Hezekiah Butterworth - The Story of Magellan and The Discovery of the Philippines

I have been asked to write a story of Ferdinand Magellan, the value of whose discoveries has received a new interpretation in the development of the South Temperate Zone of America, and in the ceding of the Philippine Islands to the United States. The works of Lord Stanley and of Guillemard furnish comprehensive histories of the intrepid discoverer of the South Pacific Ocean and the Philippine Islands; but there would seem to be room for a short, picturesque story of Magellan's adventures, such as might be read by family lamps and in schools.

To attempt to write such a story is more than a pleasure, for the study of Magellan reveals a character high above his age; a man unselfish and true, who was filled with a passion for discovery, and who sought the welfare of humanity and the glory of the Cross rather than wealth or fame. Among great discoverers he has left a character well-nigh ideal. The incidents of his life are not only honorable, but usually have the color of chivalry.

His voyages, as pictured by his companion Pigafetta, the historian, give us our first view of the interesting native inhabitants of the South Temperate Zone and of the Pacific archipelagoes, and his adventures with the giants of Patagonia and with the natives of the Ladrone Islands, read almost like stories of Sinbad the Sailor. The simple record of his adventures is in itself a storybook.

Magellan, from his usually high and unselfish character, as well as for the lasting influence of what he did as shown in the new developments of civilization, merits a place among household heroes; and it is in this purpose and spirit I have undertaken a simple sympathetic interpretation of his most noble and fruitful life. I have tried to put into the form of a story the events whose harvests now appear after nearly four hundred years, and to picture truthfully a beautiful and inspiring character. To the narrative of his lone lantern I have added some tales of the Philippines.

28 Worcester Street, Boston, Mass.

I am to tell the story of a man who had faith in himself.

The clouds and the ocean bear his name. Lord Stanley has called him "the greatest of ancient and modern navigators."

That was a strange royal order, indeed, which Dom Manoel, King of Portugal, issued in the early part of the fifteenth century. It was in effect: "Go to the house of Hernando de Magallanes, in Sabrosa, and tear from it the coat of arms. Hernando de Magallanes (Ferdinand Magellan) has transferred his allegiance to the King of Spain."

The people of the mountain district must have been very much astonished when the cavaliers, if such they were, appeared to execute this order.

As the arms were torn away from the ancient house, we may imagine the alcalde of the place inquiring:

"What has our townsman done? Did he not serve our country well in the East?"

"He is a renegade!" answers the commander.

"But he carried his plans for discovery to our own King first before he went to the court of Spain."

"Say no more! Spain is reaping the fruits of his brain, and under his lead is planting her colonies in the new seas, to the detriment of our country and the shame of the throne. His arms must come down. Portugal rejects his name forever!"

The officers of the King tore down the arms. They thought they had consigned the name for which the arms stood to oblivion. As the Jewish hierarchy said of Spinoza: "Let his name be cast out under the whole heavens!" That name rose again.

Years passed and a nephew of Magellan inherited one of the family estates. He was stoned in the streets on account of his name. This man fled in exile from Portugal to Brazil. He died there, and said: "Let no heir or descendant of mine ever restore the arms of my family."

In his will he wrote:

"I desire that the arms of my family (Magellan) should remain forever obliterated, as was done by order of my Lord and King, as a punishment for the crime of Ferdinand Magellan, because he entered the service of Castile to the injury of our kingdom."

It is the history of this same Ferdinand Magellan, whom Portugal and his own family sought to crush out from the world, that we are now about to trace.

Following his highest inspiration, he shut his eyes to the present, and followed the light of the star of destiny in his soul. His discovery seems to open to the West the doors of China.

He was filled from boyhood with a passion for finding unknown lands and waters; he was haunted by ideals and visions of noble exploits for the good of mankind. His own country, Portugal, would not listen to his projects at the time that he offered them to the court; so, like Columbus, Vespucci, and Cabot, he sought the favor of another country. Nothing could stand before the high purpose of his soul. "If not by Portugal, then by Spain," he said to an intimate friend; meaning that, if his own country denied him the favor of giving him an opportunity for exploration, he would present his cause to the court of Spain, which he did.

This man, whose real name was Fernao de Magalhaes, was born about the year 1480, at Sabrosa, in Portugal, a wintry district where the hardy soil and the "gloomy grandeur" of the mountain scenery produced men of strong bodies and lofty spirit. He belonged to a noble family, "one of the noblest in the kingdom." His boyhood was passed in the sierras. He had a love of works of geography and travel, and he dreamed even then of sunny zones, undiscovered waters, and unknown regions of the world. Henry the Navigator and his school of pilots, astronomers, and explorers, had left the country full of the spirit of new discoveries which yet lived.

He went to the capital of Portugal to be educated, and was made a page to the Queen. He was yet a boy when Columbus returned, bringing the enthralling news of a new world. Spain was filled with excitement at the event; her cities rang with jubilees by day and flared with torches at night. Portugal caught the new spirit of her late King, Henry the Navigator, and was ambitious to rival the discoveries of Spain. She had already established herself in the glowing realms of India.

In 1509 Magellan went to the West Indies in the service of the Portuguese Government. He joined the expedition that discovered the Spice Islands of Banda, and it became his conviction that these islands could be reached by a new ocean way.

A great vision arose in his mind. It was a suggestion that never left him until he saw its fulfillment in an unexpected way on seas of which he never had dreamed.

This view was that he could sail around the world and reach the Spice Islands by the way of the West.

In the service of the King against the Moors in one of the Portuguese wars, he received a wound which healed, but left him lame for life. He, like other officers, sent in his claim for the pension due to such service. He received answer from the parsimonious King (Dom Manoel):

"Your claim is not good. Your wound has healed."