One can readily see that these were hard days for
Christopher Columbus. The preparations that Queen Isabella expected
would take only ten days took ten long weeks.
[Illustration: THE THREE CARAVELS OF COLUMBUS.]
When finally ready, Columbus's little fleet consisted of three caravels
--the _Santa Maria_, the _Pinta_, and the _Nina_
(pronounced Neen'ya). A caravel was a small, roundish, stubby sort of
craft, galley-rigged, with a double tower at the stern and a single one
in the bow. It was much used in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries
for the herring fisheries which took men far from the coast; and when
the Portuguese tried to find far-off India, they too used the caravel
form of vessel.
The largest vessel of the "Discovery Fleet" was only sixty-five or
seventy feet long by about twenty feet in breadth, and of one hundred
tons' burden; Columbus having purposely chosen small ships because they
would be better adapted for going close to shore and up rivers. Only the
_Santa Maria_ was decked amidships, the others had their cabins at
either end. The cross was painted on all the sails. Columbus commanded
the _Santa Maria_, with Juan de la Cosa as pilot; Martin Alonzo
Pinzon took the _Pinta_, and his brother Vincente (pronounced Vin-
then'tay) took the _Nina_.
Pages:
54
55
56
57
58
59
60
61
62
63
64
65
66
67
68
69
70
71
72
73
74
75
76
77
78