ladolid, it was afterwards transferred to Seville, where that of his son Diego was also deposited; and in 1536, both were removed to Hispaniola and buried in the chief chapel of the Cathedral of San Domingo. There the remains of Columbus are supposed to rest still, a box containing them having been found with evidences of its authenticity, in September, 1877, though it is believed that the remains of Diego were removed to Havana, in 1795.

Beautiful realm beyond the western main,
That hymns thee ever with resounding wave,
Thine is the glorious sun's peculiar reign!
Fruits, flowers, and gems, in rich mosaic pave
Thy paths; like giant altars o'er the plain

Thy mountains blaze, loud thundering, 'mid the rave
Of mighty streams, that shoreward rush amain,
Like Polypheme from his Etnean cave.

Joy, joy, for Spain! A seaman's hand confers
These glorious gifts, and half the world is hers!

But where is he — that light whose radiance glows

The loadstar of succeeding mariners?

Behold him! crushed beneath o'ermastering woesHopeless, heartbroken, chained, abandoned to his foes! - Sir Aubrey de Vere.

The legends of the Norsemen whom the Sagas tell us came to these shores five hundred years before Columbus, belong rather to the domain of the antiquary or the poet than to that of the historian. While, as Dr. Palfrey says, it is nowise unlikely that these sturdy voyagers pushed their keels as far as the Western continent, it is surely true that they left nothing which has impressed our civilization or our history. The Round Tower at Newport, and the skeleton found at Fall River, Mass., gave Mr. Longfellow an opportunity to bring a romantic voice from the past, though it related a tale that the Sagas had forgotten; but the acute criticism of Dr. Palfrey has conclusively

THE ROUND TOWER AT NEWPORT.

25

shown that the Tower was rather built by a man of peace than by "A Viking old," being modelled after the windmill of Chesterton, England, of which he gives a cut.*

An unshapely block of stone dug up on the banks of the Merrimac has given Mr. Whittier ground for his charming verses "The Norsemen," and we may thank him that his poetic mind is so fashioned that it,

Neither can we get satisfaction from the so-called "writing" on

THE ROUND TOWER AT NEWPORT. the rock at Berkeley, opposite

Dighton on the Taunton River,

which can hardly be tortured into anything of historic value, nor traced to a time anterior to 1680.

*"History of New England," vol. i. p. 58.

CHAPTER II.

THE CABOTS AND OTHER DISCOVERERS.

The black northeaster,

Through the snowstorm hurled,
Drives our English hearts of oak
Seaward round the world.

T this period there was

AT

a centre of interest in maritime discovery in the west of England, as well as in Spain and Portugal, and it was from the city of Bristol that the navigator went out who achieved the first discovery of our continent.

The history of the American people is but a continuation of the history of the people of England, and it was fitting that the voyager who discovered our land should have sailed from the shores of the Mother Country. The offer which Columbus had authorized his brother to make to King Henry VII., was proffered at about the time that the Red Rose and the White had been united (in the persons of that monarch and Elizabeth, daughter of King Edward IV.) at the close of the disastrous War of the Roses.*

*Bartholomew Columbus started for England in 1484 and returned to his famous brother ten years later. The War of the Roses closed in 1485.