56 SCIENCE OF THE MIDDLE AGES. PT. IL 



just now, was made by the use of the mariner's compass. 

 The Greeks, as you will remember, knew that the earth was 

 a globe, but all this had been forgotten in Europe since the 

 Goths and Vandals came in, and people actually went back 

 to the old idea that the world was flat like a dinner-plate, 

 with the heavens in an arch overhead. Nevertheless, the 

 sailors, who saw ships dip down and disappear gradually as 

 they sailed over the sea, could not help suspecting that it 

 must be a round globe after all ; and Christopher Columbus, 

 a native of Genoa, was convinced he could find a way round 

 to the East Indies by sailing to the west across the Atlantic. 

 Full of this idea, he started on August 3, 1492, with three 

 small ships and ninety men, from Palos, near Cadiz, in 

 Spain, and sailed first to the Canary Islands. From there 

 he sailed on for three weeks, guided by his compass, but 

 without seeing any land ; the food in the ship began to run 

 short, and his men became frightened and threatened to 

 throw him overboard if he would not turn back; but he 

 begged them to continue for three days longer, and a little 

 before midnight on October 1 1 there was a cry of ' land ! 

 land!' and next morning at sunrise they disembarked on 

 one of the Bahama Islands in the New World. 



Columbus thought that he had sailed right round and 

 readied the other side of Asia, but if you look at your map 

 you will see he only went a quarter of that distance. He 

 died in 1506, without finding. out his mistake, though he 

 made several other voyages. During these he made a very 

 remarkable discovery about the magnetic needle of the 

 compass. It had long been known that the needle did not 

 point due north, but a little to the east of the north. 

 Columbus, however, found that, as he went westward, the 

 needle gradually lost its eastward direction, and pointed 

 due north, and then gradually went a little way to the west. 



