likes free of cost.
Porto Santo and Madeira, lying in the track of the busiest trade on the
Atlantic coast, would provide Columbus with an excellent base from which
to make other voyages; so it was probably with a heart full of eager
anticipation for the future, and sense of quiet happiness in the present,
that in the year 1479 Signor Cristoforo Colombo (for he did not yet call
himself Senor Cristoval Colon) set out for Porto Santo--a lonely rock
some miles north of Madeira. Its southern shore is a long sweeping bay
of white sand, with a huddle of sand-hills beyond, and cliffs and peaks
of basalt streaked with lava fringing the other shores. When Columbus
and his bride arrived there the place was almost as bare as it is to-day.
There were the governor's house; the settlement of Portuguese who worked
in the mills and sugar-fields; the mills themselves, with the cultivated
sugar-fields behind them; and the vineyards, with the dwarf Malmsey vines
pegged down to the ground, which Prince Henry had imported from Candia
fifty years before. The forest of dragon-trees that had once covered the
island was nearly all gone. The wood had all been used either for
building, making boats, or for fuel; and on the fruit of the few trees
that were left a herd of pigs was fattened. There was frequent
communication by boat with Madeira, which was the chief of all the
Atlantic islands, and the headquarters of the sugar trade; and Porto
Santo itself was a favourite place of call for passing ships. So that it
was by no means lonely for Christopher Columbus and his wife, even if
they had not had the society of the governor and his settlement.

We can allow him about three years in Porto Santo, although for a part of
this time at least he must have been at sea. I think it not unlikely
that it was the happiest time of his life. He was removed from the
uncomfortable environment of people who looked down upon him because of
his obscure birth; he was in an exquisite climate; and living by the
sea-shore, as a sailor loves to do; he got on well with Bartolomeo, who
was no doubt glad enough of the company of this grave sailor who had
seen so much and had visited so many countries; above all he had his
wife there, his beautiful, dear, proud Philippa, all to himself, and out
of reach of those abominable Portuguese noblemen who paid so much
attention to her and so little to him, and made him so jealous; and
there was a whispered promise of some o