GenColl 
 
 E 117 
 .C654 
 Copy 1 
 
TRANSLATIONS 
 
 53 
 
 TRANSLATIONS 
 LETTER OF COLUMBUS 
 
 [Translated for The Magazine from the Carta de Indias, 
 Madrid, 1877.] 
 
 Letter of Cristobal Colon to the Cath- 
 olic Kings, setting forth some observa- 
 tions on the art of Navigation, Granada, 
 February 6, 1502. 
 
 Most High and Mighty Kings 6° Lords : 
 I desire to be the cause of pleasure 
 and entertainment to your Highnesses, 
 and not of pain and disgust ; but since 
 the pleasure and delight attach to new 
 things of any interest, I shall speak 
 of each in compliance with your com- 
 mands as they come to my memory; 
 and assuredly they will not be judged by 
 their carelessness of expression, but by 
 my good intentions and desires, that in 
 all things I may be of service to your 
 Highnesses to state only that which has 
 occurred to myself ; and although my 
 strength fail me and my fatigue over- 
 power me, my will, as the most obliged 
 and indebted of persons, shall not be 
 wanting in my soul. 
 
 Navigators and others who trade by 
 sea always have a superior knowledge of 
 particular parts of the world in which 
 they move and have common intercourse, 
 and for this reason each one of them is 
 better informed concerning that which he 
 sees daily than any others who may go 
 thither from year to year ; and for this 
 reason we receive with pleasure the re- 
 lations which they themselves make of 
 what they have seen and gathered, as 
 certainly we gain most perfect instruction 
 from that which we learn by our own ex- 
 perience. 
 
 If we consider the world spherical a> 
 many writers have declared it their opin- 
 ion to be, or science causes us to believe ; 
 otherwise on its authority it must not be 
 supposed that the temperature is equal in 
 any parallel, since its diversity is as great 
 on the sea as on the land. 
 
 The sun diffuses its influence and the 
 earth receives it according to the con- 
 cave surfaces on mountains which are 
 framed in it, and even the ancients have 
 written enough on this subject as Pliny 
 also who says that under the north [see 
 note 1] the temperature is so mild that 
 the people who live there never die ex- 
 cept from vexation and disgust with life, 
 and that they suffocate and destroy them- 
 selves. 
 
 Here in Spain we find a variety of tem- 
 perature so great that there is no need of 
 testimony from any early age of the 
 world. We see here in Granada the 
 mountains covered with snow all the year 
 around, an evidence of great cold, while 
 at the foot of the same mountain chain 
 are the Alpuj arras, where the temperature 
 is always mild without excessive heat or 
 cold ; and as it is in this province, so it 
 is among others in Spain which it would 
 be prolixity to name. I say that on the 
 sea the, same thing happens, especially in 
 proximity with the land, and this is better 
 known to those who constantly trade 
 there than to those who trade in other 
 regions. 
 
 In the summer, and certainly in Anda- 
 lusia, every day the sun is high, and the 
 land and sea breezes blow alternately, and 
 that which comes from the west is soft 
 wind and lasts till evening, and in the 
 same manner that this wind holds some 
 time in this region, so other winds blow 
 
54 
 
 TRANSLATIONS 
 
 in other parts and regions in summer and 
 winter. 
 
 Those who constantly go from Cadiz 
 to Naples know already that when they 
 pass the coast of Catalonia what wind 
 they will find there according to the sea- 
 son, and also those who go to the Gulf 
 of Narbonne. Those who wish to go from 
 Cadiz to Naples, if it be winter time, go 
 in sight of the Cape of Creo in Catalonia 
 by the Gulf of Narbonne ; there the wind 
 is very troublesome and sometimes ves- 
 sels must yield and are obliged to run 
 before it as far as Berueria and for this 
 reason they oftener go to Cape Creo to 
 keep close to the wind and reach the 
 shelter of the Pomegas of Marsella, or 
 the Islands of Eros, and never leave the 
 coast until they arrive at their destina- 
 tion. If they have to go from Cadiz to 
 Naples in the summer time, they sail by 
 the coast of Berueria as far as Cerdena 
 or in the same manner as has been said 
 of the other north coast. Some men are 
 designated from their voyages who have 
 so often made them that they know well 
 these routes and the changes of wind 
 which may be expected according to the 
 season of the year in winch they are. 
 Commonly to these men is given the 
 name of the greater pilots, as on the 
 land to the commander of an army ; so 
 much so that one who knows perfectly 
 the road takes his command to Font- 
 arabia would not know it from here to 
 Liberia. The same upon the sea, some 
 are pilots of Flanders and others of the 
 Levant, and of the country he most fre- 
 quents. 
 
