r
the letter he carried to the Khan of Cathay. The northeast trade
winds bore them steadily westward, raising in the minds of the
already fear-stricken sailors the certainty that against these
head winds they could never beat back. At last they entered the
vast expanse of the Sargasso Sea, six times as large as France,
where they lay for a week almost becalmed, amid tangled masses of
floating seaweeds. To add to their perplexities, they had passed
the line of no variation, and the needle now swung to the left of the
pole-star instead of the right. On the last day of the outward voyage
they were 2300 miles to the westward according to the information
Columbus shared with his officers and men; according to his secret
log they were 2700 miles from the Canaries, and well beyond the
paint where he had expected to strike the islands of the Asiatic
coast. The mutinous and panic-stricken spirit of his subordinates,
the uncertainty of Columbus himself, turned to rejoicing when at
2:00 A.M. of Friday, October 12, a sailor on the _Pinta_ sighted
the little island of the Bahamas, which, since the time of the
Vikings, was the first land sighted by white men in the new world.

[Illustration: FLAGSHIP OF COLUMBUS]

The three vessels cruised southward, in the belief, expressed by
the name Indian which they gave the natives, that they were in
the archipelago east of Asia. Skirting the northern coast of Cuba
and Hayti, they sought for traces of gold, and information as to
the way to the mainland. The _Santa Maria_ was wrecked on Christmas
Day; the _Pinta_ became separated; Columbus returned in the
little _Nina_, putting in first at the Tagus, and reaching Palos
on March 15, 1493.

Though his voyage gave no immediate prospect of immense profits,
yet it was the general belief that he had reached Asia, and by a
route three times as short as that by the Cape of Good Hope. The
Spanish court celebrated his return with rejoicing. Appealing to
the Pope, at this time the Spaniard Rodrigo Bargia, King Ferdinand
lost no time in securing holy sanction for his gains. A Papal bull
of May 3, 1493, conferred upon Spain title to all lands discovered
or yet to be discovered in the western ocean. Another on the day
following divided the claims of Spain and Portugal by a line running
north and south "100 leagues west of the Azores and the Cape Verde
Islands" (an obscure statement in view of the fact that the Cape
Verdes lie considerably to the westward