as a
seafaring man would naturally have been in Palos. It lies right in the
middle of the coast, which has always been open to attack from Africa
and has been the starting point for attack on Africa. It is in the way
of trade for the same reason that it is in the way of war. What are now
fishing villages were brisk little trading towns in the fifteenth and
sixteenth centuries. Palos did not only send out Columbus. It received
Cortez when he came back from the conquest of Mexico. Palos does very
well to remember its glories. And Spain does equally well to remember
that she sent out Columbus. In spite of the platitudes talked by
painfully thoughtful persons as to the ruinous consequences of the
discovery to herself, it was, take it altogether, the greatest thing she
has done in the world. She owes to it her unparalleled position in the
sixteenth century, and the opportunity to become "a mother of nations."
The rest of the world has to thank her for the few magnificent and
picturesque passages which enliven the commonly rather colorless, not to
say Philistine, history of America.

A REMINISCENCE OF COLUMBUS.

RANDALL N. SAUNDERS, Claverack, N. Y., in the _School Journal_.

* * * What boy has not felt a thrill of pride, for the sex, at the
dogged persistence with which Columbus clung to his purpose and to
Isabella after Ferdinand had flung to him but stony replies.

* * * * *

Methinks I am starting from Palos. I see the pale, earnest face set in
its steadfast resolution from prophetic knowledge. I see the stern lines
of care, deeper from the contrast of the hair, a silver mantle refined
by the worry; the "midnight oil" that burned in the fiery furnace of his
ambition. I see the flush of pleasure at setting out to battle with the
perilous sea toward the consummation of life's grand desire. I feel the
waverings between hope and despair as the journey lengthens, with but
faint promise of reward, and with those around who would push us into
the overwhelming waves of defeat and remorse. Amid all discouragements,
amid the darkest gloom, I am inspired by his words, "Sail on, sail on";
and sailing on with the grand old Genoese, I yet hope to know and feel
his glorious success, and with him to return thanks on the golden strand
of the San Salvador of life's success.

THE DENSE IGNORANCE OF THOSE DAYS.

The Reverend MINOT JUDSON SAVAGE, an American clergyman. Born at
Norridg