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Updated: May 20, 2025
But Ojeda did not hesitate to take him prisoner and carry him into Isabella, bound. As has been said, he was eventually sent to Spain, but he died on the passage. Columbus made another fortress, or tower, on the border of King Guarionexius's country, between his kingdom and Cipango.
The earth is a sphere, and a ship may sail straight from Spain to Cipango, urges this man of imagination and faith. The king was not slow to perceive the great advantages which success in such an enterprise would bring to the government that undertook it; but he must consult the wise men.
Nobody surmised that there was a Cape of Good Hope which could be doubled, and would open the way to the Indian Ocean and its islands of spices and gold. Nor could this Cipango be reached by crossing the Eastern Continent, for the journey was full of perils, dangers, and insurmountable obstacles.
"Here, opposite Africa, near the equator, are islands called Manillas. They have lodestone, so that no ship with iron can sail to them. Here is Java of all the spices. Here is great India that the ancients knew." "We are bearing toward Cipango," said the Admiral. "I look first for small outward islands, where perhaps the folk are uncouth and simple, and there is little gold."
"Where do you get your gold?" says the admiral by signs to the islanders. "Cubanacan," say the natives. Kubla Khan, flashes across the admiral's mind, and he sails off in renewed certainty. The island which the natives called Colba, or Cuba, he took for Cipango, and after much searching he came to it at last.
Europe was known, and northern Africa, and western Asia; but to the east stretched the fabulous country of the Grand Khan, Cathay, Cipango, and farthest Ind; while to the west rolled the Sea of Darkness, peopled with unimaginable terrors. Of the youth of Christopher Columbus, as we call him, little is known.
Marco Polo especially had described two large islands, Ontilla and Cipango, the latter undoubtedly Japan, which it was expected would be the first reached by a navigator sailing westward.
The Pinta was nearly ready when there arrived a small ship from Ferro bringing news that three large Portuguese ships had sailed by that island. Said the commandant, "Spain and Portugal are at peace. They would not dare to try to oust us!" He came to waterside to talk to the Admiral. "Not to fight you," said the Admiral, "but me! King John wishes to keep India, Cipango and Cathay still veiled.
If we may believe Sebastian's friend, they reached a point as far south as Gibraltar in Europe. No more was there ice. The cold of Labrador changed to soft breezes from the sanded coast of Carolina and from the mild waters of the Gulf Stream. But of the fabled empires of Cathay and Cipango, and the 'towns and castles' over which the Great Admiral was to have dominion, they saw no trace.
Rabo de junco is explained to signify Rush-tailed: Rabo being a tail and Junco a rush in the Spanish language. Don Ferdinand compliments his father too largely in this place by supposing Cipango and Hispaniola the same.
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