The great problem was always before him, how he should connect his discoveries with the knowledge which Europe had before of the coast of Asia.  Always it seemed to him that the dominions of the Great Khan were within his reach.  Always he was eager for that happy moment when he should find himself in personal communication with that great monarch, who had been so long the monarch of the East—­who, as he thought, would prove to be the monarch of the West.

Columbus died with the idea that he had come close to Asia.  Even a generation after his death, the companions of Cortes gave to the peninsula of California that name because it was the name given in romance to the farthest island of the eastern Indies.

Columbus met with many reverses, and died, one might almost say, a broken-hearted man.  But history has been just to him, and has placed him in the foremost rank of the men who have set the world forward.  And, outside of the technical study of history, those who like to trace the laws on which human progress advances have been proud and glad to see that here is a noble example of the triumph of faith.

The life of Columbus is an illustration constantly brought forward of the success which God gives to those who, having conceived of a great idea, bravely determine to carry it through.

His singleness of purpose, his unselfishness, his determination to succeed, have been cited for four centuries, and will be cited for centuries more, among the noblest illustrations which history has given, of success wrought out by the courage of one man.

APPENDIX A.

(The following passages, from Admiral Fox’s report, give his reasons for believing that Samana, or Atwood’s Key, is the island where Columbus first touched land.  The interest which attaches to this subject at the moment of the centennial, when many voyages will be made by persons following Columbus, induces me to copy Admiral Fox’s reasonings in detail.  I believe his conclusion to be correct.)

This method of applying Columbus’s words in detail to refute each of the alleged tracks, and the study that I gave to the subject in the winter of 1878-79 in the Bahamas, which has been familiar cruising ground to me, has resulted in the selection of Samana or Atwood’s Key for the first landing place.

It is a little island 8.8 miles east and west; 1.6 extreme breadth, and averaging 1.2 north and south.  It has 8.6 square miles.  The east end is in latitude 23 degrees 5’ N.; longitude 73 degrees 37’ west of Greenwich.  The reef on which it lies is 15 by 2 1/2 miles.

On the southeast this reef stretches half a mile from the land, on the east four miles, on the west two, along the north shore one-quarter to one-half mile, and on the southwest scarcely one-quarter.  Turk is smaller than Samana, and Cat very much larger.

The selection of two so unlike in size show that dimension has not been considered essential in choosing an island for the first landfall.(*)