ecessary to restrain them. It was not intended to have more
than 1,200, but about 1,500 in all contrived to go, so that some of the
caravels must have been overcrowded. The character of the company was
very different from that of the year before. Those who went in the first
voyage were chiefly common sailors. Now there were many aristocratic
young men, hot-blooded and feather-headed hidalgos whom the surrender of
Granada had left without an occupation. Most distinguished among these
was Alonso de Ojeda, a dare-devil of unrivalled muscular strength, full
of energy and fanfaronade, and not without generous qualities, but with
very little soundness of judgment or character. Other notable personages
in this expedition were Columbus's youngest brother Giacomo (henceforth
called Diego), who had come from Genoa at the first news of the
Admiral's triumphant return; the monk Antonio de Marchena,[555] whom
historians have so long confounded with the prior Juan Perez; an
Aragonese gentleman named Pedro Margarite, a favourite of the king and
destined to work sad mischief; Juan Ponce de Leon, who afterwards gave
its name to Florida; Francisco de Las Casas, father of the great apostle
and historian of the Indies; and, last but not least, the pilot Juan de
La Cosa, now charged with the work of chart-making, in which he was an
acknowledged master.[556]

[Footnote 555: He went as astronomer, from which we may perhaps
suppose that scientific considerations had made him one of the
earliest and most steadfast upholders of Columbus's views.]

[Footnote 556: See Harrisse, _Christophe Colomb_, tom. ii. pp.
55, 56; Las Casas, _Hist. de las Indias_, tom. i. p. 498;
Fabie, _Vida de Las Casas_, Madrid, 1879, tom. i. p. 11;
Oviedo, _Hist. de las Indias_, tom. i. p. 467; Navarrete,
_Coleccion de viages_, tom. ii. pp. 143-149.]

[Sidenote: Cruise among the cannibal islands.]

The pomp and bustle of the departure from Cadiz, September 25, 1493, at
which the Admiral's two sons, Diego and Ferdinand, were present, must
have been one of the earliest recollections of the younger boy, then
just five years of age.[557] Again Columbus stopped at the Canary
islands, this time to take on board goats and sheep, pigs and fowls, for
he had been struck by the absence of all such animals on the coasts
which he had visited.[558] Seeds of melons, oranges, and lemons were
also taken. On the 7th