ean beneath, gave no promise of any land. Three
hundred adventurers were in these ships. Ten weeks had already passed
since they saw the hills of the Old World sink beneath the horizon.

For weary days and weeks they had strained their eyes looking toward
the west, hoping to see the mountains of the New World rising in the
distance. The illustrious adventurer, Christopher Columbus, who guided
these frail barks, inspired by science and by faith, doubted not that
a world would ere long emerge before him from the apparently boundless
waters. But the blue sky still overarched them, and the heaving ocean
still extended in all directions its unbroken and interminable
expanse.

Discouragement and alarm now pervaded nearly all hearts, and there was
a general clamor for return to the shores of Europe. Christopher
Columbus, sublime in the confidence with which his exalted nature
inspired him, was still firm and undaunted in his purpose.

[Illustration: AMERICA DISCOVERED.]

The night of the 11th of October darkened over these lonely
adventurers. The stars came out in all the brilliance of tropical
splendor. A fresh breeze drove the ships with increasing speed over
the billows, and cooled, as with balmy zephyrs, brows heated through
the day by the blaze of a meridian sun. Columbus could not sleep.
He stood upon the deck of his ship, silent and sad, yet indomitable
in energy, gazing with intense and unintermitted watch into the
dusky distance. It was near midnight. Suddenly he saw a light, as
of a torch, far off in the horizon. His heart throbbed with an
irrepressible tumult of excitement. Was it a meteor, or was it a light
from the long-wished-for land? It disappeared, and all again was
dark. But suddenly again it gleamed forth, feeble and dim in the
distance, yet distinct. Soon again the exciting ray was quenched, and
nothing disturbed the dark and sombre outline of the sea. The long
hours of the night to Columbus seemed interminable as he waited
impatiently for the dawn. But even before any light was seen in the
east, the dim outline of land appeared in indisputable distinctness
before the eyes of the entranced, the now immortalized navigator. A
cannon--the signal of the discovery--rolled its peal over the ocean,
announcing to the two vessels in the rear the joyful tidings. A shout,
excited by the heart's intensest emotions, rose over the waves, and
with tears, with prayers, and embraces, these enthusiastic men
accepted the