They did not even know that there was such a continent. They thought he
had sailed to Asia and found the rich countries that Marco Polo had told
such big stories about.

Columbus, you may be sure, was "all the rage" now. Wherever he went the
people followed him, cheering and shouting, and begging him to take them
with him on his next voyage to Cathay.

He was as anxious as any one to get back to those beautiful islands
and hunt for gold and jewels. He set to work at once, and on the
twenty-fifth of September, 1493, with a fleet of seventeen ships and a
company of fifteen hundred men, Columbus the Admiral set sail from Cadiz
on his second voyage to Cathay and Cipango and the Indies. And this time
he was certain he should find all these wonderful places, and bring
back from the splendid cities unbounded wealth for the king and queen of
Spain.



CHAPTER VIII. TRYING IT AGAIN.

Do you not think Columbus must have felt very fine as he sailed out of
Cadiz Harbor on his second voyage to the West? It was just about a year
before, you know, that his feeble fleet of three little ships sailed
from Palos port. His hundred sailors hated to go; his friends were few;
everybody else said he was crazy; his success was very doubtful. Now,
as he stood on the high quarter-deck of his big flag-ship, the Maria
Galante, he was a great man. By appointment of his king and queen he
was "Admiral of the Ocean Seas" and "Viceroy of the Indies." He
had servants, to do as he directed; he had supreme command over the