nd after service the Admiral briefly addressed the men. He
reminded them of the singular favor of God in granting them so quiet and
safe a voyage, and recalled his statement made on leaving the Canaries,
that after they had made seven hundred leagues he expected to be so near
land that they should not make sail after midnight. He told them that in
his belief they might find land before morning.

Nobody slept that night. About ten o'clock the Admiral, gazing from the
top of the castle built up on the poop of the _Santa Maria_, thought
that far away in the warm darkness he saw a glancing light.

"Pedro," he said to the boy near him, "do you see a light out there?
Yes? Call Senor Gutierrez and we will see what he makes of it. I have
come to the pass where I do not trust my own eyes."

Gutierrez saw it, but when Sanchez of Segovia came up, the light had
vanished. It seemed to come and go as if it were a torch in a
fishing-boat or in the hand of some one walking. But at two in the
morning a gun boomed from the _Pinta_. Rodrigo de Triana, one of the
seamen, had seen land from the mast-head.

The sudden sunrise of the tropics revealed a green Paradise lapped in
tranquil seas. The ships must have come up toward it between sunset and
midnight. No one had been able to imagine with any certainty what
morning would show. But this was no seaport, or coast of any civilized
land. People were coming down to the shore to watch the approach of the
ships, but they were wild people, naked and brown, and the sight was
evidently perfectly new to them.

The Admiral ordered the ships to cast anchor, and the boats were manned
and armed. He himself in a rich uniform of scarlet held the royal banner
of Castile, while the brothers Pinzon, commanders of the _Pinta_ and the
_Nina_, in their boats, had each a banner emblazoned with a green cross
and the crowned initials of the sovereigns, Fernando and Ysabel. The air
was clear and soft, the sea was almost transparent, and strange and
beautiful fruits could be seen among the rich foliage of the trees along
the shore. The Admiral landed, knelt and kissed the earth, offering
thanks to God, with tears in his eyes; and the other captains followed
his example. Then rising, he drew his sword, and calling upon all who
gathered around him to witness his action, took possession of the
newly-discovered island in the name of his sovereigns, and gave it the
name of San Salvador (Holy Savior).

The wild peop