 The trade and travel from Spain to 
 Flanders is greatly prosecuted ; and great 
 mariners are engaged in it. In Flanders, 
 
 in the month of January, all the ships are 
 despatched to return to their countries 
 and in this month it rarely happens that 
 there is not a stretch of wind either from 
 the northeast or north-northeast. These 
 winds at this time of year do not blow 
 gently, but strong and cold, and are 
 even dangerous : the distances from the 
 land and the character of the earth are 
 the cause which occasion this. These 
 winds are not steady even though the 
 weather may not have this fault ; those 
 who sail with them are persons who take 
 their chances, and most often arrive with 
 their hands in their hair. If the easterly 
 breeze fail them and any other wind blow 
 hard, they must make the ports of France 
 or England until another tide allows them 
 to leave those ports. 
 
 Sea-faring men are covetous of money 
 and eager to return to their homes, and 
 venture everything without waiting for the 
 weather to settle. As it was in my cham- 
 ber on another occasion, I shall inform 
 your Highnesses of what is but for the 
 security of this navigation ; which should 
 be undertaken when the sun is in Taurus 
 and be abandoned in the heaviest and 
 most dangerous season of the winter. If 
 the winds favor the crossing is very slack, 
 no departure should be made until the 
 voyage seems assured ; and this can be 
 best judged of when the sky is very clear 
 and the wind blows.from the north star 
 and holds north always rather stiffly. 
 Your Highnesses know well what hap- 
 pened the year ninety-seven, when they 
 suffered so in Burgos from the duration 
 of the severe weather and the wind which 
 followed, to escape which they went to 
 Soria ; and all the court having left on 
 Saturday, your Highnesses remained to 
 
TRANSLATIONS 
 
 55 
 
 leave on Monday, and that to a courier 
 sent to me that night I replied in a written 
 answer which I sent to your Highnesses 
 that day, that the wind would begin to 
 blow the next day, that the fleet ought 
 not to sail, but to hold on until the wind 
 strengthened, and should leave on Mon- 
 day, and that on Thursday it would be as 
 far as the Island of Huict, and if it did 
 not put in there it would be in Laredo the 
 next Monday or else the science of navi- 
 gation was lost. This writing of mine, 
 with the desire to await the arrival of the 
 Princess, induced Your Highnesses to 
 change their intentions not to go to Soria 
 and to test the judgment of the sailor ; 
 and on Monday a ship appeared off La- 
 redo which did not go into Huict because 
 it holds but few ships [see note 2]. 
 
 There are many opinions, and there 
 always have been on land and sea, as to 
 the course to be pursued in similar cases, 
 and to-day there are many other discov- 
 ered islands ; and if that route is already 
 known, those who have to trade back and 
 forth there, with the perfection of instru- 
 ments and construction of ships, will have 
 a better knowledge of the land and winds 
 and seasons most favorable to take ad- 
 vantage of, and have hope for the security 
 of their lives. 
 
 May the Holy Trinity defend your 
 Highnesses, for we have desire and need 
 to keep your Highnesses with all their 
 great estates and lordships. 
 
 From Granada the sixth of February 
 fifteen hundred and two. 
 
 . s . 
 
