eet
their friends. Some more impatient than the others would sail out in
fishing-boats to get the first news; and I should be surprised to know
that a boat did not put off from the little pier beneath La Rabida, to
row round the point and out to where the Nina was lying--to beyond the
Manto Bank. When the flood began to make over the bar and to cover the
long sandbank that stretches from the island of Saltes, the Nina came
gliding in, greeted by every joyful sound and signal that the inhabitants
of the two seaports could make. Every one hurried down to Palos as the
caravel rounded the Convent Point. Hernando, Marchena, and good old Juan
Perez were all there, we may be sure. Such excitements, such triumphs as
the bronzed, white-bearded Admiral steps ashore at last, and is seized by
dozens of eager hands! Such excitements as all the wives and inamoratas
of the Rodrigos and Juans and Franciscos rush to meet the swarthy
voyagers and cover them with embraces; such disappointments also, when it
is realised that some two score of the company are still on a sunbaked
island infinitely far over the western horizon.

Tears of joy and grief, shouts and feastings, firing of guns and flying
of flags, processions and receptions with these the deathless day is
filled; and the little Nina, her purpose staunchly fulfilled, swings
deserted on the turning tide, the ripples of her native Tinto making a
familiar music under her bowsprit.

And in the evening, with the last of the flood, another ship comes
gliding round the point and up the estuary. The inhabitants of Palos
have all left the shore and are absorbed in the business of welcoming the
great man; and there is no one left to notice or welcome the Pinta. For
it is she that, by a strange coincidence, and after many dangers and
distresses endured since she had parted company from the Nina in the
storm, now has made her native port on the very same day as the Nina.
Our old friend Martin Alonso Pinzon is on board, all the fight and
treachery gone out of him, and anxious only to get home unobserved. For
(according to the story) he had made the port of Bayona on the north-west
coast of Spain, and had written a letter from there to the Sovereigns
announcing his arrival and the discoveries that he had made; and it is
said that he had received an unpleasant letter in return, reproaching him
for not waiting for his commander and forbidding him to come to Court.
This story is possibl