ich it was
his misfortune to command, with whom all law was tyranny and all order
oppression.

He was naturally irascible and impetuous, and keenly sensible to injury
and injustice; yet the quickness of his temper was counteracted by the
generosity and benevolence of his heart. The magnanimity of his nature
shone forth through all the troubles of his stormy career. Though
continually outraged in his dignity, braved in his authority, foiled in
his plans, and endangered in his person by the seditions of turbulent and
worthless men, and that, too, at times when suffering under anguish of
body and anxiety of mind enough to exasperate the most patient, yet he
restrained his valiant and indignant spirit, and brought himself to
forbear, and reason, and even to supplicate. Nor can the reader of the
story of his eventful life fail to notice how free he was from all feeling
of revenge, how ready to forgive and forget on the least sign of
repentance and atonement. He has been exalted for his skill in controlling
others, but far greater praise is due to him for the firmness he displayed
in governing himself.

His piety was genuine and fervent. Religion mingled with the whole course
of his thoughts and actions, and shone forth in his most private and
unstudied writings. Whenever he made any great discovery he devoutly
returned thanks to God. The voice of prayer and the melody of praise rose
from his ships on discovering the new world, and his first action on
landing was to prostrate himself upon the earth and offer up thanksgiving.
All his great enterprises were undertaken in the name of the Holy Trinity,
and he partook of the holy sacrament previous to embarkation. He observed
the festivals of the church in the wildest situations. The Sabbath was to
him a day of sacred rest, on which he would never sail from a port unless
in case of extreme necessity. The religion thus deeply seated in his soul
diffused a sober dignity and a benign composure over his whole deportment;
his very language was pure and guarded, and free from all gross or
irreverent expressions.

A peculiar trait in his rich and varied character remains to be noticed;
namely, that ardent and enthusiastic imagination which threw a
magnificence over his whole course of thought. A poetical temperament is
discernible throughout all his writings and in all his actions. We see it
in all his descriptions of the beauties of the wild land he was
discovering, in the enthusiasm