1492

by Mary Johnston

  CHAPTER IX

  RISING at dawn, I walked to the sea and along it until I came at last tothose dunes beneath which I had stretched myself that day of grayness.Now it was deep summer, blue and gold, and the air all balm andcaressing. The evening before I had seen the three ships where theyrode in river mouth. They were caravels, and only the _Santa Maria_, thelargest, was fully decked. Small craft with which to find India, overa road of a thousand leagues--or no road, for road means that men havetoiled there and traveled there--no road, but a wilderness plain, awater desert! The Arabians say that Jinn and Afrits live in the desertaway from the caravans. If you go that way you meet fearful things andnever come forth again. The Santa Maria, the _Pinta_ and the Nina. TheSanta Maria could be Master Christopherus's ship. Bright point that washis banner could be made out at the fore.

  Palos waterside, in a red-filtered dusk, had been a noisy place, but thenoise did not ring genially. I gathered that this small port was morelargely in the mood of Pedro and Fernando than in that of Sancho. Itlooked frightened and it looked sullen and it looked angry.

  The old woman by the Tinto talked garrulously. Thankful was she that herson Miguel dwelled ten leagues away! Else surely they would have takenhim, as they were taking this one's son and that one's son! To hearher you would think of an ogre--of Polyphemus in the cave--reaching outfatal hand for this or that fattened body. Nothing then, she said, to dobut to pinch and save so that one might pay the priest for masses! Shetold me with great eyes that a hundred leagues west of Canaries one cameto a sea forest where all the trees were made of water growing up highand spreading out like branches and leaves, and that this forest wasfilled with sea wolves and serpents and strange beasts all made of seawater, but they could sting and rend a man very ghastly. After that youcame to sirens that you could not help leaping to meet, but they putlips to men's breasts and sucked out the life. Then if the wind droveyou south, you smelled smoke and at night saw flames, and if you couldnot get the ship about--

  In mid-afternoon I left the sands and took the road to La Rabida. Bythe walled vineyard that climbs the hill I was met by three mountedmen coming from the monastery. The first was Don Juan de Penelosa, thesecond was the Prior of La Rabida, the third was the Admiral of theOcean-Sea.

  Fray Juan Perez first saw me clearly, drawn up by wall. He had beenquoting Latin and he broke at _Dominus et magister_. The Admiralturned gray eyes upon me. I saw his mind working. He said, "The road toCordova--Welcome, Juan Lepe!"

  "Welcome, Excellency!"

  I gave him the name, seeing him for a moment somewhat whimsically asViceroy of conquered great India of the elephants and the temples filledwith bells. His face lighted. He looked at me, and I knew again that heliked me. I liked him.

  My kinsman the Prior had started to speak to me, but then had shot alook at Juan de Penelosa and refrained. The Queen's officer spoke, "Why,here's another strong fellow, not so tall as some but powerfully knit!Are you used to the sea?"

  I answered that I had been upon a Marseilles bark that was wrecked offAlmeria, and that I had walked from San Lucar. He asked my name and Igave it. "Juan Lepe." "I attach you then, Juan Lepe, for the service ofthe Queen! Behold your admiral, Don Cristoval Colon! His ships are the_Santa Maria_, the Pinta and the Nina, his destination the gloriousfinding of the Indies and Cipango where the poorest man drinks from agolden cup! Princes, I fancy, drink from hollowed emeralds! You willsail to-morrow at dawn. In which ship shall we put him, Senor?"

  "In the Santa Maria," answered the Admiral.

  So short as that was it done! And yet--and yet--it had been doing for along time, for how long a time I have no way of measuring!

  Juan de Penelosa continued to speak: "Follow us into Palos whereSebastian Jaurez will give you wine and a piece of money. Thence youwill go to church where indeed we are bound, all who sail beinggathered there for general confession and absolution. This voyage beginsChristianly!"

  Said Fray Juan Perez, "Not to do that, Juan Lepe, were to cry aloud foranother shipwreck!"

  He used the tone of priest, thrusting in speech as priests often do,where there is no especial need of speech. But I understood that thatwas a mask, and could read kinsmanly anxiety in a good man's heart. Isaid, "I will find Sebastian Jaurez, and I will go to church, Senors. Aship is a ship, and a voyage a voyage!"

