it, for although
people have talked of these lands, all was conjecture unless proved
by seeing them, for the greater part listened and judged more by
hearsay than by anything else.

"Since, then, our Redeemer has given this victory to our illustrious
King and Queen and celebrated their reigns by such a great thing,
all Christendom should rejoice and make great festivals, and give
solemn thanks to the Blessed Trinity, with solemn praises for the
exaltation of so much people to our holy faith; and next for the
temporal blessings which not only Spain but they will enjoy in
becoming Christians, and which last may shortly be accomplished.

"Written in the caravel off Santa Maria; on the eighteenth of
February, ninety-three."

The following postscript was added to the letter before it was
despatched:

"After writing the above, being in the Castilian Sea (off the coast
of Castile), I experienced so severe a wind from south and
south-east that I have been obliged to run to-day into this port of
Lisbon, and only by a miracle got safely in, from whence I intended
to write to Your Highnesses. In all parts of the Indies I have
found the weather like that of May, where I went in ninety-three
days, and returned in seventy-eight, saving these thirteen days of
bad weather that I have been detained beating about in this sea.
Every seaman here says that never was so severe a winter, nor such
loss of ships."

On the Friday a messenger came from the King in the person of Don Martin
de Noronha, a relative of Columbus by marriage, and one who had perhaps
looked down upon him in the days when he attended the convent chapel at
Lisbon, but who was now the bearer of a royal invitation and in the
position of a mere envoy. Columbus repaired to Paraiso where the King
was, and where he was received with great honour.

King John might well have been excused if he had felt some mortification
at this glorious and successful termination of a project which had been
offered to him and which he had rejected; but he evidently behaved with
dignity and a good grace, and did everything that he could to help
Columbus. It was extremely unlikely that he had anything to do with the
insult offered to Columbus at the Azores, for though he was bitterly
disappointed that the glory of this discovery belonged to Spain and not
to Portugal, he was too