OCEANIC DISCOVEBIE*. 651 



it is granted to behold all the stars of the heaven, and almost aE 

 families and forms of vegetation but to behold is not to ob- 

 Berve by a mental process of comparison and combination. 



Although in Columbus, as I hope I have succeeded in shew- 

 ing in another work, a capacity for exact observation was 

 developed in manifold directions, notwithstanding his entire 

 deficiency of all previous knowledge of natural history, and 

 solely by contact with great natural phenomena, we must by 

 no means assume a similar development in the rough and war- 

 like body of the Conquistadores. Europe owes to another 

 and more peaceful class of travellers, and to a small number 

 of distinguished men among municipal functionaries, eccle- 

 siastics and physicians, that which it has unquestionably ac- 

 quired by the discovery of America, in the gradual enrich- 

 ment of its knowledge regarding the character and composition 

 of the atmosphere, and its action on the human organisation ; 

 the distribution of climates on the declivities of the Cordilleras; 

 the elevation of the line of perpetual snow in accordance with 

 the different degrees of latitude in both hemispheres ; the suc- 

 cession of volcanoes ; the limitation of the circles of commotion 

 in earthquakes ; the laws of magnetism ; the direction of oceanic 

 currents; and the gradations of new animal and vegetable 

 forms. The class of travellers to whom we have alluded, by 

 residing in native Indian cities, some of which were situated 

 twelve or thirteen thousand feet above the level of the sea, were 

 enabled to observe with their own eyes, and by a continued 

 residence in those regions, to test and to combine the observa- 

 tions of others, to collect natural products, and to describe and 

 transmit them to their European friends. It will suffice here 

 to mention Gomara, Oviedo, Acosta, and Hernandez. Colum- 

 bus brought home from his first voyage of discovery some 

 natural products, as for instance, fruits and the skins of ani- 

 mals. In a letter written from Segovia (August 1494), Queen 

 Isabella enjoins on the Admiral to persevere in his collections; 

 and she especially requires of him that he should bring with 

 him specimens of " all the coast and forest birds peculiar to 

 countries which have a different climate and different seasons." 

 Little attention has hitherto been given to the fact that Martin 

 Behaim's friend, Cadamosto, procured for the Infante Henry 

 the Navigator, black elephants' hair, a palm and a half in length, 

 from the same western coast of Africa, whence I lanno almost 