  "This, Juan Lepe," said the Admiral in that peculiarly warm andthrilling voice of his, "is such a voyage as you have never been!"

  I made reply, "So be it! I would have every voyage greater than thelast." And as they put their steeds into motion, walked behind themdownhill and over sandy ways into Palos. There I found Sebastian Jaurezwho signed me in. I put into my pocket the coin he gave me and drankwith him a stoup of wine, and then I went to church.

  It was a great shadowy church and I found it full. Jaurez piloted me towhere just under pulpit were ranged my fellow mariners, a hundred plainsailormen, no great number with which to widen the world! A score or soof better station were grouped at the head of these, and in front of allstood Christopherus Columbus. I saw again Martin Alonso Pinzon who hadentered the Prior's room at La Rabida, and with him his two brothersFrancisco and Vicente. Martin Pinzon would be captain of the _Pinta_and Vicente of the Nina. And there were Roderigo Sanchez of Segovia,Inspector-General of Armament, and Diego de Arana, chief alguazil of theexpedition, and Roderigo de Escobedo, royal notary, and with these threeor four young men of birth, adventuring for India now that the war withthe Moor was done. And there were two physicians, Garcia Fernandez andBerardino Nunez. And there was the Franciscan, Fray Ignatio, who wouldconvert the heathen and preach before the Great Khan.

  The Admiral of Ocean-Sea stood a taller man than any there, tall,muscular, a great figure. He was richly dressed, for as soon as he couldhe dressed richly. A shaft of light struck his brow and made his hairall glowing silver. His face was lifted. The air about him to my eyesswam and quivered and was faintly colored.

  Fray Juan Perez preached the sermon and he used great earnestness andnow and again his voice broke. He talked of God's gain that we wentforth upon, reaping in a field set us. One thing came forth here that Ihad not before heard.

  "And the unthinkable wealth that surely shall be found and gained,for these countries to which you sail have eight-tenths of the world'sriches, shall put Castile and Leon where of old stood Pagan Rome, andshall make, God willing, of this very Palos a new Genoa or Venice! Andthis man, your Admiral, how hath he proposed to the Sovereigns to usefirst fruits? Why, friends, by taking finally and forever from Mahound,and for Holy Church and her servant the Spains, the Holy Sepulchre!"

  In the end, we the going forth, kneeling, made general confession andthe priest's hands in the dusk above absolved us. There was solemnityand there was tenderness. A hundred and twenty, we came forth fromchurch, and around us flowed the hundreds of Palos, men and women andchildren. All was red under a red sunset, the boats waiting to take usout to the _Santa Maria_, the Pinta and the Nina.

  We marched to waterside. Priests and friars moved with us, singingloudly the hymn to the Virgin, Lady of all seamen. Great tears ran downFray Juan Perez's checks. It was a red sunset and the west into which wewere going looked indeed blood-flecked. Don Juan de Penelosa, harking uson, had an inspiration. "You see the rubies of Cipango!"

  It is not alone "great" men who bring about things in this world. All ofus are in a measure great, as all are on the way to greater greatness.Sailors are brave and hardy men; that is said when it is said that theyare sailors. In many hearts hung dread of this voyage and rebellionagainst being forced to it. But they had not to be lashed to the boats;they went with sailors' careless air and dignity. By far the most wentthus. Even Fernando ceased his wailing and embarked. The red light, orfor danger or for rubies in which still might be danger, washed us all,washed the town, the folk and the sandy shore, and the boats that wouldtake us out to the ships, small in themselves, and small by distance,riding there in the river-mouth like toys that have been made forchildren.
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  The hundred and twenty entered the boats. It was like a little fishingfleet going out together. The rowers bent to the oars, a strip of waterwidened between us and Spain. Loud chanted the friars, but over theirvoices rose the crying of farewell, now deep, now shrill. "_Adios!_"The sailors cried back, "Adios! Adios!" From the land it must have hada thin sound like ghosts wailing from the edge of the world. That, thesailors held and Palos held, was where the ships were going, over theedge of the world. It was the third day of August, in the year fourteenhundred and ninety-two.