became a sailor.

6. Up and down the seas, first in the sunny Mediterranean, later along
the stormy Atlantic coast, sailed the lad, the young man, in the small
sailing vessels of the time, and learned well the ocean which he
afterward so boldly trusted.

[Illustration: View of Genoa]

7. He was a daring, quick-witted, handsome, bronzed young man when he
went to Lisbon, where his brother Bartholomew was established as a
cosmographer, making charts for seamen; and with all his enthusiasm
for his sea-faring life, he had enough interest in ordinary pursuits
to fall in love most romantically. It happened on account of his being
so regular at church. Every day he must attend service, and every day
to church came Donna Philippa Palestrello, who lived in a convent near
by. Across the seats flitted involuntary glances between the
cloistered maiden and the handsome brown sailor--with a dimple in his
chin, some pictures have him; something besides prayers were read
between the lines of the prayer-book, and the marriage which closed
this churchly wooing proved the wisdom of both parties.

8. Philippa's father had been one of Prince Henry's famous seamen and
the governor of Porto Santo, one of the new-found islands; and after
his marriage, Columbus lived sometimes at Porto Santo, sometimes at
Lisbon, and much of the time on the sea. He sailed south along the
African coast to Guinea; north he sailed to England, and farther on to
Iceland. Wherever ships could go, there went he, intent on learning
all there was to know of the world he lived in. He read eagerly all
that was written about the earth's shape and size. The modern science