Kane, went with them.
The Fox left Aberdeen July 1, 1857, and was frozen
in the pack in Melville Bay off the coast of Greenland
by the middle of August. She was beset for 242 days,
drifting southward, and carried 1,194 geographical miles,
or 1,381 statute miles, before she was released from the
ice, April 25, 1858.
In the beginning of winter, Dec. 4, occurred tae first
burial from the ship. A hole had been cut in the ice,
and the body was drawn on a sledge by the men. " What
a scene it was ! I shall never forget it," writes Sir F.
Leopold M'Clintock in his "Voyage of the Fox : " " The
lonely ' Fox ' almost buried in snow, completely isolated
from the habitable world, her colors half-mast high, and
bell mournfully tolling ; our little procession slowly
308 SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS.
marching over tlie rough surface of the frozen deep
guided by lanterns and direction-posts, amid the dreary
darkness of an Arctic winter: the death-like stillness
around, the intense cold, and the threatening aspect of
a murky, overcast sky ; and all this heightened by one
of those strange lunar phenomena which are but seldom
seen even here, a complete halo encircling the moon,
through which passed a horizontal band of pale light
that encompassed the heavens ; above the moon appeared
the segments of two other halos, and there were also
mock moons, or paraselenge, to the number of six. . . .
" Scarcely had the Burial Service been completed when
our poor dogs, discovering that the ship was deserted, set
up a most dismal, unearthly moaning, and continued it
till we returned on board."
After her release from the ice the Fox sailed north-
ward again through JNIelville Bay, and into Lancaster
sound to Beechey Island. Here M'Clure erected a mar-
ble monument which had been sent to the Polar regions
by Lady Franklin. Lieutenent Hartstene, when in his
search for Kane, carried the monument, but he was pre-
vented by the ice from reaching Beechey Island. On the
stone are the words : —
To the memory of
FRANKIJN,
Crozier, Fitzjamks,
ami all their
gallant brother officers and faithful
companions who have suffered and perished
in the cause of science
and the service of their country.
This Tablet
is erected near the spot where
they passed their first Arctic
Snt JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS 809
winter, and whence they issued
forth to conquer ditBculties or
To Die.
It commemorates the grief of the
admiring countrymen and friends,
and the anguish, subdued by faith,
of her who has lost, in the heroic
leader of the expedition, the most
devoted and affectionate of
husbands.
" And so He bringeth them into the
haven where they would be."
1855.
Aug. 16, 1858, the Fox sailed from Beechey Island
up Prince Regent Inlet towards Bellot Strait named
after the dead French officer, which separates north
Somerset and Boothia. After being nearly sliipwrecked
the party wintered in Port Kennedy, at the eastern end
of the strait. During the winter they made ready for
the sledge journeys in various directions in the spring.
On Feb. 17 M'Clintock set off toward the west of
Boothia with two men and two sledges drawn by fifteen
dogs.
M'Clintock says of his dog-team : " They bit tlirough
their traces, and hid away under the sledge, or leaped
over one another's backs, so as to get into the middle of
the team out of the way of my whip, while the traces
became plaited up, and the dogs were almost knotted
together ; the consequence was, I had to halt every few
minutes, pull off my mits, and, at the risk of frozen
hands, disentangle the lines. . . . Their strength and
endurance are astonishing. When an Eskimo dog feels
the whip, he usually bites his neighbor ; the bite is
•passed along to the next, and a general fight and howl-
incr niatch ensues."
310 SIR JOUN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS.
When a dog-sledge is stopped by the rough ice or
deep snow, " the dogs," said McClintoek, " instead of
exciting themselves, lie down, looking perfectly delighted
at the circumstance."
The cold was intense, 42^° below zero. On March 1
they reached the supposed position of the magnetic pole,
and soon met four Eskimos returning home from a
seal-hunt.
One of the Eskimos wore a naval button, and when
asked where he obtained it, he said, " from some white
people who were starved upon an island where there are
salmon (that is, in a river) ; and that the iron of which
their knives were made came from the same place.
One of these men said he had been to the island to obtain
wood and iron, but none of them had seen the white
men."
The entire Eskimos village, about forty-five persons,
near Cape Victoria, came out to see M'Clintock in the
morning. The Englishmen purchased all the relics of
Franklin Avhich they could find : six silver spoons and
forks, the property of Sir John Franklin, Lieutenant
H. T. D. Le Vesconte, J. W. Fairholme, and Lieutenant
Edward Couch — supposed from the initial C. and crest,
a lion's head; also a silver medal belonging to A.
McDonald, assistant surgeon of the Terror, obtained as a
prize at a medical examination in Edinburgh, April, 1838,
part of a gold watch-chain, seven knives, and bows and
arrows made by the natives out of materials obtained
from the ships, and several other things. A spear-stafP
measuring six feet and three inches, with head of steel,
the natives said they got from a boat in the Great Fish
River.
One of the Eskimos told Petersen, the interpreter,*
SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS. 311
tliat "a ship having three masts had been crushed by the
ice out in the sea to the west of King William Island,
but that all the people landed safely ; he was not one of
those who were eye-witnesses of it ; the ship sank, so
nothing was obtained by the natives from her."
The Eskimos were eager to barter with M'Clin-
tock, for knives, needles, scissors, and beads. One woman
took a naked infant by the arm from the fur hood
where she carried it on her back, and holding it toward
M'Clintock, with the thermometer at sixty degrees
below freezing point, begged for a needle for her baby.
M'Clintock says he gave her a needle "as expeditiously
as possible." One of the natives offered Lieutenant
Peary, when in Greenland, his wife and two children for a
knife, which generous proposition the officer was obliged
to decline. M'Clintock returned to his ship, after twenty-
live days, having made a sledge journey of four hundred
and twenty English miles.
Encouraged now with the hope of finding more relics
of Franklin, two sledge parties started out, one under
Captain M'Clintock, and the other under Lieutenant
Hobson. The load for each man to drag was about two
hundred pounds, and for each dog one hundred pounds.
After several days journeying they met the same Es-
kimo whom they had seen before at Cape Victoria.
They now heard from the natives that '^ttvo sJiips had
been seen off King William Island ; one of them was
seen to sink in deep water, . . . but the other was forced
on shore by the ice, where they suppose she still
remains, but is much broken. Oot-loo-lik is the name
of the place where she grounded . . . [thirty or forty
miles south-west from Cape Herschel]. . . . The body of
a man was found on board the ship ; a very large man, and
312 SIR JOHN FUANKLIN AND OTHERS.
liad long teeth. In the fall of the year the boats were
destroyed — that is August or September — all the white
people went away to the ' large river/ taking a boat, or
boats, with them, and in the following winter their bones
were found there."
At Cape Victoria the two leaders separated, M'Cliu-
tock taking the east coast of King William Island for
search, and Hobson the west. On the east shore of the
island, near Cape Norton, M'Clintock met thirty or forty
natives from whom he purchased two tablespoons, with
W. W. on one and W. G. on the other, with Franklin's
crest upon them, and four other pieces of silver plate
bearing the initials or crests of Franklin, Crozier, Fair-
holme, and McDonald; also bows and arrows of English
woods, and uniform and other buttons. . . . The silver
spoons and forks were readily sold for four needles
each." The Eskimos offered them a heavy sledge,
probably made from the ships, but this the white men
could not carry.
The Eskimos said '"There had been many books, but
all have long ago been destroyed by the weather." One
woman and boy had visited the wreck during the pre-
ceding winter, that is 1857-58. She said, " Many of the
white men dropped by the way as they went to the Great
Eiver."
May 12 M'Clintock and his party encamped upon the
ice in the mouth of Back's Great Fish River, and a little
later on Montreal Island, farther up the river. Here
they found '-'a piece of a preserved-meat tin, two pieces
of iron hoop, some scraps of copper, and an iron hook-
bolt," which had probably been brought there from the
ship. The thermometer was now at zero, and the laud was
covered with snow. Here they shot a hare and a brace of
SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS. 313
willow-grouse, showing that at this season of the year
there was very little fresh meat to be obtained for food.
They crossed over to the mainland, Adelaide Penin-
sula, and then back to King William Island, along the
southern shore. They found a cairn nearly five feet
high, appearing to be of recent construction, but notli-
ing within it. If there had been papers, they were
destroyed.
Shortly after midnight of May 25, nine miles east of
Cape Herschel, near the beach, which the winds kept
partially bare from snow, they found a human skeleton,
the bare skull showing above the snow, with here and
there some fragments of clothing appearing through the
snow, the tie of a black silk neckerchief, pieces of a blue
waistcoat, silk-covered buttons of a blue cloth great-coat,
clothes-brush, comb, and pocket-book. In the comb were
some light brown hairs.
The "bleached skeleton was lying upon its face towards
the Great Fish Kiver, " the limbs and smaller bones either
dissevered or gnawed away by small animals." The
man was slightly built. The pocket-book was opened,
when it could be thawed, and found to contain eight
letters or papers with Henry Peglar's name on several.
One thing was now proved ; viz., that some of the
Franklin party had reached the lower part of King
William Island, and had seen for themselves the North-
west Passage, through Simpson's Strait.
At Cape Herschel Avas a large cairn erected in 1839,
but which, by the appearance of the stones, had recently
been partially torn down as if somebody had been seek-
ing for things deposited therein. M'Clintock felt sure
that some most valuable documents must have been left
liere by the rt'treating party.
314 SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS.
About twelve miles beyond Cape Herschel TvrClin-
tock found a small cairn built by Hobson, and a note
within it, stating that he had found the record, so long
eagerly sought, at Point Victory, on the north-west
coast of King William Land. The cairn, which liad
been five or six feet high, had partially fallen down,
and the record in a tin cylinder was found on the ground
among some loose stones.
This was the sad record : —
" 28th of May, 1847. H. M. ships Erebus and Terror
wintered in the ice in lat. 70° 05' N., long. 98° 23' W.
Having wintered in 1846—47 [they meant 184;>-46] at
Beechey Island, in lat. 74° 43' 28" N. Long. 91° 39'
15" W., after having ascended Wellington channel to
lat. 77°, and returned by the west side of Cornwallis
Island.
Sir John Franklin commanding the expedition.
All well.
Party consisting of 2 officers and 6 men left the ship
on Monday, 24th May, 1847.
Gka. Goke, Lieut.
Chas. F. Des V<eux, Mate."
It is probable that they went to Cape Herschel to see
for themselves the North-west Passage.
Nearly a year after this, around the margin of the
record, these words were faintly traced : —
"April 25, 1848: H. M. ships Terror and Erebus were
deserted on the 22d April, five leagues N. N. W. of this,
having been beset since 12th September, 1846. The
officers and crews, consisting of 105 souls, under the com-
mand of Captain F. R. M. Crozier, landed here in lat.
69° 37' 42" N., long, 98° 41' W. Sir John Franklin died
SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS. 315
on tlie 11th of June, 1847 ; and the total loss by deaths
in the expedition has been to this date 9 officers and 15
men.
F. R. M. Crozter, James Fitzjames,
Captain and Senior officer, Cajitain II. M. S. Erebus.
and start on to-morrow 26th
for Back's Fish River.
The paper was written by Fitzjames, save the signa-
tures, and the line stating where they were going. So
sad and so concise a record is seldom found : their
leader Sir John dead ; the last hopeless winter taking
away twenty-one of their number, Graham Gore among
them ; and the remaining one hundred and live starting
away so early in the season on a journey which promised
little else save death by starvation.
M'Clintock journeyed on up the west coast of King
William Land, naming the extreme point Cape Crozier,
and soon after saw a large boat, which had been seen
also by Hobson. It measured 28 feet long, and 7 feet 3
inches wide, evidently intended for the Great Fish
River. It was mounted upon a sledge, the whole weigh-
ing about 1,400 pounds.
Within the boat were portions of two skeletons, one
of a slight young person in the bow of the boat much
devoured by wolves, perhaps, and the other of a large,
strongly made, middle-aged man, lying across the boat in
the stern, enveloped with clothes and furs. Close beside
the latter were found five watches — one watch bore the
crest of Lieutenant Couch — and two double-barrelled
guns, one barrel in each loaded and cocked, the other hav-
ing for some reason been discharged — standing muzzle
upwards against the boat's side as if ready to shoot game.
316 SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS.
Quantities of clothing were found in the boat, besides
seven or eight pairs of boots of various kinds, several
silk handkerchiefs, towels, brushes, needle and thread
cases, several small books, all Scriptural, except the
" Vicar of Wakefield," a Bible much interlined, a prayer-
book, forty pounds of chocolate, an empty pemican can,
which would hold twenty -two pounds (it was marked E.',
and probably belonged to the Erebus), eleven large silver
spoons, the same number of forks, and four teaspoons,
all marked with the initials or crests of nine different
officers.
The boat was pointed towards the north-east, that is,
towards the abandoned ships; so it seems probable that,
unable to proceed towards the Fish River, some of the
men, hoping against hope, determined to go back and
try to subsist till deliverance might come from some
source. These two were probably left till the rest
could go back to the ship and then rescue them.
The boat was about sixty -four miles from the ships,
and seventy miles from the place where M'Clintock
had found the first skeleton.
When M'Clintock reached Point Victory, he found a
great quantit}^ of things which the crews had evidently
been unable to carry after the journey of fifteen miles :
four sets of boats, cooking-stoves, shovels, a small case
of medicines, brass plate of a wooden gun-case, engraved
C. H. Osmer, E.. N. (the purser of the Erebus), bar mag-
nets, a small sextant marked Frederic Hornby, a mate
of the Terror (presented in later years by his brother,
Admiral Hornby, to Lieutenant Wyatt Rawson, who fell
at the battle of Tel-el-Kebir), and a huge pile of clothing
and blankets four feet high. From this point M'Clintock
returned to his ship. Allen Young also made a perilous
SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS. 317
and most interesting sledge journey around Prince of
Wales Land.
Hobson spent thirty-one days on the desolate west
shore of King William Island. Besides the record and
clothing at Point Victory and the boat with skeletons,
Hobson found , clothes, three small tents, and other
things at Cayje Felix, the northern extremity of the
island. During the whole month he shot but one bear
and four willow-grouse. One wolf and a few foxes were
seen. " One fox," says M'Clintock, " was either so des-
perately hungry, or so charmed with the rare sight of
animated beings, that he played about the party until the
dogs snatched him up, although in harness and dragging
the sledge at the time."
M'Clintock says nothing can exceed the gloom and
desolation of the west coast of the island. Hobson was
so afflicted with scurvy that he was unable to stand when
he reached the ship. The scarcity of fresh food attain-
able, and the fact that no preserved meat or vegetable
tins were found about the cairns or along the march of
the Franklin crew, "makes the inference," as M'Clin-
tock says, "as plain as it is painful !" Scurvy and want
probably did their fatal work quickly.
The Fox and her brave and successful men reached
Godhavn, Greenland, Aug. 26, 1859. They parted with
regret from the Eskimo guides, who said they had
been treated " all the same as brothers." The dogs they
gave to those whom they felt would treat them kindly,
but the poor creatures acted as though the ship was their
home. " They ran round the harbor to the point nearest
the ship," says M'Clintock, " and there, upon the rocks,
spent the whole period of our stay. As we sailed slowly
out of the harbor they ran along the rocks abreast of the
818 SIR JOHN FBANKLIN AND OTHERS.
ship to the outermost extreme, howling most piteously ;
even when far out at sea we could still hear their plain-
tive chorus."
The ship reached England, Sept. 23, 1859. Govern-
ment voted M'Clintock and his men five thousand pounds,
and also voted two thousand pounds for a monument in
Waterloo Place with the following inscription : —
FRANKLIN.
To the great navigator
and his brave companions
who sacrificed their lives in
completing the discovery of
the North-west Passage
A. D. 1847-48.
Erected by the unanimous vote of Parliament.
M'Clintock receiv^ed the freedom of the city of London
for his discoveries, the gold medal of the Eoyal Geograph-
ical Society, honorary degrees from different universities,
and knighthood from Queen Victoria.
There were some persons who believed that a portion
of the Franklin party might yet be alive, or, as King
William Island had been searched when covered with
snow, more traces of the dead might be discovered when
the land was bare.
One person, toiling at his trade, that of engraver, in
the city of Cincinnati, 0., for nine long years, from the
day Lieutenant De Haven went out in the Advance,
in 1850, to the return of Captain M'Clintock in the Fox,
1859, was using every spare moment in the study of Arc-
tic research, and thinking what could be done for the
rescue of Franklin.
SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS. 819
Charles Francis Hall was without means; but he had
untiring perseverance and energy, faith in his mission,
for he believed that he was called to the work, and an
unfailing trust iu Providence, Through obstacles almost
insurmountable, visiting and talking with prominent
men, explaining his plans to this and that learned
society, neglecting his business for the one purpose of
his life, he finally obtained money to build a boat, one
sledge, to procure twelve hundred pounds of pemican, a
few instruments, and other stores.
The firm of Williams & Haven of New London, Conn.,
offered to take him and his outfit, free of charge, in one
of their vessels, the George Henry, to the vicinity of
Frobisher Bay, north of Hudson's Strait, and from there
with his boat and the native helpers he intended to make
his way to King William Land and the adjoining coun-
try. He took with him from the United States, May 29,
1860, an Eskimo interpreter, Kudlago, whom Captain
Budington of the George Henry had brought back on a
previous voyage.
In crossing the Banks of Newfoimdland Kudlago took
a severe cold, and failed rapidly. An eider-duck was
shot for hiin, but he could eat only a small portion, the
Iieart and iiver, both raw. He longed to get home, and
asked frequently, " Teek-ko se-ko ? teek-ko se-ko ? " —
I^o you see ice ? do you see ice ? He died Sunday morn-
ing, near the coast of Greenland, about three hundred
miles from his home, asking pitifully at the last, ^' Do
you see ice ? " He was buried at sea.
When the ship reached her anchorage, and Kudlago's
family came to meet him, there was deep sorrow. As
the wife "looked at us," says Hall, *^and then at the
chest where Kudlago had ke])t his things, and which
320 SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS.
Captain Budington now opened, the tears flowed faster
and faster, showing that nature is as much susceptible
of all the softer feelings among these children of the
North as with us in the warmer South. But her grief
could hardly be controlled when the treasu.res Kudlago
had gathered in the States for her and his little girl were
exhibited. She sat herself down upon the chest, and
pensively bent her head in deep, imfeigned sorrow."
Hall lost his expedition boat on Frobisher Bay, which
loss was a severe blow. His original plans of going to
King William Island were therefore given up; but lie
lived among the Eskimos for more than two years,
studying their customs and language, making sledge
journeys, discovering relics of the expedition of Sir Mar-
tin Erobisher, three hundred years before, ever having
in mind the one purpose in the future to search for
the lost men of the Erebus and Terror.
Hall ascertained that " Erobisher's Strait " was not a
strait, but a bay. On his return to America, Sept. 13, 1862,
he brought with him two valuable Eskimo helpers
Ebierbing (Joe) and Too-koo-litoo, his wife (Hannah),
who had lived twenty months in England, and spoke
English well.
He at once began preparations for a second expedi-
tion, lecturing to earn money, jiutting forth almost
superhuman energy to interest the country in the enter-
prise. In his private note-books were found underscored
such sentences as these : '•' Our greatest glory consists
not in falling, but in rising every time Ave fall." " The
question is not the number of facts a man knows, but
how much of a fact he is himself."
Mr. Henry Grinnell had already given a hundred and
fifty thousand dollars for Arctic research, and had met
c
a
'^
SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS. 321
with losses. The nation was engaged in tlie Civil War,
find money was not at hand for the enterprise. Hall
therefore again accepted the courtesy of Mr. R. H.
Chapell of the hrui of Williams & Haven, New London,
and took free passage for himself, his native helpers, and
his boat, twenty-eight feet long, in the whaler Monticello,
July 1, 18G4.
The ship landed at Depot Island in the southern
part of Sir Thomas E-owe's Welcome, north of Hud-
son's Bay, and here Hall began his five years of life among
the Eskimos, living with them in their Ljloos, or
snow huts, eating their raw food, becoming their friend
and confidant, and learning all he could of the Franklin
party.
Kow they shot a walrus weighing two thousand two
hundred pounds, and now a seal, after watching whole
nights near the seal-hole in the ice to spear it when
it came up to breathe. He heard from the Eski-
mos near Depot Island that two ships were lost some
years before, ajid tlie Koh-hi-nas (white men) were
starved or frozen, all but four. Captain Crozier and three
others, who passed a winter with the tribe with whom
Hall was staying. "Crozier and the three men with him
were very hungry," the Eskimos told Hall, as Pro-
fessor Nourse relates in Hall's " Second Arctic Expedi-
tion," published by the Senate of the United States in
1879. " Crozier, though nearly starved and very thin,
would not eat a bit of the Kob-lu-nas (the bodies of
white men) ; lie waited till an Innuit who was with him
and the three men caught a seal, and then Crozier only
ate one mouthful, one little bit first time. Next time
Crozier ate of the seal, he took a little larger piece,
though that was a little bit too. One man of the whole
822 SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS.
number four died because he was sick. The others all
lived and grew fat, and finally Crozier got one Innitit
with liis kayak to accompany him and the two men in
trying to get to tlie Koh-la-nas country by travelling to
the southward."
The Eskimos said that Crozier and one of the men
reached Chesterfield Inlet, on the west of Hudson's Bay,
and visited the natives there, and were trying to reach
Fort Churchill or York Factory lower down on the bay.
Before they reached the Great Fish River Franklin's
men had a fight with the Indians, — not the Eskimos,
— and several Indians were killed, but no whites.
The Eskimos became good friends to Hall, loaned
him their dogs, and in every way tried to help the
search. In the spring of 1866, after wintering at Fort
Hojie, where Dr. Eae's headquarters Avere, at the north-
east corner of Repulse Bay, Hall started toward King
AVilliam Island. About six miles above Cape "Weynton,
on Committee Bay, at the lower part of Boothia Gulf, he
met some Eskimos whose chief gave Hall two spoons,
which he said were given him by Aglooka (Crozier) ; on
one were the letters, F. R. M. C. The wife of the chief
had a silver watch case. The natives told Hannah, the
Eskimos, that they liad been alongside the ships ; had
seen the great Eshemutta (Franklin). "■ This Eshemutta
was an old man with broad shoulders, gray hair, full
face, and bald head. He was always wearing something
over his eyes" (spectacles, Hannah said). "He was
quite lame and sick when they last saw him. He was
always very kind, wanted them to eat constantly, very
cheerful and laughing; everybody liked him. . . . The
ship was crushed by the ice. While it was sinking the
men worked for their lives, but before they could get much
SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS. 323
out from the vessel she sank. For tliis reason Acjlooka
(Crozier) died of starvation, for he could not get provis-
ions to carry with him on his land journey."
The Eskimos further said that for a long time tliey
feared to go on the other sliip. But on seeing one man
alive on her, they went and took what they wanted;
afterwards they found two boats with dead men in them.
They saw a cairn and many papers, which had been
given to the children or thrown away. One Eskimo
had slept near the cairn, wrapping liimself in blankets
taken from some banked-up clothing. A skeleton was
near the pile. (We know there was such a pile near tlie
Point Victory cairn.)
After further exploration Hall was obliged to winter
at Repulse Bay, as the Eskimos were afraid of hostile
tribes. He was cheered tliis winter by a letter from
Lady Franklin, expressing the deepest sympathy in his
work.
Hearing that some of Franklin's men were, or had
been, on the shores of Fury and Hecla Straits, having
probably crossed Boothia Gulf, Hall went thitlier a. id
passed a season in exploring. The natives described
men who wore caps on their heads and overcoats with
hoods ; footprints long and narrow, with deep places in
the heel, and the tread always outward. These had been
seen as late as 18G4, Probably some wliite men had
been there, but it is not known who.
Professor Nourse, in his "American Explorations in
the Ice Zones," repeats a story told by Captain William
Adams, of the Dundee Whaler Arctic (wlio took tlie
Polaris party from the " Raven's Craig " to Dundee in
his ship from whence they went to New York) on liis
return from a cruise as late as 1881. While liis ship
324 SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OrilERS.
was within fifteen miles of Fury and Hecla Straits an
intelligent Eskimo told him that when he was a young-
man in his father's hut, — probably about thirty-five
years before, — in 1848, three men came over the land
toward Eepulse Bay. The great " Amigak," or captain,
died and the other two, who cried very much, lived some
time in tlie hut and finally died. The Eskimos showed
Captain Adams on the chart where they were buried.
The Eskimos said years before two vessels had been
lost far to the westward, and that seventeen men came
over the country, but only three survived to reach his
father's hut.
In the spring of 18G9 Hall started for King William
Island with a party of natives, five men, three women,
and two children and a baby in the hood of its mother.
The load of one sled was twenty-eight hundred pounds ;
the other twenty-five hundred.
At Sheppard's Bay, a little to the east of King
William Island, they met Eskimos who said they had
seen Crozier, a telescope about his neck and a gun in
liis hand, and about forty-five men, in July, 1848, a few
miles above Cape Herschel, dragging two sleds. Crozier
was putting up a tent for the night. They gave him
some meat, as he and his party seemed very hungry.
During the night the Eskimos stole away from them,
fearful probably that they might be asked to share their
food with the white men, and they had none to spare.
The next spring they found the bodies of the white men,
but did not see Crozier's, so they believed he had been
saved and gone back to his country. It will be remem-
bered that they told Dr. Rae one of the bodies on the
island, perhaps Todd Island, had a telescope over its
shoulder and a double-barrelled gun lay under it.
SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS. 325
Farther on Hall heard that ono of the ships had
drifted to the shores of O'Reilly's Island, off the south-
west coast of King William Island, and that some
white men had passed the winter on her — possibly those
who Avent back with the boat — and then abandoned her.
Later the natives broke into the cabin and found one
very large man there — dead. The ship subsequently
was so broken by the ice that she sank, but not till they
had obtained a great deal of wood from the wreck.
The natives told him he would find five graves
or bodies on Todd Island, on the southern shore of King
William Island. He Avent and found human bones in
several places. On the mainland, Adelaide Peninsula, he
found an entire skeleton which was afterwards sent
to England. It was identified as the body of Lieuten-
ant Le Vesconte, by the filling in the teeth.
The Eskimos further said that east of Pfeffer
River, on the seashore, near Todd Island, two had died
and been buried ; five miles eastward another ; on the
west of Point Richardson, nearby, had been found an awn-
ing-covered boat, with the remains of more than thirty ;
and on the western part of King William Island, a
little way inland from Terror Bay above Cape Herschel,
a large tent was found whose floor was completely cov-
ered with bodies.
Hall brought away about one hundred and twenty-five
pounds' weight of relics, — a boat, a mahogany writing-
desk, many pieces of silver plate, — about one hundred
and fifty things in all, and only regretted he could not
bring more, as he said the relics are possessed, "by na-
tives all over the Arctic regions from Pond's Bay to
Mackenzie River."
. Hall ri'turnodto America in the fall of 18G9, and imme-
82G SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS.
(liately began to prepare for another Arctic expedition,
tliis time in search of the North Pole, having become sat-
isfied that all of the Franklin party were dead.
Hall sailed from New London July 3, 1871, in the
steamer Polaris, and stopped in Greenland for Eskimos
and dogs (Hans Hendrick, the dog-driver, brought aboard
his wife, three children, boxes, bundles, and several
puppies whose eyes could scarcely bear the light), and
carried his ship up Smith's Sound to a higher northern
latitude than had been reached by any other vessel, 82 °
16', two hundred miles north of Kane's highest point.
Here she was beset by ice, but eventually went into win-
ter quarters on the eastern side of the sound at a place
which Hall named Thank God Harbor. A great iceberg
protected them, four hundred and fifty feet long, and three
hundred feet broad, and probably one hundred and eighty
feet deep. Hall called this Providence Berg.
Near the middle of October, Hall started oh a sledge
journey to prospect his route towards the Pole. He
saw and named Robeson's Strait, after the Secretary of the
Navy ; Newman Bay, after Rev. Dr. Newman ; also Sum-
ner Cape and Brevoort Cape. Immediately on his return,
Oct. 24, expecting to start again in two days, he had
an apoplectic attack, and expired at 3.25, a.m., Nov. 8,
1871. The crew were two days in digging a grave twenty-
six inches deep for the devoted and self-sacrificing ex-
})lorer. The work was done by the light of lanterns, as
the daytime was all darkness there. At 11. a.m. the ship's
bell tolled, the coffin was placed on a sled, and two by
two the officers and crew bore their precious burden.
The sobs of Hannah mingled with the sound of the fro-
zen earth falling upon the coffin.
" Joe and his wife," says Rear Admiral C. H. Davis in
SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTUERS. 327
Ills " I'olaiis Expedition/' " were almost lieart-broken.
Tliey had looked upon Hall as a father for nearly ten
years ; they never could hope to find any one who would
take his place. They had been with him in many trials
and dangers ; they had often saved his life ; they felt
alone in the world."
Five years afterwards, May 13, 1876, Captain Stephen-
son, of the Sir George Nares English expedition, in the
presence of twenty-four officers hoisted the American
flag over the grave of Captain Hall, and erected a brass
tablet which had been prepared in England. On it were
these words : —
"Sacred to the memory of
Captain C. F. Hall,
of the U. S. S. Tolaris,
who sacrificed his life in the advancement of Science, Nov. 8, 1871.
This tablet has been erected by the British Polar expedition of 1875,
who, following in his footsteps, have profited by his experience."
Such international courtesy was warmly appreciated by
tlie American people.
The loss to the expedition through Hall's death was
irreparable. As the ship Avas much damaged by ice, and
the coal supply was inadequate, it was decided to return
home in the following August without further attempts
to go North. After leaving Thank God Harbor the Po-
laris entered a pack, and was tied to a floe, drifting
down the channel into Baffin's Bay. She leaked badly.
Oct. 15 the floe to which she was attached broke up in a
storm ; and it was decided to abandon her and try to save
the provisions, clothing, and boats by hastily throwing
them out on the ice. Suddenly, in the gloom of the night,
the Polaris with fourteen men on board parted from the
floe, and left the bewildered company alone. The
328 SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS.
steward called out in the daikness, " Good-by Po-
laris ! "
On the floe, a hundred yards long and seventy-five
broad, were Captain Tyson, the assistant navigator, nine
men belonging to the Polaris, besides nine Eskimos,
including three women and a baby eight weeks old christ-
ened Charles Polaris. Several men were brought in by
boat from the small pieces of ice broken from the floe.
All huddled together in a blinding snowstorm under some
musk-ox skins. They built a house from materials thrown
out from the ship, and they made some snow huts, and
lived on food procured for them by Joe and Hans, the
Eskimos^ they had some food also which had been
thrown out from the ship.
In this perilous condition they drifted down Baffin's
l>ay and Davis Strait, the floe crumbling, the sea some-
times washing over it, and finally were obliged to take
to their one boat, the other having been used for fuel.
After drifting fifteen hundred miles in one hundred
and ninety-six days, the men were picked up off the coast
of Labrador by the English ship Tigress. The journey
was one of the most remarkable and thrilling on record.
All were saved, even the baby. The Polaris Avas driven
helplessly on shore in Lifeboat Cove, Littleton Island, on
the east side of Smith Sound, where the Etah Eskimos
provided much food for the sufferers. During the winter
they built a house from the wreck of the ship; and the
Eskimos improved the opportunity to become perma-
nent visitors to the number of one hundred men, women,
and children, and one hundred and fifty dogs. The men
built two boats and embarked in them June 3, and were
picked up b}- the Dundee wlialer, Eavenscraig, in Mel-
ville Bay.
SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS. 329
The devoted Eskimos, Joe and Hannah, who saved
the lives of the Tyson party by their hunting and care,
would not escape to their Greenland home when they
had the oi)portunity, and when, as Professor J. E. Nourse
says, '' there were just grounds of fear within their
breasts that, in the almost famishing condition of the
white men, some of them might make the Eskimos
the first victims, if the direst necessity should come."
They settled at their home in Groton Conn., purchased
for them by " Father Hall," as they called the explorer.
Joe became a carpenter; and Hannah, with the aid of
her sewing-machine, made furs and other articles for
the people of New London and Groton.
Their first child died in New York in 1863; the second,
on King William Island in 1866; a third, adopted by
them, called Sylvia (Punna), who went to school in
Groton, died in 1875, at the age of nine years. When-
ever a child dies, the mother collects all its playthings
and puts them upon its grave. Hannah died of con-
sumption Dec. 31, 1876, at the age of thirty-eight.
Her last words were, " Come, Lord Jesus, and take thy
poor creature home ! "
In 1878, when Professor Nourse visited Hannah's
grave, Joe knelt beside it and carefully weeded out the
long grass. "Hannah gone! Punna gone!" he said;
'•'me go now again to King William Land; if have to
fight, me no care."
Joe went with Lieutenant Frederick Schwatka in the
Franklin search party, June 19, 1878, and did not return
to the United States.
One more and i)erhaps final effort was made to dis-
cover for a certainty the fate of the Franklin expedi-
tion. In the summer of 1878 Schwatka, of the Third
830 SIB JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS.
United States Cavalry, American by birth and Polish
by descent, with William H. Gilder second in command,
were taken out from New York in the whaler Eothen,
and landed near Chesterfield Inlet, on the west of Hud-
son's Bay. Captain Barry of the Eothen had been told
by the Eskimos at Eepulse Bay, as had Captain
Adams, of the coming among them of a *' stranger in
uniform, accompanied by other white men." The chief
had collected a great quantity of papers, and left them
in a cairn, where silver spoons and other things had
been found. The Eskimo at jMarble Island below Ches-
terfield Inlet also said, looking at Barry's log-book, that
the white chief used a similar book, and the Eski-
mos gave Barry a spoon engraved with the word
" Franklin." The spoon bore Franklin's crest, and un-
doubtedly belonged to him. It was sent to Miss Sophia
Cracroft, Loudon, niece of Sir John Franklin.
Schwatka wintered on the mainland, near Depot
Island, at the top of Hudson Bay, and April 1, 1879,
began his unequalled sledge journey of three thousand
two hundred and fifty miles, accompanied by thirteen
Eskimos, men, women, and children. Forty-two dogs
drew the sleds with six months' food for seventeen
people, about five thousand pounds. They depended for
meat largely upon animals to bo killed during the
journey.
Ci'ossing a branch of the Great Fish River, they named
it Hayes, after President Rutherford B. Hayes. On this
river they met a party of Ook-joo-liks, whose chief told
them of Franklin's men. His family comprised nearly
all the tribe which was left of that once occupying the
western coast of Adelaide Peninsula and King William
Land. He told about the same story which Captain Hall
SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS. 331
had heard. He bad seen " a white man dead in a bunk
of a big ship," when his son, about thirty-five, was a child.
He saw tracks of white men on the mainland, at first the
footprints of four, afterwards only of three. His people
did not know how to get inside of the stranded ship at
first ; but they finally cut a hole level with the ice, and
later the ship filled and sank. They saw sweepings
outside the ship, which seemed to have been brushed off
by the people living on board. They found some red
cans of fresh meat, with tallow mixed. Many had been
opened, and four were unopened. They saw books on
board, and left them there ; they took away many
knives, forks, spoons, and pans.
The son-in-law of the chief, when about fourteen years
old, saw " two boats come down Back's River ; one had
eight men in it, and he did not count those in the other
boat. He had seen a cairn on Montreal Island, and
found therein a pocket-knife, a pair of scissors, and some
fish-hooks."
The Schwatka party pushed on to the west of Richard-
son Point, on Adelaide Peninsula, and there met the
Neitchilles, a tribe of Eskimos usually hostile. An old
man told the party that he had seen a number of skel-
etons three or four miles west of there ; had seen
books and papers scattered along the shore and back
from the beach; knives and forks, a boat broken up by
the natives to make wooden implements, and some gold
and silver watches given to the children.
Another man said he had picked up tin cans, pieces of
bottles, iron, etc., only the last summer on an island off
Grant Point, near O'Reilly's Island, where the natives
said a ship was sunk off the south-east coast of King
William Island. A map being shown him, he pointed to
332 SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS.
a place eight miles west of Grant Point. All this tended
to prove the story that several men sailed on the ship
down to Simpson's Strait, thus making the north-west
passage before they abandoned her. It seems possible
that this was the Terror, from a block found at Wilmot
Bay with E, or 10 on it, with part of the R obliterated.
Schwatka and his men visited the cove west of Richard-
son Point, where Hall had been told of the awning-
covered boat and skeletons, since called Starvation
Cove. The natives said the boat was turned upside
down, and the skeletons were beneath it. One skeleton
\^as found five miles farther inland. Later they learned
from an Eskimo that in this cove was "a tin case
about two feet long and a foot square, which was fas-
tened, and they broke it open. It was full of books
written and printed, the last precious records of the
despairing company. Among the books the Eskimos
saw probably the needle of a compass, as the needle stuck
fast to any iron which it touched. The boat was then right
side up, and the tin case in it. The books were taken home
for the children to play with, and finally torn and lost,
or lay among the rocks till carried away by the wind, or
destroyed by the storms. There were also several pairs
of gold spectacles and gold watches, doubtless belong-
ing to officers. The Eskimos believed that the white
men were driven to cannibalism to preserve life. One
woman, about fifty-five, Ahlangyah, told them that on
the eastern coast of Washington Bay, on the south shore
of King William Island, years ago she saw ten men
dragging a sledge with a boat on it. Five of the men
put up a tent on the shore, and five remained in the
boat on the ice. The Eskimos erected a tent also, and
they stayed together five days. They killed a nunil)cr
SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS. 333
of seals and gave them to the white men, who were very
thin, and their mouths dry, hard, and black. They had
no fur clothing on. One man's name was Aglooka (this
was the name they always applied to Crozier) ; another,
" Toolooah," — it probably sounded like that to the Eski-
mos, — was bigger than any of the others and older.
