this last branch of the subject, and we will only observe, that his remarks on the Grecian poetic cosmogonies, on the mysteries, on the twofold Dionysius of the ancient Greeks, on the union of the mythology of Apollo and Bacchus, on the Orphic lyre, are characterised by a display of choice learning.

On the whole, this essay marks a scholar of rare promise; and it encourages us to expect much from a work, which Mr Bode has announced in his preface, a history of the Greek poets, written in German, on the plan of Bouterwek's history of poetry and fine writing in the modern languages. Experience and time will correct the only imperfections we have noted in this interesting writer; an occasional discursive profusion of learning, and sometimes a tartness of manner, in speaking of living writers, especially the French, which philologians, we know, are apt to assume, but which is better spared.

We own we have been at the greater pains to fix the public attention, through the medium of this journal, on Mr Bode's work, because its ingenious author has lately taken up his abode among us, and deserves a hearty welcome from the friends of learning and of education. He has been tempted from flattering prospects in Germany, to cross the Atlantic, not unattended with the warm recommendation of the fathers of science at Georgia Augusta. We rejoice that he will find, in the admirable institution of Messrs Cogswell and Bancroft, a worthy field of exertion; the cooperation of liberal associates in the formation of ingenuous minds. We trust he will yet have the happiness of hearing not a few of the scholars of the next generation, boast of the favored spot to which he has been called, in his own expressive words, 'ex illius terræ saltuosis montibus et consecratis lucis alma Musarum numina, mitem Gratiarum cupidinisque cultum, et mansuetam Apollinis et Dionysii religionem ad se descendisse.'

ART. VII.-Codice diplomatico Colombo-Americano, ossia Raccolta di Documenti originali e inediti, spettanti a Cristoforo Colombo, alla Scoperta ed al Governo dell' America, publicato per Ordine degl' Illmi Decurioni della Città di Genova. Genova. 1823. 4to. pp. 80348.

THE memory of Columbus ought to be peculiarly dear to Americans. He it was that disclosed to astonished Europe the rich expanse of this western world. The penetrating and adventurous Italian revealed to his cotemporaries, and through them to our fathers, the path across the broad ocean, which sunders the two great continents of the earth. Taught by his wisdom, and guided by his resolute spirit, the nations of Europe sent forth colony after colony, allured by the silver imbedded in our mountains, or driven hither by intolerable oppressions at home, to explore, to conquer, and to people the wide regions of America. We, in common with the whole human race, are under infinite obligations to him for giving an extension to the efforts of commercial enterprise, of which no past ages could have formed any conception; for opening to mankind a boundless field for the exertion of industry, skill, intelligence, the cultivation of science, literature, and the arts, and the acquisition of riches and all its consequent advantages; for giving that impulse to colonisation, by reason whereof so many enlightened millions have sprung up to inhabit the soil he discovered; in fine, for enlarging the bounds of civilisation and improvement, by adding another world to their empire.

But our own duty of gratitude is more peculiarly imperative. That we subsist as an independent state, perhaps that we have being as individuals, that it is our happy lot to constitute a free and flourishing republic, that we enter into the great family of civilised nations, who inhabit this continent, is because the Genoese mariner conceived and accomplished his splendid enterprise. It matters not whether any equally daring navigator in remote antiquity, impelled by chance, by design, or by the violence of winds and waves, had succeeded in piloting his frail galley along the selfsame track with Columbus. Plato may have learnt of the Atlantic Isles from

the priests of Egypt. The sublime vision of Seneca was not, it may be, entirely prophetic. The Phenicians, those intrepid seamen, who circumnavigated Africa, might have made, also, the far less perilous voyage to America. But, if they did, the belief, nay the memory of the event was already become, in the lapse of ages, as if it had never been unfolded to man; and therefore it detracts nothing from the glory of Columbus.* True it is, likewise, had he never drawn the breath of life, or had his overpowering conviction of the existence of undiscovered lands, far off in the western ocean, perished with himself, still among those acute and bold Italians, who abounded in every court of Europe, another Columbus might have arisen to develope the grand secret, blest in imparting it to a more worthy master than the jealous, ungrateful, and bigoted Ferdinand. Yet who will undertake to unrol the stupendous consequences depending on the single incident of the discovery of America, at that conjuncture and under those circumstances, and by the very person to whom destiny did actually give it in charge? Who is capable of conceiving what chain of extraordinary events might have ensued, if the discovery had taken place under materially different auspices? What influence, baneful or fortunate, it would have exerted upon our fate, no mortal eye can trace; and we may be content, therefore, with reiterating our grateful acknowledgments to the enterprising genius of Columbus.

