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Show Miscellany Cabot's Discovery. By Rev. Thomas S. B. Gregory. According to the very sensible rule that you must catch your Tabbit before you can cook it, it seems but fair that in telliug the story of the men who made America the first place should be given to the man who discovered America Amer-ica and took out the patent on it. As John l'iske has said, it would be ridiculous to compare Cabot's achievement achieve-ment with that of Columbus, who sowed the way across the "Sea of Darkness," but, at the same time, it is well to remember re-member that it was Cabot who, since the days of the Vikings, first set foot upon the continent of North America. It was Juno 21, 1197 417 years ago that John Cabot was grunted the first glimpse that a white man had ever had of tho shores of Continental America. It was about o'clock in the morning, morn-ing, and there before the great, captain's cap-tain's gaze lay the rocky coast of Labrador, Lab-rador, its st n uted firs and mosM-cov-ered boulders touched into gold by the sun god 's smile. Tho commander upon landing planted a banner and took possession of t'lie region in the name ot! the Knglish sovereign, sov-ereign, under whose authority ho hail made the discovery, after which he returned re-turned to Kngland, where he was received re-ceived with high honors, dressed in silk and given the title of the "Great Admiral. Ad-miral. ' ' Cabot, made his memorable voyage in a single vessel named the " M a t h-pw.'" h-pw.'" with a crew of but eighteen num. It, was a quick trip. Setting nut from Brislol early in ilay, lie made the-great discovery and wa.s back again in. liris-tnl liris-tnl by the cud of J u ly, Lavi ng mad 13 the round trip in something less than two J1MH1 t hs. The tollowing year (1 l-l) Sebastian Cabot, John's son, sol ?iil from Bristol in six ships, discovered .Newfoundland, sa i led along I he coast, for n long distance, dis-tance, probably as fa r mm it h a s the present citv of Charleston,. S. C, and, having taken possession of it all m the name 'of the king of Kngland, returned to the old world, married a rich Spanish Span-ish woman and settled down for the solid enjovment of his fame and fortune. for-tune. After his marriage we bear but little more of him. lie seems to have dropped at om-e into "innocuous desuetude" des-uetude" and almost total eclipse. John Cabot, the first white man since Lict' Krieson to set eye or foot upon the Worth American continent, was born, liko Columbus, in Ceuoa, .Italy. Wp know but little of him, bufthat little is quite complimentary to bfm. I lo seems In have been scrupuluusly truthful. Upon his return from the dis-rovrry dis-rovrry of the bleak and Inhospitable Lahradoriau roust, for example, ho absolutely abso-lutely refuser to go into the Arabian 1 Nights or MiiiH-haiisen biiMnes. lie did not "ascend Mount McKinley" or "discover Ihe north pole": lie saw ro "Indian kinds'" or other slrnnpe hihJ wonderful won-derful huniH n beings; he ra n up aRninsI no mines of nld or gems, or groves of "previous nrom:itic woods." He faw "little "lit-tle but rocks and a few dwarf trees and shrubs." Hut in spil p of his vo-'k -ribbed iri-tejrily iri-tejrily of s(!tpinent, the commander c;i.me very near ffettiiiK himself into the Uristol "Ananias club." lie told thfiii how his vessel had literally "ploughed its wa y t hrouh shoals of codfish" off the (irand hHiiks of Newfoundland, and the storv came preity near being Ids finish, i infi' of 1 1 io scribes of the day informs us but "Muster John, beins poor and a foreigner, for-eigner, would have lifn set down as a linr bad not his crew, who were mostly Uristol men. confirmed everything he mi Id about lho codfish." The political sigi i i I'ica oce of Cabot's discovery- will iippcnr at u ghiuce. r-lmcmhr. first of aU. that Cabot was Ihr first to discover and set foot upon t lie mainland ot America, and lien r In mind, in t lie scrmid placp, t hut. ha v ing discovered hi id landed upon t ho mainland, hn (nok posseesion of it in the name of l-iuelfMul. i 'vv" t ha t in mn-- vn ntn ge- ground, given her by Cabot, England never for a moment receded. Against all comers Spaniard, Portuguese, FYeneh and every other breed of men the English fought "tooth and nail'' for the rights which came to them through tiie "great admiral.'" ad-miral.'" America became English ; that is to say, was decreed by dehtlny to become be-come t he borne of the civilization that rests on the principles of freedom and progress, Intelligence and manhood, rather than upon the "paternalism" which ends on the one side In highhanded high-handed tyranny and on the other in in-teUpclual in-teUpclual dry-rot and moral turpitude. The man whose discoverv effectuated Ibis deserves to sla nd first among the makers of A ineriea. |