Doktook (Doctor) was a short man with a red beard. All
three wore spectacles, not ice-goggles. All started for
Adelaide Peninsula at night, because the ice would be
thicker at that time.
She also saw a tent on the shore at the head of Terror
Bay the next spring, probably 1849. (This was the
same tent described to Hall.) There were dead bodies
inside, and outside some were covered with sand. There
was no flesh on the bodies ; the cords and sinews only
were left. There were knives, forks, watches, clothing,
and many books. Tliere were one or two graves also.
They were not the same party she saw going to Ade-
laide Peninsula. Tears filled her eyes as she recited the
story.
The Eskimos went faster than the whites, and never
saw them again.
The Schwatka party proceeded up the west coast of
King William Island till they reached Cape Jane Frank-
lin, near Victory Point, where they found the camping-
place of the men after they abandoned the ships. There
were cooking-stoves, kettles, and an open grave, with
a quantity of blue cloth, which seemed to have been a
heavy overcoat, wrapped about the body. A silver medal
was found, a niatliematical prize from the Royal Naval
College to John Irving, midsummer, 1830. Under the
head was a figured silk handkerchief neatly folded. The
grave was identified as that of Lieutenant John Irving,
334 SIR JOUN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS.
third officer of the Terror. The bones were gathered
np and brought home by Schwatka, and returned to his
grateful relatives in Edinburgh, Scotland, where they
were buried with due honor.
At several places on the western shore of King Wil-
liam Island they found human bones, that were buried
by them. At Terror Bay the sea evidently had washed
away all traces of the tent and its " floor covered Avith
remains." Some graves were also found which liad
been opened by the Eskimos.
The Schwatka party reached Depot Island, March 4,
1880, after their sledge journey of more than eleven
months. They suffered much from lack of food during
the latter part of the journey, twenty-seven of their
dogs, or half the original number, dying from exhaus-
tion or scarcity of provisions. From Depot Island they
returned to the fort, bringing many relics of the Erank-
liu expedition, among them two sledges seen by M'Clin-
tock, which had at that time the boat upon them, witli
the two skeletons.
Schwatka received the Gold Medal of the Geographical
Society of Paris. After the Franklin Search Expedition
he explored the Yukon River in Alaska for the gov-
ernment, floating down the river on a raft for 1,305 miles.
It was found to be navigable for 1,866 miles. In 1889 he
explored Old Mexico. He died in Portland, Oregon,
Nov. 2, 1892, at the age of forty -three years. He was
buried at Salem, Oregon.
Whether all the Franklin party died during the sum-
mer of 1848, or "a few of them lingered for some years
among the Eskimos, is only conjecture. That the Eski-
mos saw more than one party is probable ; but all at last
met the same lonely death, in want of aid which came
too late.
SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND OTHERS. 835
Lady Franklin, the devoted wife, lived until 1875,
twenty -eight years after her husband's death. One of
her last acts was the erection of a marble monument to
Sir John in Westminster Abbey, for which Tennyson,
who married Franklin's niece, wrote the epitaph.
" Not here ! The white North hath thy bones, and thou,
Heroic Sailor Soul !
Art passing on thy happier voyage now
Towards no earthly pole."
It was unveiled two weeks after her death. The
late Dean Stanley added to the words on the monument,
that it was "erected by his widow, who, after long wait-
ing and sending many in search of him, herself departed
to seek him in the realms of light, 18th July, 1875, aged
eighty-three years."
DAVID LIVINGSTONE.
^' A MORE perfect example of a downright simply
-^^^ honest life, whether in contact with queens or
slave-boys, one may safely say is not on record on our
planet." Such is the testimony of Thomas Hughes, the
well-known author of " School Days at Rugby," con-
cerning the distinguished explorer, David Livingstone.
Similar testimony is given by Henry M. Stanley, the
heroic African traveller : " Four months and four days
I lived with him in the same house, or in the same boat,
or in the same tent, and I never found a fault in him.
I am a man of a quick temper, and often without suffi-
cient cause, I dare say, have broken the ties of friend-
sliip ; but with Livingstone I never had cause for
resentment, but each day's life with him added to my
admiration for him."
Again Stanley writes : " His religion is a constant,
earnest, sincere practice. It is neither demonstrative
nor loud, but manifests itself in a quiet, practical way,
and is always at work. In him religion exhibits its
loveliest features ; it governs his conduct not only
towards his servants, but towards the natives, the big-
oted Mahommedans, and all who come in contact with
him."
Florence Nightingale thought liiin '•' the greatest man
3;;o
DAVID LIVINGSTONE. 837
of his generation ; for Dr. Livingstone " said she, " stood
alone. There are few enough, but a few statesmen.
There are few enough, but a few great in medicine, or in
art, or in poetry. There are a few great travellers. But
Dr. Livingstone stood alone as the great Missionary Trav-
eller, the bringer-in of civilization ; or rather the pioneer
of civilization — he that cometh before — to races lying
in darkness."
Sir Bartle Frere, president of the Royal Geographi-
cal Society, said, '-I never met his equal for energy and
sagacity." Sir William Fergusson, eminent in medicine,
wrote to the Lancet concerning this medical mission-
ary, " There has been among us, in modern times, one of
the greatest men of the human race, — David Living-
stone."
Poor, a worker in a factory, and self-educated, he sleeps
now among kings and the noted of the earth in West-
minster Abbey.
On March 19, 1813, in a humble home in Blantyre,
Scotland, on the banks of the Clyde, was born David
Livingstone. He was the second son in a family of five
sons and two daughters.
The father, Neil Livingstone, apprenticed to a tailor
in his boyhood, disliked his trade, and became a retail
tea-dealer. With this business, which seems never to
have been very profitable, he combined that of tract-
distributing and the encouraging of reading books. He
was ardently fond of good literature, especially along
the theological line, and gathered into his home wliat-
ever his scanty money would pernait him to buy. He
was an earnest worker in the Sunday-school, and in
missionary societies, and a total abstainer from all which
intoxicates. He learned Gaelic that he might read the
Bible to his mother, who knew that language best.
338 DAVID LIVINGSTONE.
David's mother, Agnes Hunter, wa,s a gentle, affec-
tionate woman, the idol of her household, one who wore
herself out to make a little go a great way in the poor
man's home. David, when a lad, always swept and
cleaned for her, " even under the door-mat," a thing
which greatly pleased the neat, thrifty mother. He
would say to her, remembering the eyes of the boys out-
side, " Mother, if you'll bar the door, I'll scrub the floor
for you," — "a concession," says Thomas Hughes, " to
the male prejudices of Blantyre which he would not
have made in later life."
Two sons died early, but the tea-trade would not
support even those which were left ; so at ten years of
age little David had to go into the cotton factory near
by as a piecer. From tliis time on he supported him-
self and helped his mother. The first half-crown he
ever earned he laid in her lap.
His father's industry and his mother's cheer made
the home a place of happiness. After the hard work of
the day was over, which lasted from six in the morn-
ing till eight at night, the evenings were spent in read-
ing. It was the habit in this good Scotch family to
lock the door at dusk ; "by which time," says Dr. W. G.
Blaikie in his life of Livingstone, " all the children
were expected to be in the house. One evening David
infringed this rule, and when he reached the door it was
barred. He made no cry nor disturbance, but, liaving
procured a piece of bread, sat down contentedly to pass
the night on the doorstep. There, on looking out, his
mother found him. It Avas an early application of the
rule which did him such service in later days, — to make
the best of the least pleasant situations."
With a part of his first week's wages at the mill he
DAVID LIVINGSTONE. 339
purchased lluddiman's " Rudiments of Latin." This and
other books he studied in the evening school, which
lasted from eight to ten o'clock. " The dictionary part of
my labors," he wrote later in his first book, " Missionary
Travels and Researches," "was followed up till twelve
o'clock, or later, if my mother did not interfere by jump-
ing up and snatching the book out of my hands. . . .
I read in this way many of the classical authors, and
knew Virgil and Horace better at sixteen than I do
now."
David read everything which came within his reach,
especially books of science and travels, though liis
father much preferred that he would confine himself to
religious books, such as the " Cloud of Witnesses," and
Boston's " Fourfold State." His last whipping at the
hands of his father came from a refusal to read Wilber-
force's " Practical Christianity." The tract-distributer
could not realize that the rod was not a promoter of
piety. For years after this David disliked religious
reading of every kind.
In every spare hour he scoured the country, searching
for flowers, specimens of rocks or of animal life, his
eager mind always asking the reason of things. With
great delight he was gathering shells in the carbon-
iferous limestone around Blantyre, when he asked a
quarry-man (" who looked," says Livingstone, " with that
pitying eye which the benevolent assume when viewing
the insane "), " However did these shells come into these
rocks ? "
" When God made the rocks, he made the shells iu
them," was the sedate, but unconvincing reply.
"These excursions," says Livingstone, "often in com-
pany with brothers, one now in Canada, and the other a
B40 DAVID LIVINGSTONE.
clergyman in the United States, gratified my intense
love of nature ; and though we generally returned so
unmercifully hungry and fatigued that the embryo parson
shed tears, yet we discovered, to us, so many new and
interesting things, that he was always as eager to join us
next time as he was the last."
On one of these excursions they caught a salmon, — it
was against the law to catch salmon, — and the fish was
carried home secreted in the trousers leg of the brother
Charlie. Though the boys were reproved by the good
colporteur, the fish was eaten for supper.
After more than eight years of daily labor — there
could be little childhood about such a life — the lad was
promoted to a " spinner's " position. Day after day he
placed his book on a portion of the spinning-jenny, " so
that I could," he says, " catch sentence after sentence as
I passed at my work ; I thus kept up a pretty constant
study, undisturbed by the roar of the machinery. To
this part of my education I owe my present power of
completely abstracting the mind from surrounding noises,
so as to read and write with perfect comfort amid the
play of children, or near the dancing and songs of sav-
ages. The toil of cotton-spinning . , . was excessively
severe on a slim, loose-jointed lad, but it was well paid
for. ...
" Looking back now on that life of toil, I cannot but
feel tliankful that it formed such a material part of my
early education ; and, were it possible, I should like to
begin life over again in the same lowly style, and to
pass through the same hardy training."
Livingstone always retained his love for the poor, and
a pride in his honest ancestry. When asked to change
"and" to " but " in the last line of an epitaph which he
DAVID LIVINGSTONE. 341
put over the graves of his parents in Hamilton Cemetery,
he refused.
" To show the resting-place of
Neil Livingstone
and Agnes Hunter, his wife,
and to express the thankfulness to God
of their children
John, David, Janet, Charles, and Agnes,
for poor and pious parents."
Some time during these toiling years the son of Chris-
tian parents turned towards Christian thought and
reading. He found from Dr. Thomas Dick's works,
" The Philosophy of Religion " and " The Philosophy of
a Future State," " that religion and science were friendly
to one another."
He became so interested in missions, that he resolved
to give all he could earn beyond his barest needs for
the spread of the gospel. Finally a book, as a book has
done before, changed the course of a life.
Charles Gutzlaff, a German medical missionary to
China, wrote an appeal to the churches of Great Britain
and America for helpers. David, probably in his twenty-
first year, after reading this booklet, resolved to be-
come a medical missionary.
With what money he could earn, and a little given by
his parents and his elder brother, he went to Glasgow in
the winter of 1836-37, when he was twenty -three, Avalking
the eight miles in the snow from Blantyre, accompanied
by his father.
The lodgings Avere all too expensive for the slender
purse of the young man. Finally, after searching all day,
they found a room in Rotten Row at two shillings a
week.
342 DAVID LIVINGSTONE.
He engaged it, and the next day, after a tender fare-
well from his father, paid his fees of twelve pounds to
the various classes in Greek, chemistry, medicine, and
later in theology.
He soon found that his tea and sugar disappeared, so
he obtained new lodgings in High Street, at half a crown
a week.
Young Livingstone became a warm friend of Mr. James
Young, the assistant of Dr. Graham, Professor of Chem-
istry ; and in Young's room, where there was a bench
turning-lathe, and other mechanical implements, learned
the use of tools. This proved most valuable to him after-
wards, when he built houses in Africa, and was, as he
said, a " Jack-of-all-trades."
Dr. Young, F.R.S., became renowned later for liis
purification of petroleum, and was called by Livingstone,
" Sir Paraffin."
At the close of his term in April, Livingstone returned
to the mill and worked as hard as ever, savins: money
for the second session. In 1838, having offered himself
to the London Missionary Society, he and a friend. Rev.
Joseph Moore, afterwards missionary at Tahiti, were sent
to spend some months with the Rev. Richard Cecil, who
resided at Chipping Ongar, in Essex. They studied the
classics and theology under him, and prepared sermons,
which were to be committed to memory, and then deliv-
ered to the village congregations.
Mr. Moore relates the following incident : " Living-
stone prepared one ; and one Sunday the minister of
Stanford Rivers, where the celebrated Isaac Taylor
resided, having fallen sick after the morning service,
Livingstone was sent for to preach in the evening. He
took his text, read it out very deliberately, and then —
DAVID LIVINGSTONE 343
then — his sermon had fled ! Midnight darkness came
upon him, and he abruptly said : ' Friends, I have for-
gotten all I had to say,' and, hurrying out of the pulpit,
he left the chapel."
One morning at three o'clock, while at Ongar, Living-
stone started to walk twenty-seven miles to London, —
there was no money to pay for rides, — to do some busi-
ness for his elder brother. After some hours in London,
starting homeward, he found a lady by the roadside,
stunned by falling from a gig. He took her into a house
near by, ascertained that no bones were broken, and
recommended that a doctor should be called. He soon
lost his way; but, after regaining it, reached Ongar at
midnight, completely exhausted, and, says Moore, " white
as a sheet, and so tired he could hardly utter a word."
The Missionary Society hesitated for some time as to
accepting Livingstone for their work. He did not seem
successful as a preacher ; he was not fluent in extempo-
raneous prayer ; but they finally decided to give him
another trial, and later accepted him.
He hastened to London, and for nearly two years
worked earnestly and with enthusiasm in the hospitals.
Deeply interested in natural history, he gave as much
time as he could spare to the study of comparative anat-
omy in the Hunterian Museum, under Professor Owen.
Everywhere the young Scotchman won friends by rea-
son of his gentleness and sympatliy. '• He was so kind
and gentle in word and deed to all about him, that all
loved him," said one who was with him at Ongar. '•' He
had always words of sympathy at command, and was
ready to perform acts of sympathy for those who were
suffering." This gentleness he seems to have inherited
from his mother, to whom he was tenderly devoted
throucrh life.
344 DAVID LIVINGSTONE.
At the closo of his medical studies he had a dangerous
sickness from lung trouble, but recovered. He returned
to Glasgow to take his medical diploma, and spent a
night with his family. David proposed to sit uj) all
night and talk, but his mother wisely objected. " I re-
member," says Livingstone's sister, " my father and
him talking over the prospects of Christian Missions.
They agreed that the time would come when rich men
and great men would think it an honor to support whole
stations of missionaries, instead of spending their money
on hounds and horses. On the morning of 17 November
we got up ^t five o'clock. My mother made coffee.
David read the One Hundred and Twenty-first and One
Hundred and Thirty-fifth Psalms, and prayed. My
father and he walked to Glasgow to catch the Liver-
pool steamer."
They never met again. The father walked slowly
and sadly back to Blantyre. His son went out to win
world-wide renown.
Sixteen years later Neil Livingstone, the father, lay
on his death-bed. His famous son was on his way back
to Encrland. " You wished so much to see David," said
his daughter. " Ay, very much, very much ; but the
will of the Lord be done." Then he added, " But I
think I'll know whatever is worth knowing about him.
When you see him, tell him I think so."
When David was told these words, he wept, and gave
thanks that night at family prayers " for the dead who
has died in the Lord."
The opium war having closed China to David Living-
stone, where he had first hoped to go, his mind was
turned toward Africa by Dr. Robert Moffat, the noted
missionary, then in London. Livingstone was ordained
DAVID LIVINGSTONE. 345
Nov. 20, 1840, in Albion-street Chapel, London, and
sailed December 8, in the ship George, to Cape Town,
reaching it after three months.
During the journey lie learned to take astronomical
observations under the captain's instructions. He
wrote to a friend : " The captain of our vessel was very
obliging to me, and gave me all the information respect-
ing the use of the quadrant in his power, frequently sit-
ting up till twelve at night for the purpose of taking
lunar observations with me."
This knowledge proved invaluable in after years. " I
never knew a man," said Sir Thomas Maclear, the As-
tronomer Royal, " who, scarcely knowing anything of the
method of making geographical observations, or laying
down positions, become so soon an adept, that he could
take the complete lunar observation, and altitudes for
time, within fifteen minutes. ... To give an idea of
the laboriousness of this branch of his work, on an aver-
age each lunar distance consists of five partial observa-
tions, and there are 148 sets of distances, being 740
contacts ; and there are two altitudes of each object be-
fore, and two after, which, together with altitudes for
time, amount to 21,812 partial observations. . . . What
that man has done is unprecedented. . . . You could go
to any point across the entire continent, along Living-
stone's track, and feel certain of your position." Maclear
said Livingstone's observations of the course of the
Zambezi River were " the finest specimens of sound
geographical observations he ever met with."
From Algoa Bay, Livingstone started for Kuruman,
Dr. Moffat's usual residence, seven hundred miles by
ox-wagon, arriving there July 31, 1841. Around the
place it was desert for the most part, but at the station
346 DAVID LIVINGSTONE.
the missionaries by irrigation and tree-planting had
made it very attractive.
Livingstone and one of their own missionaries who had
come up from tlie Cape were warmly welcomed by the
firing of guns and the rush of men, women, and children
to clasp them by the hand.
After a short stay at Kuruman lie started north to
find a suitable place for a new station, as Dr. Moffat had
suggested. From the first the natives were won by the
kind manner and voice of Livingstone. He writes to
his sister Janet : " When about one hundred and fifty
miles from home we came to a large village. The chief
had sore ej^es : I doctored them, and he fed us pretty
well, and sent a fine buck after me as a present. When
we got ten or twelve miles on the way, a little girl
eleven or twelve years old came up, and sat down under
my Avagon, having run away with the purpose of coming
with us to Kuruman, where she had friends. She had
lived with a sister, lately dead. Another family took
possession of her, for the purpose of selling her as soon
as she was old enough for a wife ; but not liking this,
she determined to run away. With this intention she
came, and thought of walking all the way behind my
wagon. I was pleased with the determination of the
little creature, and gave her food ; but before long heard
her sobbing violently, as if her heart would break.
" On looking round I observed the cause. A man with
a gun had been sent after her, and had just arrived. I
did not know well what to do, but was not in perplexity
long; for Pomare, a native convert who accompanied us,
started up and defended her. He, being the son of a
chief, and possessed of some little authority, managed
the matter nicely. She had been loaded with beads, to
DAVID LIVINGSTONE 347
render her more attractive, and fetch a higher price.
These she stripped off and gave to the man. I after-
wards took measures for hiding her, and if fifty men
had come they would not have got her."
For six months Livingstone remained at a place called
Koloben, where, away from all Europeans, he studied
the habits and language of the Bakwains (Crocodile
People).
One of the neighboring chiefs, Sekomi, came and sat
with Livingstone in his hut, and, after being apparently
in deep thought, said, " I wish you would change my
heart. Give me medicine to change it, for it is proud,
proud and angry, angry always."
Livingstone lifted up the New Testament, and was
about to tell him how his heart might be changed through
that book, when Sekomi interrupted him by saying,
" ISTay, I wish to have it changed by medicine, to drink
and have it changed at once, for it is always very proud
and very uneasy, and continually angry with some one."
He then rose and went away.
On Livingstone's return to Kuruman he had an im-
mense medical practice. In a letter to his old tutor,
Dr. Risdon Bennett, he says, " I have patients now under
treatment who have walked one hundred and thirty miles
for my advice ; and when these go home, others will
come for the same purpose. This is the country for a
medical man if he wants a large practice ; but he must
leave fees out of the question ! The Bechuanas have a
great deal more disease than I expected to find amongst
a savage nation ; but little else can be expected, for they
are nearly naked, and endure the scorching heat of the
day and the chills of the night in that condition. Indi-
gestion, rheumatism, and ophthalmia are the prevailing
348 DAVID LIVINGSTONE.
diseases. Sometimes, when travelling, my wagon was
quite besieged by their blind, halt, and lame. . . . They
are excellent patients, too, besides. There is no wincing.
In any operation, even the women sit unmoved."
The only child of Sechele, chief of the Bakwains,
having been cured of an illness by Livingstone, he
became thereafter one of the missionary's greatest
friends.
When talked with about Christianity, Sechele said,
'* Since it is true that all who die un forgiven are lost for-
ever, why did your nation not come to tell us of it before
now ? My ancestors are all gone, and none of them
heard anything of what you tell me. How is this ? "
"1 thought immediately of the guilt of the church,"
says Livingstone, "but did not confess."
Some time later Sechele was converted, read his Bible,
and sent home to their parents all his wives save one,
giving each her clothes and all the goods which she
had in her hut belonging either to herself or her hus-
band. This alienated all their relatives, and made many
bitter enemies for Sechele. The putting away of his
wives cost Sechele a severe struggle. He often said to
Livingstone, " Oh, I wish you had come to this country
before I became entangled in the meshes of our cus-
toms ! "
At first he proposed to increase converts in a peculiar
manner. He said to Livingstone, " Do you think you
can make my people believe by talking to them ? I can
make them do nothing except by thrashing them ; and if
you like I shall call my head-man, and with our whips
of rhinoceros hide we will soon make them all believe
together."
He soon became more gentle, and began family wor-
DAVID LIVINGSTONE. 849
ship ; but to his great regret no one attended save his
own family. " In former times," he said, " if a chief
was fond of hunting, all his people got dogs and became
fond of hunting too. If he loved beer, they all rejoiced
in strong drink. But now it is different. I love the
word of God, but not one of my brethren will join me."
In one of these journeys, when the oxen became ill,
and Livingstone was obliged to walk, he overheard some
of his men saying, " He is not strong ; he is quite slim,
and only seems stout because he puts himself into those
bags (trousers) ; he will soon knock up."
" This made my Highland blood rise," he says, " and I
kept them all at the top of their speed for days to-
gether, until I heard them express a favorable opinion of
my pedestrian powers."
The journeys on the back of an ox were anything but
easy. He wrote Dr. Bennett : " It is rough travelling, as
you can conceive. The skin is so loose there is no get-
ting one's great-coat, which has to serve both as saddle
and blanket, to stick on ; and then the long horns in
front, with which he can give one a punch in the abdo-
men if he likes, makes us sit as bolt upright as dra-
goons. In this manner I travelled more than four
hundred miles."
It having been decided to form a mission station at
Mabotsa, about two hundred miles north-east of Kuru-
man, Livingstone went thither in 1843. Here he came
near being killed by a lion. These animals abounded in
the neighborhood, and ate the cows and sometimes the
people. If one of a troop of lions is shot, the others
will usually leave the country.
When a herd of cows was attacked, Livingstone
went out with the men to try to kill the intruder. He
850 DAVID LIVINGSTONE.
shot at one lion about thirty yards off, and wounded
liiui. Loading his gun again, he heard a shout from the
other men. "Starting," he says, "and looking half
round, I saw the lion just in the act of springing upon
me. I was upon a little height ; he caught my shoulder
as he sprang, and we both came to the ground below to-
gether. Growling horribly close to my ear, he shook me
as a terrier dog does a rat. The shock produced a
stupor similar to that which seems to be felt by a mouse
after the first shake of a cat. It caused a sort of dream-
iness in which there was no sense of pain nor feeling of
terror, though quite conscious of all that was happen-
ing. . . .
" Turning round to relieve myself of the weight, as
he had one paw on the back of my head, I saw his
eyes directed to Mebalwe, who was tr3nng to shoot
him at a distance of ten or fifteen yards. His gun,
a flint one, missed fire in both barrels ; the lion im-
mediately left me, and, attacking Mebalwe, bit his
thigh. Another man, whose life I had saved before,
after he had been tossed by a buffalo, attempted to spear
the lion while he was biting Mebalwe. He left Mebalwe
and caught this man by the shoulder ; but at that mo-
ment the bullets he had received took effect, and he fell
down dead. The whole was the work of a few moments,
and must have been his paroxysms of dying rage. . . .
Besides crunching the bone into splinters, he left eleven
teeth wounds on the upper part of my arm."
This encounter left Livingstone lame for life in that
arm. A false joint formed in the arm, and by this mark
his body was identified years after, when it was brought
back to England.
During the year 1844 Dr. Moffat returned to Kuruman
DAVID LIVINGSTONE. 351
from England with his family. The eldest daughter
Mary seems to have changed Livingstone's mind on the
subject of marriage. He had told the London Mission-
ary Society when he came to Africa that he had never
made proposal of marriage, nor indeed been in love.
He would prefer to go out unmarried, that he might,
like the great apostle, be without family cares, and
give himself entirely to the work.
In 1844 he writes : " After nearly four years of African
life as a bachelor, I screwed up courage to put a ques-
tion beneath one of the fruit-trees, the result of which
was that I became united in marriage to Mr. Moffat's
eldest daughter, Mary. Having been born in the coun-
try, and being expert in household matters, she was always
the best spoke in the wheel at home ; and, when I took
her on two occasions to Lake Ngami, and far beyond, she
endured more than some who have written large books
of travel."
While engaged to her in the early part of 1844, he
writes to her about the house he is building for their
future home at Mabotsa : " The walls are nearly finished,
although the dimensions are fifty-two feet by twenty
outside, or almost the same size as the house in which
you now reside. I began with stone ; but when it was
breast-high I was obliged to desist from my purpose to
build it entirely of that material by an accident which,
slight as it was, put a stop to my operations in that line.
A stone, falling, was stupidly, or rather instinctively,
caught by me in its fall by the left hand, and it nearly
broke my arm over again. . . .
" The walls will be finished long before you receive
this, and I suppose the roof too, but I have still the
wood of the roof to seek. ... It is pretty hard work,
352 DAVID LIVINGSTONE.
and almost enough to drive love out of my head, but it
is not situated there ; it is in my heart, and won't come
out unless you behave so as to quench it. . . .
" You must excuse soiled paper ; my hands won't wash
clean after dabbling mud all day. And although the
above does not contain evidence of it, you are as dear to
me as ever, and will be as long as our lives are spared."
A few weeks later he writes ; " While I give you the
good news that our work is making progress, and the
time of our separation becoming beautifully less, I am
happy in the hope that, by the messenger who now goes,
I shall receive the good news that you are well and
happy, and remembering me with some of that affection
which we bear to each-other."
He writes her that he has opened a school, and that
though he had previously had a " great objection to
Bchool-keeping," and once believed he could never have
any pleasure in it, "I find in tliat, as in almost every-
thing else I set myself to as a matter of duty, I soon be-
come enamoured of it."
After their marriage they resided for a year at Ma-
botsa. The other missionary at that place becoming
disaffected, rather than to live in any unpleasant feel-
ing, Mr. and Mrs. Livingstone left the home which
they had built, their school and garden, and moved
forty miles north to Chonuane. His colleague regretted
the outcome of the matter, and said that had he supposed
Livingstone would go away he would never have spoken
a word against him.
At Chonuane there was jilenty of hard work. He
wrote : " Building, gardening, cobbling, doctoring, tinker-
ing, carpentering, gun-mending, farriering, wagon-mend-
ing, preaching, schooling, lecturing on physics, according
DAVID LIVINGSTONE. 853
to my means, besides a chair in divinity to a class of
tliree, fill up my time."
'' We made our own butter," he says in his first book,
"a jar serving as a churn; and our candles by means of
moulds ; and soap was procured from the ashes of the
plant lolsola, or wood-ashes, which in Africa contain so
little alkaline matter, tliat the boiling of successive leys
has to be continued for a month or six weeks before the
fat ia saponified. . . . Married life is all the sweeter
when so many comforts emanate directly from the thrifty,
striving housewife's hands."
At Chonuane their first child, Robert, was born,
named after Mrs. Livingstone's father, Eobert Moffat.
After being brought up in England, having the restless
nature of his father, he was sent to Natal, Africa ; but
unable to reach Livingstone on the Zambesi, he found
his way to America, where he enlisted at Boston in a
New Hampshire regiment, in the Northern army, under
the assumed name of Kupert Vincent, to avoid being
found by his tutor. He was wounded in battle, having
shown great courage, and taken as a prisoner to a hos-
pital in Salisbury, North Carolina. Dr. Livingstone
learned of this through a letter in which the youth ex-
pressed an intense desire to travel. The father, at this
time in England, begged the intercession of the American
Minister for his boy, but immediately after it was learned
that he had died in the hospital at the age of nineteen.
He was buried in the National Cemetery at Gettysburg,
Pennsylvania. President Lincoln opened this cemetery
with a speech that made his name forever dear to Living-
stone.
Life was no holiday to either David or Mary Living-
stone. The contiiuied drought necessitated their niov-
354 DAVID LIVINGSTONE.
ing fartlier north to Kolobeng, — Sechele and his tribe
moved with them, — where he describes their daily life :
" After family worship and breakfast between six and
seven, we went to keep school for all who would attend,
— men, women, and children being all invited. School
over at eleven o'clock, while the missionary's wife was
occupied in domestic matters, the missionary himself
had some manual labor as a smith, carpenter, or gar-
dener, according to whatever was needed for ourselves
or for the people. . . . After dinner and an hour's rest
the wife attended her infant school, which the young,
who were left by their parents to their own caprice,
liked amazingly, and generally mustered a hundred
strong; or she ^vai-ied with a sewing-school, having
classes of girls to learn the art : this, too, was equally
well relished."
After working till sunset, on three nights of the week
religious services were held, varied by classes in secular
instruction, by pictures, specimens, etc. The rest of tlie
time was spent in caring for the wants of the poor and
the sick.
Though busy years, these spent at Kolobeng were happy
ones. More than twenty years later Livingstone wrote :
'•' Not a single pang of regret arises in the view of my
conduct, except that I did not feel it to be my duty,
while spending all my energy in teaching the heathen,
to devote a special portion of my time to play with my
children. But generally I was so much exhausted with
the mental and manual labor of the day, that in the
evening there was no fun left in me. I did not play
with my little ones while I had them ; and they soon
sprung up in my absences, and left me conscious that I
had none to play with."
DAVID LIVINGSTONE. 355
Having had much annoyance from the Boers, descend-
ants of the Dutch, who lived to the east of Kolobeng,
and who constantly threatened to enslave Sechele and
his people, and having heard of a lake to the northward,
where a country better watered might be found, Living-
stone started June 1, 1849, to cross the Kalahari Desert
to the north, taking with him twenty men, twenty
horses, and eighty oxen. They suffered greatly for lack
of water during the journey, the oxen sometimes going
four full days, ninety-six hours, without drinking.
The inhabitants of the desert were Bushmen and
Bakalahari. The latter were a timid people, living far
from water, with the hope that they would not be mo-
lested or enslaved. " When they wish to draw water for
use," says Livingstone, " the women come with twenty
or thirty of their water-vessels in a bag or net on their
backs. These water-vessels consist of ostrich egg-shells,
with a hole in the end of each, such as would admit
one's finger. The women tie a bunch of grass to one
end of a reed about two feet long, and insert it in a
hole dug as deep as the arm will reach ; then ram do'v^n
the wet sand firmly round it.
" Applying the mouth to the free end of the I'eed, they
form a vacuum in the grass beneath, in which the water
collects, and in a short time rises into the mouth. An
egg-shell is jjlaced on the ground alongside the reed,
some inches below the mouth of the sucker. A straw
guides the water into the hole of the vessel, as she
draws mouthful after mouthful from below. The water
is made to pass along the outside, not through tlie
straw. . . . The whole stock of water is thus passed
through the woman's mouth as a pump, and, when taken
home, is carefully buried."
356 DAVID LIVINGSTONE.
On Aug. 1, 1849, Livingstone and liis two English
friends, Oswell and Murray, looked upon Lake Ngami.
They were doubtless the first Europeans who had ever
beheld it. Livingstone guessed it to be about seventy
miles in circumference. The word means " giraffe," per-
haps from the shape of the lake. Many travellers had
tried to reach it, and had been unable to cross the desert.
Livingstone also discovered the Zouga River, concern-
ing which he wrote to his friend Watt : " It is a glorious
river; you never saw anything so grand. The banks
are extremely beautiful, lined with gigantic trees, many
quite new." There were two baobab-trees, one seventy-
six feet in girth. These trees are sometimes one hun-
dred feet in circumference. One tree bore "a fruit a
foot in length and three inches in diameter."
The Royal Geographical Society voted Livingstone
twenty-five guineas for the discovery of a " large inland
lake and a fine river." No doubt the money was very
acceptable to a man who was supporting a wife and three
children on one hundred pounds a year (five hundred
dollars), and helping now and then, in a very limited
way, his relatives at home.
His heart and hands were ever open. Some years
before he had given his brother Charles five pounds to
help him to go to America, where he might, perhaps,
obtain admission to a college where he could support
himself by manual labor and prepare for the ministry.
On landing at New York, after selling his box and bed,
Charles found himself possessed of two pounds, thirteen
shillings, sixpence.
Purchasing some bread and cheese, he started for
Oberlin College, Ohio, over five hundred miles away ;
Dr. Charles Finney was at that time the president. He
DAVID LIVINGSTONE. 357
obtained his education, and was settled over a New
England Church till he joined his brother in Africa in
1857. This is not the first nor the last time that Ober-
lin College has proved a blessing.
Livingstone hoped to push on beyond Lake Ngami to
the Chief Sebituane, but was prevented by another chief,
through jealousy. He therefore returned ; and the fol-
lowing year, iu April, 1850, he left Kolobeng a second
time for Ngami, accompanied by his wife and children,
When near the lake, they found a party of Englishmen,
one of whom, an artist, had died, and the others were
nursed to health by Mrs. Livingstone.
Fever attacked two of the children, and others of
the party, and they were obliged to return to Kolobeng.
Here a little daughter, Elizabeth, was born, who died in
six weeks. It was a great blow to the parents, the first
death in their family.
Livingstone wrote homo to his father and mother; —
'' Our last child, a sweet little girl with blue eyes, was
taken from us to join the company of the redeemed,
through the merits of Him of whom she never heard. It
is wonderful how soon the affections twine round a little
stranger. We felt her loss keenly. . . . She uttered
a piercing shriek previous to expiring, and then went
away to see the King in his beauty, and the land — the
glorious land, and its inhabitants."
Years afterward the father longed to visit the grave of
his child, but did not deem it wise to enter the country,
as the Boers then governed it.
A third and at last successful attempt was made to
reach Sebituane in April, 1851. The guide lost his way
in the desert, and for four days they were without water.
Livingstone says in his ''Missionary Travels:" "The
358 DAVID LIVINGSTONE.
supply of water in the wagons had been wasted by one of
our servants, and by the afternoon only a small portion
remained for the children. This was a bitterly anxious
night; and next morning the less there was of water,
the more thirsty the little rogues became. The idea of
their perishing before our eyes was terrible : it would
almost have been a relief to me to have been reproached
with being the entire cause of the catastrophe ; but not
one syllable of upbraiding was uttered by their mother,
though the tearful eye told the agony within. In the
afternoon of the fifth day, to our inexpressible relief,
some of the men returned with a supply of that fluid of
which we had never before felt the true value."
Livingstone said later : " My opinion is that the
most severe labors and privations may be undergone
without alcoholic stimulus, because those who have en-
dured the most had nothing else but water, and not
always enough of that."
Sebituane received Livingstone most cordially ; for it
had been the dream of his life to know white men, as he
was the " greatest man in all that country," the chief of
the Makololo. He died two Aveeks later from inflamma-
tion of the lungs. " After sitting with him some time,"
says Livingstone, " and commending him to the mercy of
God, I rose to depart, when the dying chieftain, raising
himself up a little from his prone position, called a ser-
vant and said, ' Take Robert to Maunko (one of his
wives), and tell her to give him some milk.' These
were the last words of Sebituane."
The next day he was buried in his cattle-pen, and all
the cattle driven for an hour or two around and over the
grave, so that it should be quite obliterated. His daugh-
ter, Ma-mochisane, reigned after him. When her brother
DAVID LIVINGSTONE. 359
Sekeletu was eighteen years of age, she resigned iu his
favor. Three days were spent in public discussion over
the subject, when Ma-mochisane burst into tears, exclaim-
ing, " I have been a chief only because my father wished
it ! I always would have preferred to be married and
have a family like other women. You, Sekeletu, must
be chief, and build up your father's house."