We cheerfully avail ourselves of the favorable opportunity afforded us in the publication of the Codice di Colombo, to redeem a portion of our debt to the illustrious navigator, by laying before our readers certain facts in relation to him, derived from that book, and from others lately printed in Italy, which we apprehend are not very generally known in the United States. Passing cursorily over the voyages made by Columbus in the service of Spain, and his doings in the West Indies, which are all matters of public notoriety, we shall confine ourselves to the narration of the incidents of his private and early life, his family history, and such personal particulars of his later days, as do not appropriately fall to the province of the historian.

In preparing to give an account of the life of Columbus, we are met on the threshold by the acrimonious controversy,

* See Columbus' Letter to Sanzio, Edin. Rev. No. LIV. 510.

which has existed in Italy, concerning his birthplace and parentage. For it is remarkable that Ferdinand, the son of the Admiral, who wrote a very full account of his father's life, and who was sixteen years old when the latter died, seems to have been wholly uncertain as to the place, either of his father's nativity, or of his extraction.* The num

ber of states or cities, which claim the honor of giving him birth, and the patriotic zeal displayed in the defence of their conflicting pretensions, call to mind the similar disputes in regard to the origin of Homer, commemorated in the wellknown Latin verses;

Septem urbes certant de stirpe insignis Homeri,

Smyrna, Rhodos, Colophon, Salamis, Chios, Argos, Athenæ. As the old and generally credited opinion, that Columbus was a native of Genoa, or its immediate neighborhood, appears to us, on attentive examination, to be supported by irrefragable proofs, we shall first briefly explain the merits of the controversy upon this point, and then proceed in relating the facts conformably to our own belief.

Of the opinions, which conflict with the pretensions of the Genoese, two alone are entitled to any consideration; one, that Columbus was born at Cuccaro, a castle in Montferrat, about fortyfive Italian miles from Genoa, and the other that he was born at Pradello, a village of the vale of Nura, near Piacenza. Among the Genoese, indeed, a question has arisen whether the city itself was his birthplace, or some one of the suburban villages; of which more in the sequel. He is also claimed for Cossena, and a noble house in Modena are not unwilling to adopt the discoverer of America into their line; but these last pretensions are so utterly groundless, that they answer no other purpose than to show how many families

*See Churchill's Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. II. p. 559; and Barcia, Historiadores Primitivos de las Indias Occidentales, Tom. I. p. 1. We have spoken thus cautiously of Ferdinand's opinion concerning his father's origin, because it is a little contradictory. He calls the place of his birth unknown and uncertain; and yet a few lines before says, by implication, that he belonged to the seacoast. (loc. cit. c. 1.) Again, in speaking of his father's arrival at Lisbon, he uses these very remarkable words; 'where he (Columbus) knew there were many Genoeses his countrymen,' as our English translation gives it; or as Barcia has it, 'donde sabia se hallaban muchos de su nacion Genovesa. Churchill, II. 564; Barcia, I. 4.

of his name existed in Italy. We shall endeavor to refute, therefore, only the arguments of the Piedmontese and Placentians, and after proving them inconclusive or unsound, state our reasons for thinking the Admiral was a Genoese.

The claim of Pradello may be very shortly dismissed. An Ecclesiastical History of Piacenza was published in 1662, by Pier Maria Campi, which contains the only evidence of Columbus' having originated at Pradello. This evidence consists principally of an award, purporting to have been made in the vale of Nura in 1481, which states that one Bertone de' Duzzi had formerly rented, of the late Domenico de' Colombi of Genoa, a certain estate in Pradello, which Domenico held in trust from his grandfather Bertolino; that Bertone, and subsequently his son Tommasino, had regularly paid the rent of eighty lire to Domenico, and after his death to his sons Christopher and Bartholomew; but that they having now for ten years been absent from Genoa, gone, it was reported, in search of unknown islands, and nothing having been heard of them for a long time, Tommasino de' Duzzi had not only refused to pay the rent, but had undertaken to commit waste and make sale of the estate; whereupon proceedings were instituted by Domenico and Giovanni Columbus, cousins of Christopher, which terminated in judgment in favor of his father's heirs. Now there is a violent presumption against the authenticity of this document, which we pass over as wholly immaterial; for if the instrument proves anything whatever, surely it proves that the Admiral, and his father likewise, resided at Genoa. It merely leads by inference to the supposition that Bertolino, Christopher's great grandfather, may have lived at Pradello.*

The claim of the Cuccaro family is maintained with much greater show of reason at least, but on no more substantial grounds. Indeed, the advocates of it are compelled to admit, that Columbus was born at Genoa, but they represent bis father and his family to have been of Cuccaro. The story

is occasionally mentioned by writers, so early as the close of the sixteenth century. Thus Herrera says he was born at

* Storia Ecclesiastica di Piacenza, Tom. III. See Tiraboschi, Storia della Lett. Ital. v. vii. p. 228; Bossi, Vita di Christoforo Colombo, p. 46; Cancellieri, Notizie Stor. e Bib. di Colombo, p. 26; Durazzo, Elogio di Colombo, p. 7; Spotorno, Codice, &c. Introd. p. 8.