The New York herald. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1840-1920, 1872-07-03
TAe Wss1d's Great Discoveries an
Their Lesson.

! TAs Wsssd's Great Discoveries ana
Their Lesson.
The explorations of Livingstone in the
heart Of Africa, now made known to the
world, are destined to mark no ordinary era
in history. Looking back through the long
chronicles of geographical and cosmographi-
cal researches the student of human progress
finds the noblest and most momentous devel-
opments of human activity. The discovery
OF the art of navigation necessarily preceded
any extensive and general geographical re-
searches, such as those which, since the fif-
teenth century, have astonished the world by
their magnitzu- and by their magnificent
results. The famous expedition of the Argo-
nauts, more than three thousand years ago,
is the first credible account which has
come down to us of mans enterprise in the
exploration of the globe. The wonderful
activity of the Carthagenians in coasting along
the great continent on which they lived is
well attested, and there are strong reasons for
believing that in the fourishing times of the
republic Of Carthage the celebrated Hauno,
sent southwark along the western coast of
Africa in search of discovery, sailed around
the Cape of Good Hope. To the Phnnicians
of Tyre was reserved the greatest glory of
ancient discovery, and we know that before
the time of Solomon they had become familiar
with the distant and auriferous land of Ophir
which has, until recently, been located in the
East Indies, but now, by the late discoveries
Of Carl Mauch more probably to be
identified as the southeastern coast Of Africa.
While the Roman empire was in it's infancy
and struggling for that all-absorbing great
ness which it afterward attained, and even
after it had risen to the summit of earthly
power and Importance its policy did not en-
courage it's extension over the seas. To the
Roman, as Gibbon tells us, the ocean was ever
an object of terror rather than of curiosity.
The nation Of soldiers never conceived the
idea Of enlarging the bounds of the world and
exploring its farthest shores. 1t was reserved
for the hardy mariners of the Mediterranean
the classic sea- in whose stormy waters they
had learned to manage their ships, about the
beginning of the fourteenth century, to make
the first use of the mariners compass and
strike out boldly to sea in search of new
worlds
From very remote periods the rich products
Of the East had engaged the attention and ex-
cited the avarice Of the Western nations Of
Europe When Marco Polo's wonderful dis
coveries in the thirteenth and fourteenth CEN
turtles were made widely known the desire of
trading with the nations which he represented
- hot
an overland conveyance was established be-
tween the Persian Gulf, the Red Sea and the
shores of the Mediterranean. The exactions
of the Venetians, Genoese and Florentines, at
that time the imperious masters of the sea and
the monopolists of Oriental commerce, forced
Portugal to seek an avenue of opulence
through other ports than those held
by their more fortunate rivals. The
idea of circumnavigating Africa and
opening new route to the East Indies was
advanced to meet the emergency, and it
seemed practicable, from the success of then
recent Portuguese voyage along the coast of
Africa, which dispelled the notion Of the equa-
torial regions being uninhabitable from Excess
sive heat But while Portugal was maturing
this project. which terminated subsequently in
the brilliant passage Of the Cape Of Good
Hope by the famous De Cana, the discovery
Of all discoveries was made by Columbus.
Dashing across the vast expanse Of ocean,
towards which the maritime nations had long
and 'wistfully stretched their eyes, the great
Genoese sailor, aided by the astrolnbe Of Mar
tin Behaim, forever tore away the veil
of obscurity and terror that had hung
over distant voyages, and from that time
geographical research entered upon its
grand career. England now, mortified at
being, as usual, outstripped in the race Of ma
tional glory, sent out the great navigator, Sc
bastian Cabot, the first authenticated discov-
erer of Newfoundland and the American coast
running thence to Florida Vasco de Cana
and Magellan, little later, led the van of
geographical exploration and accomplished the
long, ardently sought project Of finding
oceanic pathways to ''the golden shores Of
Cathay." But these routes round the Cape
of Good Hope-more honestly named Cabo
Tormentoso by its discoverer- Cape Horn
or the Strait of Magellan were 80
perilous, protracted and expensive thA
passage to India by the north was univer-
sally demanded. Columbus, whose apotheosis
had been celebrated, had prophetically
promised to the world ''a way to the East by
the West and, as the Southern routes
seemed 80 forbidding, it was concluded that
the prophecy warranted the expectation
of short circle route to China through
the Arctic Ocean. This fond dream Of
all the maritime nations has never given
them rest and in the last three centu-
ries more than one hundred and thirty well
equipped expeditions have exhausted their