Another member of the family, Mpepe, tried to assas-
sinate Sekeletu, who was saved by Livingstone. Mpepe
was afterwards speared by order of the chief, Sekeletu.
The latter, according to the custom of the Bechuanas,
became the possessor of his father's wives, and adopted
two of them. The children by these wives are termed
brothers and sisters. There is always a head wife, or
queen. If she dies, a new wife is selected for the same
position.
Livingstone and Oswell, who was a sportsman and
traveller, continued in their explorations to the north, to
find a suitable and healthful place for the mission.
Toward the end of June, 1851, they discovered the
Zambesi River, in the centre of the continent. The
Portuguese had always represented the river on their
maps as rising far to the eastward. There was at this
point a breadth of from three hundred to six hundred
yards. The tribes were living among the swamps for
the protection afforded them by the deep, reedy rivers,
and Livingstone felt that he could not settle his family
there. He decided, therefore, to send them to England
until he should have explored the country farther, as
they could not be left at Kolobeng, at the mercy of the
Boers.
Livingstone took his family to the Cape; and Mrs.
Livingstone, witli her four children, Robert, Thomas,
360 DAVID LIVINGSTONE.
Agues, and Oswell, an infant six months old, sailed for
England, April 23, 1852. Mr. Oswell, who was a friend
indeed, provided two hundred pounds for their outfit.
It was a sad parting for all. It seemed best for the
children to be reared in England, and for their mother
to be with them. Livingstone felt that he was called to
open up the vast country about him. The chiefs were
friendly to him. He could help to arrest the terrible
slave-trade going on before him. "Nothing," he wrote
to the London Missionary Society, " but a strong con-
viction that the step will lead to the glory of Christ
would make me orphanize my children. Even now my
bowels yearn over them. They will forget me ; but I
hope when the day of trial comes I shall not be found
a more sorry soldier than those who servo an earthly
sovereign."
After his family had gone, he wrote by every mail. Two
weeks after their departure he writes: "My dearest
Mary, — How I miss you now and the dear children!
My heart yearns incessantly over you. How many
thoughts of the past crowd into my mind ! I feel as if
I would treat you all more tenderly and lovingly than
ever. You have been a great blessing to me. You
attended to my comfort in many, many ways. ]\Iay God
bless you for all your kindnesses ! I see no face now to
be compared with that sunburnt one which has so often
greeted me with its kind looks. ... I never show all
my feelings ; but I can say truly, my dearest, that I
loved you when I married you, and the longer I lived
Avith you, I loved you the better. . . , Take them all
(the children) round you, and kiss them for me. Tell
them I have left them for the love of Jesus, and they
must love Him, too."
DAVID LIVINGSTONE. 861
Two weeks later he writes to Agnes, his eldest daughter,
then in her fifth year : '' Tliis is your own little letter.
... I shall not see you again for a long time, and I
am very sorry. I have no Nannie now. I have given
you back to Jesus, your Friend — your Papa who is in
heaven. He is above you, but He is always near you."
While at Cape Town, Livingstone put himself under
the instructions of the astronomer-Royal, Sir Thomas
Maclear. They became firm friends. The most striking
promontory on Lake Nyassa, Dr. Livingstone named
Cape Maclear, in honor of his distinguished friend.
** Livingstone acquired in astronomical observations,"
says H. H. Johnston, F.R.G.S., in his valuable life of
the explorer, " a skill and accuracy which few subsequent
travellers have possessed to a like degree."
Two months after his wife's departure for England,
he left the Cape with ten poor oxen dragging his heavy
wagon. He was so delayed that he did not reach Kuru-
man till September. Here a wheel broke, and he
stopped to repair it. This accident saved his life.
While mending it a letter was brought to him by
Masabele from her husband. It read as follows :
'' Friend of my heart's love, and all of the confidence
of my heart, I am Sechele. I am undone by the Boers,
who attacked me, though I have no guilt with them.
They demanded that I should be in their kingdom, and I
refused. They demanded that I should prevent the
English and Griquas from passing. I replied, 'These
are my friends, and I can prevent no one ! ' They came
on Saturday, and I besought them not to fight on Sun-
day and they assented.
"They began on Monday morning at twilight, and
fired with all their might, and burned the town with fire,
362 DAVID LIVINGSTONE.
and scattered us. They killed sixty of my people, and
captured women and children and men. Tliey took all
the cattle and all the goods of the Bakwains; and the
liouse of Livingstone they plundered, taking away all
his goods."
Sechele's wife had been saved by hiding herself in the
cleft of a rock, over which the Boers were firing. When
her infant cried, terrified lest the noise betray them, she
took off her armlets and gave to it for playthings.
Livingstone writes to his wife of tlie dreadful outrage
committed by the Boers : " They gutted our lionse at
Kolobeng; they brought four wagons down and took
away sofa, table, bed, all the crockery, your desk (I hope
it had nothing in it. Have you the letters ?), smashed
the wooden chairs, took away the iron ones, tore out the
leaves of all the books, and scattered them in front of
the house, smashed the bottles containing medicines,
windows, oven-door, took away the smith-bellows, anvil,
all the tools, — in fact, everything worth taking: three
corn-mills, a bag of coffee for which I paid six pounds,
and lots of coffee, tea, and sugar, which the gentlemen ,
who went to the North left."
All the corn belonging to three tribes was burned, and
all the cattle taken. The Boers expressed regret that
they could not get hold of Livingstone himself. What a
mercy that Mrs. Livingstone was out of the country !
Sechele wanted to go to England and tell his wrongs
to the Queen. He went as far as the Cape, but not
liaving the money to go farther, was obliged to return, a
thousand miles, to his own devastated country.
Livingstone pushed on toward the interior of Africa,
reaching Linyanti in the following year, in June, 1853.
It was a toilsome journey. Sometimes they waded all
DAVID LIVINGSTONE. 363
day long through floods, bramble-bushes, and serrated
grass which cut the hands like a razor. Feb. 4 he
writes in his journal: "1 am spared in health, while
all the company liave been attacked by fever. If God
has accepted my service, my life is charmed till my
work is done."
To Dr. Moffat, his father-in-law, he writes : '' I shall
open up a path to the interior or perish. I never have
had the shadow of a shade of doubt as to the propriety
of my course."
As ever, Livingstone was the closest observer in
natural history and geology. He notes the habits of
the great land tortoise which is used by the natives
for food. " When about to deposit her eggs, she lets
herself into the ground by throwing the earth up round
her shell, until only the top is visible ; then covering up
he eggs, she leaves them until the rains begin to fall
and the fresh herbage appears; the young ones then
come out, their shell still quite soft, and, unattended by
their dam, begin the world for themselves."
They saw several lions on the journey. " He seldom
attacks full-grown animals," says Livingstone ; " but
frequently, when a buffalo calf is cauglit by him, the
cow rushes to the rescue, and a toss from her often kills
him. . . . Lions never go near any elephants except the
calves, which, when quite young, are sometimes torn by
them ; every living thing retires before the lordly ele-
phant."
Serpents also abound. One python which they shot
was eleven feet and ten inches long, and as thick as a
man's leg. The natives do not like to destroy these huge
snakes.
Concerning the ostrich this close observer says : " The
SG4 DAVID LIVINGSTONE.
ostrich begins to lay her eggs before she has fixed
on a spot for her nest, which is only a hollow a few
inches deep m the sand, and about a yard in diameter.
Solitary eggs are thus found lying forsaken all over the
country, and become a prey to the jackal. She seems
averse to risking a spot for a nest, and often lays her
eggs in that of another ostrich, so that as many as forty-
five have been found in one nest. . . .
" Both male and female assist in the incubations ; but
the number of females being alway greatest, it is prob-
able that cases occur in which the females have the
entire charge. Several eggs lie out of the nest, and are
thought to be intended as food for the first of the newly
hatched brood till the rest come out and enable the
whole to start in quest of food. . . .
" The organs of vision in this bird are placed so high
that he can detect an enemy at a great distance, but the
lion sometimes kills him. ... It seeks safety in
flight; but when pursued by dogs, it may be seen to
turn upon them and inflict a kick, which is vigorously
applied, and sometimes breaks the dog's back."
Mr. H. H. Johnston, Commissioner for Nyasaland,
and Consul-General for Portuguese East Africa, says :
" The Bushmen, as is well known, stalk the ostrich,
and approach near enough to kill it, by disguising the
upper part of their bodies with the cleverly stuffed skin
of a cock-ostrich. This disguise attracts both the males
and the females among the inquisitive birds to a close
inspection of the hunter, who, however, occasionally finds
himself thwarted by his own cleverness, for he imitates
so closely the appearance, gait, and voice of a cock-
ostrich, that before he has time to shoot his poisoned
arrow, some furiously jealous male among the real os-
DAVID LIVINGSTONE. 865
triches rushes up and strikes his supposed riv^al to the
eartli with a stunning blow from his powerful two-toed
foot."
Dr. Livingstone had no sympathy with those persons
who hunt for mere sport, if there can be sport in killing
living things ! " If, as has been practised by some,"
says the explorer, " great numbers of animals are
wounded and allowed to perish miserably, or are killed
on the spot and left to be preyed on by vultures and
liyenas, and all for the sole purpose of making a ' bag,'
then I take it to be evident that such sportsmen are
pretty far gone in the hunting form of insanity."
Mr. Johnston says that unless measures are taken for
the protection of the zebras and buffaloes, they will soon
disappear from Africa. " The main object," he says,
" of all the lusty young Englishmen to whom Africa is
now becoming fashionable, and who pour into the coun-
try to join pioneer forces or expeditions, is to slaughter
the game recklessly, right and left, uselessly, heedlessly."
After spending a month at Linyanti, Livingstone
started on his journey towards the west coast of Africa.
The chief Sekeletu and about one hundred and sixty
persons accompanied him for a time. The journey to
Loanda on the coast took them from Nov. 11, 1853, to
May 31, 1854, a little over six months. At first the
country was flat, though there were many gigantic ant-
hills. These mounds are the work of termites, or white
ants, which seem to make the earth fertile in the same
manner that worms do, as has been shown by Darwin.
''These heaps and mounds are so conspicuous that
they may be seen for miles," says Professor Henry Drum-
mond in his "Tropical Africa," "and so numerous are
they and so useful as cover to tlie sportsman, that with-
366 DAVID LIVINGSTONE.
out them, in certain districts, hunting would be impos-
sible." They are seen " now dotting the plain in groups
like a small cemetery, now rising into mounds, singly or
in clusters, each thirty or forty feet in diameter and ten
or fifteen feet in height."
The termite, which is a small insect, " with a bloated,
yellowish-white body," lives almost entirely upon wood.
" Furniture, tables, chairs, chests of drawers," says
Professor Drummond, " everything made of wood, is
inevitably attacked, and in a single night a strong trunk
is often riddled through and through. ... On the Tan.
ganyika plateau I have camped on ground which was as
hard as adamant, and as innocent of white ants apparently
as the pavement of St. Paul's, and wakened next morning
to find a stout wooden box almost gnawed to pieces.
Leather portmanteaus share the same fate, and the only
substances which seem to defy the marauders are iron
and tin."
The houses of the ants are divided into numerous
apartments, the best reserved for the queen, a large
creature, two or three inches long, whom the tireless
workers feed from their own mouths. She lays thou-
sands of eggs in a single day, which are all carri ' d by
the workers into nurseries to be hatched. There is sel-
dom more than one queen in a colony.
The country would be overrun by white ants were it
not that they are killed and used for food, or as slaves
by the black ants. The latter are about half an inch
long, with a slight tinge of gray. They follow a few
leaders, who never do any work. They seem to be guided
on their marauding expeditions by a scent left on the
path by their leaders.
The journey to Loanda, never undertaken before by
DAril) LIVINGSTONE. 367
a European, had its perils as well as intense interest.
Livingstone had thirty-one attacks of fever during the
journey. Sometimes chiefs opposed his progress, though
in the main they were friendly ; but with great tact
and wisdom, he always opened a way for liimself and
his men. They sailed up the Zambesi in canoes. They
carried their burdens around falls — Livingstone made
their loads very light, so as not to discourage them —
he rode on ox-back when they went across the country,
and whenever it was possible he preached and reasoned
with the different tribes, hundreds often gathering to
hear him.
Where the slave-trade did not exist, Livingstone
found very little war. " Three brothers, Barolongs,"
he says, " fought for the possession of a woman who was
considered worth a battle, and the tribe has remained
permanently divided ever since."
Among the Balondas he found several chiefs who
were women. One named Nyamoana was the sister of
Shinte, the greatest Balonda chief in that part of the
country. The chief and her husband, the latter dressed
in a kilt of green and red baize, and armed with a spear
and broadsword, sat on a raised circular platform with
one hundred armed persons surrounding them, when
they received the first white man in their country.
" We put down our arms," says Livingstone, " about
forty yards off, and I walked up to the centre of the
circular bench, and saluted him in the usual way by
clapping the hands together in their fashion. He pointed
to his wife, as much as to say the honor belongs to her.
I saluted her in the same way, and a mat having been
brought, I squatted down in front of her."
Livingstone ex])lained his mission among the people,
368 DAVID LIVINGSTONE.
which words his interpreter gave to another, he repeat-
ing it to the husband, and he as the fourth speaker made
it known to the queen. Tlie response came back in the
same manner. He showed the people his watch and
compass. His magic lantern was also a never-failing
source of pleasure to the people.
The chief wished to send an escort to her brother
Shinte, but insisted that they must go by land instead
of by water, as the cataract was difficult to pass, and
the Balobale tribe might kill them.
Livingstone protested that he did not fear the tribe,
having been so often threatened with death, and pre-
ferred the water route. He ordered his men to take
the baggage to the canoes ; but Manenko, the daughter
of Nyamoana, a girl about twenty and a chief herself,
gave other orders to the men and seized the burdens
herself. Laying her hand on Livingstone's shoulder,
she said with a motherly look, " Now, my little man,
just do as the rest have done." " My feelings of annoy-
ance of course vanished," says Livingstone.
Manenko, accompanied by her husband and her
drummer, lead the company in a pouring rain. " Being
on ox-back," says the traveller, ''' I kept pretty close to
our leader, and asked her why she did not clothe her-
self during the rain, and learned that it is not con-
sidered proper for a chief to appear effeminate. . . . My
men, in admiration of her pedestrian powers, every now
and then remarked, ' Manenko is a soldier ; ' and
thoroughly wet and cold, we were all glad when she
proposed a halt to prepare our night's lodging on the
banks of a stream."
The company suffered from want of food, and would
have had nothing save that Manenko begged maize for
DAVID LIVINGSTONE. 869
them, and ground it for the white man with her own
hands.
When they stopped at a village over night, the people
took off the tops of their huts and brought them to
Livingstone, who, propping them up with stakes, thus
had a comfortable shelter. Every one who came to
salute Manenko or himself rubbed the upper parts of
the arms and chest with ashes ; those who wished to
show profounder reverence put ashes on their faces.
Shinte gave the explorer a grand reception. In the
Kotla, or place of audience, on a throne covered with a
leopard's skin, dressed in a checked jacket with kilt of
scarlet baize edged with green, his neck hung with
beads, his limbs covered with iron and copper armlets
and bracelets, a helmet crowned with goose feathers on
his head, surrounded by over a thousand of his people,
Shinte made an imposing appearance. Behind him sat
a hundred women, the chief wife, Odena, in front with
a curious red cap on her head. Nine speakers made
orations, musical instruments were played, and guns
discharged. Livingstone and his men sat under a tree
about forty yards from the chief. Shinte had never
seen a white man before, and thought the traveller
" had come from the gods."
Livingstone made Shinte a present of an ox; but when
Manenko, his niece, heard of it, she said, " This white
man belonged to her ; she had brought him here, and
therefore the ox was hers, not Shinte's." . . . She there-
fore had the ox slaughtered, and gave Shinte a leg only.
He made no complaint, her word seeming law here as
elsewhere.
ShinttS offered Livingstone a slave girl ten years old,
Baying that he always presented his visitors with a
370 DAVID LIVINGSTONE.
child. Livingstone tlianked him, but told him that he
thought it wrong to take a child away from her parents ;
that he had four children, and should be very sad if a
chief took one and gave it away.
On leaving the friendly chief, he hung a conical shell
round the neck of Livingstone, saying, " There, now you
have a proof of my friendship."
Other chiefs were likewise courteous, giving him
guides and food. Sometimes they shot one of their white
cows for him, which run wild like buffaloes. Living-
stone gave them presents, as many as his limited means
allowed — cloth, beads, razors, and the like. One leading
man, Mozinkwa, gave him many things from his garden,
and the missionary promised the wife some cloth when
he returned. When he came back on his homeward
journey, the wife was dead, and according to their
custom, Mozinkwa had moved away, leaving garden,
trees, and huts to ruin. If a man ever visits the place
where his favorite wife dies, it is to pray to her, or to
make an offering.
As ever, Livingstone took careful scientific observa-
tions as to the country, its formation, the rivers, fruits,
flowers, and animals. "If we step on shore," he says,
" a species of plover . . . follows you, flying overhead,
and is most persevering in its attempts to give fair
warning to all the animals within hearing to flee from
the approaching danger."
Another bird, by the name siksak, has a sharp spur on
its shoulder, much like that on the heel of a cock, but
scarcely half an inch in length. It is famed for its
friendship with the crocodile of the Nile.
In some of the almost impenetrable forests richly col-
ored and peculiar birds abound. " The pretty white
DAVID LIVINGSTONE. 371
ardetta is seen in flocks settling on the backs of large
herds of buffaloes, and following them on the wing as
they run."
Mr. Johnston says, " When the buffalo is quietly graz-
ing, the red-billed weaver-bird may be seen hopping on
the ground, snapping up insects and other food, or sitting
on the buffalo's back, picking off the ticks with which
its skin is infested. The sight of this bird being more
acute than that of the buffalo, it is soon alarmed by the
approach of danger, and, by flying up, apprises the buffalo
of its suspicions. When the big beast gallops away from
the approach of the slinking lion or the human hunter,
the little weaver-bird sits calmly on its back and is
borne off to fresh fields and pastures new."
Another African bird is the companion of the rhino-
ceros. It is called " Kala " by the Bechuanos. When
they wish to speak of their dependence on each other,
they say " my rhinoceros." The satellites of a chief are
thus called. The rhinoceros feeds by night, and the
bird will utter its well-known call for its big companion
in the morning. The rhinoceros has not keen sight but
an acute ear, and is therefore warned of danger by its
bird-friend.
Large herds of hippopotami are seen in the still, deep
water. They ascend the banks to graze at night. " They
are guided back to the water by the scent; but a long-
continued pouring rain makes it impossible for them to
perceive, by that means, in which direction the river
lies, and they are found bewildered on the land. The
hunters take advantage of their helplessness on these
occasions to kill them."
They lie hidden beneath the water, coming up every
few minutes to breathe. The young lie on the necks of
372 DAVID LIVINGSTONE.
their in others, who come frequently to the surface,
knowing the needs of their little ones. " In the rivers
of Loanda," says Livingstone, " where they are much in
danger of being shot, even the hippopotamus gains wit by
experience ; for, while those in the Zambesi put up their
heads openly to blow, those referred to keep their noses
among water-plants, and breathe so quietly that one
would not dream of their existence in the river except
by footprints on the banks."
Large, yellow-spotted spiders abound. One kind is
often found inside the huts of the Makololo. It is
spotted, brown in color, and half an inch in diameter.
" It is harmless, though an ugly neighbor," says Living-
stone.
There were many rivers to be forded, and swamps to be
waded through. In crossing one stream the men held
on to the tails of the oxen. Livingstone intended to do
this; but in the deep part, before he could dismount, his
ox dashed off with his companions. About twenty of
the men rushed to the aid of Livingstone, whom they
supposed would drown. Great was their joy when they
found that he could swim like themselves.
They laughed after this at the idea of being frightened
by rivers. '* We can all swim. Who carried the white
man across the river but himself ? " "I felt proud of
their praise," said Livingstone.
" Sinbad," Livingstone's ox, was not a very agreeable
animal. " He had a softer back," says Livingstone,
" but a much more intractable temper. His horns were
bent downward and hung loosely, so he could do no
harm with them ; but as we wended our way slowly
along the narrow path, he would suddenly dart
aside. . . .
DAVID LIVINGSTONE. 873
"When Sinbad ran in below a climber stretched over
the path so low that I could not stoop under it, I was
dragged off, and carae down on the crown of my head ;
and he never allowed an opportunity of the kind to pass
without trying to inflict a kick, as if I neither had nor
deserved his love."
The animal would never allow Livingstone to hold an
umbrella, so that he was very often drenched. He fre-
quently put his watch under his arm-pit to keep it dry.
The tribe of Chiboque gave him some trouble, insist-
ing that he should give a man to be a slave, as pay for
a passage through their country. One Chiboque made a
charge at his head from behind ; but Livingstone, who
was as brave as he was kind, brought the muzzle of his
gun to the mouth of the young man, when he quickly
retreated. The tribe had been accustomed to receive a
slave from every slave-trader who passed by, but Liv-
ingstone informed them that his men were all free.
Finally the chief said, " If you give us an ox, we will
give you whatever you wish, and then we shall be
friends." ... To this Livingstone consented ; and when
the ox was slaughtered, the chief sent a bag of meal and
two or three pounds of Livingstone's own ox !
The slave-trade, here as elsewhere, was always cruel
and despicable. It was the custom of one of the chiefs
in this part of the country to take all the goods of a
slave-trader, and then send out a party to some neigh-
boring village, seize all the people, and sell them as
slaves to pay for the goods. When Livingstone reasoned
with one of his head men as to the sin of such a course,
he replied, " We do not go up to God, as you do ; we
are put into the ground."
The obstacles became so great from swamps and
374 DAVID LIVINGSTONE.
exorbitant chiefs who demanded " a man or an ox or a
tusk," that some of his own men determined to turn
back. Worn to a skeleton from fever, and his clothing
raGTcred, he informed them that he should ^o to the coast
if he went alone, and sadly went into his tent to pray.
His head man presently came in, and said, *' Do not
be disheartened ; we will never leave you. Wherever
you lead, we will follow." They "knew no one but
Sekeletu and Livingstone, and would die for him."
When they reached the river Quango, one hundred
and fifty yards broad, they were aided by a young Portu-
guese sergeant of militia; and Livingstone finally reached
Loanda in safety, IMay 31, with his twenty-seven fol-
lowers. Here he was received most cordially by Mr.
Edmund Gabriel, the British commissioner for the sup-
pression of the slave-trade.
His Makololo were astonished when they saw the
ocean. "We were marching along with our father,"
they said, "believing what the ancients had told us Avas
true, that the world had no end; but all at once the
world said to us, 'I am finished; there is no more
of me.' "
He was so prostrated that he was urged to go to Eng-
land and see his family; but he steadfastly refused, for
he had promised his Makololo that he would bring them
back to their own land. He sent his journals, maps,
and observations by the mail-packet Forerunner, which
was lost off Madeira with all her passengers but one.
Had not Livingstone kept his promise to his colored
men, he, too, doubtless would have perished.
It was a tiresome work to rewrite, as far as possible,
his journals and maps : " A feat," says Thomas Hughes,
" equal to that of Carlyle in rewriting the volume of his
DAVID LIVINGSTONE. 375
French Revolution, after its destruction by John Stuart
Mill's housemaid."
This long journey, never before made by a white man,
produced great interest in England. The London Geo-
graphical Society, on motion of Sir Roderick Murchison,
awarded Livingstone their gold medal — their highest
]ionor.
On Sept. 20, 1854, he began his homeward journey.
Among luany presents for the chiefs he took a horse for
Sekeletu, which soon sickened and died. The Chiboque
head men were not mucli pleasanter than in the outward
journey; but when Livingstone held a six-barrelled re-
volver before the face of the chief, the latter said, " Oh,
I have only come to speak to you, and wish peace only."
The chief feared to turn lest Livingstone should shoot
him in the back.
"If I wanted to kill you I could shoot you in the face
as well," was the reply. And mounting his ox, to show
that he was not afraid of the chiefs shooting him in the
back, he rode away.
IManeidco sent -her husband fifteen miles to meet and
welcome them, and cement their friendship by becoming
" blood-relations." The hands of the parties are joined ;
then a slight cut is made on the hands, on the stomach
of each, and on the right cheeks and foreheads. A
small quantity of blood is taken from the wounds by a
stalk of grass, and put into pots of beer, when each
drinks the blood of the other. After this rite they are
perpetual friends. Presents are then exchanged.
All along on the homeward route they were warmly
welcomed. Every village gave tliem an ox and some-
times two. At the Makololo villages they were received
as people who had risen from the dead, as it was believed
376 DAVID LIVINGSTONE.
they would never return. They were kissed on the
cheeks and hands by tlieir friends, while the women
danced and sang " luUiloos."
Whenever it was possible to send a letter to the loved
ones in England, Livingstone did so. He wrote to his
wife : " It occurs to me, my dearest Mary, that if I send
you a note from different parts on the way through this
colony, some of them will surely reach you ; and if they
carry any of the affection I bear to you in their compo-
sition, they will not fail to comfort you." Speaking of
Loanda, he says, after he had recovered from the fever,
"1 remained a short time longer than that actually
required to set me on my legs, in longing expectation of
a letter from you. None came. ... I hope a letter from
you may be waiting for me at Zambesi. Love to all the
children. Accept the assurance of unabated love."
Poor Sinbad, the ox, died on the way home, from the
bite of the tsetse. This poisonous insect is no larger
than the common house-fly, and is brown like the honey-
bee, with three or four yellow bars on the hind part of
its body. Its peculiar buzz is well known by travellers,
as it is certain death to the ox, horse, and dog. There
are whole sections of African country where cattle have
perished by the thousands. Sebituane once lost nearly
all the cattle of his tribe. There is no cure yet known
for the disease. Its bite is not poisonous to man nor to
most wild animals.
Arriving at Linyanti, Livingstone spent eight weeks
with Sekeletu, who showed him every kindness. He
preached often, he studied the languages, and he won
the hearts of the people by his noble life. " No one ever
gains much influence in this country," he said, " without
purity and uprightness. The acts of a stranger are
DAVID LIVINGSTONE. 377
keenly scrutinized by both young and old; and seldom is
the judgment pronounced, even by the heathen, unfair or
uncharitable. I have heard women speaking in admira-
tion of a white man because he was pure, and never was
guilty of any secret immorality."
Sekeletu provided Livingstone with cows to furnish
him milk, slaughtered oxen for him, and when he de-
parted, Nov. 3, 1855, for the eastern coast of Africa, to
study the people and find suitable mission-fields, the
chief and two hundred of his followers accompanied him
for a long distance, leaving at their departure one hun-
dred and fourteen men, Sekwebu being the principal
guide, twelve oxen, — three for riding upon, — and au
abundance of fresh butter and honey.
Livingstone was deeply affected by this kind treat-
ment. In a severe thunder-storm at night Sekeletu
covered the traveller with his own blanket, and lay on
the ground uncovered for the night. " If such men
must perish by the advance of civilization," says Living-
stone, " as certain races of animals do before others, it
is a pity. God grant that ere this time comes they may
receive that gospel which is a solace for the soul iu
death ! "
Mamire, the mother of Sekeletu, said to Livingstone
on his departure, " You are now going among people
who cannot be trusted, because we have used them
badly ; but you go with a different message from any
they ever heard before, and Jesus will be with you and
help you, though among enemies."
He had not gone very far along the Zambesi before lie
discovered the celebrated falls, which he named after
his sovereign, Victoria Falls. Mr. Johnston calls this
" Cue of the wonders of the world. . . . The broad
378 DAVID LIVINGSTONE.
Zambesi, flowing nearly due south, and nineteen hundred
yards wide, is cleft by a chasm — a crack in its bed —
running athwart its course. The whole river plunges
precipitously down this chasm to a depth of about three
hundred and sixty feet, or, counting the depth of the
water, say four hundred feet. The entire volume of
water rolls clear over quite unbi'oken ; but after a de-
scent of four hundred feet the glassy cascade becomes
a seething, bubbling, boiling froth, from which spring
upwards high into the air, immense columns of steam-
like spray."
This mass of vapor, forming from three to six columns,
becomes condensed, and descends in a perpetual shower
of rain. The natives call this mighty cataract Mosio-
atunya, " smoke sounds there." The verdure in this
locality is of great variety and beauty.
Some of the chiefs whom he met were hostile. They
had never seen a white man before, and knew only that
some other nations, as the Arabs, were slave-traders.
Livingstone showed them his skin. They said, " We
never saw skin so white as that. You must be one of
the tribe that loves the black man," and they allowed
him to go onward.
One chief, Moyara, had fifty-four human skulls hnng
on the points of stakes around his hamlet. When asked
why his father, the chief before him, had killed these
people, some of whom Avere mere boys, he replied, " To
show his fierceness."
If a man wished to curry favor with a Batoka chief,
whenever he met a stranger he cut off his head and
brought it back to adorn the fence of the ruler.
The Batoka smoke the " mutokwane," a weed whose
narcotic effects they like ; and it produces a sort of frenzy
DAVID LIVINGSTONE. 379
in which they can make a more effective onslaught on
their enemies. The hashish in use among tlie Turks
is an extract of the same plant, the common hemp of
the variety Indica.
Much of the country through which they passed was
beautiful in its flora. Of the many lilies Mr. Johnston
says : " Cri7ium is the commonest lily genus, and has
species that are white, pink and white, and even scarlet
in their blooms. To see, as one may do towards the
close of the rainy season, fields near the river's bank or
glades in the forest an almost uninterrupted sheet of
lily blooms for several acres in extent, is a sight so
lovely that you pardon Africa all its sins on the spot."
There are also great fields of a flower like the crocus,
purple, yellow, white, and mauve colors. After the
flowers come bright red seed-pods, which contain the
''grains of Paradise." Livingstone studied carefully
the geology of the country and the beasts and birds.
The elephants were a source of great interest, as well
as of use for food for his men, '' The male and female
elephants," he says, " are never seen in one herd. The
young males remain with their dams only until they are
full grown." Their food consists of bulbs, roots, and
branches. They will break off trees as large as a man's
body, that they may feed on the tender shoots at the
top.
When attacked by the spears of the natives, the
mother elephant will place herself on the danger side
of her calf, and pass her proboscis over it again and
again, as if to assure it of safety.
A bird called the red-beaked hornbill abounds. The
mother-bird enters the nest made of her own feathers.
The male thou plasters up the hole. in the tree in which
380 DAVID LIVINGSTONE.
the nest is built, leaving only a narrow slit through which
he feeds her. She lays her eggs and hatches them,
remaining two or three months till the birds are ready
to fly. Tlie male meantime becomes so thin that he not
infrequently dies from his over-work to feed them all.
The birds called honey-guides, by their chirping, direct
men to the places where wild bees store their honey.
It is not known whether this is done out of friendliness
for man, or for a share of the honey, which is always
given them.
The men of some of the tribes were quite nude. The
women pierced the upper lip, gradually enlarging the
orifice till they could insert a shell. " The deformed lips
of the women makethem look very ugly," says Living-
stone ; " I never saw one smile." When asked why they
did this, they replied simply, " It is the fashion." When
a chief died, often his servants were killed, that he might
have them in the next world.
Some tribes built their huts on high stages to protect
them from spotted hyenas, lions, and elephants. The
wives are usually purchased of the parents for so many
cattle or goats. "If nothing is given, the family from
which she has come can claim the children as a part of
itself. The payment is made to sever this bond."
''When a young man takes a liking for a girl of an-
other village," says Livingstone, "and the parents have
no objection to the match, he is obliged to come and live
at their village. He has to perform certain services for
the mother-in-law, such as keeping her well supplied
with firewood. ... If he becomes tired of living in this
state of vassalage, and wishes to return to his own
family, he is obliged to leave all his children behind —
they belong to the wife."
DAVID LIVINGSTONE. 381
On May 20, 1856, Livingstone reached Quilimane, on
the eastern coast of Africa. Pie met a cordial welcome
from the Portuguese, who liad felt sure that no European
could pass through the dangerous tribes. Two Scripture
texts were of especial comfort to him in all his journeys:
" In all thy ways acknowledge Him, and He shall direct
thy steps." "Commit thy way unto the Lord ; trust also
in Him ; and He shall bring it to pass."
After six weeks at Quilimane, Livingstone started for
England to see his family, from whom he had not even
heard for three years, leaving his men witli the promise
"that nothing but death should prevent his return."
He sailed on the steamer Frolic, taking his guide,
Sekwebu, with hina at the earnest request of tlie latter.
" You will die if you go to a country so cold as mine,"
Livingstone had said to him.
"That is nothing," he answered; "let me die at your
feet."
The passage was rough, and the poor man became
deranged. He leaped overboard ; and though he could
swim well, he' pulled himself down, hand under hand, by
the chain cable. They could not recover his body.
Tlie shaft of the engine broke on the passage home-
Avard, but Livingstone finally reached England, Dec. 12,
1856. Nearly live years had passed since he had seen
his wife and children. To iier with her four children,
away from husband and parents, Dr. and Mrs. Moffat,
in a strange country, the separation was almost unbear-
able. Her health had broken under the strain.
She liad penned this simple but toucliing poem to give
him when he came, with tlie hope that they should
never be parted again. The final parting was not long
in coming.
882 DAVID LIVINGSTONE.
" A hundred thousand welcomes, and it's time for you to come
From the far land of the foreigner, to your country and your
home.
Oh, long as we were parted, ever since yon went away,
I never passed a dreamless night, or knew an easy day.
A hundred thousand welcomes ! how my heart is gushing o'er
With the love and joy and wonder thus to see your face once
more,
now did I live without you these long, long years of woe ?
It seems as if 'twould kill me to be parted from you now.
You'll never part me, darling, there's a promise in your eye ;
I may tend you while I'm living, you will watch me when I
die ;
And if death but kindly lead me to the blessed home on high,
What a hundred thousand welcomes will await you in the sky !
Maky."
Livingstone had been away from England sixteen
years. He was everywhere welcomed with ovations.
The Royal Geographical Society held a special meeting
to receive him. The London Missionary Society, with
Lord Shaftesbury in the chair, gave liini cordial greeting.
A great gathering assembled at tlie Mansion House to do
honor to the man who had travelled at that time over
not less than eleven thousand miles of Africa. He was
given the freedom of the city of London in a box valued
at fifty guineas, and of Hamilton, where his mother and
the rest of his family resided. Glasgow presented him
a gold box with the freedom of the city, and a gift of
two thousand pounds from the citizens.
To the cotton-spinners of tliat city he said that toil
belonged to most of the human race, and to be poor was
no reproach. The Saviour occupied a humble position.
" My great object," he said, "was to be like Him — to
DAVID LIVINGSTONE. 883
imitate him as far as He could be imitated. We have
not the power of working miracles, but we can do a
little in the way of healing the sick, and I sought a
medical education in order that I might be like Him."
Edinburgh and Dublin and Manchester followed the
example of Glasgow. Little Blantyre, where he had
worked in the mills, gave him a public reception. Ox-
ford made him D.C.L., Glasgow an LL.D., and the
Royal Society made him a Fellow. At Cambridge, where
he enjoyed the friendship of such men as Sedgwick,
Whewell, and Selwyn, he practically formed the Univer-
sities Mission, which has wrought such a noble work in
Central Africa. He said to the students and the pro-
fessors, " I know that in a few years I shall be cut off in
that country, which is now open. Do not let it be shut
again. I go back to Africa to make an open path for
commerce and Christianity. Do you carry out the work
which I have begun. / leave it tvith you ! "
Concerning the work of the Universities Mission, Mr.
Thomas Hughes says : *' From the island centre at
Zanzibar the mission has now spread over one thousand
miles of the neighboring mainland. Its staff, including
the bishop and three archdeacons, numbers ninety-seven,
of whom two deacons and thirty-two teachers and readers
are natives, and nineteen English ladies. Its income
for 1887 exceeded fifteen thousand five hundred pounds.
It has three stations on the island and ten on the
mainland." One station has a fine stone church, and
a home for one hundred and fifteen boys. A sister-
hood trains large classes of women.
Livingstone took lodgings in Chelsea, just out of
London, and, surrounded by his family, wrote his first
book, " Missionary Jcnirneys and Researches in South
384 DAVID LIVINGSTONE.
Africa." The work was irksome to the active man.
When it was finished, he said, " I tliinlc I wouhl
rather cross the African continent again tlian undertake
to write another book. It is far easier to travel than to
write about it." The book had a large sale, the London
trade alone requiring ten thousand copies. Livingstone
liaving been appointed Her Majesty's Consul at Quili-
maneforthe east coast of Africa as well as commander of
an expedition to explore Eastern and Central Africa, —
the Queen had granted him a most interesting private in-
terview, — he sailed from England with his wife and
youngest child, Oswell, March 10, 1858. It was a sad
parting from the three children, Robert, Thomas, and
Agnes, l)ut^ie rejoiced tliat his wife was at last with
him. " Glad indeed am I that I am to be accompanied
by my guardian angel," he said.
On their arrival at Cape Town, in May, Mrs. Living-
stone's health was so poor that although she had hoped
to make the second Zambesi expedition Avith her hus-
band, she, with Oswell, was obliged to remain with her
parents, Dr. and Mrs. Moffat.
Livingstone had brought out a steam-launch from
England named the Ma-Robert (the mother of Robert),
the name by which his wife was called by the natives.
