lor was about half
pirate. Every boy who lived near the seashore and saw the ships and the
sailors, felt as though he would like to sail away to far-off lands and
see all the strange sights and do all the brave things that the sailors
told about. Many of them even said they would like to be pirates and
fight with other sailors, and show how strong and brave and plucky they
could be.

Columbus was one of these. He was what is called an adventurous boy. He
did not like to stay quietly at home with his father and comb out the
tangled wool. He thought it would be much nicer to sail away to sea and
be a brave captain or a rich merchant.

When he was about fourteen years old he really did go to sea. There was
a captain of a sailing vessel that sometimes came to Genoa who had the
same last name--Columbus. He was no relation, but the little Christopher
somehow got acquainted with him among the wharves of Genoa. Perhaps he
had run on errands for him, or helped him with some of the sea-charts he
knew so well how to draw. At any rate he sailed away with this Captain
Columbus as his cabin boy, and went to the wars with him and had quite
an exciting life for a boy.

Sailors are very fond of telling big stories about their own adventures
or about far-off lands and countries. Columbus, listened to many of
these sea-stories, and heard many wonderful things about a very rich
land away to the East that folks called Cathay.

If you look in your geographies you will not find any such place on the
map as Cathay, but you will find China, and that was what men in the
time of Columbus called Cathay. They told very big stories about this
far-off Eastern land. They said its kings lived in golden houses, that
they were covered with pearls and diamonds, and that everybody there was
so rich that money was as plentiful as the stones in the street.

This, of course, made the sailors and storekeepers, who were part
pirate, very anxious to go to Cathay and get some of the gold and jewels
and spices and splendor for themselves. But Cathay was miles and miles
away from Italy and Spain and France and England. It was away across the
deserts and mountains and seas and rivers, and they had to give it up
because they could not sail there.

At last a man whose name was Marco Polo, and who was a very brave and
famous traveler, really did go there, in spite of all the trouble it
took. And when he got back his stories were so very surprising that men
were