dia.

So he sailed along the coasts of Honduras and Nicaragua trying to find
the strait he was hunting for. Just look at your map and see how near he
was to the way across to the Pacific that men are now digging out, and
which, as the Nicaragua Canal, will connect the Atlantic and the Pacific
Oceans. And think how near he was to finding that Pacific Ocean over
which, if he could but have got across the Isthmus of Panama, he could
have sailed to the Cathay and the Indies he spent his life in trying to
find. But if he had been fortunate enough to get into the waters of the
Pacific, I do not believe it would have been so lucky for him, after
all. His little ships, poorly built and poorly provisioned, could never
have sailed that great ocean in safety, and the end might have proved
even more disastrous than did the Atlantic voyages of the Admiral.

He soon understood that he had found a richer land than the islands he
had thus far discovered. Gold and pearls were much more plentiful
along the Honduras coast than they were in Cuba and Hayti, and Columbus
decided that, after he had found India, he would come back by this route
and collect a cargo of the glittering treasures.

The land was called by the Indians something that sounded very much like
Veragua. This was the name Columbus gave to it; and it was this name,
Veragua, that was afterward given to the family of Columbus as its
title; so that, to-day, the living descendant of Christopher Columbus in
Spain is called the Duke of Veragua.

But as Columbus sailed south, along what is called "the Mosquito Coast,"
the weather grew stormy and the gales were severe. His ships were crazy
and worm-eaten; the food was running low; the sailors began to grumble
and complain and to say that if they kept on in this way they would
surely starve before they could reach India.

Columbus, too, began to grow uneasy. His youngest son, Ferdinand, a
brave, bright little fellow of thirteen, had come with him on this
voyage, and Columbus really began to be afraid that something might
happen to the boy, especially if the crazy ships should be wrecked, or
if want of food should make them all go hungry. So at last he decided
to give up hunting for the strait that should lead him into the Bay of
Bengal; he felt obliged, also, to give up his plan of going back to the
Honduras coast for gold and pearls. He turned his ships about and headed
for Hayti where he hoped he could get Governor Ovando to gi