for nearly twenty years; but though the special application of his theory
was absurdly wrong, yet in principle it chanced to be right; and he was so
fortunate as to be empowered to bring it to a practical demonstration. His
notion was that the earth was not flat, but round. Therefore the quickest
route to the extreme East must be in exactly the opposite direction; the
globe, he estimated, could not be much over fifteen thousand miles in
girth; Cathay, by the land route, was twelve thousand miles or so east of
Europe; consequently the distance west could not be more than three
thousand. This could be sailed over in a month or two, and the saving in
time and trouble would be immense.--Thus did he argue--shoving the
Atlantic into the Pacific Ocean, subtracting six or seven thousand miles
from their united breadth, and obliterating entirely that western
continent which he was fated to discover, though he was never to suspect
its existence.

The heresy that the earth was a sphere had long been in existence;
Aristotle being the earliest source to which it could be traced. Sensible
people did not countenance it then, any more than they accept to-day the
conjecture that other planets than this may be inhabited. They
demonstrated its improbability on historical and religious grounds, and
also made the point that, supposing it were round, and that Columbus were
to sail down the under side of it, he would never be able to climb back
again. But the Genoese was a man who became more firmly wedded to his
opinion in proportion as it met with ridicule and opposition; proofs he
had none of the truth of his pet idea; but he clung to it with a
doggedness which must greatly have exasperated his interlocutors. By dint
of sheer persistence, he almost persuaded some men that there might be
something in his project; but he never brought any of them to the pitch of
risking money on it. It was only upon a woman that he was finally able to
prevail; and doubtless the intelligence of Isabella of Castile was less