 . S. A. S . 
 X M V 
 
 :Xpo FERENS./ 
 
 Note i. — Pone eos montes [Riphaei] ultroque 
 Aquilonem, gens felix (si cradimus) quos Hyper- 
 boreos appellavere, annoso elegit aevo, fabulosis 
 celebrata miraculis. Ibi creduntur esse cardines 
 mundi, extremi que siderum ambitus semestri 
 luce et una die solis aversi : non, ut imperiti dix- 
 ere, ab aequinoctio verno in autumnum. Semel 
 in anno solstitio oriuntur iis soles, brumaque se- 
 mel occidunt. Regis aprica, felici temperis, 
 omni afflatu noxio carens. Domus iis nemora 
 lucique et deorum cultus viritim gregatimque dis- 
 cordia ignota et segritudo omnis. Mors non nisi 
 satietate vitse, epulatis delibutoque, senio luxu, 
 ex quadam rupe in mare salientibus. Hoc genus 
 sepulturse beatissimum. — Plin., Hist. Nat., lib. 
 IV., cap. XXVI. 
 
 Note 2. — In January of the year 1497 the 
 Catholic Kings were at Burgos, as is proved by 
 the date of some ordinances which they sent 
 thence, and by the relation of Galinder de Carva- 
 jel, which also shows that " in the month of 
 March came the Princess Margurite and wedded 
 with the crown prince Don Juan, el lunes de 
 Cuasimodo, 3 de abril" with great festivity. — 
 (Carta de Indies, p. 658.) 
 
 THE SIGNATURE OF COLUMBUS 
 XPOFERENS 
 
 [Translated forTHE Magazine from the Cartas de Irtdias, 
 Madrid, 1877.] 
 
 Among the signatures of Cristobal 
 Colon hitherto published, as well those 
 by Fray Antonio de Remesal, who was 
 the first to make it known in his Historia 
 General de las Indias occidentals, and 
 particularly in chapter 7, " Guatemala," 
 etc. (lib. iv., chap, ii., page 163), as by 
 Don Martin in his Coleccion de las viages 
 y Descubrimientos que hicieron por la mar 
 los EspagTwles, etc., and by the his- 
 torian of the Admiral, Washington Irving, 
 there occur important differences which 
 deserve notice. Remesal, not supposing 
 that future ages would take such interest 
 in this subject, printed in the page above 
 mentioned the signature which, accord- 
 
56 
 
 TRANSLATIONS 
 
 ing to what he says, he had seen in a 
 letter of the discoverer of the New World, 
 without any explanation, and merely 
 "because some curious person might de- 
 sire to exercise his ingenuity in its inter- 
 pretation," and also without fixing or 
 giving their true value to certain charac- 
 teristic details decisive of its authenticity, 
 without explaining its omissions or giving 
 a justification of its punctuation, which 
 he considered as equal in all the initials 
 of the ante-signature, and taking the lib- 
 erty also of figuring the word represent- 
 ing the name of Cristobal, translating and 
 writing them in this manner 
 s. 
 s. a. s. 
 
 X. M. A. 
 
 Christo fcrens. 
 In the fifteen autograph letters of the 
 great mariner which Navarrete found in 
 the archives of the Lord Duke de Ver- 
 agua, and in those coming from other 
 quarters, which he printed jointly with 
 them in volumes I. and II. of his Colec- 
 eion, he said nothing, and Washington 
 Irving was equally silent in regard to the 
 rubric which the discoverer placed on the 
 left side of his signature ; omitting like- 
 wise one of the stops between which is 
 placed the first S of the two which are 
 in the second line of the initials of the 
 ante-signature, and although that which 
 precedes the S. of the first line in many 
 cases (stops which the Anglo-American 
 writer did not forget to place), and like- 
 wise suppressing in it the oblique line, 
 the direction of which is from outside 
 inwardly, which encloses the word KER- 
 ENS, which Washington Irving showed, 
 although without accompanying it with 
 the corresponding stop. But the most 
 
 striking variation, which can alone be 
 ascribed to thoughtlessness on the part 
 of Navarrete, is to be observed in the 
 manner of writing the Xpo, in the ab- 
 breviation of which he made use of cap- 
 ital letters, while Irving, more true to the 
 original, only placed the letter X in this 
 class and the po in small letters, and 
 prolonged the upper right stroke of the 
 versal to supply the dark abbreviation 
 sign, as in the letter ; the signatures re- 
 sulting in the following form : 
 
 According to Nav- 
 arrete. 
 
 s. 
 
