Geographie_, Paris, 1872, 6e serie, tom. iv. pp.
5-59.]

[Footnote 407: Washington Irving's _Life of Columbus_, says
Harrisse, "is a history written with judgment and impartiality,
which leaves far behind it all descriptions of the discovery of
the New World published before or since." _Christophe Colomb_,
tom. i. p. 136. Irving was the first to make use of the superb
work of Navarrete, _Coleccion de los viages y descubrimientos
que hicieron por mar los Espanoles desde fines del siglo XV._,
Madrid, 1825-37, 5 vols. 4to. Next followed Alexander von
Humboldt, with his _Examen critique de l'histoire de la
geographie de Nouveau Continent_, Paris, 1836-39, 5 vols. 8vo.
This monument of gigantic erudition (which, unfortunately, was
never completed) will always remain indispensable to the
historian.]

* * * * *

[Sidenote: Date of the birth of Columbus: archives of Savona.]

[Sidenote: Statement of Bernaldez.]

[Sidenote: Columbus's letter of September, 1501.]

[Sidenote: The balance of probability is in favour of 1436.]

The date of the birth of Columbus is easy to determine approximately,
but hard to determine with precision. In the voluminous discussion upon
this subject the extreme limits assigned have been 1430 and 1456, but
neither of these extremes is admissible, and our choice really lies
somewhere between 1436 and 1446. Among the town archives of Savona is a
deed of sale executed August 7, 1473, by the father of Christopher
Columbus, and ratified by Christopher and his next brother
Giovanni.[408] Both brothers must then have attained their majority,
which in the republic of Genoa was fixed at the age of twenty-five.
Christopher, therefore, can hardly have been less than seven and twenty,
so that the latest probable date for his birth is 1446, and this is the
date accepted by Munoz, Major, Harrisse, and Avezac. There is no
documentary proof, however, to prevent our taking an earlier date; and
the curate of Los Palacios--strong authority on such a point--says
expressly that at the time of his death, in 1506, Columbus was "in a
good old age, seventy years a little more or less."[409] Upon this
statement Navarrete and Humboldt have accepted 1436 as the probable date
of birth.[410] The most plausible objection to this is a statement made
by Columbus himself in