voyage.

[Illustration: JORGE CABRAL.

_From a coloured drawing in a Spanish MS. in the Sloane Collection in
the British Museum._]

Columbus's proposals, it is true, were received with a certain interest
by the Portuguese; but for the jealousy of some officials it is very
probable that he would, in the first instance, have seen his cherished
plans carried into effect. As it was, a vessel was secretly fitted out,
and was sent in command of a rival navigator to test the theories of
Columbus. After a while the ship returned, battered and worn, having
discovered nothing beyond a series of exceptionally violent tempests.

This attempt was in any case destined to prove equally adverse to the
fortunes of Columbus. Had it succeeded, he would have undoubtedly been
deprived of the credit which should have been his by right; since it
failed, the venture was considered to have proved the fallacy of
Columbus's theories. When, disgusted with experiences such as these,
Columbus left Portugal and took up his residence near the Court of Spain
in company with this great idea of his, which followed him everywhere,
and was in a sense bigger than himself, he met with an equal lack of
success in the first instance. Queen Isabella was sympathetic, but her
cautious husband Ferdinand showed himself cold. Dreading the utter
destruction of his plans, Columbus determined to wash his hands of the
Iberian Peninsula and its over-cautious rulers and statesmen.

He was actually on his way to England, whither one of his brothers had
already preceded him, when a message from the Court of Spain caused him