discovered America."

"So should I," observed Leif Ericson, with a wink at Vespucci.

"Tut!" retorted Columbus. "I did it, and the world knows it, whether
you claim it or not."

"Yes, just as Noah discovered Ararat," replied Pinzon. "You sat upon
the deck until we ran plumb into an island, after floating about for
three months, and then you couldn't tell it from a continent, even
when you had it right before your eyes. Noah might just as well have
told his family that he discovered a roof garden as for you to go
back to Spain telling 'em all that San Salvador was the United
States."

"Well, I don't care," said Columbus, with a short laugh. "I'm the
one they celebrate, so what's the odds? I'd rather stay down here in
the smoking-room enjoying a small game, anyhow, than climb up that
mast and strain my eyes for ten or a dozen hours looking for evidence
to prove or disprove the correctness of another man's theory. I
wouldn't know evidence when I saw it, anyhow. Send Judge
Blackstone."

"I draw the line at the mizzentop," observed Blackstone. "The
dignity of the bench must and shall be preserved, and I'll never
consent to climb up that rigging, getting pitch and paint on my
ermine, no matter who asks me to go."

"Whomsoever I tell to go, shall go," put in Holmes, firmly. "I am
commander of this ship. It will pay you to remember that, Judge