READING HALL

THE DOORS OF WISDOM

A HISTORY OF MODERN EUROPE : A.D. 1453-1900

CHAPTER VIII

THE COMMENCEMENT OF THE OCEAN NAVIGATION AND DISCOVERY OF THE NEW WORLD. ORIGIN OF EMBASSIES. PROGRESS OF THE ART OF WAR

THE period which we have been hitherto contemplating was marked by the commencement of ocean navigation, which, by the discoveries it effected, had a wonderful effect on the commerce of modern Europe, and on the respective power and resources of its several States. It therefore becomes necessary to give some account of these discoveries, which could not well have been presented, in a connected form, in the preceding chapters.

A knowledge of the properties of the magnet was a necessary antecedent of distant ocean voyages and the discovery of unknown lands. Like gunpowder, however, the magnetic needle was long known before it was applied to its present use. The invention of the compass has been attributed to Flavio Gioja, a native of Amalfi, who flourished about the beginning of the fourteenth century; but though Dr. Robertson laments that Gioja has been defrauded of his just fame, it is certain that the compass was known nearly two centuries before his time. It is minutely described in a Provençal poem by Guiot of Provins, supposed to have been written towards the end of the twelfth or beginning of the thirteenth century. The age of Guiot may indeed be disputed; yet that the compass was known at least in the first half of the thirteenth century, appears from the writings of Cardinal Vitry (Jacobus de Vitriaco), Bishop of Acre, in Syria, who died in 1214. Vitry, indeed, in his “History of the East”, confounds the magnet with the adamant or diamond, as some of our own writers have also done; yet he describes the polarity of the magnetic needle, and intimates its indispensable necessity to navigation. In 1203 the magnetic needle, fitted in a box, was in common use among the Norwegians. A letter written by Pietro Peregrini in 1269, and preserved among the manuscripts in the University of Leyden, contains a scientific account of the properties of the magnetic needle, and even of the construction of the azimuth compass. The description of Guiot of Provins, who was probably older than the authors cited, shows the compass in a very rudimentary state; merely a needle rubbed on a loadstone, and floating on a cork or other light substance in a vessel filled with water; a method, however, used early in the twelfth century by the Chinese, who were acquainted with the compass long before it was known in Europe. The English, with that talent for practical adaptation which characterizes them, seem to have made great improvements in the compass.

But although the compass was so early known, it was not till the fifteenth century that voyages of discovery were prosecuted on any systematic plan. The Spaniards had indeed discovered the Canary Islands about the middle of the fourteenth century, but rather by accident than from design; which might easily have happened, as they lie considerably less than 200 miles from the continent of Africa. Cape Non on that continent, which lies opposite to the Canaries, was long considered an impassable boundary, till an expedition fitted out by the Portuguese King John I, or the Bastard, in 1412, succeeded in doubling it and reaching Cape Bojador, 160 miles further. The only effect of this voyage was to awaken a desire for further discoveries. King John’s fourth son, Henry, who was distinguished both by an enterprising temper and a love of art and science, especially geography, establishing his residence at Sagres (Tercena Naval, afterwards called Villa do Infante), near Cape St. Vincent in the Algarves, gathered around him from all quarters men practically acquainted with navigation, as well as others versed in mathematics and astronomy, and discussed with them bold projects of maritime enterprise. Henry’s cares were rewarded by the discovery of the Madeiras (1419), and subsequently of the Azores, Cape Verde, and Guinea. His death in 1463 checked the progress of these voyages, which had extended to within five degrees of the equinoctial line.

The importance of these discoveries had roused the apprehension of the Portuguese that their title to the possession of them might be contested; and in order to settle this question, they applied to Pope Eugenius IV, who issued a bull liberally granting to Portugal all the lands from Cape Non to India! The Popes claimed a peculiar property in all islands and undiscovered lands, rather, it would seem, as the successors of the Roman emperors, than, as some authors have asserted, as the Vicars of Christ upon earth. The Guelf doctors and canonists held that the Pope was lord of all the world, while the Ghibeline doctors assigned that lordship to the Emperor. In accordance with the former of these views, Pope Adrian IV had bestowed Ireland on Henry II; and in 1295 Boniface VIII granted Gerba and some other islands on the African coast to Admiral Ruggiero di Loria, on condition of homage and tribute.

