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INTRODUCTORY
Perhaps the chief interest that Biloxi has for us is that it was a sort of key to a time, a place, and a condition in world events.
The discovery of the fringes of America by Columbus in 1492 was more of a scientific triumph than anything else. It opened the eyes of the world to new possibilities. Up to that time Europe knew very little about the seas and the world that lay beyond.
What little the Vikings had discovered about the land to the west five hundred years before was probably regarded as a myth, and what the Asiatics had discovered by going east a few thousand years before none of them had returned to tell.
Spain and Portugal were the only countries that had sailors to send across and an incentive to do it. Ferdinand and Isabella had just succeeded in making themselves absolute rulers by pulling down the influential petty rulers. The economic outlook was discouraging. The Jews, who were the traders, had been driven out of the country by the Inquisition, as were, also, the Moors who were the skilled artisans. Scholarship had nearly disappeared. Internal wars had been ended and the gentleman class was out of work in consequence.
Then came the news of a new field of activity and the Spanish and Portugese began to flock across to America.