live in the new town, while on a rocky point with its queer little round
tower looking out to sea stood the stone fort to protect the little
city. It was the first settlement made by white men in all the great new
world of America.

You must know that there are some very wise and very bright people who
do not agree to this. They say that nearly five hundred years before
Columbus landed, a Norwegian prince or viking, whose name was Leif
Ericsson, had built on the banks of the beautiful Charles River, some
twelve miles from Boston, a city which he called Norumbega.

But this has not really been proved. It is almost all the fancy of a
wise man who has studied it out for himself, and says he believes there
was such a city. But he does not really know it as we know of the city
of Isabella, and so we must still say that Christopher Columbus really
discovered America and built the first fort and the first city on its
shores--although he thought he was doing all this in Asia, on the shores
of China or Japan.

When Columbus had his people nearly settled in their new city of
Isabella, he remembered that the main thing he was sent to do was to get
together as much gold as possible. His men were already grumbling. They
had come over the sea, they said, not to dig cellars and build huts, but
to find gold--gold that should make them rich and great and happy.

So Columbus set to work gold-hunting. At first things seemed to promise
success. The Indians told big stories of gold to be found in the
mountains of Hayti; the men sent to the mountains discovered signs of
gold, and at once Columbus sent home joyful tidings to the king and
queen of Spain.