King Edward, the eldest brother of Prince Henry, and successor of their father John, and Edward’s son Alfonso V, did not pay much attention to navigation; but the spirit of maritime discovery was revived by Alfonso’s son John II, who ascended the throne in 1481. In 1484, a Portuguese fleet sailed 1,500 miles south of the line, and observed the stars and constellations of another hemisphere; settlements were made on the coast of Guinea, which were fortified, and a regular trade was established. From their own experience of the line of coast, as well as from information obtained from the natives, the Portuguese now began to conceive the possibility of reaching India by a southern navigation, agreeably to the ancient accounts of the Phoenician voyages. To acquire information and aid in effecting this design, John II dispatched two ambassadors to the King of Abyssinia, a Christian Prince, near the Red Sea, whom he supposed to be the Prester John, famed in the stories of eastern travelers, and from their inquiries it was evident that a passage round Africa to India was feasible. Meanwhile, however, Bartolomeo Diaz had already set off to attempt it. In spite of great dangers from storms and mutinous crews, this enterprising navigator sailed far enough south not only to descry but to double the Cabo Tormentoso, or Cape of Storms, the southern boundary of Africa (1487); and as the coast beyond was ascertained to trend to the north-east, the prospect of success seemed now so clear that King John renamed this headland Cabo de Bona Esperança, or Cape of Good Hope.

The discoveries and conquests of the Portuguese in the East Indies were, however, reserved to be effected in the reign of John II’s cousin, Emanuel the Great, who ascended the throne on John’s death in 1495. Vasco da Gama, having doubled the Cape of Good Hope, arrived at Calicut on the Malabar coast in May, 1498, and returned to Portugal in the following year; without indeed having founded any settlement, but bringing home a rich cargo of the various products of the country. In 1500 Pedro Alvarez Cabral, with a Portuguese fleet, having stood to the westward in order to avoid the calms and variable breezes on the African coast, arrived off the coast of Brazil and took possession of that country, of which Cabral considered himself the discoverer, for the Crown of Portugal. But though his pretensions in this respect have till lately been sanctioned by the highest authorities, it appears from more recent researches that two Castilian navigators, one of whom was Vicente Pinzon, the companion of Columbus, had previously landed there and claimed the country for Spain. These conflicting pretensions were settled by the treaty of Tordesillas, to which we shall advert further on.

While the Portuguese were making this progress in eastern navigation, the Spaniards had made still more brilliant and striking discoveries in a new hemisphere, though probably not more important in a commercial point of view.

The existence of a fourth continent and of a race of antipodes had been at least suspected by the ancients centuries before the beginning of our era. The sphericity of the earth was known to the Pythagoreans. Plato in his Timaeus refers to an Atlantis greater than Asia and Africa put together. Aristotle asserted the possibility of sailing from the extremity of Europe or Africa to the eastern parts of Asia, and the same idea was adopted by Strabo. Aristotle likewise thought it probable that there were other lands in the opposite hemisphere; and Elian also maintained the existence of a fourth continent of enormous extent. Seneca the philosopher affirms that with a fair wind the voyage from Spain to the Indies might be accomplished in a few days; and the same writer in one of his tragedies has uttered on the subject the following most precise and striking prophecy:

“The time will come in distant years when Ocean

may relax the bonds of things, and an immense region be laid open:

Tethys may then unveil new worlds, and Thule

be no longer the remotest spot of land”.

A prophecy which could hardly have been uttered but for the prevailing opinion among the learned just alluded to.

This remarkably consentient opinion of civilized antiquity continued to prevail during the earlier ages of Christianity till the Doctors of the Church, with that narrowness of view which led them to stifle all liberal knowledge, did their best to suppress it, and thus contributed to defer its realization. The work called Christian Topography, attributed to Cosmas Indicopleustes, exhibits the strange geographical notions which must have been entertained by the Fathers of the Church. It is a return to barbarism. The earth is described as a vast oblong plain, more than twice as long from east to west as it is broad, and surrounded by the ocean. The old idea nevertheless partially survived, and was recorded by Roger Bacon in the thirteenth century, and by other writers in the Middle Ages.

Even the circumnavigation of Africa by the Portuguese had been anticipated six centuries before the Christian era. With some minds antiquity is a fatal objection to any narrative that appears a little extraordinary, or that runs counter to their own narrow prejudices: yet a capricious incredulity is a more dangerous critical fault than too ready a belief; and there are two circumstances in Herodotus’s narration of the voyage round the African continent, undertaken by some Phoenician mariners at the command of Pharaoh Necho, which give it an indelible stamp of truth. By this voyage it was discovered that Africa was detached from any other continent except at the Isthmus of Suez, and could consequently be circumnavigated. Again, the Phoenicians asserted that on their voyage (which, as they started from the Red Sea and returned by the Columns of Hercules, or Straits of Gibraltar, was performed from east to west) they had the sun on the right hand. Both these circumstances are true, yet neither could be guessed a priori; the latter indeed was so contrary to all experience and probability, that Herodotus himself refused to believe it. These two facts are sufficient to dispose of the futile objections which have been raised against the story.

