Arizona republican., 1892-08-27

! G WOiAu iS tuc ptThlhI-
 oA0naf-~1 ence shown by people
 SsS of every nation and every tongue in perpetuating certain platitudes, truisms and stupidities. Ger tain foolish proverbs are to be found in nearly every language, and generation after generation repeats them with an owllike solemnity suitable to the first eBunciation of profound and newly discovered truth.
 For instance, the proverb that "a rolling stone gathers no moss" implies that no man should try to improve his condition by seeking new fields of eff fort. It is just as true today as it ever was, but if in 1S49 some millions of men hearing of gold in California had an nounced to each other, "a rolling stone gathers no moss," and settled comfort ably down in the moss of New England farms, or in Pennsylvania and New Jersey swamps, the world would not have been so wealthy today as it has become by the rolling of those enter prising stones. So with Kimberly and it's diamond fields, so with Australia, and so with all explorers and adventur- CTS by land or sea. They are talking largely now of celebrating the discovery of America by Columbus, and would suggest that over the statue, sure to be elaborately displayed, should be scroll with the motto, "A rolling stone gathers no moss"
 But speaking of Columbus reminds me of another popular platitude grown into not truism, but a falseism, if may coin word, and that is our habit of sentimentalizing over the discovery of America by Columbus, when in point of fact it has been clearly and repeatedly proven that the Norsemen, notably Red Eric and his son Jeff, not only discov- cred America 400 years before Columbus was born, but made a permanent settle ment in Greenland, explored the coast line as far south as Long Island, and named it from it's abounding growth of wild grapes, Vinsland.
 They furthermore wrote of their dis coveries and they were placed on record in the famous Heimskringla, and the Veddas, those great Morse records to be still seen in the library at Copenhagen, and which doubtless were studied by Christopher Columbus when he visited IcelRnd, some 400 years after the record of the voyages of Eric and Jeff. That he did thus visit Iceland is proved by a letter written by him to his son Fer nando, mentioning in so many words that in Eal,Y.fra 1IlN h., Co tha.. AoI the island and noted the great rise and fall of the tides. Not only is this letter published in various historical collec- tions, but the younger Columbus has embodied it in the biography of his father, called "Vita dell admiraglia ChristOforo Columbo." We all have been taught that Columbus was an in. dustrious student of the travels written by explorers of his own and previous times, and his son especially mentions that this searching mind sought out the writings of Adam of Bremen"
 Now Adam of Bremen's principal work treats largely of the Morse dis coveriss in the New World, and espe- cially of the tract called Vineland, known to us as New England; and it is almost certain that Christopher Colum- bus, having read this account and in- tending to prosecute the search for riches in the New World, went to Ice land to study the records of former nav igators and try to make more out of the expedition than they had done Natu- rally he took all the glory that he could, and, as people have done ever since the world began, he "built upon another mans foundation" without taking any especial pains to give him the credit of it. The uncertainty of the voyage was naturally very great, and we can we'll imagine that with only the vague and general directions left behind by the Fries as guides the great navigator's anxiety was intense and his landfall very uncertain.
 Nobody objects to Christopher's re- ceiving all the glory and all the posthu- nous honors which the Chicago exposi- tion chooses to give him, but it is time that the world left off asserting that he was the discoverer of America, especial ly as he never set foot on the continent, while Jeff, the son of Eric, "came to stay" and was buried upon the coast of Massachusetts, with cross at his head and another at his feet.
 But although the facts so briefly re. ferved to are patent to all men who choose to step into a library and look them up for themselves, the world will go calmly on for several hundred years more, speaking of Columbus as the dis coverer of America merely because it has done so for the 400 last years.
 l think, however. the most irritating of these parrotisms is the advice so con, stantly offered to persons conspicuous for tho importance and imperativeness of their business or other obligations, to 'Take care of yourselfr and "Now, don't get tired" Everybody says it just be- cause everybody has from time imme- morial, but did any one ever stop and analyze the meaning of the sensible sounding nonsense?
 Take care of yourself. Well, the doctors tell us that to take good care of yourself a person must go to bed at regular hour, sleep eight hours or SO, rice. hsthe and hreotfaat all after avs.