The Portuguese, on the other hand, had for a considerable period been specializing in seamanship.  From his castle at Faro, on the southernmost shores of Portugal, where Prince Henry the Navigator had founded his maritime school, that royal scientist had watched with pride the captains whom he had trained as they sailed their vessels over the gold and blue horizon of the Far South, and had exultantly drunk in on their return the tales of new shores and of oceans ploughed for the first time; of spices, riches men, and beasts, all new and strange, and, all appealing strongly to the imagination of the learned Prince, who only restrained himself with difficulty from plunging into the unknown.

It was with men such as these of Prince Henry’s with whom the Genoese had been brought into contact on his first visit to Portugal.  That he had been received by this set as one of themselves is sufficiently evidenced by the fact of his marriage with a daughter of Bartholomew Perestrello.  It was naturally, therefore, to the Portuguese Government that Columbus first applied for the assistance in men and ships which were to bear him to the land which he so fiercely promised.

As has been said, there is no doubt that Columbus was a visionary who possessed a large amount of practical knowledge and experience, from which the indulgence in these visions sprang.  That his theories were the result of something more than the merest speculation is certain.  Maritime legend and lore were rife in Genoa and the Mediterranean, and certainly abounded in Portugal under the benevolent and strenuous encouragement of Prince Henry the Navigator.  That some vague echoes of the feats performed by the Norsemen and others who had long before won their way to the Western Continent had penetrated to these parts of Europe there is no doubt.  Columbus, moreover, had stayed for many months at one of those half-way houses between Europe and the western mainland, Porto Santo, and the neighbouring Island of Madeira.

His father-in-law was at the time Governor of the lesser island, that of Porto Santo.  In such a spot as this the requirements of Columbus were naturally few, and he had gained a livelihood with ease by the making of maps.  His father was a carder of wool at Genoa, and young Christopher, rebelling at the monotony of this trade, commenced his maritime life before he was fifteen years old.

It was doubtless while at Porto Santo that Columbus had thought out his theories, aided by not a little evidence of the material order, such as floating logs and other objects, which had sailed, wind and current borne, from the unknown lands across the Atlantic.  Columbus, of course, was not actually the first to feel convinced of the possibility of gaining India by sailing to the West; the theory had been held by Aristotle, Seneca, Strabo, and others.  The sole mistake Columbus made in his calculations was concerning the size of the world.  He had overestimated the extent of the Continent of Asia, and underestimated the extent of the Atlantic Ocean; he seems to have been convinced that a very few days’ sailing to the west of Madeira would bring him to the shores of India.  It was this error in calculation that undoubtedly was responsible for many long and agonizing hours spent on the actual voyage.