The Modern Palace of Versailles Napoleon I. H.M.S. "Victory" after Trafalgar The Duke of Wellington An Old Mail Coach Old Hand Loom and Modern Power Loom Garibaldi Old Japan: Entrance to the Tombs, Tokio A Street Scene in Modern Japan A Scene in New Zealand: Mt. Pembroke {1} THE GREATEST STORY IN THE WORLD CHAPTER I HOW MAN SAILED EAST AND WEST Suddenly, at the end of the fifteenth century, the persons of our story found the picture of the world which they carried in their minds wonderfully expanded, rather as if it were a closed fist widely opening. Columbus in 1492 "discovered America": Vasco da Gama, in 1487, "rounded the Cape of Good Hope." That is the way in which most of the history books state it for us; but it is a statement which gives credit to Columbus for a little more than he actually did, and does not put enough to the credit of da Gama. For it was not what we call America at all which Columbus discovered in 1492, but only one of what we now know as the West Indies, or West Indian Islands: and the mere "rounding" of the Cape of Good Hope had been done by another before da Gama, but da Gama, after "rounding" and sailing up the eastern coast of Africa, struck across to the western coast of India. As a feat of navigation his voyage was far greater than that of Columbus. {2} [Sidenote: Vasco da Gama] Thus Vasco da Gama, going eastward, reached the western coast of India, and Columbus, going westward, reached the "West Indies." The name is worth noting. These islands, as further exploration showed them to be, were called "West Indies," because men had expected to reach India by sailing west. The geographers had no conception of the great continent of America and the vast ocean of the Pacific that lay between the land touched by Columbus and the land which he thought that he had touched. No matter. He came back with a very marvellous story--a story which grew ever more marvellous as further exploration revealed the astonishing truth. What made this discovery of America so intensely exciting was that it was discovery of a land wholly new and unexpected. Although the voyage of Vasco da Gama to India was a new and remarkable achievement in navigation, the people in the West, the only people with whom this "greatest story" has been concerned until this time, were tolerably informed about the East. But its story had never before come into their own and mingled itself with their own so that each should have an effect and make a change in the other, as did begin to happen now.