It is probable that America had been visited by Europeans centuries before the time of Columbus. Historians who long preceded him have related that, towards the close of the tenth century, Eric Rauda, Biorn, and other Icelandic navigators, visited Greenland and a country lying to the south-west of it, which they called Winland, from its grapes. In this country the sun is described as being eight hours above the horizon in the shortest day; and as this would happen in about latitude 49°, Winland was probably Newfoundland. A colony was settled there, but after a time all intercourse with it was dropped. As the distance between Iceland and Greenland is not great, there is no a priori improbability in this account, which is attested by most respectable authorities. Other voyages and discoveries, as that of the Welsh Prince Madoc ap Owen in 1170, and the navigation towards India by the west of the two Genoese, Guido de Vivaldi and Teodosio Doria, in 1281 and 1292, are perhaps not so well authenticated. But in the time of Columbus these discoveries seem to have fallen into oblivion.

CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS

Little is known about the early life of Christopher Columbus. He was a native of the territory of Genoa, but the year of his birth is so utterly unknown as to have been variously placed between 1430 and 1455. It was probably 1436. Columbus was bred to the sea, and served not only in the merchant service, but also in some warlike maritime expeditions, as that of John of Anjou for the conquest of Naples in 1459, and in some cruises against the Turks and Venetians, in which ho distinguished himself by his bravery. According to his own account, Columbus visited Tille, or Thule, by which he probably meant either the Feroe Isles or Iceland. In 1470 he proceeded to Portugal, and remained in that country till 1484. His love of enterprise was no doubt stimulated by the maritime discoveries of the Portuguese; and it has been recently proved that he conceived the first idea of his great discovery shortly after his arrival in that country, and consequently three years before he was in communication on the subject with Paolo Toscanelli. There can be no doubt, however, that his correspondence with Toscanelli, a Florentine physician and distinguished cosmographer, fortified Columbus in his project. Everything proves that his original idea and principal purpose were to reverse the Portuguese method, and to seek a passage to India, the land of gold and spices, by sailing westward; and that the discovery of lands between Europe and the eastern shores of India was only a secondary consideration both with him and Toscanelli. The idea was necessarily founded on the sphericity of the earth, and on the geographical opinions of some of the ancients, which, as we have said, were not altogether extinguished during the Middle Ages, and which Columbus appears to have more immediately derived from the treatise De Imagine Mundi of Pierre d’Ailly, Bishop of Cambray. The theory that an unknown land, which he supposed to be India, lay at no great distance in the western ocean, was confirmed by the circumstance of trees, pieces of carved timber, and other things, having been cast by the waves on the coast of Madeira and the Azores; nay, even the bodies of two men of unknown race. Columbus was also encouraged by his own errors and those of the authors on whom he relied. He did not imagine that the globe was so large as it really is, and thought that India extended much further to the east, leaving consequently a smaller space of ocean to be traversed.

It does not detract from the merit of Columbus that his project was founded on the previous opinions of others, and on such slight evidence in favor of it as could be collected; on the contrary, allowing it to be possible that the idea could have even entered his mind without these aids, still he would rather deserve to be called a madman than the greatest of all discoverers, if he had set out on his voyage without a rational probability of success. His merit consists in having realized, by courage and perseverance, what others had only speculated on in their closets. Like Luther, and all the other great benefactors of mankind, he was the man of action. Thought is a noble thing, and must necessarily precede all great and noble undertakings; but so long as it remains merely thought, it is of no practical benefit to mankind.

It is well known what difficulty Columbus found to persuade the Princes and Powers of the world to help him in realizing the magnificent theory which had taken such complete possession of his own mind. For many years he applied in vain, first to the Genoese Republic,—for he wished to bestow on his own country the honor and profit of that great discovery and precious birth of time—as well as to the governments of Portugal, England, and Spain. He was not, however, a man to be easily discouraged and thrust aside. Like most great geniuses, he had a vein of enthusiasm in his temper; and it appears from the frequency of his citing it, that the aforementioned prophecy of Seneca had made a deep impression on his mind; deeper, perhaps, than the more learned opinions of the ancient writers. This disposition degenerated, indeed, in his old age into a kind of superstition, when his soul, like that of Newton, became engrossed by a mystic theology. In a letter addressed to Ferdinand and Isabella from Jamaica, in July 1503, and still more strongly in the sketch of his extravagant work entitled Prophecies (Profecias), written a year or two later, he professes that neither human reason, nor mathematical science, nor maps of the world had been of any service in his enterprise, which was simply an accomplishment of the predictions of Isaiah. This result, and the gold which his discoveries might afford for effecting the conquest of the Holy Sepulcher, are, he asserts, alone of importance. All the letters of Columbus, indeed, express the greatest anxiety to amass gold; but this sordid desire is covered with the veil of religion. Thus in one of his letters he says: “Gold is a most excellent thing; whoever possesses it is master of everything in the world; it even brings souls into Paradise” a reference apparently to the practice of buying indulgences.

