Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: CHAPTER III COLUMBUS'S DISCOVERY AND THE PAPAL DEMARCATION LINE (1492-1494) IN the early dawn of August, 1492, the people of the little town of Palos, in western Andalusia, must have watched with strange feelings the departure of three small ships for unknown waters. Less than three months had elapsed since the royal order came to provide two vessels for twelve months, and wages for the crews for four months, as a penalty for some offence against the crown.1 At first the hardy sailors of Palos shrank from the mysterious voyage, and only the criminals in the jail were ready for the venture, relying on the promise that all who volunteered were to be exempt from any criminal prosecution until two months after their return.2 But, thanks to the powerful influence of the Pinzon family, there was no need to depend upon the jail-birds, and capable crews were secured from Palos and the surrounding towns.3 The full list of sailors and landsmen was ninety,according to Las Casas, and one hundred and twenty, according to Oviedo.1 Among them were the three Pinzon brothers, Juan de la Cosa, the maker of the famous map of 1500, and Luis de Torres, a converted Jew, who was taken as an interpreter by reason of his knowledge of Arabic. Besides the Spaniards there were two representatives of that race which was later in no small measure to enter into the inheritance of Spain in the New World. William Ires [Harris?] of Galway, Ireland, and Tallarte de Lajes [Allard?].2 Neither returned from the voyage. It is not a little strange, in view of the religious spirit of the age and of the enterprise, that no priest joined the company. 1 Navarrete, Viages, II., 12. Ibid., II., 15; III., 578. 1Ibid., III., 578; Las Casas, Historia, I., 260. Of the three vessels only the Santa Maria was full...