In this he sailed up one branch of the Zambesi Delta.
On reaching his Makololo, whom he had left behind
when he went to England, he found that thirty had
died of small-pox, while six had been murdered by the
black Portuguese. They welcomed him with the greatest
enthusiasm. The people had told them, " Your English-
man will never return ; " but " We trusted you," said
they, "and now we shall sleep."
The Ma-Robert did not prove a good launch; and
DAVID LIVINGSTONE. 385
the government sent out another called the Pioneer,
for the navigation of the Zambesi and lower Shire
River.
He sailed up the Shire for two hundred miles to
some cataracts, — these extend seventy miles, — which
he named Murchison in honor of Sir Roderick Murchi-
son ; he discovered Lake Shirwa, a salt lake, more than
sixty miles long, in the midst of a fine country sur-
rounded by mountains eight thousand feet high.
Professor Henry Drummond visited Lake Shirwa
thirty years afterwards, when a very aged female chief
came to see him, and spoke kindly of a white man who
came to her village long, long ago, and gave her a
present of cloth. This must have been David Living-
stone. Though Shirwa is one of the smaller African
lakes. Professor Drummond says it is probably larger
than all the lakes of Great Britain put together.
On Sept. 16, 1859, Livingstone discovered Lake
Nyassa. "Instead of being one hundred and fifty miles
long," says Professor Drummond, " as iirst supposed.
Lake Nyassa is now known to hav^e a length of three
hundred and fifty miles, and a breadth varying from
sixteen to sixty miles. It occupies a gigantic trough of
granite and gneiss, the profoundly deep water standing
at a level of sixteen hundred feet above the sea, with
the mountains rising all around it, and sometimes sheer
above it, to a height of one, two, three, and four
thousand feet."
On this lake now plies the little steamer Ilala, so
named from the place where Livingstone died. She-
was carried thither from England in seven Inindred
pieces, and bolted together on the shore. " The bright
spot now on the lake is the Scotch Livingstonia Mission
886 DAVID LIVINGSTONE.
at Bandaw6," says Professor DruinmoiKl. "I cherish
no more sacred memory of my life than that of a com-
munion service in the little Baudawe chapel, when the
sacramental cup was handed to me by the bare black
arm of a native communicant," whose life, he says, tested
afterwards on the Tanganyika plateau, " gave him per-
haps a better right to be there than any of us."
In this lake region Livingstone beheld, though not
for the first time, the horrors of the slave-trade. At
the village of the chief Mbame they met a slave party
on its way to Tete, on the Zambesi. The men, women,
and children were all manacled. " The black drivers,"
says Livingstone, ^^ armed with muskets, and bedecked
with various articles of finery, marched jauntily in the
front, middle, and rear of the line, some of them blow-
ing exultant notes out of long tin horns."
As soon as they saw the white men, they fled into the
forest, knowing that the English Government was try-
ing to put down slavery. The poor slaves, especially
the women and children, were soon freed. " It was more
difficult to cut the men adrift, as each had his neck
in the fork of a stout stick, six or seven feet long, and
kept in by an iron rod which was riveted at both ends
across the throat. With a saw, one by one, the men
were sawed out into freedom."
Many were children not more than five years of age.
One little boy said, '' The others tied and starved us ;
you cut the ropes and tell us to eat. What sort of people
are you ? Where did you come from ? "
" Two of the women had been shot the day before
for attempting to untie the thongs. This, the rest were
told, was to prevent them from attempting to escape.
One woman had her infant's brains knocked out because
DAVID LIVINGSTONE. 387
slie could not carry her load and it ; and a man was
despatched with an axe because he had broken down
with fatigue."
The next day a gang of fifty slaves was freed. The
leader was the negro agent of one of the principal
merchants of Tete. Sometimes these slaves are taken
in war ; but generally their village is wantonly attacked,
and those who cannot be enslaved are cruelly killed.
At this time it was estimated by the British Consul at
Zanzibar that nineteen thousand slaves annually come
from the Nyassa country through the custom-house at
Zanzibar, exclusive of those sent to Portuguese slave-
ports.
At one of the hamlets where Mariano, the great
Portuguese slave-agent, had been, "Dead bodies," says
Livingstone, " floated past us daily, and in the mornings
the paddles had to be cleared of corpses caught by the
floats during the night, . . . The corpses we saw float-
ing down the river were only a remnant of those that
had perished, whom their friends, from weakness, could
not bury, nor the overgorged crocodiles devour."
Village after village had been burned. '• Tingane had
been defeated ; his people had been killed, kidnapped,
and forced to flee from their villages. There were a few
wretched survivors in a village above the Ruo, but the
majority of the population was dead. The sight and
smell of dead bodies was everywhere. Many skeletons
lay beside the path, where in their weakness they had
fallen and expired. Ghastly living forms of boys and
girls, with dull dead eyes, were crouching beside some of
the huts. . . .
"Many had ended their misery under shady trees,
others under projecting crags in the hills, while others
888 BAVID LIVINGSTONE.
lay in their huts with closed doors, which, when opened,
disclosed the mouldering corpse with the poor rags
round the loins, the skull fallen off the pillow, the little
skeleton of the child tliat had perished first rolled up
in a mat between two large skeletons."
Sometimes these slave-traders, both Arab and half-
caste Portuguese, told the Africans, to win their confi-
dence at first before seizing them, that they were " the
children " of Livingstone, and sometimes the mission-
ary came near losing his life on account of the hostility
thus engendered.
On INIay 15, 1860, Livingstone started westward with
-Jiis^Iakololo, to take them back to their own country.
When they reached it, he found their chief, Sekele-
tu, slowly failing from leprosy. He did all for him
that was possible; but his healtli could not be restored,
and he died in ISGl. A civil war resulted, and the
Makololo were driven from their homes. Livinj^stone
returned to Tete Nov. 21, having been absent six
months.
After farther explorations, on Jan. 30, 1862, her
Majesty's ship Gorgon arrived from Europe, bringing
the steamer Lady Nyassa, for which Livingstone had
asked so earnestly and waited so long. He wanted her
on Lake Nyassa, as a preventive of the slave-trade, to
aid in mission work, and to help open up trade.
He wrote to Sir Roderick Murchison : '' If govern-
ment furnishes the means, all right; if not, I shall
spend my book-money on it. I don't need to touch the
cliildren's fund, and mine could not be better spent.
People who are born rich sometimes become miserable
from a fear of becoming poor ; but I have the advan-
tage, you see, in not being afraid to die poor. If I live,
DAVID LIVINGSTONE. 389
I nu;st succeed in what I have luulertaken ; death alone
■will put a stop to my efforts."
The government did not pay for the steamer, and she
cost Livingstone about six thousand pounds, the greater
part of his book profits.
Mrs. Livingstone was also on the Gorgon. Slie had
gone back to Scotland after the birth of her last child,
Anna Mary, Nov. 16, 1858, at her father's home in
Kuruinan. Evidently she could not breast the fatigues
of African exploration, but she would make one more
trial.
When the ship neared the coast, and Dr. James Stew-
art of the Free Church of Scotland saw Livingstone in
the distance, he said to Mrs. Livingstone, '* There he is
at last." " She looked brighter at this announcement,"
he says, " than I had seen her do any day for seven
months before."
The meeting was not for long. " Malarial fever," says
Professor Drummond, '• is the one sad certainty which
every African traveller must face. For months he may
escape; but its finger is upon him, and well for him if he
has a friend near when it finally overtakes him. . . . He
rises, if he does rise, a shadow, and slowly accumulates
strength for the next attack, which he knows too well
will not disappoint him. . . . The malaria spares no
man : the strong fall as the weak. No kind of care can do
more than make the attacks less frequent. No prediction
can be made beforehand as to which regions are haunted
by it and which are safe."
The dread enemy came to IMrs. Livingstone on
April 21 ; on the 25th she became delirious Avith the
fever ; at sunset on Sunday, the 27th, she died at Shu-
panga, on the Zambesi. Dr. Stewart says of that last
390 DAVID LIVINGSTONE.
sad scene, " Livingstone was sitting by the side of a rude
bed formed of boxes, but covered with a soft mattress,
on which lay his dying wife. All consciousness had
now departed, as she was in a state of deep coma, from
which all efforts to rouse her had been unavailing. . . .
The man who had faced so many deaths, and braved so
many dangers, was now utterly broken down, and weep-
ing like a child."
A coffin was made during the night, and a grave was
dug next day under a baobab-tree sixty feet in cir-
cumference. " The men asked to be alloived to mount
guard," says her husband, " till we had got the grave
built up, and we had it built with bricks dug from an
~old house." A temporaiy paling and wooden cross were
placed at the grave ; and these were subsequently re-
jilaced by a stone cross and slab, with an iron railing.
Livingstone wrote in his journal: "It is the first
heavy stroke I have suffered, and quite takes away my
strength. I wept over her who well deserved many
tears. . . . God pity the poor children, who were all
tenderly attached to her, and I am left alone in the
world by one whom I felt to be a part of myself. . . .
Oh, my Mary, my Mary ! how often we have longed for
a quiet home, since you and I were cast adrift at Kolo-
beng! . . . The prayer was found in her papers —
'Accept me. Lord, as I am, and make me such as Thou
wouldst have me to be.' "
He wrote later, May 11, Kongone : "My dear, dear
Mary has been this evening a fortnight in heaven — ab-
sent from the body, present with the Lord. 'To-day
shalt thou be with me in Paradise.' . . . For the first
time in my life I feel willing to die."
Mrs. Livingstone had a strong presentiment of death
DAVID LIVINGSTONE. 391
being near. She felt tliat she should never have a house
in Africa.
May 31, he writes in his journal: "The loss of my
ever dear Mary lies like a heavy weight on my heart.
In our intercourse in private there was more than what
would be thought by some a decorous amount of merri-
ment and play. I said to her a few days before her
fatal illness, ' We old bodies ought now to be more
sober, and not play so much.' — 'Oh, no,' said she, "'you
must always be as playful as you have always been ; I
would not like you to be as grave as some folks I have
seen.' "
To his daughter Agnes he Avrote : "I feel alone in
the world now, and what will the poor dear baby do
without her mamma ? She often spoke of her, and
sometimes burst into a flood of tears, just as I now do
in taking up and arranging the things left by my beloved
partner of eighteen years."
To Sir Roderick Murchison he wrote concerning his
wife, who, beside the care of her family, had taught so
successfully an infant and sewing school : " It was a
fine sight to see her day by day walking a quarter of a
mile to the town, no matter how broiling hot the sun, to
impart instruction to the Bakwains. . Ma-Robert's name
was known through all the country and eighteen hun-
dred miles beyond. A brave, good woman was she."
Later he wrote to Sir Roderick concerning the Zam-
besi as the great highway to Lake Nyassa : "It may
seem to some persons weak to feel a chord vibrating to
the dust of her who rests on the banks of the Zambesi,
and to think that the path by that river is consecrated
by her remains."
To Sir Thomas Maclear he wrote: "I suppose that
892 DAVID LIVINGSTONE.
I shall die in these uplands, and somebody will carry-
out the plan I have longed to put into practice. ... T
work with as much vigor as I can, and mean to do so
till the change comes ; but the prospect of a home is all
dispelled."
April 27, 18G3, his journal reads : " On this day
twelvemonths my beloved Mary Moffat was removed
from me by death."
And then he quotes a verse from Tennyson's " May
Queen," beginning, —
" If I can, I'll come again, mother, from out my resting-place."
Livingstone was a great lover of the poets, and was
familiar with those of America as well as Europe. INIany
poems of Longfellow and Whittier he knew by heart.
Several poems were fastened inside the boards of his
journals.
The explorations now went on for some months, till
the English government, in view of the deaths of many
missionaries who had come out, and the expense attend-
ing the expedition, recalled it.
This was a sore trial to Livingstone, but he acquiesced,
sending the Pioneer and her seamen home. He could
have sold the Lady Nyassa to the Portuguese ; but to
this he would never consent, as he knew she would be
used in the slave-trade. He therefore took her to
Bombay, India, twenty-five hundred miles away, across
the Indian Ocean. He was captain and pilot, the same
self-dependent, fearless traveller that he had been in the
wilds of Africa. He was forty-five days at sea ; during
twenty-five of these his ship was becalmed. He could
not sell her at once, but did so later, receiving only
DAVID LIVINGSTONE. 393
twenty-tliree hundred pounds for that which had cost
him six thousand pounds. This money he deposited in
an Indian bank which failed, so that he lost the whole
of it. He simply remarked, " The whole of the money
she cost was dedicated to the great cause for which she
was built — we are not responsible for results."
From India he sailed to England, arriving at Charing
Cross Station, July 23, 1864. As before, he was cordially
welcomed. He attended receptions at Lady Palmer-
ston's and the Duchess of Wellington's, and lunched
with Baroness Burdett Coutts and Lady Franklin, though
he had little love for general society. He hastened to
see his mother and children at Hamilton, planted trees
while on a visit to the Duke of Argyle, and then with
his daughter Agnes went to ISTewstead Abbey, Notting-
hamshire, where at the residence of his friend, Mr.
William F. Webb, formerly the home of Lord Byron,
he wrote his second work, " The Zambesi and its Tribu-
taries." Here he remained for eight months, Avriting
his book in the Sussex Tower, working sometimes till
two o'clock in the morning.
While at the Abbey, in June, he received the news of
his mother's death, and hastened to the funeral. He
records in his journal: "Seeing the end was near, sis-
ter Agnes said, 'The Saviour has come for you, mother;
you can " lippen " yourself to Him ! ' She replied, ' Oh,
yes.' Little Anna Mary was held up to her. She gave
her the last look, and said, ' Bonnie wee lassie,' gave a
few long inspirations, and all was still. . . . When
going away in 1858, she said to me that she would have
liked one of her laddies to lay her head in the grave.
It so happened that I was there to pay the last tribute
to a dear good mother."
394 DAVID LIVINGSTONE.
His last act in Scotland was to attend an examination
of his son Oswell's school, where prizes were given. In
making his address, he closed it with these words, —
his last public words in Scotland, — "Fear God, and
WORK HARD."
Livingstone started on his third and last journey to
Africa, Aug. 19, 1865. The government and Geo-
graphical Society each furnished him five hundred
pounds, and a friend, Mr. James Young of Glasgow,
one thousand pounds. He was continued as consul,
but without salary. He reached Zanzibar in January,
1866, and began his journey with thirteen sepoys, ten
Johanna men, nine Nassick boys, two Shupanga, — one of
these was Susi, — and two Waiyau men, of whom one was
Chuma. The latter Avas originally a slave, whom Living-
stone had freed in the Shire Highlands. They had six
camels, three Indian buffaloes and a calf, two mules,
four donkeys, and a poodle dog named Chitane.
The sepoys were almost useless, beat the poor camels
with sticks, overloaded and neglected to feed them, so
that in a month two camels and one biiffalo were dead,
one camel a skeleton from bad sores made from their
sticks, one buffalo exhausted, and one mule very ill.
Though repeatedly reproved by Livingstone, they com-
mitted their brutalities when he was not in sight. They
killed the last young buffalo calf and ate it, telling
Livingstone that they saio a tiger carry it away and
devour it before their eyes. Livingstone asked if tliey
saw the stripes, and they all declared that they did.
This of course proved their falsehood, as there are no
tigers in Africa. Finally in July he sent them back to
the coast. .
In September the Johanna men deserted, and returned
DAVID LIVINGSTONE. 895
to Zanzibar, They reported that Livingstone was dead,
which was disproved by a search expedition sent out
from England, under Mr. Edward Young, in May, 1867.
The little poodle Chitane was drowned in swimming
across the Chimbwe Eiver, a mile wide, between Lakes
Nyassa and Tanganyika. " He had more spunk in him,"
said Livingstone, "than a hundred country dogs, took
charge of the whole line of march, ran to see the first
man in the line, and then back to the last, and barked
to haul him up ; and then, when he knew what hut I
occupied, would not let a country cur come in sight of
it, and never stole himself."
From " Livingstone's Last Journals," compiled after his
death, we learn of those last tiresome but fruitful jour-
neys. They marched along the banks of the Eovuma
River to Lake Nyassa, reaching it Aug. 8. He found,
of the tribes along their route, that the Makonde know
nothing of a Deity, but pray to their mothers when in
distress or dying. The head man of the Manganjas
confided to Livingstone his afflictions, as did many of
the people. A wife had run away. The traveller asked
him how many he had. When he said twenty in all,
Livingstone told him he thought he had nineteen too
many. " But who would cook for strangers, if I had
but one ? " he naively asked.
The chief Mponda wished to go away with Living-
stone, and did not care if he were absent for ten years.
Many of the people were tattooed, and had large slits
in the lobes of the ear. Their teeth were sharpened to a
point, and some of them had the two front teeth knocked
out.
The Livingstone party reached the river Loangwa
Dec. 16. About this time they suffered much from the
39G DAVID LIVINGSTONE.
lack of food. He says in his journal : " Simon gave me
a little of his meal and went without himself. I took
my belt up three holes to relieve hunger."
Often they waded through rivers and marshes up to
the thigh. Jan. 12 he writes: "Sitting down this
morning near a tree, my head was just one yard off a
good-sized cobra, coiled up in the sprouts of its roots ;
but it was benumbed with cold. A very pretty little
puff adder lay in the path also benumbed."
Jan. 20 two Waiyaus deserted, one of them taking off
Livingstone's invaluable medicine-chest. A boy, Baroha,
had been carrying it most carefully, and he and the
Waiyau had exchanged loads for a short time. " I felt
as if I had now received the sentence of death," Living-
stone wrote in his journal. ... "It is difficult to say
from the heart, 'Thy will be done;' but I shall try."
Yet, as ever, he has an excuse for the poor creatures.
He adds: "These Waiyau had few advantages. Sold
into slavery in early life, they were in the worst possible
school for learning to be honest and honorable ; they be-
haved well for a long time ; but having had hard and
scanty fare in Lobisa, wet and misery in passing through
dripping forests, hungry nights, and fatiguing days, their
patience must have been worn out. . . . Yet the loss of
this medicine-box gnaws at the heart terribly."
Livingstone had the greatest possible tact with all the
chiefs, always talking to them against slavery and war,
and opening their minds as far as possible to good things.
One chief, Moamba, said, " What do you wish to buy, if
not slaves or ivory ? "
" I replied," says Livingstone, " that the only thing I
had seen worth buying was a fine fat chief like him, as
a specimen."
DAVID LIVINGSTONE. 397
He and many of the others drank a kind of beer made
from the grain of millet. To some this beer is almost
food ; but the result is they have poor constitutions, and
easily succumb to a slight illness.
On April 1, 1867, Livingstone reached Lake Tangan-
yika, over thirty miles broad and about four hundred
and fifty miles in length. " After being a fortnight at
this lake," says Livingstone, " it still appears one of
surpassing loveliness. . . . It lies in a deep basin whose
sides are nearly perpendicular, but covered well with
trees ; the rocks which appear are bright red argillaceous
schist ; the trees at present all green ; down some of
these rocks come beautiful cascades, and buffaloes, ele-
phants, and antelopes wander and graze on the more level
spots, while lions roar by night."
Here Livingstone had several fits of insensibility from
fever, and had no medicine with which to cure himself.
He discovered Lake Moero, sixty miles long, on Nov.
8, 1867. He met with a grand reception from Casembe,
a chief who cut off his peoples' hands and ears for vari-
ous offences. His principal Avife, with light-brown
complexion, was carried about in a sort of palanquin, by
a dozen men, while a niimber of men ran before her,
brandishing swords and battle-axes, one man beating a
hollow instrument to warn people to clear the way for
the queen. A bride or a chief is often carried on a man's
shoulders.
In Casembe's country if a child cuts the upper front
teeth before the lower, it is killed, as unlucky. If a child
is seen to turn from one side to the other in sleep, it is
killed. If Casembe dreams of any man twice or three
times, he puts him to death, lest the man may practise
some secret art against the chief's life.
398 DAVID LIVINGSTONE.
Many of the tribes asked for '' gun medicine," so that
they could shoot straight, and desired to " drink medi-
cine," so as to understand how to learn to read.
Jan. 1, 1868, Livingstone writes in his journal : "Al-
mighty Father, help me to be more profitable during
this year. If I am to die this year, prepare me for it."
Several more of the explorer's men deserted him, but
he, as ever before, excused them. "I did not blame
them very severely in my own mind for absconding," he
said ; " they were tired of tramping, and so, verily, am I."
In early spring he saw marigolds in full bloom all over
the forests, and foxgloves also. In June he came to a
grave in the forest, a little rounded mound, as if the
occupant sat in it in the usual native way. It had flour
and large blue beads strewn over it. " This is the sort
of grave I should prefer," Livingstone wrote: "to lie in
the still, still forest, and no hand ever disfctu-b my bones.
The graves at home always seem to me to be miserable,
especially those in the cold, damp clay, and without el-
bow room ; but I have nothing to do but wait till He
who is over all decides where to lay me down and die.
Poor Mary lies on Shupanga brae, 'and beeks foment
the sun.' "
July 18, 1868, Livingstone discovered Lake Bangweolo,
one of the largest lakes of Central Africa^ He sailed
upon it in a canoe forty-five feet long and four feet
broad.
AVhen the New Year came he was so ill that he had
to be carried in a litter made of boughs. He reached
the great Arab settlement at Ujiji, on the eastern shore
of Lake Tanganyika, INIarch 14, 1869, only to find that
the stores which he had ordered sent by caravans from
Zanzibar had been plundered and scattered far and wide.
DAVID LIVINGSTONE. 399
Sixty-two out of eighty pieces of cloth, each piece con-
taining twenty-four yards, had been disposed of. The
buffaloes had all died on the way. Here he wrote some
letters, and sent them by the Arabs to the coast, but
they were never delivered.
All through these last journeys he had been saddened
by the enormities of the slave-traders. " Slavery is a
great evil wherever I have seen it," he writes in his
journal. " A poor old woman and child are among the
captives. The boy, about three years old, seems a mother's
pet ; his feet are sore from walking in the sun. He was
offered for two fathoms [four yards of unbleached calico],
and his mother for one fathom. He understood it all, and
cried bitterly, clinging to his mother. She had, of course,
no power to help him."
Again he writes : " We passed a woman tied by the
neck to a tree, and dead. The people of the country
explained that she had been unable to keej) up with the
other slaves in a gang, and her master had determined
that she should not become the property of any one else
if she recovered after resting for a time." Others were
lying in the path, shot or stabbed.
*' One of our men wandered and found a number of
slaves with slave-sticks on [these yokes weigh from thirty
to forty pounds], abandoned by their master for want of
food. They were too weak to be able to speak, or say
wliere they had come from ; some were quite young."
The slave-gangs numbered several hundred in each.
When far enough from their own country so as not to
run away, the slave-sticks were usually removed. Great
numbers of the slaves died from sobbing and " heart-
breaking." They would talk of their wives and children
to the last, and sink down and die from no apparent
400 BAVII) LIVINGSTONE.
disease. The slavers would express surprise that people
should die while they had plenty to eat and no work.
" Children for a time would keep up with wonderful
endurance ; but it happened sometimes that the sound
of dancing and the merry tinkle of the small drums
would fall on their ears, in passing near to a village ;
then the memory of home and happy days proved too
much for them ; they cried and sobbed, the ' broken
heart' came on, and the}^ rapidly sank."
Since Liviufrstone's death the Arab slave-raids have
been worse than ever. Professor Henry Drummond,
in Scribner's Magazine for June, 1889, gives some de-
tails of this dreadful traffic. Cardinal Lavigerie, Arch-
bishop of Algiers, and Roman Catholic Primate of
Africa, estimates that two millions of lives are de-
stroyed yearly in Africa through the liorrors of the
slave-trade.
" The men who appear the strongest," said Cardinal
Lavigerie, in an address delivered in London, " and
whose escape is to be feared, have their hands tied, and
sometimes their feet, in such fashion that walking be-
comes a torture to them ; and on their necks are placed
yokes which attach several of them together. They march
all day ; at night, when they stop to rest, a few handfuls
of raw ' sorgho ' are distributed among the captives. This
is all their food. Next morning they must start
again. . . .
" The women and the aged are the first to halt. Then,
in order to strike terror into this miserable mass of
human beings, their conductors, armed with a wooden
bar to economize powder, approach those who appear to
be the most exhausted, and deal them a terrible blow on
the nape of the neck. The unfortunate victims utter
DAVID LIVINGSTONE. 401
a cry, and fall to the ground in the convulsions of
death. . . .
" If, goaded by their cruel sufferings, some attempt to
rebel or escape, their fierce masters cut them down with
their swords, and leave them as they lie along the road,
attached to one another by their yokes. Therefore it
has been truly said that, if a traveller lost the way lead-
ing from Equatorial Africa to the towns Avhere slaves
are sold, he could easily find it again by the skeletons of
the negroes with which it is strewed."
Professor Drummond quotes from Stanley in his book
on the Congo. The latter tells of 118 villages with
probably 1,000 persons in each, and 43 tribal districts
devastated by fire and sword, that 2,300 women and
children might be captured by these Arab slave-
dealers.
" If each expedition has been as successful as this, the
slave-traders have been enabled to obtain 5,000 women
and children safe to Nyangwe, Kirundu, and Vibondo,
above the Stanley Falls. This 5,000 out of an annual
million will be at the rate of a half per cent, or 5 slaves
out of 1,000 people. This is poor profit out of such
large waste of life."
This Scribner article by Professor Drummond, and a
map of Central Africa showing what is possible for the
suppression of the slave-trade, may be obtained free by
addressing Mr. C. P. Huntington, 23 Broad Street, Xew
York City, who has taken a deep interest in the subject.
The present condition of the slave-trade and the suc-
cess attending the efforts of several nations to suppress
it, are shown in a valuable article by Stanley in Harper^s
Magazine for March, 1893, on " Slavery and the Slave-
trade in Africa." The founding of the Congo Free
402 DAVID LIVINGSTONE
State, with its military stations and trade, has been a
wonderful check to the awful traffic. Missions have
been another powerful factor. The Congo Railway, now
building, with the steamers now plying on the large
lakes, will form a police cordon, through Avhich the Arab
slave-traders will find it difficult to pass.
Stanley urges stringent measures, and commends the
German government for what it has done on the east
coast of Africa. "No caravan is permitted to leave
without search ; gunpowder and arms are confiscated ;
slave-traders are tried and hanged after conviction (the
chief judge on the German coast lately sentenced sev-
enteen Arabs to be hanged at Linde). The trading-
depots of the African Lakes' Company are pre-eminently
successful in subserving the anti-slavery cause by sup-
pressing the odious trade in slaves."
Still the traffic goes on in all its horrors in many
portions of Africa ; in the interior, and in some of the
northen parts as well. " The importation of negroes
from the Nigritien basin and South-western Soudan into
the public slave markets of Morocco," says Stanley,
"will continue until for very shame it will irritate
Europe into taking more decided steps in the name of
humanity to force the ever-maundering authorities to
decre the abolition of the slave-trade."
Commerce and civilization must go hand in hand.
Railways must be built, telegraphic lines established,
and the nations of the world must unite to protect the
African from the greed and the cruelty of the slave-
market.
Livingstone left Ujiji, July 12, improved in health, to
start northward into the Manyuema country to ascertain,
if possible, whether the Lualaba River is the western
DAVID LIVINGSTONE. 403
branch of the Nile or the eastern of the Ccngo. He did
not live to ascertain that it is, indeed, the Congo.
He reached the banks of the river at Nyangwe, March 29,
1871, more than a year after he started. He read the Bible
through four times while in the Manyuema country, the
land of cannibals. On his journey back to Ujiji, begun
July 20, 1871, he several times narrowly escaped death,
as many Arabs were with him, and they were so hated by
the natives. Great trees were chopped down just as he
passed, and sometimes the spears just missed him ; one
grazed his neck, flung by a man ten yards off. During
the last of the journey, "1 felt as if dying on my feet,"
lie wrote. He reached Ujiji, Oct. 23, 1871, a living
skeleton. To his amazement and despair, a leading
Arab, professing to believe Livingstone dead, had sold
all his remaining goods. He had not a single yard of
cloth left out of his three thousand, nor a string of beads
out of seven hundred pounds. Sick in body and really
sick at heart, he had now to wait to see what the
future might have in store.
Five days later, Oct. 28, Susi came running toward
his master exclaiming excitedly, "An Englishman! I
see him ! " Livingstone looked out and beheld a cara-
van with the American flag at the head.
"Bales of goods, baths of tin, huge kettles, cooking-
pots, tents, etc., made me think," he says, "this must
be a luxurious traveller, and not at his wits' end like me."
The leader of the caravan, who had come just at the
opportune moment, was Henry M. Stanley, sent thither
at an expense of over four thousand pounds by James
Gordon Bennett of the ^^ew York Herald, " to find Liv-
ingstone, dead or alive."
For eleven long months the young journalist had
404 DAVID LIVINGSTONE.
faced disease and liostile tribes in the heart of an un-
known country to find the great teacher, from whom
nothing liad been heard for three years. Once he was
well-nigh discouraged; but he wrote in his journal: "No
living man shall stop me — only death can prevent me.
But death — not even this ; I shall not die — I will not
die — I can not die ! Something tells me I shall find
him and — write it larger — find him, find him. Even
the words are inspiring."
At last he had found him, and the two men stood face
to face. It was a supreme moment. They clasped
hands warmly. " I thank God, Doctor, I have been per-
mitted to see you," said Stanley with a full heart.
" I feel grateful that I am here to welcome you," Avas
the response of the weary, white-haired man.
For four happy months they talked and explored to-
gether, and each grew fond of the other. Stanley says,
" I had gone over battle-fields, witnessed revolutions, civil
Avars, rebellions, emeutes, and massacres, . . . but never
had I been called to record anything that moved me so
much as this man's Avoes and sufferings, his priA^ations and
disappointments. . . . Livingstone was a character that
I venerated, that called forth all my enthusiasm, that
evoked nothing but sincerest admiration." . . . Again
Stanley says : " Livingstone's gentleness never forsakes
him; his hopefulness never deserts him. No harassing
anxieties, distraction of mind, long separation from
home and kindred, can make him complain. He thinks
' all Avill come out right at last ; ' he has such faith in the
goodness of Providence, . . .
" From being hated and thwarted in every possible
way by the Arabs and half-castes upon his arrival in
Ujiji [on account of his opposition to the slave-trade]
DAVID LIVINGSTONE. 405
lie has, through uniform kindness and mild, pleasant
temper, won all hearts. I observed that universal re-
spect was paid to liim. Even the Mohammedans never
passed his house without calling to pay their compli-
ments, and to say ' The blessing of God rest on you.' "
Stanley begged Livingstone to go back with him, and
he would " carry him every foot of the way to the coast."
" No," replied the latter ; '•' I should like to see my
familyVery much indeed. My children's letters affect
me intensely ; but I must not go honie, I must finish my
task."
They went together on the homeward journey as far
as Unyanyembi, — Stanley bearing homeward Living-
stone's journals in waterproof canvas, sealed with five
seals, — and then the farewells were said.
" Good-by, Doctor, dear friend ! "
" Good-by."
" Now, my men, home ! Lift the flag. March ! "
Through the distance Stanley waved his handkerchief
and Livingstone raised his cap. He never looked upon
a white man's face again. Six months afterwards
Stanley said, " My eyes feel somewhat dimmed at the
recollection of the parting."
Livingstone wrote his daughter Agnes concerning
Stanley : " He laid all he had at my service, divided
his clothes into two heaps, and pressed one heap upon
me ; then his medicine-chest ; then his goods and every-
thing he had, and, to coax my appetite, often cooked
dainty dishes with his own hands. . . .
" He came with the true American characteristic —
generosity. The tears often started into my eyes on
every fresh proof of kindness."
Stanley had brought him letters and gifts from home.
406 DAVID LIVINGSTONE.
Nothing pleased Livingstone more than four woollen
shirts from Agnes — now Mrs. Bruce — and a letter
from her which said, " Much as I wish you to come
home, I had rather that you finished your work to your
own satisfaction than return merely to gratify me."
Livingstone says in his journal: ^'Eightly and
nobly said, my darling Nannie ; vanity whispers pretty
loudly, ' She is a chip of the old block.' My blessing on
her and all the rest."
Livingstone waited at Unyanyembe till Stanley should
send back suitable porters from the coast, fifty-seven
men and boys, and then the heroic man began again
his toilsome explorations through swamps and fever-
laden districts. It was gratifying that his government
had voted him one thousand pounds, as he had received
no salary for the previous six years.
Five days after Stanley's departure, on Livingstone's
birthday, March 19, 1872, he writes in his journal :
"Accept me, and grant, gracious Father, that ere this
year is gone I may finish my task."
He wished to find the true sources of the Nile, and
then he would go home. Death came before he had
settled the problem.
On Aug. 25, 1872, Livingstone started on his last
journey westward. He had written to his old college
friend, James Young: "I rejoice to think it is now
your portion, after working nobly, to play. May you
have a long spell of it ! I am differently situated. I
shall never be able to play. ... During a large part of
this journey I had a strong presentiment that I should
never live to finish it. . . . This presentiment did not
interfere with the performance of any duty ; it only
made me think a great deal more of the future state of
being."
DAVID LIVINGSTONE. 407
On Oct. 14 they reached Lake Tanganyika, and then
struggled ou toward the eastern shore of Lake ]>ang-
weolo. It was tlie rainy season, and tliey forded river
after river, nearly to their necks in water.
Jan. 24, 1873, he writes in his journal : " Went one
hour and three-quarters' journey to a large stream,
through drizzling rain, at least three hundred yards of
deep water, among sedges and sponges of one hundred
yards. One part was neck-deep for fifty yards, and the
water cold. We plunged in elephants' foot-prints one
hour and a half, then came on one hour to a small riv-
ulet ten feet broad, but waist-deep ; bridge covered and
broken down.
"Carrying me across one of the broad, deep, sedgy
rivers is really a very difficult task. One we crossed
was at least two thousand feet broad, or more than three
hundred yards. The first part, the main stream, came
up to Susi's mouth, and wetted my seat and legs. One
held up my pistal4)ehind, then one after another took a
turn ; and when he sank into an elephant's deep foot-
print, he required two to lift him, so as to gain a footing
on a level, which was over waist-deep. Others went on
and bent down the grass to insure some footing on the
side of the elephant's path."
No wonder he wrote, " This trip has made my hair
all gray." It was evident that his health was failing.
He writes, March 19 : " Thanks to the Almighty Pre-
server of men for sparing me thus far on the journey of
life ! Can I hope for ultimate success ? So many obsta-
cles have arisen."
" March 24. The loads are all soaked, and with the
cold it is bitterly uncomfortable."
"March 25. Nothing earthly will make me give up
408 DAVID LIVINGSTONE.
my work in despair. I encourage myself in the Lord
my God, and go forward."
" April 10. I am pale, bloodless, and weak. . . . Oh,
how I long to be permitted by the Over Power to finish
my work ! "
"April 19. I am excessively weak, and but for the
donkey could not move a hundred yards. It is not all
pleasure, this exploration. ... I can scarcely hold a
pencil, and my stick is a burden."
" April 21. Tried to ride, but was forced to lie down,
and they carried me back to vil [village] exhausted."
His faithful followers, seeing that he was daily fail-
ing, had made a litter, covered it with grass, laid a
blanket upon it, and carried Livingstone upon their
shoulders.
There were no entries now in his journals except the
date. Then the last words were written by the dying
man on the eleventh anniversary of his wife's death,
April 27, 1873: "Knocked up quite, and remain —
recover — Sent to buy milch goats. We are on the
banks of the Molilamo."
As best they could, they bore him forward to the
village of the chief Chitambo, where they built him
a hut.
On April 30 Livingstone asked Susi to bring him his
watch, that he, the servant, might hold it, while the key
was slowly turned by the enfeebled hands. At 11 p. m.
Susi went to his master's bedside. The latter said,
in Suaheli language, " Siku-ngapi kwenda Luapula ? "
(How many days is it to the Luapula ?)
Upon being told that it w^as about three days, he half
sighed, half said, " Oh, dear, dear ! "
After midnight Susi boiled some water for him.
DAVID LIVINGSTONE. 409
and held the candle near him while he selected some
calomeL Then Livingstone said in a low voice, "All
right ; you can go now."
At four o'clock, before light, Susi again entered, being
called by the boy who slept just inside the hut. Living-
stone was kneeling beside his bed, his head buried in
his hands upon the pillow. The 29,000 miles of travel
in Africa were ended ; he was dead, and the body almost
cold. Susi and Chuma with Jacob Wainwright, who
could write, decided that the body must be carried to
Zanzibar, and from thence to England. Then they pro-
ceeded to embalm it the best they knew how. Remov-
ing the heart, lungs, etc., these were placed in a tin box
and reverently buried at Ilala, where he died. Then
the body was exposed to the sun for fourteen days,
wrapped in calico, and enclosed in the bark of the
Myonga tree, with tarred sail-cloth sewed over the
cylindrical package.
Then the homeward journey began, the precious bur-
den being carried on their shoulders. Half of the men
became ill, and some of the tribes were hostile. When
they reached Unyanyembe, Lieutenant Cameron wished
to have the body buried there, rather than make the
perilous journey to the coast, but the men would not
for a moment consent.