We have entered rather fully into the circumstances which led to the discovery of America, both because that event is one of the most striking and important of the 15th century, and because it is, perhaps, more entertaining and instructive to trace the rise and development of a great idea than to detail the steps by which it was carried into practical execution. The latter, indeed, our space does not allow, nor is it necessary to our purpose. The narratives of the discoveries, conquests, and settlements of the Portuguese and Spaniards in the East and West Indies are episodes in the history of Europe, important only in relation to the effects which they produced on its commerce, politics, and manners; and we shall therefore only briefly indicate the leading-features of these discoveries.

Shortly after the conquest of Granada by the Spanish Sovereigns in 1102, Columbus, after many tedious years of suspense, at length succeeded in gaining for his scheme the sanction and assistance of Queen Isabella. An agreement was signed with him constituting him High Admiral in all the seas and Viceroy in all the lands which he might discover, securing him one-tenth of the net profits of their products, and another one-eighth on condition of his furnishing one-eighth of the expense of the expedition. Ferdinand, though he signed this agreement, refused to take any part in the enterprise, the expenses and profits of which were therefore limited to Castile. Columbus appears to have been aided in advancing his stipulated share of the outfit by Martin Pinzon, a wealthy ship-owner and experienced navigator of Palos de Moguer, a little seaport town in Andalusia. Pinzon had been one of the chief patrons of his scheme, and with his brothers Vicente and Francisco, not only furnished one of the vessels required for the expedition, but also engaged personally to accompany it.

On the 3rd of August, 1492, Columbus left the mouth of the Odiel with his little squadron, consisting of three ships; the largest of which, the Santa Maria, in which he hoisted his flag, was under 100 tons’ burden, and the only one decked. The two other vessels, called caravels, were little better than boats, being open in the center, with cabins in the stem and forecastle. Our limits will not permit us to pursue the details of this extraordinary voyage which forms, perhaps, the most interesting chapter in all the records of human adventure. Suffice it to say that, after touching at the Canaries to refit, and again sailing thence on September 6th, the sagacity and perseverance of Columbus, and the courage and fortitude with which he braved not only the perils of that long and unknown navigation, but also the still more formidable danger of alarmed and mutinous crews, were at length rewarded by the discovery of land (Friday, October 12th). This proved to be one of the Bahama islands. Columbus called it San Salvador, but it is better known by the native name of Guanahani. In his further searches he discovered the large and important islands of Cuba and Haiti, the latter of which he called Hispaniola. The loss, however, of his largest ship, and other events, compelled Columbus to return to Europe. After building a little wooden fort which he called Navidad, or Christmas, where he left a garrison of thirty-nine men, he set sail from Hispaniola, January 4th, 1493; and after many adventures, being driven by a fearful storm into the Tagus, he landed at Lisbon, February 24th. Here he had an interview with King John II, who received him with much apparent honor, but with secret jealousy and mortification at his success. Columbus arrived at Palos March 10th, seven months and eleven days after the date of his sailing thence. In proof of his success he had brought home with him some native Indians, as well as birds, stuffed specimens of animals, and bracelets and other ornaments of gold. We have already adverted to the splendid reception which he met with from Ferdinand and Isabella at Barcelona.

The Spanish Sovereigns were readily induced by the success of Columbus’s first voyage to fit out another expedition on a larger scale. A fleet of seventeen ships was prepared, reckoned to carry 1,500 persons, with all the means and appliances necessary for colonizing; and so great was now the ardor to share in the enterprise that many persons of distinction volunteered to join it. A board was established at Seville for the management of the affairs of India; for Columbus still believed that he had touched at the eastern parts of that country; whence the islands which he discovered have still retained the name of Indies, though qualified with the epithet of West.

