The Enchanted Islands - 6

The Enchanted Islands - 6

 They saw a great many geese, and the strange dogs that did not bark, and they saw
potatoes also, although they did not know what they were. Columbus, having heard this
report, and contemplating these gentle amiable creatures, so willing to give all they had in
return for a scrap of rubbish, feels his heart lifted in a pious aspiration that they might
know the benefits of the Christian religion. "I have to say, Most Serene Princes," he
writes,
"that by means of devout religious persons knowing their language well, all would soon
become Christians: and thus I hope in our Lord that Your Highnesses will appoint such
persons with great diligence in order to turn to the Church such great peoples, and that
they will convert them, even as they have destroyed those who would not confess the
Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit: and after their days, as we are all mortal, they will
leave their realms—in a very tranquil condition and freed from heresy and wickedness,
and will be well received before the Eternal Creator, Whom may it please to give them a
long life and a great increase of larger realms and dominions, and the will and disposition
to spread the holy Christian religion, as they have done up to the present time, Amen. Today
I will launch the ship and make haste to start on Thursday, in the name of God, to go
to the southeast and seek gold and spices, and discover land." Thus Christopher
Columbus, in the Name of God,
November 11, 1492.