grants to Portugal we may find a clew to the real cause why Columbus failed to enlist the support of the Portuguese King John II., for his project to reach the Indies by sailing westward. Our scanty sources give us two or three different reasons, such as that Columbus made excessive demands upon the king, and that the king hesitated by reason of the great effort and heavy expense already incurred in the conquest of Guinea.[1]
The Portuguese had come to consider it only a question of time when they should reach the Indies by sailing around Africa, and the exclusive use of that route was secured to them by papal Bulls and a treaty with their only rivals. Is it not likely then, that the real reason why they had no encouragement for Columbus was that they thought it not worth while? They had a sure thing of the African route and only time was needed to develop it. Why then waste time and money on a mere possibility?[2] Spain, on the other hand, had no chance at all at the Indies, unless they could be reached, as Columbus proposed, by sailing westward.
Returning now to our second query, why so prompt an appeal to the Pope? Columbus recorded in his journal, March 9, 1493, that in their interview, King John of Portugal had affirmed that by the treaty of 1480 this new conquest would belong to him. Columbus promptly replied that he had not been in the direction of Guinea. We can feel almost certain that this remark of King John's was reported by Columbus to Ferdinand and Isabella,[3] and that they felt
- ↑ Historie del Signor Don Fernando Colon, ch. xi.
- ↑ Two criticisms were passed on this conjecture when first offered. One, that the Portuguese could not then have been confident of reaching India. On this point it is decisive to refer to the Fra Mauro Map of 1459 (see Ruge, Gesch. des Zeitalters der Entdeckungen, 80, and Winsor, Nar. and Crit. Hist., 2, 41), to the citation from Barros, and to the Bull of Jan. 8, 1454 pp. 194–5 supra, and to Muñoz, Hist. del Nuevo Mundo, Lib. II, cap. xix. The second criticism was: What then of the story that King John of Portugal secretly tried to avail himself of Columbus' ideas by sending a caravel westward? (Historie, cap. xi.) This presents a difficulty, but I cannot see that it shuts out the conjecture. Ruge, 232, declares this statement of the Historie destitute of historical credibility.
- ↑ In the Historie Columbus is credited with having suggested the appeal to the Pope: "Per più chiaro e giusto titolo delle quali di subito i re catolici per consiglio dell' ammiraglio procacciarono di haver dal sommo pontefice l'approbatione e donatione della conquista di tutte le dette Indie." Historie, etc., ch. xlii.
