They spent, in all, thirty-three days at sea. Only on October 11, with the crew on the brink of mutiny, did a sailor called Rodrigo sight land—a coral island in the Bahamas that they named San Salvador. “All breathed again and were rejoiced,” wrote Columbus. That night they anchored offshore, and the next morning Columbus and a small group of his crew went to land in an armed boat, with a banner bearing Ferdinand and Isabella’s initials and a crusader-style cross.43
