thers, was discussing the subject
of new lands to be discovered, literary resources had become available.
The Latin writers could be examined; but, above all, the fall of
Constantinople had driven numbers of Greeks into Italy. The Greek
language was studied, and Greek books were eagerly bought by the Latin
nations, as before they had been by the Arabs. Thus, all that had been
written as to the four worlds was within the ken of Columbus.

COLUMBUS A HERETIC AND A VISIONARY TO HIS CONTEMPORARIES.

JAMES FREEMAN CLARKE, an American writer and Unitarian minister.
Born at Hanover, N. H., in 1810; died at Jamaica Plain, June 8,
1888.[32]

We think of Columbus as the great discoverer of America; we do not
remember that his actual life was one of disappointment and failure.
Even his discovery of America was a disappointment; he was looking for
India, and utterly failed of this. He made maps and sold them to support
his old father. Poverty, contumely, indignities of all sorts, met him
wherever he turned. His expectations were considered extravagant, his
schemes futile; the theologians exposed him with texts out of the Bible;
he wasted seven years waiting in vain for encouragement at the court of
Spain. He applied unsuccessfully to the governments of Venice, Portugal,
Genoa, France, England. Practical men said, "It can't be done. He is a
visionary." Doctors of divinity said, "He is a heretic; he contradicts
the Bible." Isabella, being a woman, and a woman of sentiment, wished
to help him; but her confessor said no. We all know how he was compelled
to put down mutiny in his crew, and how, after his discovery was made,
he was rewarded with chains and imprisonment, how he died in neglect,
poverty, and pain, and only was rewarded by a sumptuous funeral. His
great hope, his profound convictions, were his only support and
strength.

LIKE HOMER--A BEGGAR IN THE GATE.

DIEGO CLEMENCIN, a Spanish statesman and author of merit. Born at
Murcia, 1765; died, 1834. From his "Elogio de la Reina Catolica,
Isabella de Castilla" (1851).

A man obscure, and but little known, followed at this time the court.
Confounded in the crowd of unfortunate applicants, feeding his
imagination in the corners of antechambers with the pompous project of
discovering a world, melancholy and dejected in the midst of the general
rejoicing, he beheld with indifference, and almost with contempt, the
conclusion of a conquest whic