Page:Columbus and other heroes of American discovery; (IA columbusotherher00bell).pdf/38

 and thoroughly imbued with all the superstitions of the age with regard to the perils of the deep, caused Columbus much embarrassment from the very first, and he was detained for three weeks at the Canaries by an "accident"—supposed to have been purposely brought about—to the rudder of the Pinta. It was not until the 6th September that the actual voyage of discovery can be said to have commenced. Setting sail that day from the island of Gomera he passed Ferro, the last of the Canaries, on the 9th.

EMBARKATION OF COLUMBUS.

As the last traces of land faded from the sight of the untutored mariners, their hearts failed them, and with tears and groans they entreated their leader to turn back while there was yet time. The passing of a portion of a wreck on the 11th still further aroused their fears, and it was all that Columbus could do to induce them to obey his orders.

On the 13th September a slight but deeply significant incident occurred. Columbus, watching with eager interest the little compass—which, surrounded as he was by timid, vacillating spirits, must have seemed to him his one steadfast, unchangeable friend—noticed a variation in the needle. To quote the words of Washington Irving, "he perceived about nightfall that the needle, instead of pointing to the north star, varied about half a point, or between live and six degrees, to the northwest, and still more on the following morning."

Knowing how greatly this phenomenon would alarm his people, Columbus at first kept it to himself; but it was soon remarked by the pilots, and their report sent a fresh thrill of horror through the crews. They were entering a new world, where the very laws of nature were changing, and in which even inanimate objects were subject to weird, unearthly influences.

Calm amid the ever-increasing excitement, Columbus, with greater in