Hendrik Loon: The Story of Mankind

67. The Home of Swiss Liberty. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 188

68. The Abjuration of Philip II. . . . . . . . . . . . . 189

69. Medieval Trade . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 199

70. Great Nowgorod . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 202

71. The Hansa Ship . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 204

72. The Mediæval Laboratory. . . . . . . . . . . . 209

73. The Renaissance. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 210

74. Dante. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 212

75. John Huss. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 220

76. The Manuscript and the Printed Book. . . . . . . . . 222

77. Marco Polo . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 225

78. How the World Grew Larger. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 227

79. The World of Columbus. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 230

80. The Great Discoveries Western Hemisphere . . . . . . 233

81. The Great Discoveries. Eastern Hemisphere. . . . . . 234

82. Magellan . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 237

83. The Three Great Religions. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 243

84. The Great Moral Leaders. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 249

85. Luther Translates the Bible. . . . . . . . . . . . . 257

86. The Inquisition. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 263

87. The Night of St. Bartholomew . . . . . . . . . . . . 268

88. Leyden Delivered by the Cutting of the Dikes . . . . 269

89. The Murder of William the Silent . . . . . . . . . . 270

90. The Armada is Coming!. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 271

91. The Death of Hudson. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 273

92. The Thirty Years War . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 275

93. Amsterdam in 1648. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 277

94. The English Nation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 280

95. The Hundred Years War. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 281

96. John and Sebastian Cabot See the Coast of Newfoundland . 284

97. The Elizabethan Stage. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 285

98. The Balance of Power . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 299

99. The Origin of Russia . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 303

100. Peter the Great in the Dutch Shipyard . . . . . . . 308

101. Peter the Great Builds His New Capital. . . . . . . 310

102. The Voyage of the Pilgrims. . . . . . . . . . . . . 318

103. How Europe Conquered the World. . . . . . . . . . . 321

104. Sea Power . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 822

105. The Fight for Liberty . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 323

106. The Pilgrims. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 324

107. How the White Man Settled in North America. . . . . 325

108. In the Cabin of the Mayflower. . . . . . . . 327

109. The French Explore the West . . . . . . . . . . . . 328

110. The First Winter in New England . . . . . . . . . . 329

111. George Washington . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 331

112. The Great American Revolution . . . . . . . . . . . 332

113. The Guillotine. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 337

114. Louis XVI . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 339

115. The Bastille. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 342

116. The French Revolution Invades Holland . . . . . . . 347

117. The Retreat from Moscow . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 355

118. The Battle of Waterloo. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 358

119. Napoleon Goes Into Exile. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 359

120. The Spectre Which Frightened the Holy Alliance. . . 364

121. The Real Congress of Vienna . . . . . . . . . . . . 367

122. The Monroe Doctrine . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 385

123. Giuseppe Mazzini. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 395

124. The First Steamboat . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 407

125. The Origin of the Steamboat . . . . . . . . . . . . 408

126. The Origin of the Automobile. . . . . . . . . . . . 409

127. Man-power and Machine-power . . . . . . . . . . . . 414

128. The Factory . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 416

129. The Philosopher . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 427

130. Galileo . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 429

131. Gothic Architecture . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 437

132. The Troubadour. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 448

133. The Pioneer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 447

134. The Conquest of the West. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 451

135. War . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 457

137. ANIMATED CHRONOLOGY . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 467

142. THE END . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 473

THE STORY OF MANKIND

HIGH up in the North in the land called Svithjod, there stands a rock. It is a hundred miles high and a hundred miles wide. Once every thousand years a little bird comes to this rock to sharpen its beak.

When the rock has thus been worn away, then a single day of eternity will have gone by.

THE SETTING OF THE STAGE

WE live under the shadow of a gigantic question mark.

Who are we?

Where do we come from?

Whither are we bound?

Slowly, but with persistent courage, we have been pushing this question mark further and further towards that distant line, beyond the horizon, where we hope to find our answer.

We have not gone very far.

We still know very little but we have reached the point where (with a fair degree of accuracy) we can guess at many things.

In this chapter I shall tell you how (according to our best belief) the stage was set for the first appearance of man.

If we represent the time during which it has been possible for animal life to exist upon our planet by a line of this length, then the tiny line just below indicates the age during which man (or a creature more or less resembling man) has lived upon this earth.

Man was the last to come but the first to use his brain for the purpose of conquering the forces of nature. That is the reason why we are going to study him, rather than cats or dogs or horses or any of the other animals, who, all in their own way, have a very interesting historical development behind them.

In the beginning, the planet upon which we live was (as far as we now know) a large ball of flaming matter, a tiny cloud of smoke in the endless ocean of space. Gradually, in the course of millions of years, the surface burned itself out, and was covered with a thin layer of rocks. Upon these lifeless rocks the rain descended in endless torrents, wearing out the hard granite and carrying the dust to the valleys that lay hidden between the high cliffs of the steaming earth.

Finally the hour came when the sun broke through the clouds and saw how this little planet was covered with a few small puddles which were to develop into the mighty oceans of the eastern and western hemispheres.

Then one day the great wonder happened. What had been dead, gave birth to life.

The first living cell floated upon the waters of the sea.

For millions of years it drifted aimlessly with the currents. But during all that time it was developing certain habits that it might survive more easily upon the inhospitable earth. Some of these cells were happiest in the dark depths of the lakes and the pools. They took root in the slimy sediments which had been carried down from the tops of the hills and they became plants. Others preferred to move about and they grew strange jointed legs, like scorpions and began to crawl along the bottom of the sea amidst the plants and the pale green things that looked like jelly-fishes. Still others (covered with scales) depended upon a swimming motion to go from place to place in their search for food, and gradually they populated the ocean with myriads of fishes.

Meanwhile the plants had increased in number and they had to search for new dwelling places. There was no more room for them at the bottom of the sea. Reluctantly they left the water and made a new home in the marshes and on the mud- banks that lay at the foot of the mountains. Twice a day the tides of the ocean covered them with their brine. For the rest of the time, the plants made the best of their uncomfortable situation and tried to survive in the thin air which surrounded the surface of the planet. After centuries of training, they learned how to live as comfortably in the air as they had done in the water. They increased in size and became shrubs and trees and at last they learned how to grow lovely flowers which attracted the attention of the busy big bumble-bees and the