There was one circumstance, however, which gave the Catholic Sovereigns some uneasiness. They felt no scruple in wresting these newly discovered lands from their native masters, who were infidels and enemies of Christ, and consequently their possessions conceived to be lawfully at the mercy of the first Christian Prince who could seize upon them; but the King of Portugal, as we have said, had already obtained from the Pope a donation of the Indies, and King John had referred to this matter in his interview with Columbus at Lisbon. A fresh appeal to the Pope seemed to be the only way to escape this embarrassment. Alexander VI, who then occupied the See of Peter, was a Spaniard by birth, and might be presumed therefore to new with favor the claims of the Spanish Sovereigns; which, however, were urged upon him in that high and independent tone which, in the midst of all its bigotry, distinguished at that time the intercourse of the Spanish Court with Rome. Alexander readily undertook to settle a question which appeared to him the simplest in the world. The theory of the sphericity of the earth, on which the discoveries of Columbus were founded, and in accordance with which the Spanish and Portuguese adventurers might come into collision in their new settlements, was an erroneous notion which could not for a moment be entertained by the See of Rome. Unfolding the orthodox map, before mentioned, of Cosmas Indicopleustes, from which it appeared that the longer the Spaniards sailed to the west, and the Portuguese to the east, the further they would be separated from one another, Pope Alexander drew with infallible hand from north to south a line of demarcation, passing 100 leagues to the west of the Azores and Cape Verde; all to the east of this line he gave to Portugal, all to the west, to Spain.

The jealousy of the King of Portugal, however, was not so easily appeased. By the advice of some of his courtiers he had prepared, under pretense of an expedition to Africa, a naval armament, destined to seize the countries discovered by Columbus; and as King Ferdinand had heard of these preparations, a keen diplomatic game ensued between the two Sovereigns. After lengthened negotiations, the points in dispute between the two Courts were arranged by the treaty of Tordesillas, June 7th, 1401, by which it was agreed that the line of demarcation should be placed 370 leagues to the west of the Cape Verde Islands. Under this treaty the Portuguese subsequently claimed Brazil.

Meanwhile Columbus had set sail from Cadiz on his second voyage, September 25th, 149, carrying with him Father Boyl and a troop of friars destined to convert the natives. He now held a more southerly course, which brought him to the Caribe Islands, November 2nd. Dominica, Marigalante, Guadalupe, Antigua, San Juan de Puerto Rico, and other islands, were successively discovered, and found to be inhabited by a race of ferocious cannibals, the very reverse of the gentle natives whom he had met with in his former voyage. On arriving at his settlement of Navidad, in Hispaniola, he found that all his men had been destroyed by the natives, whom they had ill-treated. Having now greater means at his disposal, he founded a town, which he named Isabella, in honor of the Queen of Castile, and soon after erected Fort St. Thomas. But he had great difficulties to contend with. His followers were discontented and mutinous, and not the least turbulent among them was Father Boyl. Columbus now deemed it prudent to send home twelve ships for reinforcements. Meanwhile he set out on a further voyage (April 24th, 1491), which, however, after a five months’ cruise, ended only in discovering Jamaica. On his return to Hispaniola, he found his colony there in the greatest distress. In March, 1496, he returned to Europe, where a new plan was formed of a settlement on a more extended scale; and as gold dust had been discovered in Hispaniola, the attention of the settlers was to be directed, not to cultivation, but to the working of that precious metal. Two years were spent in preparation, and in July, 1498, Columbus again set sail with only six ships. On this occasion he steered due south till near the equinoctial line, and then to the west. Trinidad was discovered August 1st, and soon after the American continent (Paria and Cumana) with the small adjacent islands. On the 30th of August he again reached Hispaniola. The success of Columbus stimulated other navigators to emulate his voyages. One of the most eminent of those who followed in his track, the Florentine Amerigo Vespucci, had either the address or the good fortune to make it appear that he had first discovered the American continent in 1497, which to the disparagement of Columbus, has from him derived its name.

The profits of Columbus’s discoveries did not answer the expectations of the Spanish Sovereigns; jealousy and envy were at work against him, the minds of Ferdinand and Isabella were poisoned by the machinations of his enemies, and in 1500 Don Francisco de Bovadilla, Commander of the Order of Calatrava, was dispatched to Hispaniola to inquire into the charges of mal­administration which had been brought against the Indian Viceroy. Bovadilla was a man of small and malignant mind; he encouraged the colonists to bring accusations against Columbus, whom he caused to be arrested, and sent home in irons. On Columbus’s arrival in Spain, December 17th, 1500, the Spanish Sovereigns ordered him, indeed, to be set at liberty; but although he cleared himself from the charges brought against him, he was superseded in the government of Hispaniola.

