No matter how trying the day had been,
with fractious crews and boisterous ocean, no matter how little sleep
the anxious commander had had the night before, no matter how much the
ill-smelling swinging lamp in his cabin rocked about, he never failed to
write in his journal.
This precious manuscript was long in the possession of Columbus's friend
Bartolome de las Casas, who borrowed it because he was writing a history
of Columbus and wished to get all the information, possible in the
navigator's own words.
Las Casas was a monk who spent his life in befriending the Indians. When
quite old, he ceased journeying to the New World and stayed at home
writing history. He copied a great deal of Columbus's diary word for
word, and what he did not actually copy he put into other words. In this
way, although the original log of the _Santa Maria_ no longer
exists, its contents have been saved for us, and we know the daily
happenings on that first trip across the Atlantic.
Nearly every day some little phenomenon was observed which kept up the
spirits of the crew. On September 13 one of them saw a bright-colored
bird, and the sight encouraged everybody; for instead of thinking that
it had flown unusually far out from its African home, they thought it
belonged to the new land they were soon to see.
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