respectful
consideration, for no fewer than five. Down to the middle of the
Nineteenth Century the weight of opinion and tradition favored Cat
Island, and upon most maps and charts it was designated as "Guanahani,
or San Salvador." It is by far the largest and the northernmost of the
five islands in question. Next, to the southeast, lies Watling's Island,
to which the distinction of having been the scene of Columbus's landfall
has now for half a century been most generally given, and upon maps it
is generally named San Salvador. It is the only one of the five which
stands out in the Atlantic, beyond the generally uniform line of the
Bahamas, as a sort of advance post to greet the voyager from the east.
Samana, south by east from Watling's, also called Attwood's Cay, was
selected as the true Guanahani by some officers of the United States
Coast Survey. Mariguana, further in the same direction, was proclaimed
"La Verdadera Guanahani" by F. A. de Varnhagen in a scholarly treatise
published in 1864 at Santiago de Chili. Finally, Grand Turk Island, at
the southeastern extremity of the Bahama chain, and just north of the
coast of Hayti, was designated by Navarrete, in 1825, and by various
other authorities, chiefly American, at later dates.

[Illustration: MONUMENT ON SUPPOSED FIRST LANDING PLACE OF COLUMBUS,
WATLING'S ISLAND]

The chief interest of these speculations for present consideration in
this writing is their bearing upon the subsequent course of Columbus,
the identity of the next islands which he visited, and finally the point
at which he first touched the coast of Cuba. If the original landfall
was on Cat or on Watling's Island, then the second land visited, which
Columbus called Santa Maria de la Concepcion, was probably either the
tiny island now known as Concepcion or the larger Rum Cay; the third,
called by him Ferdinandina or Fernandina, was either Great Exuma or Long
Island; the fourth, Isabella, may have been either Long Island or
Crooked Island, according to whether Fernandina was Great Exuma or Long
Island; and the coast of Cuba was reached at some point between Punta
Lucrecia and Port Nuevitas. On the other hand, if Grand Turk Island was
first reached, the second land would naturally have been, as Navarrete
held, at Gran Caico; the third at Little Inagua; the fourth at Great
Inagua; and Cuba would have been reached somewhere between Cape Maysi
and Sama Point. To me it seems decidedly the more probable th