Engraved by Goodall after Turner. ( Rogers's Poems, p. 248. Rawlinson 401. Wilton 1205.)
There has been some confusion concerning the time of day, and the significance of the light on the horizon in this vignette. Rawlinson considers that sunset is indicated, and this is consistent with the events recounted in the poem, where the discovery of land occurs just before nightfall. More recently it has been suggested that the light is supernatural, and that Turner is responding to Rogers 's description of a divine 'glimmering light', symbolic of 'Columbus as Deliverer' ( Piggott, Turner's Vignettes, p.43). However, in the vignette, the relation between the phase of the moon and the light on the horizon is astronomically inconsistent with sunset; and entirely consistent with Ruskin 's interpretation that it is dawn ( MP I:238, 263).