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was followed by crowds of admirers. The merchant's letter adds, "These Englishmen run about after him. like mad people; so that he can enlist as many of them as he pleases, and a number of our own rogues besides." A year after, in 1498, Sebastian Cabot sailed again with two ships, and three hundred men; some of these being Italian "rogues," very likely. Such expeditions were very popular among reckless and daring men in those days. The explorers again went to Labrador,

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son's Bay. Sebastian Cabot lived to be a very old man, and had a pension from the king, and the title "The Great Seaman." He loved the sea so much, that, even while he was dying, his wandering thoughts were upon the ocean. continent

It was said of him, "He gave England a and no one knows his burial-place."

The next expedition of which I have to tell is that of Ponce de Leon to the coast of Florida. There was a story told in Spain, and believed by many people, that there was somewhere in the regions discovered by

Columbus a wonderful fountain, whose waters would restore youth to any one who should bathe in them. 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 the 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.

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It would be interesting to tell of other voyages that took 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, 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,

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.

coast.

This voyage is important, because Verrazzano has left us the earliest full description of the North American 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 staid 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

fishing-vessel ! It would be strange never to see a 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 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 VII.

HOW AMERICA WAS EXPLORED AND SETTLED.

TH

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 who have discovered a large pond in the woods, somewhere 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 black-birds' 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

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