Then felt like some watcher of the skies When a new planet swims into his ken, Or like stout Cortez, when with eagle eyes He stared at the Pacific--and all his men Looked at each other with a wild surmise-- Silent, upon a peak in Darien. --Keats With these well loved lines John Keats recognized the most important geographical event in all the world, excepting only the feat of the Admiral Columbus himself. It was the discovery by European men of a vast sheet of water covering nearly 40 per cent of the globe--the ocean later to be named Pacific by Ferdinand Magellan because of its seeming tranquility. It is too bad that Keats’ beautiful lines erred in naming stout Cortez instead of the equally stout Balboa, a hero of much courage and perseverance. Too bad it was, too, for the immortal Vasco Nunez de Balboa, that communications in his day were so slow and uncertain. Had they been better he might well have avoided losing his head for his pains in bringing renown to Spain and incalculable new knowledge to the civilized world. For lose it be did, under the axe at the insance of a jealous governor.
The author quotes the six lines from John Keats’ poem to call attention to ______. h. the beauty of the poetry B. Keats’ historical error C. the vastness of the Pacific D. the silence in Darien