that the East Indies could be
reached by sailing to the west about A. D. 1474. He was at that time in
correspondence with Toscanelli, the Florentine astronomer, who held the
same doctrine, and who sent him a map or chart constructed on the
travels of Marco Polo. He offered his services first to his native city,
then to Portugal, then to Spain, and, through his brother, to England;
his chief inducement, in each instance, being that the riches of India
might be thus secured. In Lisbon he had married. While he lay sick near
Belem, an unknown voice whispered to him in a dream, "God will cause thy
name to be wonderfully resounded through the earth, and will give thee
the keys of the gates of the ocean which are closed with strong chains."
The death of his wife appears to have broken the last link which held
him to Portugal, where he had been since 1470. One evening, in the
autumn of 1485, a man of majestic presence, pale, careworn, and, though
in the meridian of life, with silver hair, leading a little boy by the
hand, asked alms at the gate of the Franciscan convent near Palos--not
for himself, but only a little bread and water for his child. This was
that Columbus destined to give to Europe a new world.

A PEN-PICTURE FROM THE SOUTH.

The Right Rev. ANTHONY DURIER, Bishop of Natchitoches, La., in a
circular letter to the clergy and laity of the diocese, printed in
the New Orleans _Morning Star_, September 10, 1892.

We cherish the memory of the illustrious sailor, also of the lady and of
the monk who were providential instruments in opening a new world to
religion and civilization.

[Illustration: HEAD OF COLUMBUS.

Designed by H. H. Zearing of Chicago.]

Honor to the sailor, Christopher Columbus, the Christ-bearing dove, as
his name tells, gentle as a dove of hallowed memory as Christ-bearer. In
fact, he brought Christ to the New World. Look back at that sailor, 400
years ago, on bended knees, with hands uplifted in prayer, on the shores
of Guanahani, first to invoke the name of Jesus in the New World; in
fact, as in name, behold the Christ-bearing dove. Columbus was a knight
of the cross, with his good cross-hilted sword, blessed by the church.
The first aim and ambition of a knight of the cross, at that time, was
to plant the cross in the midst of heathen nations, and to have them
brought from "the region of the shadow of death" into the life-giving
bosom of Mother Church.

Listen to the prayer