Now that I have given you an account of European cities in my "Tales
about Europe," I shall now furnish you with some description of America,
with its flourishing cities, and its multitude of ships, its fertile
fields, its mighty rivers, its vast forests, and its millions of happy
and industrious inhabitants, of which I am quite certain you must be
very curious to know something, when you are told that though the world
has been created nearly six thousand years, and many powerful nations
have flourished and decayed, and are now scarcely remembered, yet it is
only three hundred and seventy years ago since it was known that such a
country as America existed.

It was in the year 1492, which you know is only 370 years since, on the
third of August, a little before sunrise, that Christopher Columbus,
undertaking the boldest enterprise that human genius ever conceived, or
human talent and fortitude ever accomplished, set sail from Spain, for
the discovery of the Western World.

I will now give you a short account of Columbus, who was one of the
greatest men the world ever produced. He was born in the city of Genoa,
in Italy; his family were almost all sailors, and he was brought up for
a sailor also, and after being taught geography and various other things
necessary for a sea captain to know, he was sent on board ship at the
age of fourteen. Columbus was tall, muscular, and of a commanding
aspect; his hair, light in youth, turned prematurely grey, and ere he
reached the age of thirty was white as snow.

His first voyages were short ones, but after several years, desiring to
see and learn more of distant countries, and thinking there were still
new ones to be discovered, he went into the service of the King of