The active mind of Columbus was still brooding over new schemes of discovery. The experience of his former voyages had taught him that he must look still further for the shores of India; he anticipated the existence of the great Pacific Ocean, which he thought might perhaps be entered by a narrow strait, and India reached. He set out from Cadiz on his fourth and last voyage, May 0th, 1502, with only four small barks, and discovered on this occasion the coast of the American main from Cape Gracias a Dios to Puertobello; but he was not destined to behold the Pacific. Compelled to quit the Honduras coast by violent hurricanes, he bore away for Hispaniola, and in the passage was wrecked at Jamaica. Here he was forced to linger more than a year; for, though two of his officers, Mendez a Spaniard, and Fieschi a Genoese, had with incredible difficulty and danger contrived to reach Hispaniola in a canoe, Ovando, the governor, from a mean jealousy of Columbus, could not for a long period be persuaded to send a vessel to bring him away. It was impossible for the Admiral to remain in Hispaniola with a man of the temper of Ovando; he quitted that island as soon as he could, and arrived at San Lucar, in Andalusia, December, 1504. Queen Isabella was now dead. The mean and ungrateful Ferdinand evaded the recognition of Columbus’s claims under the agreement of 1492, amusing him with fair words and deceitful promises; till the great navigator, worn out by blasted hopes and the fatigues and troubles which he had undergone, died, unrewarded, at Valladolid, May 20th, 1500. Ferdinand may surely claim the first rank in the list of pseudo and ungrateful patrons. Of Gonsalvo, indeed, who had acquired for him the Kingdom of Naples, and who was allowed to end his days in banishment and disgrace, it may be said that he had only discharged his duty as his Sovereign’s officer; but Columbus, who had added a new world to the dominions of Spain, was actually cheated out of the reward stipulated by a solemn agreement under the royal hand.

ALFONSO ALBUQUERQUE

We shall only briefly pursue the principal remaining discoveries of the Spaniards and Portuguese during the period comprised in the preceding pages. In 1508 Puerto Rico was settled by the Spaniards. In 1509 Juan Diaz de Solis and Pinzon discovered long reaches of the coasts of South America, landed in several places, and took possession for the Crown of Spain. In 1511 Cuba was reduced by Diego Velasquez; and in the following year Florida was explored by Ponce dc Leon. Ponce is said to have undertaken this voyage with a view to discover a miraculous fountain, whose waters were reputed to restore to the aged and decrepit all the vigor and beauty of youth. In 1513 Balboa penetrated into the Isthmus of Darien, and from the top of the Sierra de Quarequa first beheld the vast expense of the South Sea—a discovery which excited almost as great a sensation as that of America.

Meanwhile the Portuguese had been extending their conquests and settlements in the East. Cabral, to whose expedition we have before adverted, established friendly relations with the Zamorin, or Ruler of Calicut, whose dominion extended over Malabar, and thence he pursued his voyage to Cochin and Cananor. The renowned Alfonso Albuquerque was, however, the chief founder of Portuguese power in India. He established a settlement at Goa, in the middle of the Malabar coast, one of the most advantageous posts in India (1508); and subsequently, by his conquest of the island of Ormus, at the entrance of the Persian Gulf, obtained a station which commanded the trade between Persia and the East Indies. The Portuguese went on adding to their settlements at Malacca, the Molucca Islands, Ceylon, and other places; and though the route to India through Egypt and the Red Sea still lay open to European commerce, yet it had been rendered almost useless by the command which the Portuguese had obtained of the Indian markets, as well as by the superior advantages of the sea route.

England was not altogether without participation in these great maritime discoveries. In 1497, under the auspices of Henry VII, Sebastian Cabot, a native of Bristol, and one of three sons of John Cabot, a Venetian merchant settled in that city, sailed round the northern coast of Labrador, and penetrated into Hudson’s Bay, in the attempt to find a north-west passage to India. He reached as far as 67’5 north; but being unable to go further, sailed to the south along the coast of America as far as 38º. His enterprise, however, led to no immediate advantage; for though some subsequent voyages were made, no trade or settlements were established. Thus the navigation of the Atlantic was first opened by men springing from the two great maritime Republics of Genoa and Venice, on whose Mediterranean commerce these discoveries were to inflict a fatal blow. The voyages of the French to Canada fall after this period.

The commercial effects of the discoveries in the East and West Indies were not immediately felt. We shall, therefore, postpone the consideration of them, and close this chapter by describing some of the results of the new European System, the commencement of which, inaugurated by the Italian wars of the French, has been shown in Chapter V. As before observed, one of the effects of it was to establish a sort of community of nations, maintained by negotiations, treaties, and finally by a code of international law. In this intercourse of nations, ambassadors were necessary, and we will here give a brief sketch of the origin and progress of their functions.

