Page:History of the United States of America, Spencer, v1.djvu/30

6 good old age, after many and various adventures, died in the city of London. It is an instructive lesson of the uncertainty of human distinction, that although he gave a continent to England, neither the date of his death is known, nor does the humblest monument show where his remains lie interred.

In 1498, Vasco de Gama, under the patronage of Emanuel, king of Portugal, an able and enterprising monarch, doubled the Cape of Good Hope, and opened to the Portuguese a new and most important route to the Indies. The same king sent Gaspar Cortereal with two vessels to explore the north-western ocean. This navigator sailed some seven hundred miles along the shores of North America. His only exploit was the kidnapping a number of the natives, and carrying them to Portugal as slaves.

Juan Ponce de Leon, a hardy old Spanish warrior, and one of the companions of Columbus, having conquered Porto Rico, greatly enriched himself by the compulsory labor of the unhappy natives. But, growing in years, and ill content to let go his grasp upon the possessions for which he had fought and toiled, he listened to the romantic story of that miraculous fountain fabled to restore to youth and vigor all who bathed in its waters. He actually set out to find this wonder of nature. In the course of his voyage, on Easter Sunday, March 27th, which the Spaniards call Pascua de Flores, he discovered that peninsula which separates the Gulf of Mexico from the Atlantic. It was the beautiful season of flowers, and from this as well as the day on which he saw the land, he gave to the new region the name of On his return from Spain some years after, he was unable to effect a settlement in consequence of the hostility excited among the natives by previous injustice and ill usage.

It was about this date that another famous Spanish captain, Vasco Nuñez de Balboa, discovered the Pacific Ocean. This memorable event took place on the 26th September, 1513. It certainly was one of the most sublime discoveries that had yet been made in the New World, and must, as Mr. Irving says, have opened a boundless field of conjecture to the wondering Spanish adventurers who from the mountain summit gazed down upon the vast ocean, with its waters glittering in the morning sun.

The hardy English and French mariners had engaged with zeal and success in the productive fisheries on the banks of Newfoundland at the beginning of the century. Fishermen from Brittany discovered and named in 1504. "This fishery," says Hildreth, "on the coast and bank of formed the first link between Europe and North America, and, for a century, almost the only one."

Francis I. of France, although busily occupied in his contests with the astute and powerful Charles V. of Spain and Germany, was not wholly unaware of the importance of giving due attention to discoveries and settlements in the New