At one village opposition was shown to a dead body
passing through it, so a bale of sticks was prepared like
a body, and the people were given to understand that
they would bury the corpse. Some of them went back
with the pretended body, while the real one was re-
wrapped like a bale of goods, and carried forward with-
out suspicion.
Through nine long months they made the journey of
410 DAVID LIVINGSTONE.
more than a thousand miles to tlie coast, bearing their
beloved dead. '' The story stands alone in history," says
Thomas Hughes.
Through the generosity of Livingstone's friend, James
Young, Susi and Chuuia, two out of seven long-tried and
faithful servants, with Jacob Wainwright, who had been
sent by Stanley from Zanzibar, were brought to England
on the steamer, and assisted at the burial of their great
leader.
On Saturday, April 18, 1874, Livingstone was buried
near the centre of the nave in Westminster Abbey. The
grand old abbey was crowded in every part. Among
the pall-bearers were Stanley and Jacob Wainwright.
A black slab now marks the resting-place of him
whom Mr. Johnston well calls " Tlie greatest and best
man who ever explored Africa." On the slab are these
words : —
" Brought by faithful hands
over land and sea,
here rests
David Livingstone,
missionary, traveller, philanthropist,
born March 19, 1813,
at Blantyre, Lanarkshire.
Died May 4 [probably May 1], 1873.
At Chitambo's village, llala.
For thii-ty years his life was spent in an unwearied
effort to evangelize the native races, to explore the
undiscovered secrets, and abolish the desolating slave-
trade of Central Africa, where, with his last words,
he wrote : —
' All I can say in my solitude is, may Heaven's rich
blessing comedown on every one — American, English,
Turk — who will help to heal this open sore of the
world.' "
DAVID LIVINGSTONE. 411
These words concerning slavery were the last penned
in a letter which the missionary explorer wrote to the
Neto York Herald, after Stanley left him. The nations
are now trying to do that to which Livingstone's life
and death were consecrated.
MATTHEW CALBRAITH PERRY.
TT is not often that five naval officers are found in one
-L family, and two of these so famous as Matthew Cal-
braith Perry, who opened Japan to the world, and Oliver
Hazard Perry, the hero of Lake Erie, in the war of 1812.
Matthew, tlie fourth child in the family of a sturdy
sea-captain, Christopher Raymond Perry, was born at
Newport, R. I., April 10, 1794. He was an active,
earnest boy, showing in early life the energy and strength
of character which distinguished him in his manhood.
Under the training of a self-reliant and noble mother,
Matthew learned to be honest, devoted to countiy, and
persevering in every duty. Though gentle in her man-
ners, she had great force of character, teaching her chil-
dren obedience as one of the first virtues, and exhibiting
the same fearlessness and fortitude before them which
they themselves showed in after life.
Matthew was eager to enter the navy when a lad of
twelve, but his youth prevented. On Jan. 18, 1809,
he became a midshipman, and soon went aboard the
schooner Revenge, commanded by his brother Oliver,
She was attached to the squadron under Commodore
John Rodgers, which guarded our coasts from the
Chesapeake to Passamaquoddy Bay, to prevent Ameri-
can sailors from being pressed into British service by
British ships. 412
MATTHEW CALBEAITIL PERRY. 413
On Oct. 12, 1810, the lad was transfen-ed to the
frigate President, the flag-ship of Commodore Rodgers.
The Revenge was wrecked off Watch Hill, R.I., three
months later.
On the President, June 22, young Perry, then seven-
teen, received his first wound in the first naval battle of
the war of 1812. By the explosion of a gun the leg of
Commodore Rodgers was broken, several sailors were
killed, and others wounded; among the latter was young
Perry.
After capturing seven British merchant vessels, Com-
modore Rodgers was obliged to return, his crew being
unfitted for duty by scurvy. On another trip Rodgers
captured twelve British vessels, with two hundred and
seventy-one prisoners. Young Perry was promoted to
an acting lieutenantcy when he was eighteen, and was
soon transferred to the ship United States, under Com-
modore Decatur.
On Christmas eve, 1814, the youth of twenty was
married to Miss Jane Slidell, then only seventeen years
of age, the daughter of a rich New York merchant.
Matthew probably seemed much older than he really
was, from the experience he had already enjoyed in
travel and naval warfare. From this happy union came
a family of four sons and six daughters.
Mr. Slidell, the father-in-law of Perry, offered the latter
the command of his merchant-vessel bound for Holland.
Perry obtained a furlough, accepted the position, and re-
mained in the commercial marine for nearly three years,
when he re-entered the navy.
In 1819, Perry, in the ship Cyane, visited the Dark
Continent to convoy the first company of black colonists
to Africa. The ship captured some slavers, and helped
414 MATTHEW CALBRAITII PERRY.
the negroes in settling and house-building. Most of
the colonists and crew suffered from the African fever,
and the colony proved a failure. Another remedy had
to be found for the cure of slavery in America nearly
a half-century later.
After another voyage to Africa, during which Perry
gave especial study to that dread disease scurvy, finding
that it resulted largely from salt diet, lack of vegeta-
bles, and want of ventilation and cleanliness, he gave
some time in his war-ship, the Shark, in helping to rid
the West Indian Archipelago of pirate crafts. He
studied Spanish the more effectually to do his work,
and became well versed in the standard literature in tliat
language.
After a rest of some months with his family in New
York, Perry joined the North Carolina, one of our first
line-of-battle ships, and sailed in her to Malaga, May 19,
1825. She with some other ships was commissioned
to protect American commerce on the Mediterranean.
Perry's next sea voyage was to Russia, in the Concord.
While at Cronstadt the Tsar Nicholas came on board,
and inspected her with apparent pleasure. Perry and a
few other officers were received at the imperial palace.
The Tsar asked many questions of the young American
officer, who answered with dignity and courtesy.
Perry visited Copenhagen, Cowes in the Isle of Wight,
Malta, and Alexandria. On the trip to Alexandria he
had Lady Franklin on board. She " was full of her
husband," says the chaplain ; '' and, of course, at each
meal, the whole company had to hear theories and suc-
cesses and memories repeated on the one theme."
At Alexandria the officers were invited to dine with
Mehemet, the Viceroy of Egypt, who presented the
party with thirteen swords.
MATTHEW CALBRAITII PERRY. 415
Later Perry was sent to Italy in command of the
ship Brandywine, and on his return, at his own request,
was given the command of the recruiting station at ISTew
York.
Here, for ten years, lie enjoyed liis family, and de-
voted himself to the welfare of the navy. He organized
the Brooklyn Naval Lyceum, " to promote the diffusion
of useful knowledge, to foster a spirit of harmony and a
community of interests in the service, and to cement the
links which unite us as professional brethren."
A library was begun, pictures were given by wealthy
patrons, and a bi-monthly magazine was started. The
Lyceum is still doing its valuable work. Perry was al-
ways an advocate of reading and general culture for his
men. On ship-board he organized classes. He urged the
sailors to give up liquor, and was instrumental in ob-
taining the prohibition of the spirit ration to all under
twenty-one, which rule was passed Aug. 29, 1842. He
also helped to abolish flogging with "the cat-of-nine
tails," on the bare back.
Perry was offered the command of the United States
Exploring Expedition to the Antarctic continent ; but as
he declined, it was given to Lieutenant Charles Wilkes,
whose subsequent publications are full of interest.
Perry took the deepest interest in the use of steam
for the navy, and applied for the command of the Ful-
ton, a floating battery for the defence of New York har-
bor, the first American steamer of war. He took her
to Washington, and President Jackson and his cabinet
enjoyed an inspection of her.
Perry was the first to urge a training-school for naval
engineers provided by the government. This was real-
ized later at Annapolis. He made a special study of
416 MATTHEW CALBRAITII PERRY.
naval ordnance, and proposed the ram, " using a steamer
as a striking body."
Perry with others made a careful study of the water
approaches to New York. He went to Europe to study
lighthouses, visited fouuderies and ship-yards, and met
distinguished scientists and rulers. He was invited by
King Louis Philippe to an informal supper, where he
met the royal family, the Queen pouring the tea.
On his return to New York, Perry purchased one hun-
dred and twenty acres near Tarrytown, on the Hudson,
and built a stone cottage which he called " The Moor-
ings." He rose early to care for his land, studied and
wrote evenings, and became the close friend of Wash-
ington Irving, his neighbor.
At the request of the government he conducted many
experiments with projectiles and great guns.
After another voyage to Africa, to help suppress
piracy and the slave-trade, he took an active and success-
ful part in the Mexican War, in the surrender of Vera
Cruz, Tabasco, and other cities.
All this varied experience was leading to the one
crowning act of his life — the opening of Japan to the
world.
For centuries this empire of Japan had been closed to
the ships and citizens of every land. The Dutch were
allowed a very few limited privileges. For more than
three hundred years Portuguese, English, French,
Russians, and Americans had tried in vain to hold com-
mercial relations with her, to travel among her people,
and to buy the delicate workmanship of her hands.
Commodore Perry believed that with kindness and tact,
backed by a force sufficient to impress the natives,
entrance to Japan might be effected.
MATTHEW CALBRAITII PERRY. 417
He read all the available literature on the subject as
soon as he knew that he was to take the lead of the
expedition. He notified the authorities at Washington
of his intention to take with him, for the Japanese,
specimens of our mechanical products, arms, and ma-
chinery, and asked manufacturers for samples of every
description.
The Norris Brothers of Philadelphia furnished a
little locomotive and rails to be laid down in Japan.
A letter to the Emperor of Japan from the President
of the United States, Millard Fillmore, written by the
Hon. Edward Everett, the Secretary of State, was hand-
somely engrossed and enclosed in a box which cost a
thousand dollars.
After various delays and obstacles, Commodore Perry
started in the ship Mississippi from Norfolk, Va., Nov.
24, 1852, several other vessels of the squadron soon
following him. " Until the great Civil War, only two
fleets — that is, collections of war vessels numbering at
ieast twelve — had assembled under the American flag.
These were in the waters of INlexico and Japan. Both
were commanded by Matthew C. Perry." Thus writes
the Rev. William Elliot Griffis in his life of Perry.
On the passage out they stopped at Madeira, where
the Commodore made some official calls in the fashion-
able conveyance of Funchal, a sledge with a gayly deco-
m.ted carriage body, drawn by a yoke of oxen. The ladies
of the town often rode on horseback, a groom keeping
pace with the liorse. At the island of St. Helena the
officers visited the lonely spot Avhere Napoleon found a
home and a grave in 1821.
At Cape Town, in the south of Africa, Perry saw
something of the Hottentots, who lived in movable huts
418 MATTHEW CALBRAITII PERRY.
made of boughs, which they conveyed from place to
place on the backs of oxen.
At Mauritius the officers visited the supposed tomb
of Paul and Virginia, immortalized by the pen of Ber-
nardin St. Pierre, who was then an officer of the garrison
of Mauritius. Tlie French ship, St. Gevan, was wrecked
on the north-east coast of the island on the night of Aug.
18, 1744. On board the ship were two young hidies
Mallet and Caillon, returning as passengers from Prance,
whither they had been sent to be educated. Monsieur
Longchamps de Montendre (Paul) and Madamoisello
Caillon (Virginia) were last seen on the top-gallant
forecastle of the wrecked vessel. Montendre had
lowered himself down from the ship's side to throw
himself into the sea, earnestly begging the girl to at-
tempt to save herself with him, but on her refusal, he
reti\rned and would not again leave her. Mademoiselle
Mallet was on the quarter-deck with Monsieur de Pera-
mont, who never left her for a moment. Nearly all on
board perished.
A short stay was made at Ceylon by the squadron.
" Of the productions of the island," says the narra-
tive of the Perry expedition, compiled by Dr. Francis L.
Hawks, " the cocoanut is probably the most valuable to
the natives. Everywhere in Ceylon, as far as the eye
can reach, extensive plantations of this tree are to be
seen, and the numerous roads throughout the island are
bordered with it. The weary and heated traveller finds
not only protection from the sun in its shade, but refresh-
ment from the milk of the fruit, which is both agreeable
to the taste and wholesome.
" The cocoanut palm has a great variety of uses.
The green fruit, with its delicate albuminous meat and
'MATTHEW CALBRAITH PERRY. 419
its refreshing milk, is a favorite article of food. When
ripe, the kernel of the nut is dried, forming what the
natives term copperal, and an oil of great value is ex-
pressed from it, while the residuum forms an excellent
oil cake for the fatteiiing of animals. Even the husk
of the nut is useful ; its fibres are wrought into the coir
rope, of which large qua,ntities are annually exported,
and the shells are manufactured into various domestic
utensils. From the sap of the tree a drink is obtained
which is called ' toddy,' -and made into arrack by distil-
lation. The leaves afford a good material for the
thatching of the native huts, and are, moreover, given
as food to elephants."
The talipot is one of the wonders of the island. A
single leaf of this tree will shade several persons. When
the leaf is softened by boiling, the natives use it as a
substitute for paper, and write upon it. The cinnamon-
tree abounds with its beautiful white blossoms and red-
tipped leaves.
After touching at Singapore, the squadron reached
Hong Kong, April G. Perry spent a few days at Macao,
in which is the cave of Camoens, where the celebrated
Portuguese poet is supposed to have written a portion of
liis " Lusiad." He first visited Macao when banished
from Portugal on account of his persistent courtship of a
lady of rank, whose parents were opposed to a poor
genius. He returned to Portugal, and died in a hospital
in poverty. Above the cave at Macao is a marble monu-
ment with a bronze bust of the poet.
Shanghai was visited; and then the squadron, the Com-
modore having transferred his home from the Mississippi
to the Susquehanna, sailed from Napa, the principal
port of the Great Liu Kiu Island, one of a group said to
number tliirty-six islands, a dependency of Japan.
420 MATTHEW CALBRAITH PERRY.
Bayard Taylor had joined the squadron at Shanghai,
and thereafter kept most interesting journals of the
expedition.
Two hours after the ships came to anchor two Jap-
anese officials appeared on board, presenting with pro-
found salutations a folded red card of Japanese paper
a yard long. One man wore a loose salmon-colored robe
of grass cloth, while the other wore blue. Both had on
oblong caps of bright yellow.
The Commodore declined to see these men, determined
to receive only the principal dignitaries. The next day
these officials came with presents, — a bullock, several
pigs, fowls, and eggs ; but these were declined till a
treaty should be made, or some formal recognition taken
of the American representatives.
A few days later the regent of Liu Kiu, a venerable
old man, arrived, and was received with much ceremony
by the Commodore, who repaid the visit at the royal
palace, June 6, evidently much against the will of the
authorities.
The Commodore was borne in a sedan chair by eight
Chinese coolies, his marines, under arms, in line on either
side, with two field-pieces and the artillerymen in front.
The natives knelt as the procession passed. It was
evident that spies were on every side. The band played
" Hail Columbia " as they reached the palace gate.
The Commodore and his officers were received in the
hall of audience, where smoking-boxes were distributed
and twists of gingerbread. The queen dowager, and boy
prince for whom the regent governed, did not make
their appearance.
After this formal reception the party was received
at the home of the regent, where a bountiful repast was
MATTHEW CALBRAITU PERRY. 421
served. Many of the dishes were unfamiliar to Americans.
Of those which they knew, " there were sliced boiled
eggs, which had been dyed crimson, fish made into rolls
and boiled in fat, pieces of cold baked fish, slices of hog's
liver, sugar candy, cucumbers, mustard, salted radish
tops, and fragments of lean pork fried. Cups of tea
were first handed round ; these were followed by very
small cups of sake [an intoxicating drink made from
rice], which had the taste of French liqueur. Small
bamboo sticks, sharpened at one end, and which some
of the guests mistook for toothpicks, were furnished, to
be used as forks in taking balls of meat and dough from
the soup, which made the first course. Soup consti-
tuted also the next seven courses of the twelve whereof
the repast consisted. The other four were gingerbread,
salad made of bean sprouts and young onion tops, a
basket of what appeared to be some dark-red fruit, but
proved to be artificial balls composed of a thin dough
rind covering a sugary pulp, and a delicious mixture
compounded of beaten eggs and a slender white root with
an aromatic taste."
As long as the squadron remained at Liu Kiu all
jnilitary and naval drills were regularly performed daily.
Of the seventeen boats manned and equipped, five carried
twelve and twenty-four pounders. These created great
interest among the people of Liu Kiu.
The inhabitants were found to be very neat, living in
plain, unpainted houses, whose floors were covered with
mats which were carefully preserved from dirt, the
people stepping on them with bare feet or with stockings
only. When they entered the house, they slipped off
their loose straw sandals, and left them at the door.
The crown of the head, to the extent of two or three
422 MATTHEW CALBRAITn PERRY.
inches, was shaved, and into the vacant space the hair
was drawn and plaited, fastened by two large hair-pins.
The lower class usually wore brass or pewter pins,
Avhile the literati, or dignitaries, used gold or silver.
On June 9, Bonin Islands, lying in the Japanese Sea,
were visited ; and a month later, on July 7, the fleet
came to anchor at Uraga, in the Bay of Yedo. Great
was the astonishment of the Japanese. A number of
Japanese guard-boats were sent out to the ships, but
the Commodore would not allow the men to come on
board. They made several attempts to climb into the
American vessels, but were checked by the sight of
pistols and pikes.
Finally an official appeared with an order for the ships
to depart instantly. He was told that the Commodore
bore a message from the President of the United States
to the Emperor, and would confer with no one except
the highest in rank in Uraga.
During that first night, when a foreign squadron
anchored in the Bay of Yedo, beacon fires glimmered on
the hills, and the great bell tolled its danger signal.
Companies of Japanese soldiers, in their scarlet uni-
forms, jjassed from garrison to garrison.
Perry was finally informed that he must go to some
other port to deliver his message to the Emperor ; but
this he declined to do, saying that if the Japanese
government did not see fit to appoint a proper person
to receive such a valuable letter, the Commodore, with a
sufficient force, would be obliged to deliver it in person,
let the consequences be what they might.
Boats with white flags, to show their peaceful inten-
tion, were sent out from the American ships to explore
the bay and harbor of Uraga ; and when the Japaneso
MATTUEW CALBRAITII rFAlRY. 423
demurred, saying that tins was against their laws, they
were told that the American laws commanded these
explorations, and American subjects must obey.
Sunday, July 10, was carefully observed by religious
services, and no communication was held with the
Japanese on that day.
On July 13, tlie governor of the Province arrived,
bearing a letter of credence from the Emperor, wrapped
in velvet, and enclosed in a box of sandal-wood. It was
treated with such reverence by the governor that no one
was allowed to touch it. The letter was addressed to
his highness, Toda, Prince of Idzu : "I send you to
Uraga to receive the letter of the President of the
United States to me, which letter has recently been
brought to Uraga by the Admiral, upon receiving which
you will proceed to Yedo, and bring the same to me."
The Emperor's seal was at the bottom.
A building was immediately constructed, trimmed
with flags and painted screens, wherein the Commodore
was to meet Toda, Prince of Idzu, and deliver the Presi-
dent's letter in the thousand-dollar gold case.
When the time arrived the Commodore, surrounded
by about three hundred of his men, all in uniform, the
guns from his ships firing every now and then, repaired
to the place of meeting. Two stalwart seamen bore the
flag at the head of the procession, and two boys pre-
ceded the Commodore, carrying the golden box in a
covering of scarlet cloth. The President's letter, and
the credentials of Perry, were written on vellum, ami
not folded, but bound' in blue silk velvet. Each seal,
attached by cords of gold and silk, was encased in
a circular box of pure gold. Each document was in a
rosewood box, with locks, hinges, and mountings of
424 MATTHEW CALBRAITII PERRY.
gold. Two tall negroes, armed, acted as Perry's body-
guard.
The ships had meantime been cleared for action in
case there should be hostile demonstrations on shore
towards the Americans.
The Japanese officials were gorgeously attired in silks
and gold lace. A hundred Japanese boats lined the
shore, while thousands of the people flocked to witness
so strange a spectacle.
The letter to the Emperor from the President iirged
the abrogation of the ancient Japanese laws which for-
bade foreign trade, desired to make a treaty useful alike
to both nations, whereby Japanese ports should be
opened, and begged the acceptance, by the Emperor, of
some gifts. The friendly letter of Millard Fillmore, to
his " Great and Good Friend," said, " May the Almighty
have your imperial majesty in His great and holy keep-
ing ! "
Commodore Perry, " Commander-in-chief of all the
naval forces of the United States of America, stationed
in the East Indies, China and Japan Seas," sent as a
special ambassador by the President, also wrote a full
letter to the Emperor.
After the giving of the letters, the Commodore ex-
plained that he would return to Japan the following
spring, to receive the answer of the Emperor to the
President.
Perry sailed back to Liu Kiu and China, where he
studied the people, and obtained much valuable infor-
mation. All the land in Liu Kiu was held by the
government, and rented to large tenants, who in turn
sub-let it to the direct cultivators of the soil. Rice was
found to be the chief product, though wheat, tobacco.
MATTHEW CALBRAITII PERRY. 425
peanuts, onions, and radishes — some three feet long and
twelve inches round, were seen in abundance. The
flowers were the camellia, which grows \vild and bears
a pink blossom, the dahlia, morning-glory, marsh-mallow,
etc. The bamboo was large, and of great value to the
people.
" Great reverence is paid to the dead in Liu Kiu,"
says the Perry narrative, " where they are put in coffins
in a sitting posture, and being followed by the friends
and relations, and a procession of women in long white
veils which cover their heads and faces, are interred iu
well-built stone vaults, or tombs constructed in the sides
of the hills. After the body has been interred for a
period of seven years, and all the flesh is decayed, the
bones are removed and deposited in stone vases, which
are placed upon shelves within the vaults. The poor
people place the remains of their dead in earthen jars,
and deposit them in the crevices of the rocks, where
they are often to be seen, broken and disarranged.
Periodical visits are paid by the surviving friends and
relations to the burial-places, where they deposit offer-
ings upon the tombs. On the first interment of the
rich dead, roast pig and other articles of food are offered,
and after being allowed to remain for a short time, are
distributed among the poor."
The Commodore and his squadron returned to the
Bay of Yedo about the middle of February, 1854. The
Japanese Emperor had died during Perry's absence, and
the treaty, if concluded at all, would be made with his
successor.
A treaty -house was built near Yokohama; and here the
conferences took place, Perry coming thither with five
hundred men in twenty-seven boats. Twenty-one guns
426 MATTHEW CALBRAITII PERRY.
were fired in honor of the Emperor, and seventeen in
honor of his high commissioner, Hayaslii Daigaku-no-
Kami.
The presents to the Emperor of Japan, and to his
officials, filling several large boats, were delivered March
13. These were swords, mnskets, telegraph instruments,
three life-boats, seven volumes of Audubon's "Birds
and Quadrupeds of America," potatoes, stoves, telescope,
agricultural implements, etc. The mile of telegraph,
when in working order, created intense interest. Tlie
tiny locomotive was at once secured for a ride by a man-
darin,' on its roof. " It was a spectacle, not a little
ludicrous," says Perry, " to behold a dignified mandarin
whirling around the circular road at the rate of twenty
miles an hour, with his loose robes flying in the wind."
Eleven days later, March 24, a large number of gifts
were received for the government of the United States
from the Emperor ; gold lacquered writing-tables, desks,
boxes, silks, pongees, crape, matting, porcelain, bamboo
stands, two hundred bundles of rice, each measuring five
Japanese pecks, and three hundred chickens.
Perry gave a feast to the Japanese officials. At the
close of the dinner, the guests gathered in long folds of
paper all they could reach from the tables, and stored
it away in their pockets, or in the capacious sleeves of
their robes. This was the fashion of the country, and
when they entertained the Americans, the Japanese
urged them to take to the ships all they could carry
from the feasts.
After many days spent in conference, a treaty with
America by which two ports were opened, Hakodate in
Yesso, and Shimoda in Idzu, was finally concluded,
Friday, March 31, 1854, Avhereupon Perry presented
MATTHEW CALEB AITH FERRY. 427
Prince Hagashi with an American flag, as the highest
expression of national courtesy and friendship which he
could offer. On a portion of the ground at Yokohama
where the treaty was made, the first Protestant Church in
Japan was organized by the Rev. Mr. Ballagh, The first
five thousand dollars towards its erection were sent by
Christian converts of the Hawaiian Islands.
After remaining for some days in the Bay of Yedo,
where the camellias on the shore grow to forty feet in
height, with magnificent red and white blossoms, and
being entertained in the homes of some of the officials,
where the rooms were covered with soft mats, and the
windows made of oiled paper, the Commodore sailed for
Shimoda on the island of Niphon, He found the houses
as usual, divided into several compartments by means
of sliding panels, and destitute of tables, chairs, sofas,
and what to us are essentials for comfort.
" Shimoda," says William Elliot Griffis, in his very
interesting "Mikado's Empire," "before it fairly began
to be of much service, was visited by a terrific earthquake
and tidal wave, that hurled a Russian frigate to destruc-
tion, overwhelmed the town, sweeping back by its reces-
sion into the boiling ocean scores of houses and about
one hundred human beings. The effluent wave ploughed
the harbor with such force that all the mud was scoured
from the rocky bed. The anchors of ships could obtain
no grip on the bare, slippery rock bottom ; and Shimoda,
being useless as a harbor, was abandoned. The ruin of
Shimoda was the rise of Yokohama."
By a new treaty five years later, 1859, Kanagawa,
three miles across the bay from Yokohama, and Nagas-
aki were made open ports.
Eliza Ruhamah Scidmore, in her " Jinrikisha Days in
428 MATTUEyV CALBRAITH PERRY.
Japan," tlius describes a Japanese house : " The area of
every room is some multiple of three feet, because
the soft tatami, or floor-mats, measure six feet in lengtli
by tliree in width. These are woven of common straw
and rushes, faced with a closely wrought mat of rice-
straw. It is to save these tatami and the polished floors
that the shoes are left outside the house.
" The thick screens, ornamented with sketches or
poems, that separate one room from another, are the
fusuvia ; the screens shutting off the veranda, pretty lat-
tice frames covered with rice-paper that admit a pecul-
iarly soft light to the rooms, are the slioji, and in their
management is involved an elaborate etiquette. . . .
" The Japanese bed is the floor, with a wooden box
under the neck for a pillow and a futon for a covering.
To the foreigner the Japanese landlord allows five or
six futons, or cotton- wadded comforters, and they make
a tolerable mattress, although not springy, and rather
apt to be damp and musty. . . . By day the futons are
placed in closets out of sight, or hung over the bal-
conies to air, coming back damper than ever, if the ser-
vants forget to bring them in before sunset."
At Shimoda Commodore Perry found nine Buddhist
temples, one large Shinto temple, and a great number of
smaller shrines. At the door of the main apartment
to the temples of Buddha there was a drum on the left
and a bell on the right, to awaken the attention of the
idols when the devout come to pray.
In connection with each Buddhist monastery was a
well-kept graveyard, where statues of Buddha, some
life-size and some not larger than a foot high, were
generously distributed. Fresh cut flowers were daily
deposited before the tombs and the idols.
MATTHEW CALBRAITII PERRY. 429
A broad avenue of fir and juniper trees led to the
great Shinto temple, which was very plain both Avithout
and within. A subscription list, thirty feet long, hung
on the walls of the temple, giving the names of those
who provided for the expenses of the temple service.
From the door hung a straw rope connected with a bell,
that the deity worshipped might know when the reli-
gious call was made.
At present the established religion of Japan, save
where Christianity has been accepted, is Shintoism.
The great divinity of the Shinto religion is tlie Sun
Goddess Amaterasu. Prom her, according to Japanese
belief, the Mikados are directly descended. The first
emperor, or Mikado, about whom there is any authentic
history, was Jimmu Tenno, the fifth in descent from the
Sun-Goddess. He reigned from G60 to 585 B.C. He
married Tatara, the most beautiful woman in Japan, the
daughter of one of his captains, and died at the age of
one hundred and twenty-seven.
Isabella L. Bird, in her " Unbeaten Tracks in Japan,"
written in 1880, says there are about 98,000 Shinto
temples in Japan, which number includes all the Avay-
side shrines and the shrines in the groves. Miss Scid-
more says there are about twice this number. " The
characteristics of ' Pure Shinto,' " says Miss Bird (Mrs.
Bishop), " are the absence of an ethical and doctrinal
code, of idol-worship, of priestcraft, and of any teachings
concerning a future state, and the deification of heroes,
emperors, and great men, together with the worship of
certain forces and objects in nature."
The Shinto temples are of unpainted wood. Within
each shrine is a circular steel mirror, a copy of the one
given by the Sun-Goddess as an emblem of herself to
430 MATTHEW CALBRAITn PERRY.
Ninigi, when she sent him down to govern the world.
" In the pure Shinto temples," says Miss Bird, '•' which
do not even display the mirror, there is a kind of recep-
tacle concealed behind the closed doors of the actual
shrine, which contains a case only exposed to view on
the day of the annual festival, and which is said to con-
tain the spirit of the deity to whom the temple is dedi-
cated, the ' august spirit substitute,' or ' God's seed.' "
Shintoism was the ancient religion of Japan ; but
Buddhism, being introduced in the sixth century, made
rapid progress, and was almost the only religion till the
restoration of the Mikado to power in 1868, when Shin-
toism again became the State religion.
Buddhist temples are still built by the faithful ; and
Miss Alice Mabel Bacon describes a great one, building
at Kyoto, where the women, " wishing to have some part
in the sacred work, cut off their abundant hair, a beauty
perhaps more prized by the Japanese women than by
those of other countries, and from the material thus
obtained they twisted immense cables, to be used in
drawing the timbers from the mountains to the site of
the temple. The great black cables hang in the un-
finished temple to-day."
" This Higashi Hongwanji " (Eastern Temple), says
Miss Scidmore, "was eight years in building, and is the
largest temple in Japan." Of the ropes of hair, she
says, " The largest rope is five inches in diameter and
two hundred and fifty feet long, the hair, wdund in a
dozen different strands around a slender core of hemp,
having been given by three thousand five hundred of the
pious maids and matrons of the province of Echizen.
Here and there in this giant cable are pathetic threads
of white hair, the rest being deep black."
MATTHEW CALBRAITH PERRY. 481
The services are very elaborate, and bear a strong
resemblance to those of the Roman Catholic Church.
In the country, more frequently than in the cities,
is seen the Nagare, kanjo (flowing invocation). A
piece of cotton cloth is suspended by four corners to
stakes set in the ground near a brook. Resting on the
cloth, or if in the city, in a pail of water, is a wooden
dipper. The passers-by offer a prayer with the aid of
the rosary, dip a cup full of water, pour it on the cloth,
and when it has strained through, move on. This act is
to help a mother out of Hades in the Lake of Blood
who has died at the birth of a child, on account of some
sin committed in a previous state of existence. When
the cloth is so worn out that it no longer permits the
water to drain through it, the spirit of the mother arises
from Purgatorv to live in a higher state of existence.
It is said that the rich are able to procure at the
temples cloth tliat will soon wear out, while the poor
are able to buy only the stoutest woven fabric, so that
unfortunately the poor mothers are kept longer in
punishment. The Japanese have a proverb that '"'tlie
judgments of Hades depend on money."
The Japanese women pleased Perry with their gentle-
ness and extreme courtesy. They marred their attrac-
tiveness by painting the teeth black, as soon as they were
married, and shaving the eyebrows. This ugly fashion
has been done away by the Empress Haruko. Most
travellers seem to agree with Sir Edwin Arnold in his
'^Japonica" and Henry Norman in his "Real Japan,"
published in 1892, that " The Japanese woman is the
crown of the charm of Japan. In the noble lady and
lier frailest and most imfortunate sister alike, there is
an indefinable soinctluiig which is fascinating at first
432 MATTHEW CALBRAITn PERRY.
sight, and grows only more pleasing on acquaintance. . . .
I think the charm lies chiefly ... in an inborn gentleness
and tenderness and sympathy, the most womanly of all
qualities, combined with what the Romans used to call ' a
certain propriety ' of thought and demeanor, and used to
admire so much." . . . The key to the character of the
Japanese woman lies in the word obedience. Ages ago,
her three great duties were religiously declared to be
obedience : if a daughter, to her father ; if a wife, to her
husband ; if a widow, to her eldest son, Mr. GrifRs
believes this abject obedience and polygamy are the
great hindrances to the elevation of women in Japan.
Miss Alice Mabel Bacon says in her " Japanese Girls and
Women : " " In Japan, the idea of a wife's duty to her
husband includes no thought of companionship on terms
of equality. The wife is simply the housekeeper, the
head of the establishment, to be honored by the servants
because she is the one who is nearest to the master, but
not for one moment to be regarded as the master's
equal. . . . She appears rarely with him in public, is
expected always to wait upon him, and save him steps,
and must bear all things from him with smiling face and
agreeable manners. ... In all things the husband goes
first, the wife second. If the husband drops his fan or
his handkerchief, the wife picks it up. The husband is
served first, the wife afterwards — a good, considerate,
careful body-servant. . . .
" Upon the 11th day of Feb. 1889, the day on which
the Emperor, by his own act in giving a constitution to
the people, limited his own power for the sake of put-
ting his nation upon a level with the most civilized
nations of the earth, he at the same time, and for the
first time, publicly placed his wife upon his own level.
MATTHEW CALBRAITII PERRY. 433
" lu an imperial progress made thi-ougli the streets of
Tokyo, the Emperor and Empress, for the first time in
the history of Japan, rode together in the imperial
coach."
After Commodore Perry had spent some time at
Shimoda, he visited the other open port, Hakodate,
which means "box shop." The town lies at the base
of a lofty promontory divided into three principal peaks.
The houses were very neat, the streets sprinkled and
swept, with wooden picket-fences and gates across the
road at short intervals. These were opened for the people
to pass during the day, but closed at night.
In some of the better houses there were exquisite
wood carvings. The walls were usually hung with rolls
of gayly-colored paper, on whicli were painted their
sacred bird, the stork, the winged tortoise, and the
porpoise, or dolphin of the ancients.
In the centre of the common sitting-room was a
square hole built in with tiles and gravel where a cliar-
coal fire was kept burning, witli a tea-kettle suspended
above it. There was thus a constant supply of hot
Avater ready for tea, which is handed to every visitor on
his arrival.
In one of the burial-places at ILakodate, Perry saw a
tall post in which an iron wheel was inserted on an axle.
Every person who turned this wheel in passing was
believed to obtain credit in the other Avorld for one or
more prayers. " This praying by wheel and axle," he
said, " would seem to be the very perfection of a cere-
monious religion, as it reduces it to a system of mechani-
cal laws, which, provided the apparatus is kept in order,
a result easily obtained by a little oil, moderate use, and
occasional repairs, can be readily executed with the least
434 MATTHEW CALBRAITII PERRY.
possible expenditure of human labor, and with all that
economy of time and thought which seems the great
purpose of our material and mechanical age."
While on the island of Yesso, though rarely in the
neighborhood of Hakodate, Perry saw some of the in-
digenous races of Ainos. They are a little over five
feet in height usually, and their bodies are covered
with coarse black hair, for which reason they are called
" Hairy Kuriles."
Miss Bird travelled extensively among these people,
so little known previously. She says they are stupid,
gentle, good-natured, and submissive. Their huts are
set on wooden stilts. They are made of reeds, tied upon
a wooden framework, and covered with thatch. Their
food consists largely of stews made of *' wild roots, green
beans, and seaweed, and shred dried fish and venison
among them, adding millet, water, and some strong-
smelling fish-oil," cooked for three hours, and stirred
often with a wooden spoon.
Miss Bird says the Ainos seem never to have heard of
washing themselves, for when she bathed her hands and
face, they thought she was performing an act of worship.
The women do all the hard work, such as chopping
wood, cultivating the soil, etc. The people are univer-
sally tattooed, the process of disfigurement beginning
when they are five years old. They cut lines on the
upper lip, and fill the wounds with soot, Avashing the
scarred parts of the body with a decoction of the bark of
a tree to fix the pattern. The pattern on the lips is
deepened and broadened till marriage. This custom has
recently been prohibited, much to the regret of these
savages, who say " It is a part of our religion,"
They are very fond of their children, though a boy is
MATTHEW CALBRAITn PERRY. 435
prized more highly than a girl. Tlie babies are carried
ill a hood or net on the back of the mother or of another
child. This is common among the poor of Japan. The
children of the middle classes in Japan ride on the backs
of nurses, while those of rich families and the nobility
are carried in the arms of an attendant. Imperial babies
are held day and night till they learn to walk.
The Ainos worship the bear. They capture a cub,
feed it in their house, their children play with it, till
when it is strong and well-grown, they have " the Festival
of the Bear," kill it, put its head upon a pole, worship it,
and drink quantities of sake.
At the death of her husband, an Aino woman remains
secluded for a period varying from six to twelve months ;
at the death of his wife, the man secludes himself for
thirty days.
They have a great dread of death. They dress a
corpse in its best clothes, sew it with some ornaments in
a mat, and carry it on poles to some lonely grave, where
it is laid in a recumbent position.
