No trial or disappointment could divert him from the steady pursuit of his object. That object, it is supposed, he meditated as early as the year 1474, though as yet it lay crude and immatured in his mind. Shortly afterwards, in the year 1477, he made a voyage to the north of Europe, navigating one hundred leagues beyond Thule, when he reached an island as large as England, generally supposed to have been Iceland. In vain he had applied to Don John the Second, who ascended the throne of Portugal in 1481. That king was so deeply engaged in sending out expeditions to explore the African coast that his counsellors advised him to confine his efforts in that direction. He would, however, have given his consent had not Columbus demanded such high and honourable rewards as were considered inadmissible. To his eternal disgrace the Bishop of Ceuta advised that Columbus should be kept in suspense while a vessel was secretly dispatched in the direction he pointed out, to ascertain if there was any truth in his story. This was actually done, until the caravel meeting with stormy weather, and an interminable waste of wild tumbling waves, the pilots lost courage and returned. Columbus, indignant at this attempt to defraud him, his wife having died some time previously, resolved to abandon the country which had acted so treacherously. He first sent his brother Bartholomew to make proposals to Henry the Seventh, King of England; but that sovereign rejected his offers, and having again made a proposal to Genoa, which, from the reverses she had lately received, she was unable to accept, he turned his eyes to Spain. The great Spanish Dukes of Medina Sidonia and Medina Coeli, were at first inclined to support him, and the latter spoke of him to Queen Isabella, who giving a favourable reply, Columbus set off for the Spanish Court, then at Cordova. The sovereigns of Castile and Arragon were, however, so actively engaged in carrying on the fierce war with the Moors of Grenada, that they were unable to give due attention to the scheme of the navigator, while their counsellors generally derided his proposals. The beautiful and enlightened Isabella treated him from the first with respect, and other friends rose up who were ready to give him support. Wearied and discouraged by long delays, however, he had again opened up negotiations with the King of Portugal, and had been requested by that monarch to return there. He had also received a letter from Henry the Seventh of England, inviting him to his Court, and holding out promises of encouragement, when he was again summoned to attend the Castilian Court, and a sum of money was sent him to defray his expenses, King Ferdinand probably fearing that he would carry his proposals to a rival monarch, and wishing to keep the matter in suspense until he had leisure to examine it.