Page:The Cambridge History of American Literature, v3.djvu/203

Henry Harrisse 185 est attention to details, debated every disputed point with great ability, and revealed to the world not only its metes and bounds but its most salient interior features. Not all of his conclusions have been accepted by his successors, but no man has opposed him without acknowledging that Harrisse made possible the investigations of his critics. Of his Discovery of North America (1892), a comprehensive view of the whole field of his labour made when he had advanced far in his own development. Professor Edward Gaylord Bourne said that it was "the greatest contribution to the history of American geo- graphy since Humboldt's Examen." Harrisse gave a large portion of his thought to three great figures in the period of discovery, Columbus, Cabot, and Ves- puccius, planning an exhaustive book on each. On the first he produced his Jean et Sebastien Cabot (1882), besides several smaller pieces; and on the second he wrote his Christophe Co- lombe (2 vols. , 1 884-85) . On the third he collected a great mass of material, discussing some of the points in monographs, but death intervened before a final and exhaustive work was ac- tually written. Like a true explorer he was ever seeking new knowledge, correcting in one voyage errors made in another. He did not hesitate to alter his views when newly discovered facts demanded it. He was strong in defending his opinions and did not escape controversies with those who opposed them. But he was a true scholar and no love of ease or honour tempted him away from the joyful toil of his studies. Although he spent the best part of his life in Paris, he considered himself an American to the end. He bequeathed his annotated set of his own writings together with the most valuable of his manuscripts and maps to the Library of Congress. Harrisse's achievements tend to dwarf the work of two New York historians who took a high stand in the circle out of which he got his first impulses to historical scholarship. James Car- son Brevoort (1818-87) was a business man who gave his leisure to history. His Verrazano, the Navigator (1874) was an important book on that phase of our early history. Henry Cruse Murphy (1810-82), a lawyer and Democratic leader of high character, found himself stranded when the Civil War swept his party into a hopeless minority. Unwilling to twist himself into a Republican he retired from politics and devoted