Ambassadors, who in early times, and even in the reign of Henry VIII, were called orators, were, of course, at all periods occasionally necessary in the intercourse of nations; yet except among the Venetians, embassy, as a diplomatic office, was unknown in the middle ages, and the functions of an ambassador were from time to time discharged by eminent men, when the interests of their country might require their services. The custom of employing resident ambassadors belongs to the period of modern history; for though the Kings of Poland and Sweden, the Knights of St. John and of the Teutonic Order, had residents at Rome in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, who bore the title of procurators, these seem different from what we properly understand by the term ambassador. Mr. Prescott ascribes the introduction of resident ambassadors to Ferdinand the Catholic of Spain. The practice, however, does not appear to have become common till towards the middle of the sixteenth century; nor indeed during the whole of that century can the diplomatic career be said to have been thoroughly established, as the office of ambassador was often filled not by regularly bred diplomatists, but by distinguished ecclesiastics, magistrates, and influential citizens.

The Florentines distinguished themselves from an early period as diplomatists and ambassadors; and often undertook the office not only for their own city but also for foreign States; thus escaping one part of Sir Henry Wotton’s definition, that, “an ambassador is a clever man sent abroad to lie for his country”. Each of Florence’s great literary triumvirate, Dante, Petrarca, and Boccaccio, was employed as an ambassador, and at a later period Machiavelli distinguished himself in the same capacity. His dispatches, under the title of Legazioni, are published among his works, and although not correctly arranged, contain a treasure of authentic information respecting the persons as well as the political relations of the period. The Venetians, however, were the first to bestow any systematic attention upon embassies. The Venetian Signory, by an order of September 9th, 1268, directed their ambassadors to deliver up on their return all the presents they had received; and in December of the same year the Great Council ordered them to make a report of what might be useful to the Government. It was necessary that the Venetian ambassadors should be nobles and past the age of thirty-eight. In the sixteenth century, after the custom of resident ambassadors had been introduced, the term of Venetian embassies was restricted to three years, lest the patriotism of the ambassadors should be weakened by too long a residence abroad. The disadvantages attending the appointment of a new and inexperienced minister were thought to be counterbalanced by the number of men conversant with foreign affairs which by this arrangement would be always congregated at Venice: nor did their recall preclude them from being again appointed. We have already alluded to their reports, or Relationi, which in process of time became elaborate descriptions of the countries and courts to which they were accredited. The substance of some of the oldest of them is preserved in the Chronicle of Marino Sanuto.

The ambassadors of Rome were divided into two classes; if Cardinals, they bore the title of Legates, while other Papal ambassadors of high rank were called Nuncios. In the middle ages, Legates were frequent enough, while in modern times Cardinals are seldom sent in a diplomatic character. The ambassadors of Rome hold the highest place in the diplomatic body: they are now always Archbishops, mostly in partibus; a condition not indispensable in the middle of the sixteenth century, when persons who were not even clerical had the office and title of Nuncios, as Castiglione and Acciajuoli under Clement VII. The reports of some of the Roman ambassadors, like those of the Venetian, have become important historical papers.

Ambassadors had the title of Excellence at the beginning of the sixteenth century, though perhaps only by courtesy. The official address was Magnifico Oratore or Magnifico Signore. Charles V ordered that the title of ambassador should be given only to the envoys of Kings and of the Republic of Venice, and not to the agents of any vassal State. After the Papal ambassadors, the Venetian had the precedence. In Italy the Imperial ambassadors naturally took the first place; next those of France, and then those of Spain. It was usual in former times for ambassadors to follow the movements of the Court to which they were accredited, whithersoever it went; and as journeys were then generally made on horseback, they had thus a good opportunity of becoming acquainted with the countries which they visited.

In the middle ages treaties were promulgated by the voice of the herald, nor was it customary to print and publish them till long after the invention of printing. The Golden Bull, however, the fundamental law of the Holy Roman Empire, forms an exception, which appeared at Nuremberg in Latin in 1474, and at Ulm and Strasburg in German in 1484 and 1485. The Annales Ecclesiastici of Baronius, the first volume of which appeared at Rome in 1588, is one of the earliest historical works in which treaties are inserted.

Of international law, another and very important result of the European system, we shall speak in a subsequent chapter, as its foundations were hardly laid in the period we are considering; and we will close this chapter with some account of the methods of warfare at this period.

