cit._, in 1884, gives the number
at sixty-four.]

[Sidenote: Defects in Ferdinand's information.]

Nevertheless, while these contemporary materials give us abundant
information concerning the great discoverer, from the year 1492 until
his death, it is quite otherwise with his earlier years, especially
before his arrival in Spain in 1484. His own allusions to these earlier
years are sometimes hard to interpret;[402] and as for his son
Ferdinand, that writer confesses, with characteristic and winning
frankness, that his information is imperfect, inasmuch as filial respect
had deterred him from closely interrogating his father on such points,
or, to tell the plain truth, being still very young when his father
died, he had not then come to recognize their importance.[403] This does
not seem strange when we reflect that Ferdinand must have seen very
little of his father until in 1502, at the age of fourteen, he
accompanied him on that last difficult and disastrous voyage, in which
the sick and harassed old man could have had but little time or strength
for aught but the work in hand. It is not strange that when, a quarter
of a century later, the son set about his literary task, he should now
and then have got a date wrong, or have narrated some incidents in a
confused manner, or have admitted some gossiping stories, the falsehood
of which can now plainly be detected. Such blemishes, which occur
chiefly in the earlier part of Ferdinand's book, do not essentially
detract from its high authority.[404] The limits which bounded the son's
accurate knowledge seem also to have bounded that of such friends as
Bernaldez, who did not become acquainted with Columbus until after his
arrival in Spain.

[Footnote 402: Sometimes from a slip of memory or carelessness
of phrasing, on Columbus's part, sometimes from our lacking the
clue, sometimes from an error in numerals, common enough at all
times.]

[Footnote 403: "Ora, l' Ammiraglio avendo cognizione delle
dette scienze, comincio ad attendere al mare, e a fare alcuni
viaggi in levante e in ponente; de' quali, e di molte altre
cose di quei primi di io non ho piena notizia; perciocche egli
venne a morte a tempo che io non aveva tanto ardire, o pratica,
per la riverenza filiale, che io ardissi di richiederlo di
cotali cose; o, per parlare piu veramente, allora mi ritrovava