 S. A. S. 
 X M Y 
 XPO KERENS 
 
 According to Wash- 
 ington Irving. 
 
 .s. 
 
 .S. A. S. 
 X M Y 
 Xe? FERENS/ 
 
 That the celebrated Spanish Indian- 
 ographers omitted these particulars there 
 is no doubt, since in some of the fifteen 
 letters found which we have had the 
 pleasure to examine, thanks to the good 
 will of Senor don Cristobal Colon de la 
 Cerda, the present Duke of Veragua, 
 and in which, besides the rubric that pre- 
 cedes the signature in the facsimile B, 
 the two points and rays are clearly seen. 
 But it is difficult to explain a similar 
 error in a person so minutely precise as 
 the author of the " Criterion de Viages," 
 who asserts that the signatures of Colon 
 written in other ways to be apocryphal, 
 such, for instance, as the one in which 
 the initials X. M. Y. were punctuated, 
 and the Latin I in place of the Greek Y. 
 and those which present separately and 
 not in continuation of the initials the 
 XPO KERENS, as is established in the 
 document, evidently not authentic, dis- 
 covered in the Library of the Cara de 
 
TRANSLATIONS 
 
 57 
 
 Corsini at Rome, with the title of Codi- 
 cilltis more militarii Cristophori Columbi, 
 upon which is placed datum Valledoliti 4 
 Mai, 1506, and which shows this signa- 
 ture : 
 
 .s. 
 
 S. A. S. 
 
 X. M. I. XPOFERENS. 
 
 Besides these peculiarities, we have ob- 
 served in the Admiral's manner of signa- 
 ture, that only in the olograph writings 
 the complementary rubric of the signa- 
 ture is made use of, and not in those 
 which are wanting in this particular, as 
 any one may satisfy himself who will 
 compare the facsimiles A and B (in the 
 Cartas de Indias), noting also that in 
 each of these documents he placed the 
 two stops which precede the Xpo FER- 
 ENS as in the second facsimile B, and 
 in a letter preserved by the General 
 don Eduardo Fernandez San Roman, 
 while in those which the Lord Duke of 
 Veraguas was obliging enough to show 
 us he appears to have omitted it, although 
 this cannot be affirmed with certainty 
 when it concerns documents " much in- 
 jured by time, the ink obscured or faded 
 out, and the margins creased or torn, 1 ' 
 as, according to Navarrete (Vol. L, p. 
 477), were the letters which by his dili- 
 gence were discovered in the archives of 
 the descendants of the Admiral. Be- 
 tween the one and the other of these au- 
 tographs it is likewise to be considered 
 that in the familiar letters the sign of 
 abbreviation appears distinctly, and that 
 in those written to the Kings the prolon- 
 gation of the arm of the X ; from which it 
 is to be deduced that the great mariner 
 did not confine himself to any fixed rules 
 as to this stop, as sometimes, also, he 
 
 subscribed for the Xpo FERENS by the 
 title of the office he was at the time fill- 
 ing, as may be seen in the document 
 where he treats of the establishment of 
 his family estates, famous from the suit 
 which was pleaded February 22, 1498, 
 which the aforesaid Navarrete gave to 
 light in this manner : 
 
 .S. 
 
 S.A.S. 
 
 X M Y 
 
 El Almiratite. 
 
 Now, in the instruments of August 3, 
 1499, in the names of the Catholic kings, 
 he made to the trader, Pedro de Salcedo, 
 conceding to him the exclusive privilege 
 for life of cutting hard wood in the Island 
 of Hispaniola, he signed his name in this 
 manner : 
 
 .S. 
 
 S.A.S. 
 