Commodore Perry returned from his successful m'.s-
sion to Japan, January 12, 1855, having been absent over
two years. He had shown remarkable firmness, tact,
good sense, and ability. He at once hired a room in
Washington, and aided by his secretaries, artists, and a
Japanese lad as an attendant, he prepared for publica-
tion the three sumptuous volumes of his report of the
great country heretofore closed to the civilized world.
His own land did not forget the honors due him.
The city of New York presented him with a set of silver
plate. The merchants of Boston had a medal struck in
his honor. The citizens of Newport, his native city,
tendered him a reception. Rhode Island, in the presence
436 MATTHEW CALBRAITH PERRY.
of lier legislature, and at the hands of her chief magis-
trate, gave him a solid silver salver weighing three hun-
dred and nineteen ounces, suitably inscribed.
When Perry's first volume was published, he sent a
copy to Washington Irving, who wrote back : " You
have gained for yourself a lasting name, and have won it
without shedding a drop of blood, or inflicting misery
on a human being. AVlaat naval commander ever won
laurels at such a rate ? "
Commodore Perry did not long survive his last impor-
tant work. He wrote several papers on naval matters
and diplomacy. In February, 1858, he took a severe cold,
;nd March 4th, a little past midnight, died of rheumatism
of the heart, at his home in Tiiirty-second Street, New
York city. He was buried with distinguished honors
from St. Mark's Church, the church bells tolling, and
the minute-guns booming from the ships in the harbor.
He lies buried at Newport near his famous brother,
Oliver, and the other members of his family. His
widow survived him twenty-one years, dying June 14,
1879, at the age of 82.
" He had both the qualities," says Mr. Griffis, " neces-
sary for war and for peaceful victory. Though his
conquests in war and in peace, in science and in diplo-
macy, were great, the victory over himself was first,
greatest, and most lasting. He always kept his word and
spoke the truth. . . . He seemed never idle for one
moment of his life. . . .
" In the matter of ijecxinxarij resiJonsibiUtij, Perry was
excessively sensitive, with a hatred of debt bordering on
the morbid. . . . He believed a naval officer, as a servant
of the United States Government, ought to be as chival-
rous, as honest, as just and lovely in character^ to a boot-
MATTHEW CALBRAITII PERRY. 437
black or a waslierwomau as to a jewelled lady or a titled
nobleman."
Perry once remarked to Rear-Admiral Almy, on a
voyage home by way of the West Indies : " I have just
finished the Bible. I have read it through from Genesis
to Revelation. I make it a point to read it through
every cruise. It is certainly a remarkable book, a most
wonderful book."
When, in 1842, the ships fitted out were supplied with
Bibles by the government, Perry said, "The mere cost
of these books, fifty cents each, is nothing to the
moral effect which such an order will have in advancing
the character of the service."
Since Perry's time, a new nation has been born in
Japan. Before he opened the ports, thinking men had
become dissatisfied with the condition of things. The
Mikado, from being an active ruler as in former cen-
turies, had become a mere figure-head. He never ap-
peared in public. His subjects never saw his face.
" He sat on a throne of mats behind a curtain," says
Mr. Griffis, " and his feet were never allowed to touch
the earth. When he went abroad in the city, he rode in
a car closely curtained, and drawn by bullocks."
In 1868 a great revolution came. The Shogun, who
Avas the actual niler, was dethroned ; the daimios, or
feudal princes, gave up their great estates and their
thousands of " two-sworded " retainers, called the sd-
viurai, and retired to private life; and the present Mi-
kado, Mitsu Hito, the one hundred and twenty-first
Emperor of his line, became the ruling monarch. He is
now a little over forty years of age, having been born in
the Kyoto palace, November 3, 1852. The Empress Ha-
ruko is the daughter of Ichijo Tokada, a court noble of
438 MATTHEW CALBRAITII PERKY.
the highest rank. She is said to be well educated, of
charming manners, helpful to the women of her realm,
and talented as well. Several of her poems have been
set to music.
The Emperor and his court have all adopted European
dress. Two among the foremost ladies at court are
graduates of Vassar College.
In 1868 the IVIikado declared that " intellect and
learning should be sought for throughout the world," and
the promise has been faithfully kept. Japanese boys
were sent at once to foreign nations to learn the best
that their schools afforded. Many came to America.
A remarkable educational system was adopted in 1873.
Upon the elementary schools alone, more than six mil-
lion dollars are spent annually. Miss Bird says, " The
glory and pride of Japanese educational institutions is
the Imperial College of Engineering. . . in the opinion
of many competent judges, the most complete and best-
equipped engineering college in the world." This in-
stitution at Tokyo, with the Imperial University, the
Medical, Naval and Military Schools, are an honor to the
nation, and the surprise and admiration of foreigners.
The first short telegraph line was built in 1869 ; now
they thread Japan in every direction. Bell telephones
have been imported into the country. There are seven-
teen hundred miles of railroad, covering almost the
entire length of the main island, one road running east
and west, says the new " Handbook for Travellers in
Japan," just written by Basil Hall Chamberlain and
W. B. Mason. The former has also just published
" Things Japanese," a mine of valuable information.
The usual mode of travel is by the jinrikisha, in-
vented in 1873, a small carriage with two high wheels,
MATTHEW CALBRAITII PERRY. 439
and a pair of shafts, in which are one, two, or three
men as runners. A tolerably good runner, says Miss
Bird, can trot forty miles a day, at the rate of about
four miles an hour. The runners do not live on an
average over five years; and this unnatural method of
life, " making draught animals of themselves," brings
on heart and lung disease.
"The fleet of Japan," says Mr. Henry Norman,
" numbers some of the finest and fastest vessels afloat.
She has at her command an army of fifty thousand
highly trained and perfectly equipped men in peace, and
one hundred and fifty thousand in war. . . . The arsenal
at Koishikawa is simply Woolwich on a smaller scale, and
its English machinery turns out one hundred rifles and
thirty thousand cartridges (seventy thousand if neces-
sary) per day. . . . The Military College and Academy
are models of such institutions. ' One of the foremost
of similar institutions which I have seen in the world,'
I saw that General Grant had written in the visitors'
book of one of them."
The first newspaper, according to Miss Bird, was
started in 1871. Now there are thirty-five daily papers
in Tokyo alone, a city of one million three hundred
and eighty-nine thousand people, most of them morning
papers.
Christianity lias made marked progress since the
opening of Japan. Tlie life of the noble Japanese,
Joseph H. Neesima, by Prof. Arthur Sherburne Hardy,
as fascinating as a novel, is an illustration of what one
educated Christian can do for his native land.
Seeing some Christian tracts in Chinese, in Tokio,
Neesima determined to come to America and study.
He managed to get on board a ship bound for this coun-
440 MATTHEW CALBRAITII PERRY.
try, though if detected the punishment for leaving
Japan was death. Neesima found a noble man of means
in Boston, the Hon. Alpheus Hardy, who educated him
at his own expense. Later he accompanied Mr. Tanaka,
the Japanese Minister of Education, to England, France,
Sweden, Denmark, Russia, and Germany, to ascertain
the best methods for Japan in her schools and colleges,
and then went back to his own people to found a great
University in Kyoto, now having about six hundred
pupils, and to preach the gospel. The Doshisha School
in Kyoto, established in 1875, has about twenty buildings,
including thirteen dormitories, a gymnasium, a chapel,
library, scientific department, etc.
Among the last words of Mr. ISTeesima, who died
Jan. 23, 1890, at the age of forty-seven, when told that
his friends would carry on the work at the college, were,
"Sufficient, sufficient." "And at twenty minutes past
four," says Mr. Hardy, "with the words, 'Peace, Joy,
Heaven,' on his lips, entered into rest."
The procession which followed him to the grave was
a mile and a half long, the bier hidden by flowers, which
the people of "the flowery kingdom" love so well.
Men like Joseph Neesina are to be the deliverance of
Japan from Shintoism and Buddhism.
Japan sends us her silk and her tea to the amount of
many million dollars annually. Her art has spread over
the world. Her lacquered ware, with its five coats of
varnish, drawn like sap from the lacquer-tree, is
universally admired.
Her women must be educated and elevated till the
ideal wifehood is possible : " A companion in solitude,
a father in advice, a mother in all seasons of distress,
a rest in passing through life's wilderness."
MATTHEW CALBRAITir PERRY. 441
Women in Japan occupied a more prominent position
formally than now. Some of her greatest rulers have
been women; and many of her classics are the work of
women, written about 1000 a.d. Jingu Kogo, 201-269
A.D., who conquered Corea, was a queen of great abil-
ity. She is still worshipped in many of the temples.
Japan is now visited by thousands of foreigners annu-
ally. Her flowers, chrysanthemums, wistarias, camellias ;
her neat homes, as Sir Edwin Arnold in his " Japonica "
says, ''cheap to build, beautiful in appearance, spotlessly
pure, and with proper arrangements eminently salu-
brious ; " her hundreds of public baths ; her cheerful,
active, progressive people, are all an interesting study.
Perry opened a new land to America, and his name will
not be forgotten.
GENERAL A. W. GREELY AND OTHER
ARCTIC EXPLORERS.
SEVERAL Arctic voyages, since the sad one of Sir
John Franklin, liave been most interesting and
pathetic. Many explorers have striven to place their
flag at the North Pole.
Captain Weyprecht of Austria, and Lieutenant Julius
Payer, in the Tegetthoff, sailed from Bremerhaven, Ger-
many, June 13, 1872. The ship was beset by the ice off
the west coast of Nova Zembla, where the men remained
on her for two winters, and then abandoned her. Aug.
31, 1873, they discovered to the far north, above Siberia,
Franz Joseph Land. They made a sledge journey to
82° 5', about one hundred and sixty miles be^^ond their
ship, naming the country discovered. Crown Prince
Kudolph Land. Here they planted the Austro-Hun-
garian flag. An appearance of land beyond 83° north
latitude, they called Petermann Land.
May 29, 1875, Sir George S. Nares of England sailed
in the Alert and Discovery through Smith Sound for
the Korth Pole. The Discovery was left in latitude 81°
44' at the entrance of Lady Franklin Bay, On Sept. 1
the Alert reached 82° 27', a higher latitude than any
other ship up to that time — the Polaris reached 82° 16'
— when she was met by solid ice. Here she remained
for eleven months.
442
ARCTIC EXPLORERS. 443
From this point their sledging parties went out, the
sledges drawn by men instead of dogs. Griunell Land
was somewhat explored by Lt. Aldrich, the north-west
coast of Greenland by Lt. Beaumont, while one party,
under Commodore Albert H. Markham, travelled north
on the frozen sea, and reached a point four hundred
miles from tlie North Pole, latitude 83° 20' 26", — the
highest point attained up to that date.
Commodore INIarkham says in his journal, May 12,
1876 : " We had some severe walking, struggling
through snow up to our waists, over or through which
the labor of dragging a sledge Avould be interminable,
and occasionally almost disappearing through cracks and
fissures, until twenty minutes to noon when a halt was
called. . . .
" At noon we obtained a good altitude, and proclaimed
our latitude to be 83° 20' 26" K, exactly 399|- miles from
the North Pole. On this being duly announced, three
cheers were given, with one more for Captain Nares :
then the whole party, in the exuberance of their spirits
at having reached their turning-point, sang the ' Union
Jack of Old England,' and the ' Grand Palaeocrystic
Sledging Chorus,' winding up like loyal subjects with
'■ God save the Queen.' "
Several of Markham's men were disabled by scurvy.
One died, and eleven of the original seventeen were
brought back to the ship on relief sledges.
After a journey full of hardship. Captain Nares
returned to England in November, 1876.
On July 4, 1878, Baron Nordenskiold, the noted
Swedish scientist, sailed from Gothenburg, Sweden, in
the Vega, Captain Palander commanding, hoping to make
the northeast passage from the Atlantic to the Pacific.
444 GENERAL A. W. GEE ELY
The first attempt to make this passage ended in dis-
aster. Sir Hugh Willoughby sailed from England with
three ships, the Bona Esperanza, in wliich was Sir Hugh,
the Edward Bonaventure, and the Bona Confidentia, in
1553. Sebastian Cabot, then an old man, superintended
the preparations for the voyage.
Two of the vessels, the Edward Bonaventure having
been separated from them by a storm, wintered on the
coast of Russian Lapland, it is probable at the mouth of
the Varzina River. During the winter. Sir Hugh and
his sixty-two companions all perished, doubtless from
scurvy. A Russian fisherman found their bodies the
following year. From Sir Hugh's journal it was ascer-
tained that most were alive in January, 1554. The two
vessels and the body of the distinguished commander
were sent to England in 1555. The Bona Esperanza was
soon after driven by a storm into the Korth Sea, and
was never heard from. The Edward Bonaventure, com-
manded by Richard Chancellor, returned to England in
1554 ; in 1556 he w^ent to the Dwiua River with a Russian
ambassador, and suite of sixteen men, and goods valued
at 20,000 pounds. The vessel was wrecked in Aberdour
Bay, and Chancellor, his wife, and seven Russians were
drowned.
The Vega made a most interesting and successful
voyage. At Goose Land, on tlie coast of Nova Zembla,
they studied the habits of the great numbers of geese
and swans, from which the region takes its name. The
nests of the swans are so large that they can be seen on
the open plain for a great distance. They are built of
moss, plucked vip from about the nests. The female
hatches the four grayish-white eggs, while the male
remains near by. The geese build their nests on little
0-'
A. E. NORDENSKIOLD.
AND OTHER ARCTIC EXPLORERS. 445
hillocks close to the small lakes which abound iu Goose
Land.
The Samoyeds in European Russia proved an inter-
esting study. They are small in stature, with unkempt
hair, and, like the Lapps, live largely by their reindeer.
A rich Samoyed will own a thousand or more. They
catch whales and walrus, and barter with the Russians.
The Samoyeds sacrifice animals to their idols, eating
the flesh of the animals which are offered, and making a
mound of their bones. At the sacrificial feasts they
cover the mouths of the idols with blood and brandy.
In their graves they deposit wooden arrows, an axe,
knife, ornaments, and rolled up pieces of bark, which
the occupant is supposed to need, probably to light fires
in the other world.
Among the Siberian natives, clothes were sometimes
found hanging on a bush beside the graves, and among
the richer natives, some rouble notes with the food, that
the dead might have ready money in the other world to
purchase what they need.
The Samoyed has one or more wives. "These are
considered by the men," says Baron Nordenskiold, "as
having equal rights with themselves, and are treated
accordingly, which is very remarkable."
In these Polar Seas, the voyagers found innumerable
flocks of birds, especially near uninhabited regions.
The eggs of the little auk, or rotge, were sometimes
found laid upon the ice. The eggs of the looms — each
bird lays but one — are laid on the bare rock. The birds
often quarrel for a place on the rock, when the Q^g is
thus precipitated into the sea. The eider builds its nests
on low islands, so that the surrounding water prevents the
mountayi foxes from disturbing it. There are usually
446 GENERAL A. W. GREELY
five or six eggs in a nest, and sometimes more, as the
eider steals eggs from other birds. The nest is made
of soft, rich down, whicli is better than that obtained
from the dead birds. When tlie mother is driven
from the nest, she hastily scrapes the down over lier
eggs, so that they may not be visible. The nests are
so close together that it is difficult to avoid stepping on
the eggs.
The voyagers found Polar bears and walruses in abun-
dance. " If an unarmed man falls in with a Polar bear,"
says Nordenskiold, "some rapid movements and loud
cries are generally sufficient to put him to flight, but if
the man flies, he is certain to have the bear after him at
full speed. If the bear is wounded, he always takes
to flight. He often lays snow upon the wound with his
fore-paws ; sometimes in his death-struggles he scrapes
with his forefeet a hole in the snow, in which he buries
his head."
Concerning the walrus, which is hunted for its skin,
blubber, and oil, Nordenskiold says : " When the walrus
ox gets very old, he swims about by himself as a solitary
individual, but otherwise animals of the same age and sex
keep together in large herds. The young walrus long fol-
lows its mother, and is protected by her with evident fond-
ness and very conspicuous maternal affection. Her first
care when she is pursued is, accordingly, to save her
young, even at the sacrifice of her own life. . . . How-
ever eagerly she may try by blows and cuffs to get her
young under water, or lead her pursuers astray by diving
with it under her forepaw, she is generally overtaken
and killed. Such a hunt is truly grim, but the wal-
rus-hunter knows no mercy in following his occupa-
tion."
AND OTHER ARCTIC EXPLORERS. 447
The mother is usually lost iu the water after being
killed. Sometimes the young is saved, but it does not
live long. " It is easily tamed," says Nordenskiold, " and
soon regards its keeper with warm attachment. It seeks
as best it can — poorly equipped as it is for moving
about on dry land — to follow the seamen on the deck,
and gives itself no rest if it be left alone."
Lieutenant Greely says the full-grown walrus is from
twelve to fifteen feet long, with a small, short head.
The broad fore and hind paws are about two feet long,
and the tusks of adults about a foot and a half long.
The white whale is from twelve to eighteen feet in
length, and yields not far from a thousand pounds of
meat and blubber. The skin, called " mattak " by the
Eskimos, is much valued as an anti-scorbutic.
The narwhal, or unicorn, is of a yellowish-white
color, and has a long tusk projecting from the left side
of the upper jaw. This tusk is often about ten feet
long, equal to the length of the body of the animal. It
is probably used by the narwhal as a weapon.
The Vega sailed through Kara Sea past the New
Siberian Islands. Here portions of the skeletons of the
extinct mammoth (elephant) abound. In a previous
journey in 1876, Nordenskiold found on the Yenisei
River bones and some fragments of hide of a naammoth
nearly twenty-five millimeters (about an inch) thick,
which had been imbedded " hundreds of thousands, per-
liaps millions of years."
In Siberia whole animals have been found frozen in
the earth, with " solidified blood, flesh, liide, and hair."
In 1799 one was found by tlie Tunguses who live east
of the Lena River. They waited five years for the ground
to thaw so that the salable tusks could be uncovered.
448 GENERAL A. W GREELY
Meantime some of the flesh was destroyed by dogs and
other animals. In 1806 the skeleton, part of the hide,
and a large quantity of the hair a foot and a half long,
were taken away. Parts of the eye could still be clearly
distinguished.
In 1839 a complete mammoth was uncovered by a
landslip on the shore of a lake west of the Yenisei River.
It was almost entire, even a black tongue hanging out
of the mouth.
Nordenskiold believes that the climate of Siberia was
then about the same as at present, from the leaves of the
dwarf birch, northern willows, shells, and other things
found in the earth in which the mammoths were imbedded.
The Vega finally found herself beset by the ice, and went
into winter quarters in Bering's Strait, just beyond
Koljutschiu Bay, Nov. 25.
They found the natives, the Tchuktches (or Chukches),
very friendly, and glad to furnish them with bear and
reindeer meat as far as they were able. " The vessel's
tent-covered deck," says Nordenskiold, '' soon became a
veritable reception saloon for the whole population of
the neighborhood. Dog-team after dog-team stood all
day in rows, or, more correctly, lay snowed up before the
ice-built flight of steps to the deck of the Vega."
A native who had lost his way came on board in a
blinding snowstorm, thermometer— 36°, carrying his dog,
frozen stiff. The dog was for hours rubbed and warmed,
and finally, to the amazement of all, came to life again.
In excursions among the Tchuktches, the Vega officers
found them a tall, hardy race, kind and peaceable, usually
with one wife for each husband. " Within the family
the most remarkable unanimity prevails, so that we never
heard a hard word exchanged, either between man and
AND OTHER ARCTIC EXPLORERS. 449
wife, or parents and cliildren ; . . the power of the
woman appears to be very great. In making the more
important bargains, even about weapons and hunting im-
plements, she is, as a rule, consulted, and her advice is
taken. There is great affection in the families, and much
caressing of children. , . .
" Criminal statistics have been rendered impossible
for want of crimes, if we except acts of violence com.
mitted under the influence of liquor." When brandy was
first offered to the Tchuktches by whites, the taste
was most obnoxious to them ; but they soon learned to
like fire-water, and to suffer from its use.
They are very different in their treatment of dogs
from the Eskimos. These are of the same breed as the
dogs in Danish Greenland, but smaller. " As watch-
dogs," says Nordenskiold, " they have not been required
in a country where theft or robbery appears never to
take place. The power of barking they have therefore
completely lost, or perhaps they never possessed it." Tlie
natives at first were much frightened by the bark of two
Scotch collies on the Vega.
When the Vega officials went to a reindeer camp to
purchase some of the herd for fresh meat, they were
refused, even when tobacco, bread, rum, and even guns,
were offered in exchange. The herd of fifty, led by an
old reindeer with large horns, came in the early morning to
meet the master of the house, and rubbed his nose against
the Tchuktches's hand. The herd all stood m order, while
■the man took each reindeer by the horns, the animal, in
turn, rubbing his horns against the man's hands. At a
given sign the whole herd wheeled and went back to its
pasturage on the hillside.
Marco Polo, in his wonderful travels in the country of
450 GENERAL A. W. GBEELY
Kubla Khan, had learned somewhat of these interesting
people.
The breaking up of the ice enabled the Vega to press
forward on her journey, July 18, 1879. She passed down
Bering's Strait and anchored on St. Lawrence Island.
The natives first saw a European, June 27, 1816, Otto
von Kotzebue, after whom Kotzebue Sound was named.
When invited to their tents, he says, " a dirty skin was
spread on the floor, on which I had to sit ; and then they
came in one after the other, embraced me, rubbed their
noses hard against mine, and finished their caresses by
spitting in their hands, and then stroking me several
times over the face."
The next stopping-place was Bering Island, named, as
also the strait, for a Dane, Vitus Bering, who, after seve-
ral successful voyages, died here of scurvy in December,
1790. Most of his men fell victims to the same disease.
The island was at that time inhabited by thousands of
foxes, which were driven away by the men with sticks
while they were building a new vessel from the old one
which had been stranded on the beach.
The shore was covered with sea-otters, which had no
fear of men, till hundreds of them were caught. George
Wilhelm Steller, the naturalist of the Bering expedi-
tion, says, " The male and female are much attached to
each other, embrace and kiss e ach other like men. The
female is also very fond of its young. When attacked,
she never leaves it in the lurch; and when danger is not
near, she plays with it in a thousand ways, almost like
a child-loving mother with her young ones, throws it
sometimes up in the air, and catches it with her fore-
feet like a ball, swims about with it in her bosom,
throws it away now and then to let it exercise itself in
AND OTHER ARCTIC EXPLORERS. 451
the art of swimming, but takes it to herself with kisses
and caresses wlien it is tired."
The Vega arrived at Yokohama, Japan, Sept. 2,
1879. Their journey homeward was one continued ova-
tion to the skilful and brave navigators who were the
first to make the brilliant northeast passage.
On July 8, 1879, the Jeannette sailed from San Fran-
cisco, in the attempt to reach the North Pole by way of
Bering's Strait. Slie was under command of Lieutenant
George W. De Long, U.S.N., and was bought and fitted
out largely at the expense of Mr. James Gordon Bennett,
of the New York Herald. She was formerly the ship
Pandora, under command of Captain Allen Young. li.N.
The Jeannette sailed towards Wrangell Land and Herald
Island, north of Siberia, and in a few weeks was fast in
the ice-pack. She drifted about in tlie pack helplessly
for two years (lacking two months), and was crushed
by the ice June 13, 1881, in latitude 77 N. longitude
155 E.
At eleven o'clock at night all that was possible was
removed from the ship, and placed in three boats, while
the thirty-three men who composed the ship's party
escaped on an ice-floe. The ship sunk, five hours later,
at four o'clock on the morning of the thirteenth.
They were three hundred and fifty miles from the Si-
berian Coast, and fifteen hundred miles from Yakutsk on
the Lena River. They hoped to reach the New Siberian
Islands, and then go by boat to the Lena Delta.
They made only a mile and one-half in the knee-deep
snow in the first three hours. One of the men fainted,
and several were ill and unfit for duty. They gained
only a mile or two a day, as the men had to go over the
road thirteen times to bring up supplies, — six times
452 GENERAL A. W. GREELY
empty-handed and seven times with loads, — making
twenty-six miles to advance two.
Thaddeus Island, New Siberia, was reached Aug. 20,
and Sept. 12 the Asiatic coast was in sight. A
severe storm came up, and the boats were separated.
The boat under command of Engineer George W. Mel-
ville and Lieutenant J. W. Danenhower, after a perilous
voyage entered one of the eastern mouths of the Lena
Eiver, and Sept. 26, fourteen days after the boats
separated, reached a small village, where lived some Si-
berian exiles.
The whole company were in a wretched condition.
" Our legs," says Melville in his book, " In the Lena
Delta," " presented a terribly swollen appearance, being
frozen from the knees down ; and those places where
they had previously been so frozen and puffed as to
burst such moccasins as were not already in tatters, or
force tlie seams into gaps corresponding to the cracks in
our bleeding hands and feet, were now in a frightful
condition. The blisters and sores had run together, and
our flesh became as sodden and spongy to the touch as
though we were afflicted with the scurvy."
Two men at the little village started on the long jour-
ney to Bulun to tell the Russian authorities of the ar-
rival of the Americans. On their way they met some
natives with their reindeer sleds, who were also going to
Bulun, with two men, Nindemann and Noros, who had
been in the boat with De Long. These two had left De
Long Oct. 9, in a starving condition, with the faint
hope that they might reach Bulun, and bring relief be-
fore death came.
As soon as word was brought to Melville, he started
Nov. 5, with a dofr-team to their aid. The two sea-
r
..-«^'-1
:.r"pr^^
%tw •mi*:..
\^
■N
GEORGE W. DE LONG.
AND OTHER ARCTIC EXPLORERS. 453
men were too ill to return, but they described the route
back to De Long as best they could. Twenty-five days
had passed since De Long's men were sent, and it was
thought probable that all were dead.
Melville searched along the river for three weeks, in
deep snow, with dogs and men exhausted, finding the
log-books under a cache, left by De Long, but learning
nothing of the missing part}^, beyond a certain point,
where the trail was lost. Most reluctantly he gave up
the search.
In early spring, March 16, the search was renewed;
and on the 23d the bodies of the missing men were dis-
covered. Captain De Long, Surgeon Ambler, and Ah Sam,
the Chinese cook, were found beside each other buried in
the snow. Four poles lashed together, projecting from
the snow-drift a Remington rifle hung across the forks
of the sticks, pointed to the place where the dead lay.
By the side of De Long was his note-book, with his
last feebly-written words. His arm protruded above the
snow, as if he had thrown the book just before death,
with the hope that it might be found by some person to
tell the pitiful story. " He lay on his right side, with
his right hand under his cheek, his head pointing north,
and his face turned to the west."
Dr. Ambler lay on his face, and had bitten into his
hand in his agony, and the snow was stained with his
blood. "None of the three," says Melville, '' had boots or
mittens on, their legs and feet being covered with strips
of woollen blanket and pieces of the tent cloth, bound
around to the knees with bits of rope and the waist-
belts of their comrades."
This record of De Long's showed that his party had
landed in the Lena Delta, Sept. 17 about ninety-five
454 GENERAL A. W. GREELY
or more miles from the nearest settlement. The entry
made Sept. 19 read : " Opened our last can of pemmi-
can, and so cut it that it must suffice for four days' food •
then we are at the end of our provisions and must eat
the dog (the last of the forty), unless Providence sends
something in our way. When the dog is eaten " ?
Sept. 21 two reindeer were shot. Oct. 3 the dog
was shot for food. H. H. Erickson had now become
delirious, and soon died. Oct. 6 the journal reads :
''As to burying him, I cannot dig a grave; the ground
is frozen, and I have nothing to dig with. There is
nothing to do but to bury him in the river. Sewed
him up in the flags of the tent, and covered him with
my flag. Got tea ready, and with one-half ounce alcohol
we Avill try to make out to bury him. But we are all so
weak that I do not see how we are going to move,"
Erickson was buried in the river at 12.40 p.m., the
burial service read, and three volleys fired over him.
'' Oct. 10, eat deerskin scraps. . . . Nothing for sup-
per except a spoonful of glycerine.
"Oct. 14, Friday. Breakfast, willow tea. Dinner,
one-half teaspoonful sweet-oil and willow tea. Alexai
shot one ptarmigan. Had soup.
" Oct. 15. Breakfast, willow tea and two old boots.
"Oct. 17. Alexai died, covered him with ensign. . . .
"Oct. 21, one hundred and thirty -first day (from
leaving ship). Kaack was found dead at midnight.
" Friday, Oct. 28, one hundred and thirty-eighth day.
Iverson died during early morning.
" Saturday, Oct. 29, one hundred and thirty-ninth day.
Dressier died during the night.
" Sunday, Oct 30, one hundred and fortieth day. Boyd
and Gortz died during the night. ]Mr. Collins dying."
AND OTHER ARCTIC EXPLORERS. 455
This was the last entry, De Long probably died that
day or the next.
The twelve were all dead several days before Mel-
ville started on the search, Nov. 5. The bodies were
interred by Melville, and afterwards brought home to
the United States, a distance of twelve thousand one
hundred and ninety-one miles. Everywhere along the
route, in Asia, Europe, and America, the bodies of
the dead heroes were treated with the utmost honor.
They were followed by a grand procession in New York
on Washington's birthday, 1884, and tenderly buried.
The third boat party, under Lieutenant Charles W.
Chipp, was never heard from ; probably all on board
perished in the gale.
Two years after De Long sailed in the Jeannette, an
expedition was sent out by the United States under
Lieutenant Adolphus W. Greely. Through Lieutenant
Weyprecht of the Austrian navy, the United States
promised to unite with other nations in establishing
international circumpolar stations in the interests of
science. Magnetic and meteorological investigations
were to be made at fourteen different points by eleven
different nations. It was decided to make one station
at Lady Franklin Bay, in latitude 81° 44' N., Congress
appropriating twenty-five thousand dollars for the work
at this place.
Lieutenant Greely of the 5th U. S. Cavalry was
chosen to command the expedition.
He was born in Newburyport, Mass., March 27, 1844,
and was therefore at the time of starting, 1881, thirty-
seven years of age. He was fitted for college at the
High School in Newbury port, graduating in 1860, at a
younger age than any before him save one. When the
456 GENERAL A. W. G RE ELY
Civil War broke out, the lad of seventeen desired to join
the 40th New York Volunteer Infantry, but was not
received. On July 3, 1861, he was enrolled a,s a private
in Major Ben. Ferley Poore's Rifle Battalion, of the 19th
Regiment, Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry. The same
year he was made a corporal.
He distinguished himself for brave and faithful ser-
vice during our Civil War; served at Ball's Bluff, at
the siege of Yorktown, West Point, Fair Oaks, Peach.
Orchard ; was wounded at White Oak Swamp, fought at
Malvern Hill and Chantilly, twice wounded at Antietam
and lay in' the hospital for two months, and was ap-
pointed first sergeant at Fredericksburg.
In February, 1863, he was made a second lieutenant
under the lamented Colonel Robert G. Shaw, in the 54th
Regiment Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry, and later
served in the 81st United States Colored Infantry. He
took an active part in the siege of Port Hudson. He
was made first lieutenant April 11, 1864, and captain,
March 26, 1865, having been brevetted major United
States Volunteers, March 13, 1865, '• for faithful and
meritorious services during the war." Two years later,
March 7, 1867, Greely was appointed second lieutenant in
the 36th Regular Infantry, and served with his regi-
ment at Fort Sanders, Fort Bridger, and at Salt Lake
City. In 1873 he determined a danger, or flood, line for
the Mississippi, Missouri, Ohio, Cumberland, and Ten-
nessee rivers, which has made it possible to prevent, in
large measure, damage from high waters.
Two years later, in 1875, Greely constructed the Texas
division of military telegraph lines, building, in eleven
months, eleven hundred and fifty miles of line. In 1876
he received a six months' relief from duty, which time
AND OTHER ARCTIC EXPLORERS. 457
lie spent in Europe, mostly in France. On his return
he gave his time to constructing military telegraph
lines in New Mexico, Arizona, Dakota, and Montana,
and in examining the rivers of the Pacific coast for the
establishing of danger lines. He married, June 20,
1878, when he was thirty-five, Henrietta Hudson
Nesmith, daughter of Thomas L. Nesmith of San
Diego, Cal., formerly of New York City.
Lieutenant Greely had now become an officer in the
United States Artillery, and later in the 5th Cavalry,
doing much scientific work in connection with the sig-
nal service. It was therefore fitting that he should be
chosen by the President to superintend the establishing
of a signal station at Lady Franklin Bay in 1881.
The ship Proteus, of six hundred and nineteen tons,
built at Dundee for the sealing business, was chosen to
take Lieutenant Greely and his party of twenty-five
persons in all to their home in the far north, with pro-
visions for three years. At the end of a year a ship
was to be sent to them with supplies, and at the end of
the second year a second relief ship with stores; and if
these failed to reach Greely, he was not to remain in the
Polar regions after Sept. 1, 1883, but go southward by
boat until the relief vessel should meet him.
On July 7, 1881, the Proteus sailed away with her
precious freight under the command of Captain Kichard
Pike, who had had much experience in ice navigation in
the seal-fishing in Labrador.
She took with her the hope and pride of many fami-
lies, who bade a cheerful good-by, yet with aching
hearts. Lieutenant F. F. Kislingbury had been in ser-
vice for fifteen years, was a brave man of fine physique
and mind, " and never spared himself," as Lieutenant
458 GENERAL A. W. GREELY
Greely said in his report, " any personal exertion which
wouhl add to the personal comfort or pleasure of others,"
Lieutenant James B. Lockwood, the son of Gen.
Henry H. Lockwood of Maryland, a young man of
twenty-nine, the idol of his family, had been eight years
in service, always on the frontier in Arizona, Nebraska,
or other Western States. He was well read, a good
Spanish scholar, quite skilled in music, and most active
in mind and body, "a man," as Greely said, "of unvary-
ing truthfulness, good judgment, and Christian charity."
Sergeant Edward Israel, a graduate of Ann Arbor
University, a young man of means and ability, was the
astronomer of the expedition.
Sergeant George W. Rice, a lawyer and professional
photographer as well, was a young man of promise, and
proved most valuable to the expedition. Sergeants
Jewell and Ralston had served long and faithfully as
meteorological observers. Sergeant David L. Brainard
of the 2d Cavalry, twenty-five years old, had been twice
wounded in Indian campaigns under General Miles, and
was a man of imusual force of character and honor.
After a pleasant passage, the Proteus stopping at
Godhavn, Greenland, to purchase twelve Eskimo dogs
and food for them, and also at Ritenbenk and Uper-
navik for nineteen more dogs and Eskimo guides,
the Greely party crossed INtelville Bay without acci-
dent, reaching Lady Franklin Bay Aug. 12, 1881. The
Proteus broke her way through nearly two miles of
heavy ice, some of it ten feet thick, to reach Discovery
Bay in the northern part of Lady Franklin Bay, where
Greely was to establish his quarters, the place where
the English ship Discovery had wintered in 1875-76.
A house sixty by seventeen feet was built at once, and
AND OTHER ARCTIC EXPLORERS. 459
the station named Fort Conger, in lionor of Senator 0.
D. Conger, wlio liad shown much interest in the expedi-
tion. Fourteen musk-oxen were soon killed, and their
flesh preserved for the winter's use. Greely wisely pre-
vented the killing of more than was for their absolute
need, having no sympatliy with the shooting for mere
pleasure, a thing which seems scarcely possible to those
who love animals.
Although the surrounding scenery was grand in many
respects, yet far from home and friends the place
could not be other than desolate after a time. On the
borders of open streams, grasses and buttercups were
growing, and higher up on the glacier drift there were
countless yellow Arctic poppies in blossom. The largest
plant — there were no shrubs — was the creeping Arctic
willow, about a foot long and an inch above the ground.
The autumn days passed rapidly in their work.
Observations were made on the pressure of the atmos-
phere, i\\Q direction and force of the wind, the kind and
movement of clouds, the aurora and weather. Some
sledge journeys were made; but the sun disappeared from
sight Oct. 15, and they were left in darkness for one
hundred and thirty-seven days, till Feb. 28. '' At Fort
Conger," says Greely, '' stars were to be seen at local
noon seven days afte^- tlie sun had gone for the winter,
and so remained visible in a cloudless sky for over four
months. . . . The darkness of midday at Conger was
such for nearly two months in midwinter, that the time
could not be told from a watch Iield up with its face to
the south."
From the long-continued darkness, their faces became
a yellowish-green color, and they were irritable in tem-
per, gloomy, disinclined to eat, and indisposed to excr-
460 GEN Eli A L A. W. G RE ELY
tion. Some of the men became mentally affected. A
tri-weekly school was carried, on by Greely throughout
the winter, and Lieutenant Lockwood edited a semi-
monthly paper called the Arctic Moon. It died in two
months from lack of interest.
Lockwood wrote in his journal: "Another twenty-
four hours of this interminable night nearly gone !
Thank God ! . . . The days and weeks seem weeks and
months in passing."
Much interest Avas taken in every new litter of
puppies, as was but natural, removed as they were from
everything living. Gypsy, their brightest dog, having
lost her own offspring, " improved every opportunity in
the absence of their own mothers, to suckle the young
in other litters." One puppy, during the temporary
abience of its mother, was placed with another litter,
"but it was pushed away by the indignant parent, who
declined any addition to her cares."
