Boys with a bent for history may especially enjoy The Quest of Columbus, a very nice book, edited and adapted by Robert Meredith and E. Brooks Smith. They have taken a book written by Christopher Columbus' son, Ferdinand, and edited and adapted it so that children can read it. Here is an excerpt to give you a taste of the flavor of the writing:

"Having gained knowledge in these sciences, the Admiral went to sea and made voyages to the east and west. Of these voyages and many other things of his early days, I have no perfect knowledge, because he died while I was still young and not so bold as to ask him about his youth. To tell the truth, being just a boy, I was not troubled
by such matters. But in a letter to Their Catholic Majesties in 1501, to whom he dare not write anything but the truth, he wrote these words:
Most serene Princes:
I went to sea very young and followed it to this day. The art of sailing makes those who practice it want to discover the secrets of the earth. For more than forty years I have been sailing to all parts of the known world. I have dealt and spoken with wise men, both clergy and lay, Latins, Greeks, Jews, Moors, and many others...

Chapter XV
On Monday the first of October, after sunrise, a pelican came to the ships, and two more about ten in the morning. Long streams of seaweed lay from east to west. In the morning of that day the pilot of the Admiral's ship said they were 578 leagues west of the island Ferro in the Canaries....
The next day, the second of October, they say many fish and caught a small tunny. A white bird, like a gull, was seen, and many pardelas. They saw some seaweed that was old and almost reduced to powder.
The next day, not seeing any other birds than a few pardelas, they were much afraid they had passed between some islands without seeing them. The birds they had seen must have been going from one island to another.....