Two of a Kind

I started thinking about Christopher Columbus when I ran across a mention of an important anniversary observed on January 9th this week. The event took place in 1493, but let me back up a bit. I want to talk about Christopher Columbus. He was a remarkable man in many ways. I say this even as history has tarnished his image as the “discoverer of the New World.” He was a phenomenal navigator, sailor and even astronomer. Four times he sailed across the uncharted Atlantic and returned safely. Each time, he found his way back to the very island he first claimed for Spain in 1492. Hundreds before him sailed off into the Atlantic, never to return.

Until now, however, I never realized how much he had in common with Don Quixote, and not just because both spent a great deal of time in Spain. Throughout his years of adventure, Columbus was, like Quixote, an idealist. He encountered many things, and, just as the Man of La Mancha did, he chose to believe they were something more noble.

To Don Quixote, Aldonza the serving wench and part-time prostitute became the Lady Dulcinea, and Aldonza’s dishrag a silken scarf. Sancho, the manservant, became a squire. A barber’s shaving basin became a helmet that granted the wearer the miraculous power of invulnerability.

To Christopher Columbus, the Dominican Republic was Cathay or China, the island of Cuba was Japan and the outskirts of paradise were in coastal Venezuela.

Don Quixote had a quest and so did Columbus. His was both a material and a religious quest. In the preface to his journal on the first of his four historic voyages, he says (speaking of Isabella and Ferdinand of Spain)

“…Your Highnesses, as Catholic Christians… thought to send me, Christopher Columbus, to the said parts of India, to see those princes and peoples and lands…and (showed me) the manner which should be used to bring about their conversion to our holy faith and (you have) ordained that I should not go by land to the east by which way it was the custom to go, but by way of the west by which down to this day we do not know with certainty that anyone has passed…”

And so he sallied forth, four times between 1492 and 1504. While he explored much of the Caribbean, Central and South America, by all accounts he never found China or Japan, or the passage to India, but you wouldn’t know it by reading his journals. To the very end, he persisted in his claims to the contrary. It seems he spent his time convincing himself and the sovereigns of Spain that what he found was indeed the dream he had set out to pursue. He returned each time from his journeys with gold and other treasures. But he dreamed of finding Solomon’s mines in the areas he had explored on his earlier voyages.

He believed he was close to Solomon’s realms of gold when he explored the outer regions of earthly paradise (Coastal Venezuela as it turns out). But another story persists about Christopher Columbus. The one I learned about him earlier this week. Let’s drop in on him for a moment.

It’s early one evening, some months after Columbus and his ships have discovered San Salvador, Cuba and Haiti, which he renamed Hispaniola and claimed for the Spanish Sovereigns, Columbus is standing on the deck gazing out to sea, about to leave for Spain. He is mentally composing the day’s entry in the ship’s journal.

“When the winds once again become favorable we shall sail for Spain. I have indeed found the way to Cathay, and have explored the outer reaches of Japan. What else shall I report? (PAUSE) Oh Ho! Look, there they are! I see three mermaids. I see their eyes and eyelashes. And there, see their tails! With each movement, their great fins break the surface of the waves. Come closer, sea creatures, so I may look upon your beauty. Whoa, you’re not nearly beautiful enough to lure a sailor to his watery grave, are you? In fact, you’re quite homely. (Looking around now) Is anyone else around to see this? Hmmm, they’re all below deck. I am the only witness.”

With that Columbus rushed to his quarters and made this entry in the voyage record:

“Ship’s Journal, January 9, 1493. I have finally seen them with my own eyes—mermaids. They aren’t half as pretty as artists portray them on canvas.”

Columbus returned three times in his search for a strait that would give passage to India, but he was never to find it, and he never again reported a mermaid sighting He was convinced he had come quite close to Solomon’s fabled city of gold, his insistence led the Spanish Sovereigns to fund multiple trips for him. Each time he returned with more treasure, but never the big hit. He returned from his fourth voyage a beaten man in some ways. He’d been denied entry into Hispaniola by its new governor, Queen Isabella was dying, and he would never again enjoy the same favor in the court of Spain. But, like Don Quixote de La Mancha, he kept his vision—that he had found China and Japan, and explored the outer regions of Paradise.

He faced many doubters, but he steadfastly denied discovering a “New World.” In one of his final letters, he lamented the doubters but remarked “at least they never claimed I did not see those mermaids.”

Historians, those myth-busters, point out the mermaids were, more likely, manatees, commonly found in the warm waters of the Caribbean. Would Columbus ever know or admit those homely mermaids were manatees? Did the Man of La Mancha ever stop seeing the Lady Dulcinea where the wench Aldonza stood?