 X M Y 
 
 VI R E Y 
 
 But ordinarily he signed, as has been 
 shown, with the Xpo FERENS. Of the 
 fifteen autographs mentioned as in the 
 archives of the Duke de Veragua, pub- 
 lished by Fernandez Navarrete, "four 
 addressed to his great friend, Fray Don 
 Gaspar Gorricio, monk of the Monastery 
 of Santa Maria de las Cuevas de la Car- 
 tuja de Sevilla, and eleven to his son and 
 heir, Don Diego Colon," all are signed 
 in the same manner, except one done 
 in Seville, February 25, 1505 (fifteen 
 months before the death of the Ad- 
 miral), in which he suppressed the in- 
 itials, and only signed with capital and 
 small letters, as we make them, in this 
 manner : 
 
 Xpo Ferens. 
 
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 
 
 58 
 
 TRANSLATIONS 
 
 011 563 904 3 
 
 It seems easy to comprehend the sig- 
 nificance of these words written " partly 
 in Greek and partly in Latin," as Don 
 Nicolas de Azara wrote from Rome to 
 Don Juan Bautista Mnnoz on the 12th 
 of February, 1 784. 
 
 But is it known what it was if the ini- 
 tials preceded the Christo Ferens. Wash- 
 ington Irving says that to read them we 
 must begin by the lower letters, combin- 
 ing them with those above ; Juan Bau- 
 tista Spoterno conjectures that they sig- 
 nify #// Xristus, Sancte Maria, Josephus, 
 oh Salvame Xristus, Maria, Josephus ; 
 and in the North American Review for 
 April, 1827, the substitution of Jesus for 
 Josephus is suggested. Such a substitu- 
 tion should not, in our judgment, be ac- 
 cepted, because of the redundancy it 
 implies, since Jesus and Christus are 
 synonymous, and Josephus would com- 
 plete the invocation, now quite common, 
 of Jesus, Maria, and Jose. Were we to 
 share this opinion, we should also substi- 
 tute Salve for Salvatne. 
 
 •5- 
 
 5. V? J - 
 
 •' JF/>° FE A Fits' J 
 
 EULOGY OF COLUMBUS. 
 
 [Translated for The Magazine.] 
 
 Funeral sermon in eulogy of his Ex- 
 cellency, Sefior Don Cristoval Colon, 
 Admiral-in-Chief, Vice-Roy, and Gov. 
 ernor-General of the West Indies, their 
 discoverer and conqueror, delivered on 
 
 occasion of the removal of his remains 
 from the Metropolitan Church of Saint 
 Domingo, to the Cathedral of our Lady 
 of the Conception, at Havana, by Doctor 
 Don Jose Augustin Caballero, Master of 
 Philosophy in the Royal and Councillor 
 Seminary College of San Carlos and San 
 Ambrosia, on the morning of January 
 19th, in the year 1796. 
 
 To the Most Illustrious Governor of 
 this city of Havana : 
 
 Illustrious Sir! If I made the sacrifice 
 of my health and of some of my occupa- 
 tions when I undertook to prepare a 
 funeral eulogium upon the ever-famous 
 Admiral Don Cristoval Colon, now that 
 Your Excellency has deigned to request 
 a copy for publication, I sacrifice all the 
 force of my talents, and lose all my tran- 
 quillity of mind. The first sacrifice was 
 an homage cheerfully and justly rendered 
 to my friend Sefior Don Diego Jose Perez 
 Rodrigues, Canon of this cathedral ; this 
 second is a polite deference to the most 
 flattering desire and persuasions of Your 
 Excellency. From one and the other I 
 might derive an incontestable right to 
 claim a double indulgence. But when 
 Your Excellency, to the courtesies with 
 which you honored me in your official 
 letter of January 29th following, added 
 the request to print my sermon, no doubt 
 that the world may not be ignorant of 
 the smallest detail of the demonstrations 
 made by Havana in honor of the obse- 
 quies of the discoverer of the Americas, 
 Your Excellency felt obliged to tender 
 to me his protection — a condescension 
 which, on the part of Your Excellency, 
 is a simple expression of his generosity, 
 will be to me an honor and an advantage. 
 An honor ? — who would not feel it such