derful

Columbus a wonderful fountain, whose waters would The wonrestore youth to any one who should bathe in them. fountain. Ponce de Leon was a Spaniard and a brave soldier; he had sailed with Columbus on his second voyage, and was finally made governor of the Island of Porto Rico. But he had heard of the fountain of youth, and resolved to discover it; and so sailed westward from Porto Rico in March, 1512, on that errand. At last, on Easter Sunday, a day which Spaniards call Pascua Florida, or Flowery Easter, - land was seen. It was the peninsula of Florida, then thought to be an island; and its blossoming forests seemed to him so beautiful, that he gave it this name.

Ponce de Leon landed near what is now St. Augustine. He explored the coasts and islands for many weeks, and then returned home. He visited the flowery land again, five years after, meaning to establish a colony, but was driven away by the Indians, was wounded with an arrow, and went back to Spain to die, without ever finding the fountain of youth.

coverers.

It would be interesting to tell of other voyages that other distook place in those years, when the New World seemed to Europeans so very new. It is exciting to hear how Balboa, crossing the Isthmus of Darien in 1513, came for the first time in sight of an unknown sea, - the vast Pacific Ocean; how he knelt on the mountain-top from which he saw it, and thanked God for this great discovery; and how, descending to the shore, he waded in, waist deep, and, waving his sword, took possession of the ocean for the king of Spain, and pledged himself to defend it for his sovereign. It is interesting to read the adventures of Cortez, who conquered Mexico,

Voyage of
Verrazzano.

Appearance of

the coast

and of Pizarro, who overcame Peru. But, as these things do not strictly belong to the history of the United States, this is not the place to describe them; and I shall only speak of one more of the early voyages, that of Verrazzano, or Verrazzani, an Italian in French employ.

This voyage is important, because Verrazzano has left us the earliest full description of the North American coast. He sailed from France, by way of Madeira, in 1524, leaving that island with a single vessel, and spending fifty days before seeing land. At last he reached the shore of North Carolina, and followed it southward for a time; then sailed northward, carefully examining the coast. He put into what is now the harbor of New York, and afterwards into what is now the harbor of Newport, R. I. There he stayed a fortnight, trading with the Indians, and he mentions that he found vines and grapes there, just as the Northmen described them in Vinland, long before. Then he sailed along the New-England coast to Nova Scotia, still trading with the Indians on the way. His narrative, as translated in an old collection of voyages, describes the savages as "coming to the seashore upon certain craggy rocks; and we standing in our boats, they let down with a rope what it pleased them to give us, crying continually that we should not approache to the land, demanding immediately the exchange, taking nothing but knives, fish-hookes, and tooles to cut withal; neither did they make any account of our courtesie."

Think how strange it would be, if we were to sail along the Atlantic coast, and not meet so much as a

early days.

zanno's

report.

fishing-vessel! It would be strange never to see a in those lighthouse, a buoy, or a wharf; and to enter New York harbor, and see only a few wooded hills and uninhabited islands, but no sign of human life, except, perhaps, a half-naked Indian standing on the shore. Yet this is what Verrazzano did. He carried home full accounts Verraz of what he saw. He thought that the savages were "like the people in the uttermost parts of China," and that "these new countries were not altogether destitute of the drugs and spicery, pearls and gold," for which everybody was so eager. King Francis I. was quite delighted. He said that he "did not think God had created those new countries for the Castilians alone: but it is not certain whether he sent out a second expedition; or whether Verrazzano made any more voyages, or what became of him.

CHAPTER VIL

First explorers

HOW AMERICA WAS EXPLORED AND SETTLED.

THE

HESE were some of the first voyages to America, made by Columbus, the Cabots, Ponce de Leon, and Verrazzano. But after the continent was fairly discovered, the next question was, Who should explore it, and claim it, and settle it ?

It has always seemed to me that the first explorers of North America were very much like a family of boys to a family who have discovered a large pond in the woods, some

compared

of boys.

where within reach of their dwelling-house. The boys wish to be always on the water, and are constantly exploring. They have different objects: some go merely for the fun of it; others to catch fish; others, to look for blackbirds' nests among the reeds; others, to find a shorter route to the village or to the schoolhouse. What wonderful stories they tell their little sisters about the things they have seen by the side of the lake! By degrees they know the whole shore very well, and can find their way anywhere. Yet if they were to sit down at night to draw the outline of that shore from memory, - with all the ins and outs, all the bays and the islands,

no two would draw it alike; and the different maps would look very strangely side by side.

Now, this is precisely the way it was with those who

first came to the shores of the North-American Continent. Everybody wished to see the new country. Eagerness Everybody who came saw something wonderful; and the New

to visit

each described even more wonders than he had seen. World. The returning sailors told of giants and Amazons, of countries where the sands sparkled with gems, and

of rivers in which were found golden pebbles as large as hens' eggs. So there was immediately the greatest eagerness to undertake voyages to these new lands. Some large towns in Spain lost half their inhabitants, so many people went on these expeditions. The Spaniards generally went for gold; the Portuguese, for slaves; and the French and English, for the sake of fishing. Many people still believed that this new Different country was India, of which they had known something this time. before. But the more learned people-the geographers,

ideas at