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Even if Columbus had discovered a new route to Farther India, he could not, as we have seen, claim the merit of having originated the idea, which, even in detail, he had taken from Toscanelli. But his claim is even a greater one.
At the time when Christopher Columbus was in correspondence with the astronomer Toscanelli, he learnt that the latter, at the request of Alphonso V., King of Portugal, had sent to the king a learned Memoir upon the possibility of reaching the Indies by the western route.
This child-mind held depths of understanding such as he had never met with among his learned friends. Day after day the old man and the boy bent eagerly together over their problems, and when night fell Toscanelli would take the child up with him to his lonely tower above Florence, and teach him to know the stars and to understand many things.
If Columbus had been the man some of his biographers would like to make him out the nephew or descendant of a famous French Admiral, educated at the University of Pavia, belonging to a family of noble birth and high social esteem in Genoa, chosen by King Rene to be the commander of naval expeditions, learned in scientific lore, in the classics, in astronomy and in cosmography, the friend and correspondent of Toscanelli and other learned scientists we should find it hard indeed to forgive him the shifts and deceits that he practised.
It must be right this time!" cried Betty; and then she obeyed her uncle's request: "'The Toscanelli Opera Company, Salvatore Toscanelli manager, which has made a very favorable impression among the music lovers of the East and Middle West during the last few months, will sail for Rio Janeiro on Sunday on the San Salvador of the Blue Star Line.
In a general way, as to these distances from Spain to China, Toscanelli and Behaim agreed, and there is no reason to believe that the views of Columbus were in any noteworthy degree different.
The San Salvador does not leave her dock until eleven at the earliest. It may be several hours later. I have wired to Miss Bellethorne aboard the ship and in care of the Toscanelli Opera Company as well. I do not know the hotel at which Miss Bellethorne has been staying."
These letters made a deep impression on Columbus. He wrote back to Toscanelli that he thought of sailing westwards to Marco Polo's countries according to his instructions, and Toscanelli replied that he was glad to find his ideas were so well understood, and that such a voyage would bring great gain to Columbus, and an extraordinary reputation among all Christian peoples.
It was early in the morning of Friday, the 3d of August, 1492, that Columbus set sail from the bar of Saltes, a small island formed by the rivers Odiel and Tinto, in front of Palos, steering for the Canary Islands, from whence he intended to strike due west. As a guide by which to sail, he had the conjectural map or chart sent him by Paolo Toscanelli, of Florence.
But even so, Italy, at the close of the fifteenth century, with Paolo Toscanelli, Luca Pacioli and Leonardo da Vinci, held incomparably the highest place among European nations in mathematics and the natural sciences, and the learned men of every country, even Regiomontanus and Copernicus, confessed themselves its pupils.
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