SYSTEMS OF MODERN WARFARE

Even at the beginning of the sixteenth century the gens d'armes, or heavy cavalry, were still pretty generally regarded, at least in Western Europe, as forming the pith of armies; though in the Spanish forces the heavy cavalry were not so numerous as the light, who fought in Moorish fashion. The Burgundian gens d'armes had a great reputation. Infantry, however, were now beginning to be more employed. During the preceding century, and especially the first half of it, little or no care had been bestowed on the raising or discipline of the infantry, who were considered incompetent to resist cavalry. Yet those horsemen all cased in iron, who fought with long lances and heavy swords, could not engage except upon an open plain; a small fortification, a little stream, even a ditch, arrested them; and it was rarely that they ventured to attack an entrenched camp. Thus an engagement could not take place unless the generals on both sides were desirous of it; and in Italy, especially, there was frequently no pitched battle, scarcely even a skirmish, in the course of a war. The expeditions were confined to what were called cavalcades, or forays into the enemy's country; when the horsemen swept over the plains, destroying the crops, carrying off the cattle, and burning the houses. In short, war was thus made upon the people, and not against the enemy’s army.

The Swiss, whose mountainous country is ill adapted to horse­men, were the first European people who organized a formidable infantry; and its effect on the Burgundian horsemen has been seen. The Swiss foot soldiers were armed with pikes of enormous length, or halberds; they had gigantic sabres, wielded with both hands, and a club armed with points of iron, called the Morgen-stern, or morning-star. Such arms were necessary against the helms and cuirasses of mounted knights. Among the German peasantry, oppressed and discontented for a long series of years, it was also easy to raise soldiers, and it was in their villages that were recruited the lance-knights, Lanzknechte, whence the French lansquenets, who played so great a part in the wars of Europe during the period we are contemplating. In this respect the example of their Swiss neighbors had a great influence upon them. The German lance-men were also, as their name implies, armed with long spears. But however effective against cavalry, those troops could not contend in close combat with the short swords of the Spanish infantry.

The missile weapons used before the introduction of muskets were arrows, discharged from bows or crossbows. Hand-guns, or arquebuses, are first mentioned in 1432, when Sigismund, on his journey into Italy, had a guard of 500 men so armed. These arquebuses were so heavy as to require a rest, and were fired with a matchlock, which inconveniences long caused them to be considered inferior to the crossbow. It appears from a passage of Aeneas Sylvius, that the hand-guns used in 1459 were also without locks. Muskets, or pistols, with locks were first made at Nuremberg in 1517.But a century elapsed before the bow was quite laid aside. Artillery (in the modern sense of the word) had come into pretty general use before the end of the fourteenth century. It seems to have been first used by the Moors in their wars with the Spaniards about 1312. In 1339 the Scots battered the walls of Stirling Castle with bombards, and the Turks are said to have used artillery with effect at the first siege of Constantinople in 1422. The use of gunpowder in mining was a Spanish invention, first adopted by Francisco Ramirez at the siege of Malaga in 1487. Pedro Navarro afterwards used mines on a more extended and scientific scale in the Italian wars of the sixteenth century, as before related.

In a military point of view, the nations of Eastern Europe presented some peculiar features. They possessed few fortresses in comparison with the Romance or Teutonic nations, and their chief military force, even down to the seventeenth century, consisted of enormous bodies of cavalry. Louis, King of Hungary and Poland, often assembled, about the middle of the fourteenth century, an army of 40,000 or 50,000 horsemen, to the astonishment of the Italians, who in their most important wars could hardly raise 3,000. The Hungarians served like the Poles on the condition of their tenures. Although well mounted they were badly armed, having only a long sword, a bow and arrows, and no coat of mail; for which, however, a thick jacket formed a kind of substitute. It was computed in the sixteenth century that the Polish cavalry was equal in number to that of Spain, France, and Germany combined. The Grand-Prince of Moscow could bring into the field 150,000 mounted combatants. The force of the Voyvodes of Transylvania, Moldavia, and Wallachia was reckoned at 50,000 horsemen each, and the Szekler in Hungary at 60.000. Beyond were the bordering Tartar hordes, who may be said to have lived on horseback.

We have already adverted to the origin of standing armies in the reign of Charles VII of France, and previously among the Turks; but it was long before they were kept up in any force, and only some garrisons and a few gens d'armes were retained in time of peace. The institution of standing armies, like every other division of labor, must, on the whole, be regarded as having promoted civilization, by enabling those not engaged in military service to direct their whole attention to other pursuits. This institution was one of the effects of centralization, or the establishment of the great monarchies, the progress of which we have already seen. But this centralization was not yet complete. Considerable remains of feudalism still lingered in Europe, and we shall see in the sequel its gradual extinction.

We now resume the narrative.

CHAPTER IX

FROM THE ELECTION OF POPE LEO X TO THE ELECTION OF CHARLES V AS EMPEROR, AND THE DIET OF WORMS, 1513-1521