About the middle of December some of the six weeks'
old puppies, running out into an atmosphere — 45°
to collect bits of food thrown out, Avere actually
frozen to the ice, and had to be cut out with a hatchet !
The favorite sleeping-place for the dogs was the ash-
barrel, or where the ashes had been strewn. When a
dog would leave his place to attack a rival, he would
lose his position by another taking it. " Sometimes,"
says Greely, "failing to dislodge a comrade comfortably
ensconced on the coveted barrel, a dog jumped on top
of the first comer and curled himself up contentedly.
The under dog knew by bitter experience that to quar-
rel Avas to lose his bed, and remained until worn out by
the weight of his rival."
The return of the sun was most heartily welcomed.
AND OTHER ARCTIC EXPLORERS. 461
March 1, Lockwood, with three men and a dog-sledge,
started for Thank God Harbor, preparatory to his ap-
proaeliing journey towards the Pole. They visited the
grave of C. F. Hall, and also that of the two Englishmen,
Hand and Paul, who died on the exploring trip under
Lieutenant Beaumont of the Nares expedition.
Dr. Favy, the surgeon of the party, went with others
to Cape Joseph Henry; and Greely, with Privates Bie-
derbick, Connell, and Whisler, journeyed over two hun-
dred and fifty miles in GrinneU Land. A puppy team
of eight, born at Fort Conger in November, hauled the
first load, of three hundred and fifty-five pounds.
They explored the large Lake Hazen, 60 miles long
by 6 wide, and covering 300 square miles ; they named
after Greely's wife, the Henrietta Nesmith Glacier,
" a mass of sheer, solid ice, averaging about one hundred
and seventy-five feet in height," of crescent shape, and
about five miles frour hill to hill, and discovered moun-
tains and rivers unseen before by man.
Later in the season Greely again explored Grinnell
Land, naming the highest mountain seen, A[ouyt C. A.
Arthur. He says in his " Three Years of Arctic Service : "
"After two hours of steady climbing, I reached the sum-
mit of the mountain in a worn-out condition. The ba-
rometer stood at 25.35, indicating an ascent of over
eighteen hundred feet, and an elevation above the sea
of forty-five hundred feet.
" The travelling was of such an exhausting character
that Sergeant Lynn was unable to follow me ; and after
wading about a half uiile in snow four feet deep, under-
lain with water two feet deep, he was so worn out that I
sent him back to the junction of the brooks, where he
was ordered to await my return. Li my tired condition,
462 GENERAL A. W. G RE ELY
I could never have reached the top except as a matter of
lionor and duty. Frequently I crawled on my hands and-
knees a long distance, at one time as far as a quarter of
a mile. At times I threw the glasses ahead of me, so
as to make it certain I should proceed. ...
" When I was about a half mile from the top, farther
progress seemed impossible. My strength failed me, my
sight dimmed, and my throat became parched, and thirst
intolerable, while perspiration poured off me profusely.
I revived myself by rest, and by eating snow, a doubtful
expedient even in summer. After that I could walk
oidy a hundred, and later fifty steps at a time, but
finally the summit was reached.
" As I had been travelling for over five hours with my
boots filled with ice-water, kept at the lowest tempera-
ture by the snow, I found on reaching the summit of the
mountain, that my left foot had lost all sense of feeling,
and that there was but little sensation in my right.
Knowing the danger of perishing by freezing, I kept
moving steadily, as that was my only safety."
On April 3 the expedition under Lockwood, destined
for North Greenland, started from Fort Conger. There
were thirteen men in the party, with five sledges.
Lockwood had the sledge Antoinette, with a team of
eight dogs, — Eitenbenk, the king, a large white dog;
Howler, Avho was the king of the dogs till Ritenbenk
usurped his position ; two mother-dogs. Black Kooney
and White Kooney; and Ask-him, who was a puppy
when purchased in Greenland. Gypsy, Boss, and Major
completed the number. Kitenbenk, although most
useful, was a thief whenever an opportunity offered to
get food; but Howler always gave the alarm by un-
earthly barking. Howler was a faithful creature, who
AND OTHER ARCTIC EXPLORERS. 463
never shirked in his work. Indeed, all the dogs have
contempt for an idler, and have been known to pounce
upon one of their number who would not do his full
share of pulling the load, and kill him.
After travelling several days, and enduring much in-
tense cold, with severe snow-storms, so unbearable that
they sometimes lay in their fur sleeping-bags for forty-
five hours, several of the party became disabled, and were
obliged to return to camp. The bags were sometimes so
frozen that four men could scarcely open them. The
wind often blew over the tents, and once the dog-sledge
with its load of two hundred and fifty pounds was lifted
bodily from the ground, and one of the men, Ralston,
severely injured by the sledge knocking him several
yards. They dug holes in snow-banks, and burrowed in
them, when it was impossible to go forward. Often
they cut their way over the high, hummocky ice with
axes.
May 29 Lockwood, Brainard, and the Eskimo Fred-
erick Christiansen pushed on alone with the dogs.
Brainard says in his journal : " The dogs hot being ac-
customed to hauling such heavy weights, sit down as
soon as the runners cut through the crust, and compla-
cently watch us Avith a puzzled expression, until we lift
the sledge bodily and place it on the firm crust."
Later he writes : "After camping, the dogs were run-
ning about like ravenous wolves, gnawing at everything,
and badly chewed and splintered the thermometer-box
before it could be secured. The ptarmigan lately shot
was placed on the ridge-pole for safety. A hasty rush
of feet, and a heavy body striking violently against the
tent, caused us to rush out to investigate this commo-
tion. The ptarmigan was missing. A few feathers in
464 GENERAL A. W. GREELY
his bloody jaws marked the king-dog, Ritenbenk, as the
thief, notwithstanding his blank look of innocence."
At another time, " As I awoke," says Lockwood, " a
small piece of pemmican (our only remaining dog-food)
was slowly but surely moving out of the tent. The
phenomenon astonished me ; and rubbing my eyes, I
looked more carefully, and saw Eitenbenk's head with-
out his body, and found that his teeth fixed in one
corner of the sack, was the motive power. His eyes
were fixed steadily on me ; but head, eyes, and teeth van-
ished as I looked. He had burrowed a hole through the
snow, and had inserted his head just far enough into the
tent to lay hold of a corner of the sack. Th-e whole
pack are ravenous, and eat anything and everything,
which means substantially nothing in this case."
The snow was now so deep, up to their thighs, and
the ice so rough, that the use of the axe was constant.
In ten hours, however, they made sixteen miles.
May 13, after a severe storm lasting for four days,
they reached an island, which Greely afterwards appro-
priately named Lockwood Island, the highest point
(thus far, 1893) ever reached by man. The land to the
rear towered up four thousand feet.
Several snow buntings were flying about, and there
were traces of the hare, lemming, and fox. They ascended
the summit of the cape on Lockwood Island, about two
thousand six hundred to three thousand feet above the
level of the sea.
"We reached the top," says Lockwood, " at 3.45 p.m.,
and unfurled the American flag [Mrs. Greely had made
one for the expedition] to the breeze in latitude 83° 24' N.
The summit is a small plateau, narrow but extending
back to the south to broken, snow-covered heights. . . .
AND OTHER ARCTIC EXPLORERS. 465
The horizon beyoiul, on the laud side, was concealed by
numberless snow-covered moLintains, one profile over-
lapping another, and all so merged together, on account
of their universal covering of snow, that it was impos-
sible to detect the topography of the region." A cape
of land in the distance was called Cape Washington.
For sixty miles they could look towards the Pole, with
not a trace of land in sight : the ice appeared to be
rubble. It is probable that there is much open water
beyond, and, as Greely says, "■ its main ice moves the
entire Avinter."
" The north polar land is, I believe, of limited extent,"
says Greely, " and its shores, or the edges of its glaciers,
are washed by a sea, which, from its size and consequent
high temperature, its ceaseless tides and stray currents,
can never be entirely ice-clad. Nordenskiold believes
in the open sea, convinced by the polar pack setting
northward from Mussel Bay in 1872. Nares even would
seem to be uncertain on this point, else he never would
have equipped Commander Markham with the heavy
boats hauled by his party in 187G. . . . That the Teg-
etthoff and Jeannette driftecl northward winter as well
as summer is confirmatory evidence of an " open polar
sea." Greely does not believe in a " navigable polar
sea," and thinks " the water-space to the northward can
only be entered in extremely favorable years by the
Spitzbergen route."
On May 16 Lockwood and his party turned towards
Conger, which they reached June 1, after an absence of
sixty days. They had travelled over a thousand and sev-
enty statute miles, the outward rate two and one-tenth
miles per liour, and the homeward two and three-tenths
miles per hour.
466 GENERAL A. W. GREELY
"This sleJge-trip," says Greely, '-must stand as one
of the greatest in Arctic history, considering not only
tlie high latitude and the low temperature in which it
was made, but also the length of the journey, and the
results flowing therefrom. . . . His (Lockwood's) dis-
coveries extended to a point ninety-five miles along the
ISlorth Greenland coast beyond the farthest ever seen by
his predecessors, to which should be added about thirty
miles of coast-line between Capes May and Britannia not
visible to Lieutenant Beaumont [a point near Cape May'
was Beaumont's farthest when he was turned back by
the death of his men by scurvy].
" The results of Lockwood's journey, then, consist not
in the mere honor of displaying the Stars and Stripes
four miles nearer tlie geographical pole than the flag of
any other nation, but in adding one hundred and twenty-
five miles of coast-line (not including several hundred
miles of inland fjords) to Greenland, and in extending
the mainland over a degree of latitude from Cape May
northward to Cape Washington."
Besides this honor to our flag and nation, an lionor
which England had held for nearly three centuries,
young Lockwood traversed Grinnell Land from east to
west, as well as the interior, and covered by his labors,
as Greely says in his official report to the government,
" from Cape Washington, 38° W. to Arthur Land, 83°
W. above tlie eightieth parallel, one-eighth of the circle
of tlie globe. ... If his tragic fate awakened the sym-
pathy of the world, none the less should his successful
work receive recognition. He unfortunately did not
return for merited promotion."
Fearless of danger, persevering in the p^reatest difficul-
ties, as modest as he was courageous, the name of
AND OTHER ARCTIC EXPLORERS. 467
Lieutenant Lockwood will always be honored and loved.
With him was associated the self-denying, manly Bvain-
ard, but for whose energy and aid the Greely expedition
niiglit have left only its starvation record.
The summer of 1882 passed away, and the party
looked in vain for a relief ship to bring provisions and
to cheer their hearts with messages from home. A
relief ship had been sent, but of course they did not
know it.
In 1882 Congress appropriated thirty-three thousand
dollars to send a ship to Greely. The Neptune was
chartered, which was to reach Lady Franklin Bay if
possible, and if not, to leave two caches, of two hundred
and fifty rations each, at certain points. Besides these
rations, the Neptune carried two thousand pounds
of canned meats, two thousand five hundred pounds of
canned fruits and vegetables, six tons of seal meat, three
liundred pounds extract of coffee, and other provisions.
Mr. William M. Beebe, private secretary of the chief
signal officer, was sent in charge of provisions, and
Williani So])p was the master of the ship. Six times tl' 3
Neptune tried to pass through the ice in Kane Sea above
Smith Sound, with tlie hope of reaching Greely, but
each time she was baffled by the ice. Finally the two
caches of rations were left at Cape Sabine, and at the.
north end of Littleton Island, and she returned to the
United States.
Commander W. S. Schley, in his rescue of Greely,
pertinently says, *• For some unaccountable reason, the
miscellaneous provisions Beebe was ordered to bring back
in the event of failing to reach Lady Franklin l^ay, and
which he actually did bring back, to be stored at St.
Johns, from which place they were carried up next
468 GENERAL A. W. GREELY
summer, to be sunk in the Proteus. Tliey would have
kept better in the ice upon the rocks at Sabine."
The acting signal officer, Lieutenant L. V. Caziarc, in
the absence of General Hazen, had given orders '' You
will return the vessel and the remainder of the stores to
Saint Johns." Had they been left at Sabine, there would
probably have been no Greely tragedy to arouse the
sympathies of the world.
All summer long the men looked and waited for the
ship. Lockwood writes in his journal : " I find myself
constantly reading over old letters brought with me, and
received at St. Johns, though read before again and
again. The effect is depressing, bringing too strongly
into view home and the dear ones there. I am oppressed
with ennui and low spirits, and can't shake off tliis feel-
ing, partly induced by the cruel disappointment of 7io
shijj.'^
Later he wrote : " Have been reading of Kane and
his travels. He is my beau ideal of an Arctic traveller.
How pitiful that so bold a spirit was incased in so fee-
ble a frame ! Vihy is nature inconsistent ? "
Again he wrote : " The life we are now leading is
somewhat similar to that of a prisoner in the Bastile :
no amusements, no recreations, no event to wreck the
monotony or dispel ennui. I take a long walk every
day along shore to North Valley with that view, study
French a little, or do some tailoring, now doubly neces-
sary, as our supply of clothing is getting low. ... I
must go on another sledge-journey to dispel this gloom."
The men amused themselves with their efforts to rear
the four young musk-oxen, which had been taken alive
when the older ones were shot. Three of the dogs nearly
killed "John Henry," the youngest of the calves; and
ANB OTHER ABC TIC EXPLORERS. 469
the others, though tame and :nost .affectionate, being
unused to the new and strange conditions, soon died.
" Tame foxes and tame owls," wrote Lockwood, " have
also been given up. The former bit their keepers, the
latter ate each other up."
''The tame fox, Reuben," wrote Greely in his journal,
"after running away, has amused himself for a long
time by catching supplies of extra meat. He was out
once near the dogs, and a one-month puppy coming up,
the fox caught him by the nose and sent him away
yelping. He seemed lately to have but little fear of
tlie dogs."
Greely finally gave up looking for the relief ship in
1882, and wrote in his journal, Aug. 25: "Artificial
light will soon be needed. I have quite given up the
sliip, as indeed have most of the men. I hope against
hope, and defer going on an allowance of our remain-
ing stock of vegetables until Sept. 1. We have enough
of them, but in the matter of vegetables we must live
much more simply tlian the past year."
The second Arctic winter was not j)assed so happily
as the first. Lieutenant Greely interested the men
by scientific and historical lectures, or talks regarding
the battles of the Civil War, while others spoke on
astronomy or other matters with which they were most
familiar.
The spring of 1883 was most welcome, though Greely
notes iu his journal: "Perfect ease of mind cannot
come until a ship is again seen."
The dogs had been cared for as well as possible, as
• North Greenland was to be again explored, and the jour-
ney was long and hazai-dous. They were not fed as well
as Greely wished; for he had no food but "pork, beef,
470 GENERAL A. W. GREELY
and fish (all salt).. Their food," he says, "has always
been tlioroughly soaked and freshened, and, what I con-
sider an important point, always fed to them in an un-
frozen and generally warm condition. Hard bread has
been given to as many as would eat it, which includes
tlie puppies raised here, and one or two of the old dogs.
Most of the Greenland dogs will not touch bread even
when hungry."
Lockwood and others, with twenty dogs, started on
another Greenland journey, March 27, but returned in a
few days, disappointed, as they were prevented from
going forward at Beach Horn Cliffs, by a great body of
open water, several miles wide.
Lockwood then started on his month's trip across Grin-
nell Land, discovering and naming Greely Fjord between
sixty and eighty miles long, and fifteen miles wide, and
the two bays at its head, after Greely's daughters,
Adola and Antoinette. " No such word as ' failed ' to
write this time," says Lockwood, " I am thankful to say ;
but the happy reflection is mine that I accomplished
more than any one expected, and more than I myself
dared hope — the discovery of the western sea, and
nence the western coast line of Grinnell Land." The
journey was laborious. Some of the dogs had to be
sliot to provide food for their co-workers. One dog,
Disco King, drew his load till completely exhaiisted,
and died Avith Fort Conger in sight, being unable to
crawl thither after being released from the harness.
As the summer of 1883 waned, everybody looked
eagerly for the expected relief ship. There could be
little doubt, this time, as on the previous year. Yet
Greely wisely made provision for his retreat southward,
in case the ship did not come.
And other arctic explorers. 471
June, July, and August passed, and in v^ain they strained
their eyes for the coming sliip. Now they thought tliey
saw the smoke of a vessel sailing up the icy passage, but
hope always gave way to disappointment. It almost
seemed as though America had forgotten her explorers.
They could not know that the aid intended for them
was in the bottom of the sea.
Greely, with a foresight which seemed almost pro-
phetic, had left explicit directions for the relief ships.
If the vessels could not reach Fort Conger in Discovery
Bay, they were to land provisions for forty men for
fifteen months at the farthest point j)ossible on the east
coast of Grinnell Land, and also at Littleton Island, and
" establish a winter station at Polaris winter quarters,
Lifeboat Cave, when their main duty would be to keep
their telescopes on Cape Sabine, and to the land north-
ward."
Two vessels, the Proteus, under Lieutenant E. A. Gar-
lington of the 7th U. S. Cavalry, the same vessel in
which the Greely pnrty had sailed in 1881, and the
Yantic under Commander Frank Wildes of the U. S.
Navy, sailed from St. Johns, Newfoundland, June 21,
1883, on their returning expedition. The Proteus had a
fair passage through the ice of INIelville Bay, touched at
south-east Cary Island, and examined the Nares cache of
1800 rations, left a record at Pandora Harbor on the
east side of Smith Sound, and being met by the ice pack,
anchored in Payer Harbor on the west coast of Smith
Sound. She remained at Cape Sabine four hours and a
half,- but did not leave provisions (which would have
saved so much starvation later on) through conflicting
directions from officials, an unsigned memoraiulum
ordering that provisions should be left on the way north,
172 GENERAL A. W. QUE ELY
and a verbal statement from the chief signal officer, that
this memorandum " was no part of his orders."
Garlington was to examine caches, and replace any
damaged articles of food. He examined the Beebe cache
left by the steamer Neptune, but not the Nares cache
on Stalknecht Island, a half mile away, which he
said was "in a damaged condition," and which, unfortu-
nately, he did not replace.
Tlie next day, while near Cape Albert on the west
coast of Kane Sea, above Smith Sound, the Proteus was
crushed by ice seven feet thick, and went down on the
evening of July 23. Some of the provisions were thrown
overboard ; but in the hurry, a third of these were lost
by falling too near the ship. Tlie crew were uncontrol-
lable, and pillaged for tliemselves.
One of the whale-boats was loaded with provisions,
estimated at five hundred rations, and taken by Lieutenant
Colwell of the navy to a point four miles west of Cape
Sabine, known as the " Wreck-camp cache." Greely
found only one hundred rations of meat wlien his men
were starving, and was greatly disappointed.
The stores of the Proteus being lost, her men could not
winter at Lifeboat Cave, unless the Yantic, which was
a relieving boat to the Proteus, and not fitted for passing
through the ice, could be reached, and food obtained.
By a series of the most unfortunate misunderstand-
ings, the two commanders, Garlington and Wildes, failed
to reach each other, one always having left a certain
specified point agreed upon when the other arrived.
If the Yantic reached Littleton Island, as she had
been instructed, Garlington would remain for the winter
at Lifeboat Cave, close by. He thought she would not
come from the condition of the ice. She did come six
AND OTHER ARCTIC EXPLORERS. 473
days after liis departure, and not finding Garlington, her
provisions were not left, and she started to seek him and
his men. Had her provisions been cached at Littleton
Island, and a party of volunteers left with them, the
horrors of the next Avinter might have been avoided.
As Garlington had with him in his boats forty days'
rations for fifteen men, the provisions of the Yantic
could easily have been spared.
Lieutenant Colwell, after a perilous boat journey across
Melville Bay, reached Disko, eight hundred miles, with
his exhausted party. They as well as Garlington and
the crew were rescued by the Yantic, and brought to St.
Johns, Newfoundland.
The whole country was saddened at the failure to help
Greely. The question on every side was, " What can
be done for his relief ? " Of fifty thousand rations taken
up to or beyond Littleton Island by the steamers Nep-
tune, Yantic, and Proteus, '-'only about one thousand
were left in that vicinity, the remainder being returned
to the United States, or sunk with the Proteus."
In the letter left by Garlington at Cape Sabine, for
Greely, he liad assured the latter that " everything
within the power of man will be done to rescue the brave
men at Fort Conger from their perilous position." How-
ever, when the Yantic returned about the middle of Sep-
tember, it was deemed inexpedient to send any other
relief ship that fall. The result of tliat decision was
pitiful in the extreme. Of course another vessel might
not have reached the sufferers; though Greely, INIelville,
and some others, believed relief was prii.cticable in
the fall of 1883. '■ Had a stout sealer," says Greely,
"and there were many available — left St. Johns, under
a compet':nt ofHcer, within ti'u days after the return of
474 GENERAL A. W. GLIEELY
the Yantic, the entire Lady Franklin Bay Expedition, in
my opinion, v/ould have returned."
Meantime, what had become of Lieutenant Greely and
his brave men, waiting two whole years for the prom-
ised ships ? He well says in his "Three Years of Arc-
tic Service " : " My journal shows that I looked forward
to privation, partial starvation, and possible death for
a few of the weakest, but I expected no such thing as
an abandonment to our fate."
When the 8th of August came, and no ship had been
seen, the Greely party of twenty-tive men, according to
previous instructions, started on their retreat toward
the south, in four boats, the steam yacht Lady Greely,
the whale-boat Narwhal, English ice-boat Beaumont,
the English boat, Valoi-ous, with a small boat for special
use.
The poor dogs, to Avhom all were greatly attached, were
left behind, as they could not well be killed; for if the
party should be obliged to return to Fort Conger, their
help would be needed. Several barrels of seal blubber,
fresh beef, and bread, were opened, so that the}^ could live
for some mouths before starvation came. A pitiful voy-
age lay before their masters — and probably a pitiful
death for them.
The journey from the first was a most dangerous one.
Ice blocked their way, storms assailed them, and heavy
fogs prevented their progress.
"As the midnight sun," says Greely, "struggled
tlirough the distorted masses of angry clouds, we turned
our prows into Kennedy Channel — to the southward,
and, we hoped, to safety. . . .
" And so we turned homeward, knowing we had the
courage to face the blinding gale, the heavy floes, the
AND OTHER ARCTIC EXPLORERS. 475
grinding pack, the countless other dangers which environ
the Arctic navigator ; and having also, though we knew
it not, heart and courage to encounter uncomplainingly,
on barren crags, the hardships and horrors of au Arctic
winter, with scant food, shelter, and clothing, with neither
fire, light, nor warmth, and to face undauntedly intense
cold and bitter frost, disaster and slow starvation, insan-
ity and deatli." Snow fell to the depth of several inches
m these early August days. Now the men cut their way
with axes through the solid ice. " Four hours' cutting,
charging, rolling, etc., worked wonders,'"' says Greely in
his journal, "and, as the result of our exhaustive labors,
the launch was got to open water."
Now they passed through the middle of an immense ice-
berg, it having split so that there was a passage scarcely
a dozen feet wide and a hundred yards long, while the
ice rose above them on either side fifty feet high.
Sometimes the boats were caught between the great
moving pack of ice, and the ice-foot, ten feet high, along
the shore. At Cape Hawks they stopped to obtain the
food from the English cache. The bread, which was in
casks, was covered with green, slimy mould, and would
have been thrown away except for the possible privations
in the future. The barrels and casks were broken up to
be used for steam on the launch, as they had little fuel
left.
Aug. 26, the new ice having now become three inches
thick from the severity of the weather, the Lady Greely
haunch w^as held fast in the ice. After being beset
fifteen days, during, which time she drifted twenty-
two miles to the southward, she was abandoned, and tlie
Greely party started on the ice with their sledges.
Greely and tliirteeen others dragged the ice-boat Valor-
476 GENERAL A. W. GREELY
ous with six hundred pounds other weight, Lieutenant
Kislingbury and five men another sledge, and seven hun-
dred pounds, and Sergeant Jewell with three men,
another. One sledge broke down and had to be
abandoned.
They camped on a floe in a severe snow-storm. Some-
times they fancied they saw smoke rising, or heard a
dog bark, but the faint hope soon died out. They had
journeyed over four hundred miles, and the prospects
were not brightening. Darkness was coming on. The
floe on which they were camping was drifting away
from tlie shore which they were endeavoring to reach.
Between them and the distant shore the waves were so
high that no small boats could live in them.
The thoughts of the men turned towards home.
Lockwood wrote in his journal •, " I wonder what they
are doing at home. How often I think of the dear ones
there. The dangers and the uncertainties ahead of us
are not alleviated by the thought of the concern felt on
my account by those at home. Most of us, I think,
have given up the idea of getting home this fall. I
dread another winter in this country more than I do
anything else. . . .
" The outlook at present is rather gloomy. However,
if there is help at Sabine, we are all right. Indeed, if
there is help at Littleton Island, we ought not to despair
of reaching it, working as we are for our lives."
Later he writes: "God knows what the end of all
this will be. I see nothing but starvation and death.
The spirits of the party, however, are remarkably good."
Perhaps it was well that they did not then know that
there was help neither at Sabine nor Littleton Island,
but that it was being carried safely back to St. Johns
in the Yantic.
AND OTHER ARCTIC EXPLORERS. 477
Finally, Sept. 29, after five hundred miles of travel
by boat and sledge, they reached a point a few miles
below Cape Sabine, which Greely called Eskimo Point,
because in former years Eskimos had lived there.
As it was impossible to cross Smith Sound to Little-
ton Island by reason of the high tide and thick ice, it
was decided to build winter huts of stone, the roofs
covered with moss, and four inches of moss for the floor,
which they gathered under the snow.
Lockwood wrote in his journal ; " We find it very severe
work building with these rocks. We are all weak, and
the rocks are granite, very heavy, and not easily obtain-
able. . . . We have now three chances for our lives .
First, finding American cache sufficient at Sabine or at
Isabella; second, of crossing the straits when our pres-
ent rations are gone ; third, of shooting sufficient seal
and walrus near by here to last during the winter. Our
situation is certainly alarming in the extreme. ... A
miserable existence, only preferable to death."
Greely wrote in his journal : " My hands are bruised,
bleeding, and swollen, joints stiff and sore, clothing
badly torn, hand and foot gear full of holes, and my
back so lame I cannot stand erect. The work has taxed
to the utmost limit my physical powers, already worn
by mental anxiety and responsibility. All the officers
have worked with the same assiduity and constancy."
" Oct. 7. Mrs. Greely's birthday ; a sorry day for
her, and a hard day for me, to reflect on the position of
my wife and children should this expedition perish as
did Franklin's. However, I hope in faith that we shall
succeed in returning. We will at least place our records
where our work will live after us."
These were placed under a cairn on Stalknecht Island.
■^78 GENERAL A W. G RE ELY
Sergeant Rice and Eskimo Jens were sent to Sabine,
and returned with tlie letter left there by Garlington,
telling of the wreck of the Proteus, and the efforts
that would be made for the rescue of the party. Rice
found the three caches of provisions, the English, the
Beebe of 1882 from the Keptune, and tlie wreck-cache
of the Proteus. As Greely could not move these from
Sabine, he decided to cross thither by sledges and
"await the promised help," as he says.
" I am fully aware of the very dangerous situation we
are now in," writes Greely in his journal, '''and foresee
a winter of starvation, suffering, and probably death for
some. The question is, did the Yantic reach Littleton
Island ? if so, we are safe. Our fuel is so scanty that
we are in danger of perishing for want of that alone."
The Yantic, as we now know, did reach Littleton
Island, but left no provisions for the starving party.
"We now had four boats," says Greely, "and, al-
though the sun was about leaving us for the winter,
we could yet travel southward, there being open water
visible at Cape Isabella. Had I been plainly told that
we must now depend upon ourselves, that trouble and
lack of discipline prevailed among the Proteus's crew,
that the Yantic was a fair-weather ship, and that its
commander and lieutenant were acting independently
of each other, I should certainly have turned my back
to Cape Sabine and starvation, to face a possible death
on the perilous voyage along shore to the southward."
As most of the party felt sure that the Yantic must
have left provisions at Cape Isabella, Sergeant Rice and
Eskimo Jens were sent tliither ; but they returned dis-
appointed, finding only the English cache of one hundred
and forty pounds of meat.
A.XD OTHER ARCTIC EXPLORERS. 4Y9
The party constructed winter quarters at Sabine, call-
ing the place Camp Clay, after Henry Clay who went
with them in 1881, and returned on the Proteus,
The rock walls of the house were about two feet thick
and three feet high, covered with the whale-boat turned
bottom side upward. "Under that boat," says Greely's
journal, " was the only place in whicli a man could even
get on his knees and hold himself erect. Sitting on our
bags, the heads of the tall men reached the roof. . . .
The scarcity of rocks prevented our building higher
walls, and snow-blocks were at first insufficient to build
snow-huts."
The caches were now to be examined. " God only
knows," says Greely, ^' what we shall do if it (the
Englisli cache) is spoiled; this hut will be our grave;
but, until the worst comes, we shall never cease to hope
for tlie best." Garlington had reported it damaged,
though he did not visit it and make good the damaged
food.
Greely hoped against hope, that the provisions would
be eatable. " On bringing it in," he says, "the rum and
alcohol were found to have entirely leaked away or evap-
orated, the groceries spoiled, and the four hundred and
fifty pounds of bread and dog-biscuit all mouldy. Se\^-
enty-two pounds of the latter, only a mass of green
mould, was entirely unserviceable. Dr. Pavy emphati-
cally declared tliat tliese slimy biscuits were not only
valueless as food, but that their use would be absolutely
injurious to health, an opinion in which I fully concurred,
and so ordered tliem thrown away. However, as I sub-
sequently learned, the ravenous condition of some of the
party was such that, despite my positive order and ear-
nest entreaties, they were all eaten."
480 GENERAL A. W. GREELY
Braiuard writes in liis journal: "When this bread,
thoroughly rotten and covered with a green mould, was
thrown on the ground, the half-famished men sprang to
it as wild animals would. What, I wonder, Avill be our
condition when we undergo a still greater reduction in
our provisions ? "
"The canned meat brought in was good," says Greely,
" but the bacon rancid, though all of it was eaten by us
later." But for these English caches, probably no one of
the party would have been spared.
In bringing in the Neptune cache, a mile away, sev-
eral of the men had their feet frozen, Greely among the
number.
With scanty supplies, the men now settled down to
the long, dark winter's waiting. "We are now in our
hut," writes Lockwood in his journal, " but it is not yet
finished, and is cold and uncomfortable. Our constant
talk is about something to eat, and the different dishes
we have enjoyed, or hope to enjoy on getting back to
civilization. How often my thoughts turn toward home
and the dear ones there. We all suppose that Garling-
ton and party are at Littleton Island, but yet doubts
will arise as to it. We have found out some scraps of
news from slips of newspaper wrapped around the
lemons. Each man had a lemon to-night. We are all
hungry all the time."
Among some clothing cached at Sabine, a newspaper
article was found written by Henry Clay, May 13, 1883,
from which they infei-red that the Jeannette was lost.
" Rice read the paper aloud this evening," writes Lock-
wood, " and it has excited a great deal of remark. We
all think Clay's paper almost prophetic, except, of
course, our ' lying down under the quiet stars to die.'
AND OTHER ARCTIC EXPLORERS. 481
The article gives me pain in reflection of the great alarm
and sorrow felt by my dear father and mother and sisters
on my behalf. Should my ambitious hopes be disap-
pointed, and these lines only meet the eyes of those so
dear, may they not add to my many faults and failings
that of ingratitude or want of affection in not more fre-
quent allusions to them, and my thoughts concerning
them."
Oct. 26 was the last day of sunlight for one hun-
dred and ten long days. " How to pass this coming
Arctic winter," writes Greely, "is a question I cannot
answer. AVhen they read," he says, " tlie wretched
Eskimo lamp, with its faint glimmer of light, is held
close to the reader. Some already begrudge the oil for
this purpose ; but I look on it as more than well spent in
giving food for our minds, which, turned inward, these
coming months would inevitably drive ns all insane."
Storms increased ; and altliough the hunters, espe-
cially Fi-ancis Long, sought daily for game, almost none
was obtained. Lockwood writes : " This is miserable ;
we have insufficient supplies of everything. Even the
blubber will support but one poor light, and that hardly
for the winter. We must rely on the whale-boat and
the barrel-staves mostly for fuel, the alcohol being
almost exhausted. Cold, dampness, darkness, and hun-
ger are our portion every day and all day. Here in the
hut one has to grope around in the darkness to find
anything laid down."
Oct. 29 Lockwood writes, even before they had been
reduced .to winter rations: "Occupied some time this
morning in scratching like a dog in the place where the
mouldy dog-biscuits were emptied. Found a few crumbs
and small pieces, and ate mould and all. . . . Long
482 GENERAL A. W. G RE ELY
and Frederick [Christiansen tlie Eskimo] went out to
hunt to-day, but got nothing. . . . We now get about
one-fourth what we could eat at a meal, and this limited
allowance is to be much farther reduced as soon as the
sledging is done, which is about '^ov. 1.
" Oct. 31. To-morrow our reduction of rations com-
mences. Whether we can live on such a driblet of food
remains to be seen. We are now constantly hungry,
and the constant thought and talk run on food, dishes
of all kinds. ... I have a constant longing for food.
Anything to fill me up. God! what a life. A few
crumbs of hard bread taste delicious. . . . The hunting
party have a slight increase of rations during their
absence. I hope to God they have got something. How
often my thoughts wander home, and I recall my dear
father, mother, and the family generally — then comes
the family dishes of all kinds. Numb fingers, and want
of light — I can writ-e no ,more. . . . No sledging any
more, excepting Rice's trip, until spring, should we live
to see it.
" Thursday, Nov. 1. A white fox shot this morning
by Schneider. We ate the entrails as well as everything
else of tlie animal.
"■ Nov. 3. Breakfast this morning of a few mouthfuls
of hard bread and a little piece of butter about as large
as one's finger. I had some mouldy potatoes. . . .
They are spoiled and mouldy all the way through, but
anything that fills the stomach is grateful."
How one laments as he reads these pitiful words, that
the Neptune and the Yantic should have come home
laden with stores, which would have saved these fam-
ished men !
"Mngers and toes cold nearly all the time; temper-
AND OTHER ARCTIC EXPLORERS. 483
ature here in the house about freezing-poiiit all the time.
God! this miserable existence cannot be conceived of
by any one but ourselves. Constant thoughts of home
and dear ones there.
"Nov. 9. For dinner we had tea, a spoonful of Eng-
lish meat, and a handful of hard-bread. Breakfast was
chocolate, a little piece of butter, and a little bread.
One is more hungry when he gets through these meals
than before. . . . Smoke at almost every meal insuffer-
able. It is blinding, and hides everything."
Early in November it was decided to send Rice, Eli-
son, Lynn, and Frederick to Cape Isabella for the one
hundred and forty-four pounds of beef cached there by
Nares in 1875. They suffered on the way over from
cold, and on the way back Elison froze his hands and
feet. "At night their sleeping-bag," says Frederick in
his journal, " was no more nor less than a sheet of ice.
I placed one of Elison's hands between my thighs and
Rice took the other, and in this way we drew the frost
from his poor frozen limbs. The poor fellow cried all
night from pain. This was one of the worst nights I ever
spent in the Arctic."
Elison was soon helpless, and had to be carried. To
save his life tlie meat was abandoned; and after ten
hours of struggling in the snow and over the hummocky
ice, they reached their old camp at Eskimo Point.
Here, to thaw out his limbs, they cut up the Englisli
ice-boat, Avhich had been left intact for a possible jour-
ney southward. " When the poor fellow's face, feet,
and hands, commenced to thaw from the artificial heat,"
says Frederick, " his sufferings were such that it was
enough to bring the strongest to tears."
Rice finally travelled back twenty-five miles to Camp
484 GENERAL A. W. GREELY
Clay at Sabine, for assistance, and reached the place
exhausted, having eaten only a piece of frozen meat on
the way.
Lockwood, Brainard, and others at once started to
their aid. When they reached Eskimo Point, the frozen
sleeping-bag, in which Frederick, Lynn, and Elison had
lain for eighteen hours, unable to move, had to be cut
off them with a hatchet, Elison was nearly dead, and
when brought back to Camp Clay bogged piteously for
death.
Greely regards this rescue journey of Lockwood "the
most remarkable in the annals of Arctic sledgin<-r."
" This half-starved party," he says in his official report,
" made a round trip of about forty mih^s in total dark-
ness, and over rough and heavy ice, in forty-four hours,
with temperatures ranging from — 10° to — 34.5°. The
remarkable Avork done by this party appears the more
astonishing, in tliat this Avas their third winter within
the Arctic circle, that they liad been on short rations for
over two months, and had been utterly inactive for the
previous ten days. In the most willing manner, without
a murmur, these men ventured their lives on the mere
possibility of rescuing a comrade whom they expected
to find dead."
Elison now received twice as much food as any other
man, with the hope that his life might be saved. No
one complained, for it was felt that Elison had crippled
himself in trying to bring meat for the party from Cape
Isabella,
The dreadful winter wore on. Lieutenant Greely
varied the monotony as much as possible by a daily
lecture on the physical geograph}' of the United States,
its resources, etc, ; others read various books to the party,
AND OTHER ARCTIC EXPLORERS. 485
or gave personal reminiscences. Nov. 14 Lockwood
writes in his journal : " Oh ! the dear ones at home, how
I long to see them. Brainard plants a pole on a neigh-
boring rock to-day, to attract the attention of any party
from the other side." They still had hopes that Gar-
lington might be at Littleton Island, nearly opposite.
