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ubique gestarum ' of Pope Pius II.,1 Mandeville's' Travels',2
and other works, of which several with marginal notes by
himself and his brother Bartholomew are still to be found
in the Colombine Library at Seville. At Lisbon he
listened to accounts, more or less fanciful, of voyages
beyond Madeira and the Azores. Having matured his
scheme of discovery, he submitted it to King John. The
King seems to have listened with favour to the proposals
of this persistent stranger, but his scientific advisers,
D. Diogo Ortiz de Vilhegas, Master Rodrigo, and Master
Josepe or Jose,3 looked upon Columbus as a visionary, and
upon his scheme as not likely to yield any profit, if not
altogether impracticable. And they were justified in
their opinion if they had approximately correct notions as
to the extent of Asia and the consequent vast breadth of
the Western Ocean, which up till then had in vain been
navigated by Portuguese expeditions in search of
imaginary islands depicted upon the charts.4 But the
King, notwithstanding this unfavourable report, might
have provided a caravel had not the reward claimed by
the Genoese in case of success been most unreasonable.
Moreover, it was thought preferable to devote the
resources of the kingdom to the prosecution of the
voyages of discovery round Africa, which in the course of
time yielded a direct sea-route to India and Cathay.5

Columbus, disappointed, turned his back upon
Portugal at the end of 1484 or in the spring of 1485.
But in Castile, too, which was still engaged in the
struggle with the Moors, he met with little encouragement
, and he seems to have made fresh overtures to King
John of Portugal. Such, at least, may be judged to have
been the case from the tenour of a letter which the King
wrote to him on March 20, 1488," in which he guaranteed
that Columbus should not be proceeded against, civilly or
criminally, on account of any offence he might have

1 Enea Silvio de Piccolomini (Pius II.) was born at Pienza in Tuscany in
1405, became Private Secretary of the Emperor Frederick III. in 1442 ;
Cardinal in 1455; and was elected Pope in 1458. He died in 1464.
His ' Opera' were published at Basel in 1471, his 1 Historia ' at Venice in
1477. (G. Voigt, 'Enea Silvio als Papst,' Berlin, 1852-63 ; H. Berg,
' Enea Silvio als Geograph,' Halle, 1901.)

2 Columbus told his friend Andres Bernaldes, the Curate of Villa de
los Palacios, that he had read Mandeville's 1 Travels' first published in
1480. (A. Bernaldes, 'Historia de los Reyes Catolicos,' Seville, 1870,
c. 123.)

3 Concerning these see Ch. VI. The question of the breadth of the
Western Ocean is dealt with in Oh. XIX.

4 Harrisse, 'The Discovery of North America,' Paris 1892, p. 655.

6 It was after the rejection of the proposals of Columbus that his
brother, Bartholomew, proceeded to England, where, on February 13,
1488, he had completed a map of the world which he intended to present
to Henry VII. This map seems to be lost past recovery. (Ferdinand
Colon, ' Vida de D. Christobal Colon,' c. 10; Las Casas, ' Historia,' I.,
p. 225, and list of errata.) In England the year began on the 25th of
March, and if the date given is according to the English style, we ought
to read February 13, 1489.

6 This letter is published in Navarrete's ' Coleccion,' II., Madrid, 1859,
doc. No. 2. A. C. Teixera de Aragao, ' Breve noticia sobre o descobri-
mento de America,' Lisbon, 1892, p. 26, doubts the authenticity of this
letter.

committed.7 Columbus did not at once avail himself of
this permission, for on June 16, 1488, he was still at
Seville, but probably started for Portugal soon after the
birth of his son Ferainand, on September 28, 1488. He
certainly was at Lisbon in December, for he was present
when the King received the report of Bartholomeu Dias
on his return from the memorable voyage round the Cape
of Good Hope. *ut, however friendly his treatment by
the King, Columbus failed once more in gaining
acceptance for his adventurous proposals. He returned
to Spain. Granada, the last stronghold of the Moors in
Spain, fell on January 2, 1492 ; his conditions, in spite of
their extravagance, were agreed to, and on August 3,
1492, he sailed from Palos on his momentous passage
across the Atlantic. And though he did not discover the
promised ocean highway to the spice-lands of India or to
the wealthy cities of Cathay, he revealed, unconsciously,
the existence of a veritable ' Mundus novus,' the existence
of which had been foreshadowed by Crates of Mallos
and even earlier speculative cosmographers, but which
Columbus himself refused to recognise down to the day
of his death.8

On March 8, 1493, on the triumphant return from his
first and most daring voyage, he once more called at
Lisbon. Behaim at that time was still absent at
Nuremberg.

It will thus be seen that the opportunities for
personal intercourse between Behaim and Columbus were
not many, especially if it be borne in mind that both were
frequently absent from Lisbon, the one residing usually
in the island of Fayal, the other undertaking occasional
voyages to England and the Guinea coast. The
" opinions " held by Columbus surely needed no " confirmation
" on the part of Behaim. In 1484, the earliest
date when the two men could have met, the mind of
Columbus on the subject of his proposed voyage of
discovery had been fully made up, and it is not likely
that a young German merchant, quite new to questions
of that kind, would have obtruded his opinions upon a
man so much his superior in age and experience.

' It has been suggested that Columbus was involved in the conspiracy
headed by the Duke of Viseu, whom the King killed on August 23,1484 ;
or that he obtained surreptitiously a copy of Toscanelli's Chart and letter,
but it seems more probable that he left Lisbon secretly in order to escape
being prosecuted for heavy debts incurred by him. We know, from a
codicil to his last will and testament, that when he left Lisbon he owed
about two hundred ducats and half a mark of silver. He instructed his
son Diego to discharge these debts " for conscience' sake." Diego only
remembered these debts on his own death-bed, in 1523, when he ordered
them to be paid so " that his father's and his own soul should rest in
peace " (Navarrete, II., doc. 152).

8 It is true that Columbus, after the discovery of the Orinoco, in 1498,
spoke of " ma t extensive lands to the south, not known hitherto," but
this " Mondo novo," to his mind, was merely an appendage of Asia. This
is clearly shewn by his brother Bartholomew's map (see p. 36, No. 4).
Peter Martyr (Letter No. 136, October 1, 1493) already doubts that the
islands discovered by Columbus adjoined India, though merely on the
ground that the habitable world, according to Ptolemy, had an extent of
only 180" in lon^ivide.

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