he endless waves, while the wind drove them steadily
into the unknown west.

The sailors never expected to see their wives and children again. They
were frightened when they started, and every day they grew more scared.
They looked with staring eyes for the bleak fogs or the frightful
monsters of which they had been told. At one place they came upon great
tracts of seaweed, and thought they were in shallow water and would be
wrecked on banks of mud. Then the compass, to which they trusted,
ceased to point due north and they were more frightened than ever. Soon
there was hardly a stout heart in the fleet except that of Columbus.

The time came when the sailors grew half mad with fear. Some of them
made a plot to throw Columbus overboard and sail home again. They would
tell the people there that he had fallen into the sea and been drowned.

It was a terrible thing to do, was it not? But desperate men will do
dreadful things. They thought one man had better die than all of them.
Only good fortune saved the life of the great navigator.

One day a glad sailor called his comrades and pointed over the side. A
branch of a green bush was floating by with fresh berries on it. It
looked as if it had just been broken off a bush. Another day one of them
picked from the water a stick which had been carved with a knife. Land
birds were seen flying over the ships. Hope came back to their hearts.
They were sure now that land must be near.

October 11th came. When night fell dozens of men were on the lookout.
Each wanted to be the first to see land. About 10 o'clock that night,
Columbus, who was looking out over the waves, saw a light far off. It
moved up and down like a lantern carried in a man's hand.

Hope now grew strong. Every eye looked out into the darkness. About two
o'clock in the morning came the glad cry of "Land! Land!" A gun was
fired from the leading vessel. One of its sailors had seen what looked
like land in the moonlight. You may be sure no one slept any more that
night.

When daylight came the joyful sailors saw before them a low, green
shore, on which the sunlight lay in beauty; men and women stood on it,
looking in wonder at the ships, which they thought must be great
white-winged birds. They had never seen such things before. We can
hardly think what we would have done if we had been in their place.

When the boats from the ships came to the shore, and Columbus landed,
clad in shining armor, and bearing the g