" Nov. 19. . . . Day overcast. Bread reduced now to
six ounces a day, and meat to four ounces. This is on
account of increased rations issued Elison. Ate a lot
of mouldy dog-biscuit to-day. . . . Feel ravenous, and
could eat anything now in the shape of food. Fill up
with tea leaves when any are left over.
"Nov. 21. . . . American mineral products discoursed
on by Lieutenant Greely. . . . What an experience
is this I am going through. Such an experience is
enough for one's life. How I long for the time to pass.
"Nov. 23. . . . Kemarks in the morning on the State
of Maine, by Lieutenant Greely and others. Conversa-
tion during the day about dishes of all kinds, and des-
serts, soups, etc. We never seem to weary of this
subject. , . . Chewed up the foot of a fox this evening
raw. It was altogether bone and gristle."
Nov. 29 was set aside as a day of thanksgiving and
praise, "in order," says Greely, "that we might act
in accord with those we have left behind. ... It
seemed to me then that making this a great and happy
day would so break in on our wretchedness and misery
as to give us new courage and determination. . . . To-
day we have been almost happy, and had almost enough
to eat. .... It seemed to me that the Psalms of the day
made a deeper impression than I have ever before
noted."
Tlu> next day, Nov. 30, Lockwood wrote in his journal:
486 GENERAL A. W. GREELY
" How often I picture to myself the old, familiar scenes
of home ! How I long to know that all are well, and
trust their anxiety for me is not too great. I picture to
myself where my sisters are living, and the family
scenes and conversation at the old roof-tree in the
evening.
" Dec. 3. Breakfast this morning consisted of choco-
late and one and one-half ounces butter — no bread, for
I ate all my bread last night. Many of us eat all our
bread at night, and many try to save and manipulate
their dole of food in a dozen wavs to make the mite of
food seem more filling. I liave saved from yesterday
some scraps of seal-skin ; and after Long was through, I
put the can over the remnants of the tire for a few
minutes, and the scraps became quite soft. I ate the
hair and all. The skin has little on it but the hair, the
blubber and meat being cut off as clean as possible.
" Dec. 19. We are all very weak, and I feel an apathy
and cloudiness impossible to shake off. ... I always
eat my bread regretfully. If I eat it before tea, I re-
gret that I did not keep it ; and if I wait till tea comes,
and then eat it, I drink my tea hastily and do not get
the satisfaction I otherwise would. What a miserable
life, when a few crumbs of bread weigh so on one's
mind ! "
Brainard writes in his journal : " We are all more or
less unreasonable, and I only wonder that we are not all
insane. ... If we are not mad, it should be a matter
of surprise. I wonder if we Avill survive the horrors of
this ice-prison."
Still the poor starving men kept up hope. Their
spirits improved when the sun, after its farthest distance
from them, began to return Dec. 21. "Thank God,"
AND OTllElt ARCTIC EXPLORERS. 487
exclaims Lockwood in his journal, '•' now the glorious
sun couimenced to return, and every day gets lighter
and brings him nearer. It is an augury that we shall
yet pull through all right. By a great effort I was able
to save an ounce of bread and two ounces of butter for
Christinas. I shall make a vigorous effort to abstain
from eating it before then. Put it in charge of Bierder-
bick as an additional safeguard. Brainard shot another
fox last night, a blue one. . . . This makes the twentieth
fox killed. Louisiana spoken of to-day. I added to it
by recounting my trip from Baltimore to Texas, and
then, on return, to iSlew Orleans and up to Cincinnati."
On Christmas Day, the party were in good spirits.
Brainard replaced the broken distress flag-staff facing
the Greenland coast, and predicted that Lieutenant
Garlington would visit them during the full moon in
January. Alas! that the prediction did not prove true.
The fuel had now become so scanty that ropes were
burned, which made a dense smoke, irritating to the eyes
and throat. One of Elison's feet had been taken off by
Dr. Favy, the surgeon, but he did not know it.
By Jan. 15 Lieutenant Lockwood had become so weak
that Greely, in Avhose sleeping-bag he slept also, was
obliged to help him to turn over, and support him while
he ate his scanty breakfast.
Greely offered him his ration of beef, four ounces,
which he declined, saying that Greely's need was as
great as his own. He urged Greely that when the time
came for crossing to Littleton Island, in the early spring,
when it was light and the channel frozen, that he be
left behind, and be sent for later, but to this Greely
would not for a moment consent.
Jan. 15 Lieutenant Greely writes: "In consequence
488 GENERAL A. W. GREELY
of the necessity of melting ice hereafter for all our
water, I was obliged to reduce tlie quantity of tea, so
that hereafter we have but half allowance. It comes
very hard upon many of the men. I am able to stand
it myself, and have taken some pulverized ice in a rub-
ber bag, which I have melted by the heat of my body to
furnish drinking-water for others. The party are some-
what depressed by the reduction of water."
The first death among the starving party occurred Jan,
18, that of Sergeant William H. Cross. The body was
sewed up in sacks and canvas by Braiuard and Bierder-
bick ; and after Lieutenant Greely had read the Episcopal
burial service, and tried to cheer the men in their de-
spondency, the corpse was covered by the American flag,
and six weak men dragged it on the English sledge to
the summit of a hill near b}', and buried it in a grave
fifteen inches deep. Cross would have been forty on the
day following. It was found that he had saved con-
siderable bread and butter Avith which to celebrate his
birth da}'.
On Feb. 1 Lieutenant Lockwood was so weak that
Lieutenant Greely issued to him daily an ounce each
of bread and meat, as extra food. Two days later, poor
Lockwood writes : " I am getting stronger very slowly.
The slight increase in the rations will help me rapidly.
. . . Jewell fainted to-night, just after coming in from
outside.
"Feb. 5. . . . I got up myself to-day, and managed
to get out of doors without the assistance of Frederick
[Christiansen, the Eskimo], but fell down in the alleyway-
coming back, and also fell down on getting inside here."
On Feb. 2 Rice and Jens, tlie Eskimo, started to cross
Smith Sound to Littleton Island, to bring whatever
AND OTHER ARCTIC EXPLORERS. 489
food might be there, and to see Garlington, although
Gveely had little belief that he was there. Much hope
and prayer went with the brave fellows as they started
on their journey. Brainard wrote in his journal : " A
tremulous ' God bless you ! ' a hearty grasp of the hand,
and we turned away in tears from those brave souls wlio
were daring and enduring so much for us. . . . While
watching their progress I distinctly heard the hoarse
grinding of tlie pack not far away. Of this I said noth-
ing to my companions, owing to the depressing effect
such information would have on their minds."
Four days later, to the surprise and bitter disappoint-
ment of all, .Rice and Jens returned, having found open
water as far as the eye could reach, and no frozen passage
as they had hoped. The only signs of game Avere some
old bear-tracks.
Lockwood wrote in his journal : " Of course we are
all very much disappointed ; the party takes a bold front,
and are not wanting in spirit. ... If our fate is the
worst, I do not think we shall disgrace the name of
Americans and of soldiers."
To keep up the spirits of the men, Greely announced
that it was more than probable Smith Sound would
freeze over by March 1. " In such an event," I argued, " we
could afford to deny ourselves a little, and so I had decided
to cut down our bread a couple of ounces, so we would
be able to remain here until March 6. . . .
"I certainly do not deceive all the party, but perhaps I
do some. Perhaps my plans may succeed, and this wide
strait freeze solid, but I cannot now believe it. . . .
Jewell froze his fingers to-day.
" Our poor starved bodies have not enough blood and
vital heat to resist this temperature of — 27.5°. ... I
490 GENERAL A. W. GUEELY
have been obliged to cut off, after to-day, Lieutenant
Lockwood's extra ration.
"Feb. 8, Mercury again frozen, greatly to our delight,
for a "week of this weather would cement securely the
ice of Smith Sound.
" Feb. 12. . . . Notwithstanding the mercury is frozen,
the water in the straits still remains open, probably in
consequence of spring tides. The roaring ice, a dismal,
fateful sound to us, was heard nearly all day."
The same day Lockwood writes: "Our situation is
deplorable. ... It will be pitiable if this party after
fighting short rations, cold, etc., all winter, is doomed to
die in the spring. Poor Elison, I am afraid, will never
survive. How often I think of the dear ones at home,
the Sunday evening reunions, and all the bright and
happy pictures that present themselves.''
Four days later : " I shall be glad when the end comes,
Avhenever it is to be. . . . We are all very dirty ; my
hands and face are actually black in color. All our
clothes are covered with grease and dirt. ... I do lit-
tle talking, finding it difficult to raise my voice. I find
myself pursued by ennui, aimlessness, apathy, and indif-
ference, produced by hunger, cold, gloom, dirt, and all
the miseries of this existence. ... I see no chance of
the straits being closed to the end of the month. To
my mind we must find game here, or else receive help
fi'oiu Littleton Island. It will soon be decided, thank
God.
" Feb. 18. . . . We are drawing nearer the end of
our rations. The prospect of getting more is rather dis-
mal. We are all very hopeful, however."
March 1, the day previously fixed by Lieutenant
Greely for crossing Smith Sound came, but he writes :
AND OTIIEIi ARCrW EXPLOllERS. 491
"The straits are wide open, and if we only had sufficient
strength to remove the boat from the building, we could
now attempt a passage partly by sledge, and partly by
boat."
Long and Christiansen travelled seventy miles to find
game, but returned unsuccessful. Greely sadly writes,
March 13 : " The fates seem to be against us — an opeu
channel, no game, no food, and apparently no hopes
from Littleton Island. We have been lured here to our
destruction. If we were now the strong, active men of
last autumn, we coTild cross Smith Sound where there is
much open Avater ; but we are a party of twenty-four
starved men, of whom two cannot walk and a half-dozen
cannot haul a pound. "We have done all we can to strug-
gle on, but it drives me almost insane to face the future.
It is not the end that affrights any one, but the road to
be travelled to reach that goal. To die is easy, very
easy: it is only hard to strive, to endure, to live."
They could not get the boat, covered with snow, off
the roof of the hut ; a little later, they had not the
strength to clean off the snow even \vhen it commenced
leaking through.
March 14, three ])tarmigans were killed, the first game
since early in February. "Beaks, claws, and entrails
were eaten."
One week later Greely writes : " It is surprising with
what calmness we view death, which, strongly as we
may hope, now seems inevitable. Only game can save
us. We have talked over the matter calmly and quietly,
and I have always exhorted the men to die as men, and
not as dogs."
Lockwood writes in his journal on the same day,
March 21 : " The time draws near when our group comes
492 GENERAL A. W. GREELT
to an end. We look on it with equanimity, and the
spirits of the party, witli tliis prospect of a miserable
death, is certainly wonderful. I am glad as each day
draws to an end. It puts us nearer the end of tliis life,
— whatever that end is to be. How often I think of
those at home, and of what they are doing. Oh, God !
That 1 could be with them for a few hours only. . , .
The fuel, all except the boat, is about gone — ends with
to-morrow."
Lockwood's feet were badly swollen, and his mind
wandered much of the time, yet as late as March 25,
he wrote : '•' We are all confident now of pulling through."
For the first time in five months a ray of sunlight
entered the wretched hut.
They had now given up all hope of crossing the Sound.
Long and Brainard killed several dovekies, and their
hopes were strengthened. Long was especially happy as
he had promised for months to provide Greely with a
birthday present of food on his fortieth birthday, March
27, which promise he was thus enabled to keep.
April 5 the secoyd death occurred, that of Frederick
Christiansen, to whom all were much attached. He was
buried beside Cross.
April 6 Lynn became unconscious at one p.m. and
died at seven. He asked for water just before dying, but
they had none to give. He had never recovered from
the disastrous trip to Isabella for the one hundred and
forty pounds of meat.
Near midniglit of the same day, April 6, Sergeant Rice
and Frederick started southwards towards Cape Isabella,
to bring the meat which they had been obliged to aban-
don when Elison's hands and feet were frozen. The
darkness had prevented their going much earlier, and
AND OTHER ARCTIC EXPLORERS. 493
Greely feared the results of such a journey. Rice
begged to be allowed to go on the same rations as the
rest of the men were receiving, four ounces of meat, and
four ounces of bread daily. For a few hours previous to
their departure Rice slept in the same bag with the
dead body of Lynn, so fully had they become used to
the presence of the destroyer.
Through a blinding snow-storm these two men trav-
elled, and reached the place where the meat was abaw-
doned, about three o'clock in the afternoon of April 9.
Not a trace of it was to be found. An hour later, on
their return trip, Rice became too weak to stand. He
talked of home and friends ; Frederick took off his own
outer garment and wrapped up the feet of his dying
comrade. In the driving snow, in his shirt sleeves on
the ice, he held Rice in his arms till eight o'clock, when
the noble and self-denying young lawyer and photogra-
pher of the expedition passed away. Frederick buried
his comrade in the snow and ice, and, more dead than
alive, returned to Camp Clay.
Meantime the affectionate and heroic Lockwood had
penned the last words in his journal, April 7: . . .
" Jewell is much weaker to-day." On April 8 he fell
fainting in the passage-way. For three days he had been
receiving four ounces of raw dovekies daily, but it was
of no avail. April 9 his mind wandered, and he became
unconscious at four in the morning. At four twenty in
the afternoon he died peacefully.
l>rainard writes : " This will be a sad and unexpected
blow to his family, who evidently idolized him. Bier-
derbick and myself straightened his limbs and prepared
his remains for burial. It was the saddest duty that I
have ever yet been called upon to perform."
494 GENERAL A. W. GREELY
" He was a gallant officer," writes Greely, " a brave,
true and loyal man. Christian charity, manliness, and
gentleness were the salient points of his character. He
always did his best; and that best will give him a name
in Arctic history as long as courage, perseverance, and
success shall seem worthy of man's praise and am-
bition."
Jewell, to whom four ounces of extra food were given
cUily, being fed by the hands of Greely, became un-
conscious in his arms, and died without a struggle,
April 12. He and Lockwood were buried beside the
others on Cemetery Kidge.
Greely was now so weak that his death was expected,
and Lieutenant Kislingbury was to take his place in
that event.
April 11 Brainard fell breathless in the passage-way,
calling out, " A bear, a bear ! " The animal was killed
by Long and Jens, the Eskimo. He weighed four
hundred pounds. No words could express the joy of the
starving men. The following day Long shot a seal
weighing sixty pounds.
Brainard, before this, saved the lives of the party by
gathering shrimps, which are so small that it takes
1300 to make a gill. From April 8 to 30 he brought in
no less than four hundred and fifty pounds. On May 3,
however, the last bread was gone, and but nine days'
meat remained.
Poor Jens Edward, the Eskimo, was drowned by the
overturning of his kayak, April 29, while endeavoring
to reach a seal. Their only reliable rifle was also lost in
this boat.
It was hourly expected that Greely would pass away.
Brainard writes : " This life is growing almost un-
A.VD OTHER ARCTIC EXPLORERS. 495
bearable — it is horrible! I am afraid that we will yet
all go mad. In my ease the thoughts of home, a bright
future, the many enjoyments of life, and a feeling of
responsibility for the poor fellows, who, to a certain
extent, look to me to provide them with food, do more
to inspire me to work and to fight the end than anything
else."
Thursday, IMay 1, Brainard says: "Lieutenant Kis-
lingbury's mind is almost completely gone. Poor fel-
low ! it is only a few days ago that he spoke so hopefully
of the future, and the happiness he anticipated in meet-
ing his young son on his return. Yesterday I saw him
lying on the small sledge outside, weeping like a child ;
turning to me he said with a half-smothered groan, 'It
is hopeless ; I cannot fight this starvation longer : I am
doomed to die here ! ' "
May 20 Private Ellis was buried ; the first death
from starvation in six weeks. The men were so ■weak
that they could scarcely drag the body to Cemetery
Ridge.
Ralston died three days later, at one a.m. Greely
remained in the sleeping-bag, with the body, till about
five A.M., "chilled through by contact with the dead."
As the hut had become unfit to live in from the melt-
ing snow, which wet the inmates constantly, the party
moved to a tout some three hundred yards away.
Whisler died at noon. May 24.
Sergeant Israel, the bright young astronomer from
Ann Arbor University, fed for several days by Greely,
died May 27t He was beloved by all.
Seal-skiu thongs, which had been used in lashing
together the sledge, now began to be used for stews. "It
is astonishing to me," says Greely in his journal, "how
the party holds out."
496 GENERAL A. W. G RE ELY
The last day of May brought a heavy snow-storm
which lasted twenty-four liours. " If," writes Brainard,
" possessing the gift of divining the future, I should dis-
cover that I had yet another month of this terrible ex-
istence before me, I would at once end everything. . , .
In my daily journeyings across Cemetery Eidge, it was
but natural at first that my reflections should be sad and
gloomy. . . . The brass buttons on Lieutenant Lock-
wood's blouse, scoured bright by the flying gravel, pro-
truded through the scanty covering of earth which our
depleted strength barely enabled us to place over him. . . .
Later on our Avretched condition served to counteract
these feelings ; and I can now pass and repass the place
without emotion, and almost Avith indifference."
Lieutenant Kislingbury died Sunday, June 1, 1884, at
three p.m. His last act was to sing the Doxology, in a
weak, but clear voice : "Praise God from whom all bless-
ings flow." '
Corporal Salor died June 3, at three a.m. " We had
not strength enough to bury Salor, so he was put out of
sight in the ice-foot," notes Greely in his journal.
June 5 Greely crawled up the rocks, and gathered a
pint of tripe de roche.
June 6 Private Henry was shot at two p.m. by order
of Greely, for stealing provisions, which meant death
to all if persisted in. Bender died at five forty-five p.m.,
and Dr. Pavy at six. The rest now lived on their seal-
skin gloves, boots, sleeping-bags, and lichens. The last
of the seal-skin was divided June 18.
Gardiner died June 12, about five p.m. The doctor
predicted that he would die in April, but his intense
desire to see his wife and mother seemed to keep him
alive. To the last (his skeleton fingers clutching the
AND OTHER ARCTIC EXPLORERJ. 497
picture even after death) he held in his hrnds an anibro-
type of his wife and mother, looking at ib continually,
and speaking to it. His last words were, "Mother!
Wife ! " " He was more religious," says Greely, '■ than
perhaps any other one in the party : although allowed
only eight pounds of baggage on the retreat, he denied
himself to bring with him his Bible, our only one, though
I had a prayer-book."
Schneider begged for opium pills with which to end
his sufferings on June 16, but nobody would give them
to him. He died at six p.m., June 18. He was not
buried.
June 20 Greely's diary reads : " Six years ago to-day
I was married, and three years ago I left my wife for
this expedition. What a contrast ! When will this life
in death end ? "
His journal ends the next day, June 21 : " Connell's
legs paralyzed from knee down. Bierderbick suffering
terribly from rheumaijism. Buchanan Strait open this
jioon a long way up the coast."
Brainard entered the last words in his journal on
Thursday, June 21 : " Since day before yesterday Eli-
son has transferred his food to his mouth by a spoon
which is tied to the stump of his frozen arm."
June 22, Sunday, all were exhausted. Greely tried to
read a little from the prayer-book, but the high wind
and lack of food made it too exhausting. Connell was
scarcely conscious, and all had resigned themselves to
despair. A storm had been raging, and the tent was
nearly blown down, pinning some of the men under it.
The end was now only a question of a few hours at
most.
Meantime another expedition had been fitted out by
498 GENERAL A. W. G RE ELY
the United States for the rescue of Greely. Three
vessels were sent, the Thetis, Bear, and Alert, — the last
the flag-ship of Nares, the generous gift of the English
government tendered by the Queen to America, — under
Commander Winfield J. Schley, a brave and exjierienced
naval officer. The ships were provisioned for one hun-
dred and fifteen men for two years.
Late in April of 1884 the vessels steamed out of New
York harbor, watched by anxious and sympathetic
hearts. Both the Thetis and Bear were Dundee whalers,
built for forcing the ice, which they did through Melville
Bay, sometimes by a single blow splitting a pan of ice
two hundred yards across. The Alert was said to be the
strongest modern ship afloat.
When Littleton Island was reached and searched, it
was evident that Greely had not been there. It was
decided to run over to Cape Sabine, to see if any traces
of the party could be found. They sailed away Sunday,
June 22, at three p.m., the very day on Avhich the Greely
party seemed to have lost all hope. The ships were made
fast to the ice just off Brevoort Island, two miles south
of Sabine, and parties were sent in various directions.
Soon cheers were heard, for some of the men had found
the Greely records on Stalknecht Island. These papers
liad been left Oct. 21, eight months before, and the
party then had rations for forty days. It seemed cer-
tain that all had long ere this perished.
With all possible haste the cutter started for Camp
Clay. On the top of a ridge they saw the figure of a
man. Greely had heard the whistle of the Thetis at mid-
night ; and Brainard and Long had crawled out of the
tent to see if any vessel was in siglit, but they returned
disappointed. Long went out a second time to set up
AND OTHER ARCTIC EXPLORERS. 499
the distress fl;ig which had blown down. The cox-
swain in the cutter waved a flag. The man on the
ridge had seen it, for he waved one in return. Then lie
came slowly down the ridge, falling twice as he came.
Lieutenant Colwell called out, " Who all are there
left ? "
" Seven left."
"Where are they? "
'•'In the tent, over the hill — the tent is down."
" Is Mr. Greely alive ? "
*• Yes, Greely 's alive."
" Any other officers ? "
'• No."
" Who are you ? "
" Long."
'•' He was a ghastly siglit," says Commander Schley, in
l>is '• Rescue of Greely." " His cheeks were hollow, his
eyes wild, his hair and beard long and matted. His
army blouse, covering several thicknesses of shirts and
jackets, was ragged and dirty. [They had not changed
their clothing nor bathed for over eleven months.] He
wore a little fur cap and rough moccasins of untanned
leather tied around the leg. As he spoke, his utterance
was thick and mumbling."
Meanwhile one of the relief party, crying like a child,
was trying to roll away the stones which held down the
flapping tent cloth. Colwell cut a slit in the tent and
looked in.
" It was a sight of horror," says Schley. " On one
side, close to the opening, with his head towards the out-
side, lay what was apparently a dead man. His jaw had
dropped, his eyes were open, but fixed and glassy, his
limbs Avere motionless. On the opposite side was a poor
500 GENERAL A. W. G RE ELY
fellow, alive to be sure, but without liauds or feet, and
with a spoon tied to the stump of his right arm. Two
others, seated on the ground, in tlie middle, had just got
down a rubber bottle that hung on the tent-pole, and
■ were pouring from it into a tin can. Directly opposite,
on his hands and knees, was a dark man with a long
matted beard, in a dirty and tattered dressing-gown, with
a little red skull cap on his head, and brilliant, staring
eyes. As Col well appeared, he raised himself a little, and
put on a pair of eye-glasses."
" Who are you ? " asked Colwell.
The man made no answer, staring at him vacantly.
" Who are you ? " again.
One of the men spoke up : " That's the Major — Major
Greely."
Colwell crawled in and took him by the hand, saying,
" Greely, is this you ? "
"Yes," said Greely in a faint, broken voice, hesitat-
ing and shuffling with his words; "Yes, — seven of us
left — here we are — dying — like men. Did what I
came to do — beat the best record." Then he fell back
exhausted.
Conuell had almost ceased to breathe. He was speech-
less, and his heart was barely beating. His body was
cold, and all sensation was gone. When they tried to
revive him, he managed to speak, "Let me die in
peace." Elison, with his hands and feet frozen off, had
lain helpless in his sleeping-bag for seven months, kept
alive by the kindness of his fellows, who gladly allowed
him to have increased rations in his pitiable condition.
"The faces of two of the men were so swollen," says
Chief Engineer George W. Melville, " that they could
scarcely see." He cleansed the eyes of one in warm water,
AND OTHER ARCTIC EXPLORERS. 501
and bade hiin look over towards the mast-heads across the
rocks. Coniiriander Schley said, " My man, don't you see
the ships' masts ? Don't you see the flags ? "
" Please lift me up a little," he urged huskily, '•' that
I may see." Then catching sight of the colors, he cried,
" Hooray ! There is the old flag again." Tears of joy
ran down his cheeks, as he was sujiported in his sleep-
ing-bag.
Greely Avas near to death. He could not stand, and
for some time had not left his sleeping-bag. No food
had passed the lips of any of them for forty-two hours,
save a little water and a few square inches of soaked
seal-skin.
Colwell gave Greely and Elison a little of the biscuit
which he had brought in his pocket. Then a can of
pemraican was opened, and a little scraped off with a knife
was fed to them slowly by turns. They could not stand,
but had dropped on their knees, and begged piteously
for more. A fire was made of charred wood lying about,
the remnants of the boat which covered the hut, and beef
extract warmed, and given them every ten minutes.
The survivors could scarcely realize that they were
saved. Their minds were enfeebled like their bodies.
" This seems so wonderful," said Greely ; and when
told that pictures of his wife and children were on
board the Thetis, he added, " It is so kind and thought-
ful." The men were carried on board the boats on
stretchers, as they were unable to walk, and then rowed
out a hundred yards or so to the ships. Greely fainted
after being taken on board, but was revived by spirits of
ammonia. His" clothes were carefully cut off, and heavy
flannels, which bad been warmed, were put upon him.
The bodies of the ten dead on the hill wore dug up,
502 GENERAL A. W. GBEELY
wrapped in blankets, and carried tenderly on board the
ships for a burial at their homes. The unburied bodies
of Schneider and Henry were also brought ; but the five
buried in the ice-foot, as well as the body of Jens, who
Avas drowned in his kayak, could not of course be recov-
ered, as they were swept away by the currents. Within
the tent near each sleeping-bag were found little pack-
ages done i;p and addressed to friends at home. The
survivors had also made a like preparation, knowing
that their turn would soon come. The packages were
all carefully preserved.
At four o'clock, June 23, the vessels started homeward
with their precious freight. Elison died on the journe}^,
at Godhavn, July 8, at three thirty a.m. The body
of Frederick Christiansen of Upernavik was buried at
Godhavn at the request of the Inspector of Kortli
Greenland.
The ships reached St. Johns July 17. when telegrams
were sent immediately to Hon. W. E. Chandler, Secre-
tary of the Navy, by Commander Schley, and to Mrs.
Greely by her husband. Throngs of people gathered on
the streets to welcome the heroic explorers, and all shared
in the feelings of Secretary Chandler, who telegraphed
Commander Schley : " The hearts of the American
people go out with great affection to Lieutenant Greely
and the few survivors of his deadly peril. Care for
them unremittingly, and bid them be cheerful and hope-
ful on account of what life has in store for them."
The six survivors, Greely, Brainard, Long, Bierder-
bick, Council, Frederick — Elison had died on the passage
home — soon gained strength and a return to health.
Lieirtenant Greely gained fifty pounds in six weeks.
The relief ships received an ovation at Portsmouth
AND OTHER ARCTIC EXPLORERS. 503
Harbor, N.H. and then sailed for New York, where the
bodies were formally delivered to G(Mieral Hancock,
representing the War Department. Two were taken to
the Cypress Hills National Cemetery, Henry and Schnei-
der. The former was buried there, and the latter sent
to friends in Germany.
The remains of Lockwood were forwarded to Annapo-
lis, and placed under a military guard in the church of
St. Anne, where he had been baptized and confirmed.
He was buried in the cemetery of the Naval Academy.
A tablet was erected to his memory in the handsome
army chapel at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, chiefly at the
expense of his old regiment. To one of the officers,
General Lockwood presented a sword which had belonged
to his son.
Truly said his pastor in Georgetown, "Most fittingly
did his brother explorers give his name to this spot, the
farthest land north trod by human foot. Lockwood
Island shall stand as long as the earth endures, amid the
ample wastes and silence of these mysterious regions,
as the monument of this brave young soldier." He died
as he had lived, honored for his gentleness, his .affection-
ate yet courageous heart, his unselfishness, and his
nobility of soul.
Not less did Greely commend the heroic Brainard
for his " manhood, courage, and self-sacrifice, displayed
on the Polar Sea and at Sabine." His name will forever
be associated with Lockwood in planting the flag, as yet,
farthest iu)rth, and in liis heroic devotion to the Greely
party, which must have perished save for him and Fran-
cis Long.
The valuable scientific rei)orts, magnetic, meteorologic,
botanic, and those in natural history, of this Arctic
504 GENERAL A. W. GUEELY
expedition, have been transmitted by Lieutenant Greely
to the government, and published. They were brought
on the long and perilous journey from Conger to Sabine,
and are a lasting monument to the ability and industry
of the Greely party and its heroic leader.
Concerning this dreadful life in the Arctic regions.
Lieutenant Greely said at a reception in New York :
** I promised only that I would get to Sabine, and at
Sabine I was found. In regard to the life that we spent
on that barren rock — a life which was eked out, God
only knows how — forty days' provisions being made to
last for nine or ten months, with what scanty subsist-
ence we could draw from the surrounding rocks, it was
a hell upon earth during all the five months of utter
darkness.
'' The hut was so dark that for a week at a time,
although I lay in a bag with two men, so closely packed
that when one man turned over the others had to turn
also, I was not able to see the face of the man to the
right or the left. The only light we had was a wretched
rag dipped in tallow oil. The walls were so low that
when I sat in my sleeping-bag my head touched the
roof. The bags froze to the ground. They were that
way for five months. If vacated for ten minutes, they
froze stiff inside. For ten months we never knew what
it was to have our appetites satisfied. Yet all that time,
with few exceptions, the men displayed such remarkable
loyalty, such cheerfulness, and such a law-abiding spirit,
that I think better of mankind for having lived with
those men through that trouble.
" For two or three months at a time we never knew
what it was to have a drink of water, except such as we
could get by putting snow and ice in a rubber bag and
AND OTHER ARCTIC EXPLORERS. 505
thawing it with the heat of our bodies. In that way we
could get eight or ten spoonfuls at a time."
The whole country rejoiced in the rescue of Greely
and the five others who were saved. The President sent
grateful words of thanks for himself and the nation ; and
Queen Victoria, who had given the ship Alert, also sent
messages of sympathy and inquiry.
The Koyal Geographical Society of London unani-
mously awarded to Greely their highest honor, the
Founders' Gold Medal for 1886, " for having so consid-
erably added to our knowledge of the shores of the
Polar Sea and the interior of Grinnell Land ; the first,
through the exploration of the late Lieutenant Lockwood
along the northern coast of Greenland, as far as 83° 23' 8"
N.W., being the nearest to the Pole ever attained, and
the second, by his own explorations into the interior of
Grinnell Land, together with the journey across it to
the Western Sea, by Lieutenant Lockwood ; also for his
admirable narrative of the expedition which he has just
given to the world."
This medal, publicly received by the American minis-
ter, Mr. Phelps, was officially transmitted to Greely
through the State and "War Departments.
The same year, 1886, Greely was awarded the Ro-
quette Medal of Gold by the Geographical Society of
Paris, forwarded through our minister to France.
His native state, Massachusetts, also tendered him
through her Senate and House of Representatives.
" With just pride in his career and achievements," her
thanks, " as a tribute to his patriotism, courage, and loy-
alty as shown in his service as a volunteer soldier; to
his ability and zeal as a regular officer of the United
States army, in dealing practically as well as theoreti-
506 GENERAL A. W. GBEELY
cally, both here and in the High North, with the varied
scientific questions arising in connection witli the sig-
nal service ; to his prudence, patience, and enterprise as
an explorer in solving geographical problems involving
the progress of mankind in science and civilization, and
in thus advancing the name of America to the foremost
rank in scientific Arctic research ; and finally to his
capacity and intrepidity as a commander in maintaining
the courage, discipline, and unity of his command under
most untoward, prolonged, and desperate circumstances."
Lieutenant Greely was promoted to be captain in
the 5th U. S. Cavalry, June 11, 1886 ; and in December
of the same year, during the illness of General W. B.
Hazen, the duties of acting chief signal officer devolved
upon him by law as the senior assistant. He was form-
ally promoted to be brigadier-general, and chief signal
officer of the army, March 3, 1887.
General Greely has several times visited Europe,
where he has received distinguished courtesies. He is an
honorary member of several geographical and scientific
societies, and has just been (1893) elected one of the
faculty of the Columbian University in charge of the
Department of Geography.
General Greely has written extensively on scientific
subjects, the Isothermal Lines of the U. S. Geography of
the Air, Eainfall of the Pacific Slope and Western States
and Territories, American weather, with chapters on
Hot and Cold Waves, Blizzards, Hailstorms, etc., besides
various articles in the Century, Sci-ibner's, North Ameri-
can Review, Forum, Science, and other magazines.
General Greely is yet in middle life, under fifty,
doing valuable work for the country, and enjoying the
development in character of his four girls and two boys.
AND OTHER ARCTIC EXPLORERS. 507
Whatever experiences are before him, he can never for-
get the dreadful months at Cape Sabine. His unselfish
and brave record is befoi-e the world.
Since General Greely's explorations, Dr. Nausen of
Norway made the first crossing of Greenland from east
to west. He was then a young man only twenty-seven,
a graduate of the University of Christiania, and curator
of the museum at Bergen. He started in May, 1888, in
a sailing-vessel, arriving at Reykiavik, the capital of
Iceland. Here they took passage in a little steamer,
landing on the shore ice of Greenland July 17. They
were taken out to sea on an ice-floe, but finally returned
and crossed Greenland, reaching Godthaab Oct. 3. For
three or four weeks they were more than nine thousand
feet above the level of the sea.
*' Our day's marches were," says Dr. Nausen, " as a
rule, short, and varied between five and ten miles.
The reason of this was the persistently heavy going.
Had we come earlier in the season, say about midsum-
mer time, we should have found an excellent hard and
slippery surface, such as that we had during the first
day or two of our ascent. On such a surface both ski
and sledges would have run well, and the crossing could
not have taken us long. Now, however, the old, hard-
frozen layer was covered with a loose coat of freshly-
fallen snow, which was as fine and dry as dust, or else
packed by the wind in drifts, on the cloth-like surface
of which both ski and sledge runners are very hard to
move."
When they came within sight of the western shore of
Greenland, he says : " We were just like children, as we
sat and gazed and followed the lines of the valleys
downward in a vain search for a glimpse of the sea. It
508 GENERAL A. W. GREELY
was a fine country that lay before us, wild and grand as
the western coast of Norway. Fresh snow lay sprinkled
about the mountain tops, between which were deep,
black gorges. At the bottom of these were the fiords,
which we could fancy but could not see.
" Words cannot describe what it is for us to have the
earth and stones again beneath our feet, or the thrill
that went through us as we felt the elastic heather on
which we trod, and smelled the fragrant scent of grass
and moss. Behind us lay the ' inland ice,' its cold, gray
slope sinking slowly toward the lake ; before us lay the
genial land. Away down the valley we could see head-
land beyond headland, covering and overlapping each
other as far as the eye could reach."
The last noted exploring expedition to the Arctic
regions was that under Civil Engineer Robert E. Peary,
IT. S. N., m 1891. On June 6, 1891, the ship Kite, under
Captain Richard Pike, who had taken the Greely party
in the Proteus in 1881 and the Garlington relief
party in 1883, sailed for Greenland. On July 24 she
reached McCorniick Bay, where Peary established
his winter-quarters, calling his little house Red Cliffe
House, over which his young wife, Mrs. Josephine
Diebitsch-Peary, presided, sharing with him its peril and
its loneliness. Lieutenant Peary and his single compan-
ion, Edward Astrup, in this exploring trip of thirteen
hundred miles, found Greenland to be an island, whose
general northern contours lie south of the eighty-third
parallel. Besides the settlement of this mooted question
about Greenland, says Prof. Angelo Heilprin, m Scrib-
ner's for Jan. 1893, the Peary expedition " has for-
ever removed that tract from a consideration of compli-
city in the main workings of the Great Ice Age. The
AND OTHER ARCTIC EXPLORERS. 509
inland ice-cap, which by many has been looked upon as
the lingering ice of the Glacial Period, stretching far
into the realm of the Pole itself, has been found to ter-
minate throughout its entire extent at approximately the
eighty-second parallel ; beyond this line follows a region
of post glaciation — uncovered to-day, and supporting an
abundance of plant and animal life, not different from
that of the more favored regions southward." They
reached within one hundred miles of the farthest north
})oint attained by Loekwood and Brainard, and went two
hundred miles on the north-eastern coast farther than
any other human being ever attained. Most of the
journey was on ice eight thousand feet above the level
of the sea.
The only unfortunate thing in connection Avith this
expedition was the disappearance of the meteorologist
and mineralogist of the North Greenland party, Mr.
John T. Verhoeff. He was last seen on the morning of
Aug. 11, 1892, when he stated his intention of visiting
the Eskimo settlement of Kukan, across McCormick
Bay. Not returning, a large party searched for him for
seven days and nights. His footprints and some bits
of paper were discovered near a rifted glacier now called
the Verhoeff glacier, and it is probable that he was lost
in some crevasse. Some of his friends still hope that
he is alive.
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