ew him
intimately in his later years, says "he was a man of very lofty genius,
and of marvellously honored memory."

[Illustration: Columbus ridiculed at the Council of Salamanca.]

With these personal characteristics, Columbus united a restless spirit,
a firm will, and a singularly enthusiastic temperament. The latter
faculty gave him a consuming zeal for his undertakings, which was as
rare as it proved ultimately successful in compassing his great
discovery. He was discouraged by no rebuffs, would take no denials. His
motto seemed to be never to despair, and never to let go. His spiritual
nature was as remarkable as his intellectual. Here, his imagination was
the predominant faculty. He firmly believed himself divinely
commissioned to find out the Indies, and to bring their inhabitants into
the fold of the true faith. He had early vowed to devote the profits of
his enterprise, if successful, to rescue the tomb of Christ from the
infidels. Himself a devout son of the Church, he fervently believed that
he had miraculous aid on many perilous occasions of his life. Humble
before God, he was sufficiently proud and independent before men. He
insisted upon conditions with the haughty sovereigns of Spain which they
deemed exacting, but the high views and tenacity of Columbus carried the
day, and his own terms were granted at last. He never forgot, in all his
subsequent trials and humiliations, that he was a Spanish admiral, and
Viceroy of the Indies.

Such was the character of Columbus. Let us now look at his environment,
which in all men contributes so much to make or modify character. Born
in Genoa, the headquarters in that day of navigation, Columbus early
imbibed a passion for maritime affairs. His youthful days and nights
were given to the study of astronomy and of navigation. He was a trained
sailor and map-maker from his boyhood. He brooded over the problems
involved in the spherical form of the earth. He caught up all the hints
and allusions in classical and mediaeval writers that came in his way, of
other lands than those already known. The Atlantis of Plato, and the
clear prediction in Seneca of another world in the west, fired his
imagination. He himself tells us that he voyaged to the Ultima Thule of
his day, which was Iceland, besides various expeditions in the Atlantic
and Mediterranean.

The early fancies of isles in the western sea loomed up before his eyes,
and repeated themselves in his dreams. These vis